What were the effects of colonialism and mercantilism in America?

The first thing to know before answering the question is what colonialism and mercantilism mean. 

Colonialism can be defined as the submission by a stronger country or land of a weaker one. The stronger exploits the weaker one's resources for its benefit. Mercantilism is an economic system given after the feudalism which works to increase a nation's wealth by government regulation of all of the nation's commercial interests. Mercantilism is the idea that colonies existed for the benefit of the Mother Country. 

Now that we know what the two concepts mean, we're going to go back in history and talk about how the British came to America and established their colonies and how colonialism and mercantilism are related to each other and the most important thing, how they affected America in different ways. 

The British arrived to America in the late 16th century and they began to establish their first colonial settlement in Jamestown and later in 1620 they founded Plymouth in Massachussetts. The English settled in Northamerica because they thought that it would be a good way to make money and also would improve their quality of life so they could have freedom in politics and religion. 

When the colonies were established, Britain used the mercantilism system, and as i said at the begining, they exploited America's resources for the economical benefit of the Motherland. The most important thing for Britain to do was keep its money and not trade with other countries to get necessary items. The colonists role was to provide many of these items to the British.

As the colonies grew and became more flourishing, the English realized that the colonies could provide increased trade, if competition could be eliminated. Americans had established profitable trade with other countries, specially the Dutch. In order to increase their wealth, Britain implemented regulatory policies, most of them with taxes and laws of trade called Navigation Acts which purpose was basically to ensure that they were the only commercial partner of America.

The colonists started to avoid the taxes and also they started smuggling making this activity profitable in America. This was not an easy thing to control by the British government.

Knowing all of this, we can say now that the main effects of mercantilism and colonialism in America had to do with economical, political, cultural and religious aspects. There were obviously positive and negative consequences for example the people had the freedom to practice the religion they wanted but on the other hand they were exploited by the british government and had to pay taxes. But that submission led the colonialists to think about a way to get rid of that opression and they started to think about the benefit of America and not the benefit of England and their government.