the supremacy of Parliament as based on usurpation; but now, in defence. of their privileges, they denied the prerogative of the king, the source of their political existence. This grew out of the Massachusetts Circular Letter. The General Court came together December 30, 1767. John Hancock, James Otis, and Joseph Hawley were prominent members, but though James Otis was still active, Samuel Adams was the master spirit. Never was his practical sagacity more serviceable to the cause; never did his genius for politics shine brighter. His fruitful pen is apparent in the remarkable series of state papers called forth by the Townshend Acts, comprising the letter of the House to their London agent (January 12, 1768), the Petition to the king (January 20), and the Circular Letter to the assemblies of the several colonies (February 11). If the Townshend Acts were to be successfully resisted, union of sentiment and action among all the colonies was essential. This was the object of the circular letter. It was an arraignment of Parliament and the ministry in respect to the revenue acts, and the system by which the British government proposed to make civil officers, including the judges, the instruments for its enforcement; and it solicited an interchange of opinions on these subjects.2 Governor Bernard watched the proceedings of the House with the deepest interest, nor was he long in doubt as to the nature of the circular letter, for two days after its adoption a copy of it was proffered, in case he desired it. This letter was preceded (besides the documents already mentioned) by letters to the Marquis of Rockingham, General Conway, Lord Camden, and to the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury. The details of these papers cannot be given here. They present the whole case of the colonies, their rights, their grievances, their remonstrances, and their petitions. They proceeded mainly from the pen of Samuel Adams, who, when he had shaken himself clear from profuse professions of loyalty and disclaimers of "the most distant thoughts of independence," rose to the annunciation of the loftiest principles of statesmanship, in the declaration that "the supreme legislative, in any free country, derives its power from the constitution, by the fundamental rules of which it is bounded and circumscribed; " - " that it is the glory of the British Constitution that it hath its foundation in the law of God and nature; "-"that the necessity of rights and property is the great end of government;"-"that the colonists are natural-born subjects by the spirit of the law of nature and nations;" and "that the laws of God and nature were not made for politicians to alter." Nor does he confine himself to the enunciation of abstract principles, but states the rights of the colonists of Massachusetts on historical grounds, and shows the oppressive and impolitic nature of the acts 1 Mass. State Papers, 121, 124, 134. 2 The circular letter was not adopted without opposition. Bernard says that the proposition was first rejected two to one; and after the measure was finally carried, in order to give the appearance of greater unanimity, the former proceedings of dissent were obliterated from the journal (Letters, 8). 3 Mass. State Papers, 113. complained of.1 Changes were taking place in the Grafton ministry which boded evil to the colonies. Shelburne, the most liberal friend of the Americans, was succeeded by Hillsborough in December, 1767, and Conway by Weymouth, January 20, 1768. While the circular letter was on its way to the colonies and to Westminster (for it was intended also for England), events were occurring at Boston which showed the temper of the people, and had no inconsiderable influence upon the action of the British government. The anniversary of the repeal of the Stamp Act, March 18, 1768, did not pass without popular demonstrations of ill-will to the customs officials, nor did the governor escape abusive language from the mob.2 For some years these officers had been resisted in making seizures of uncustomed goods, which were frequently rescued from their possession by interested parties, and the determination of the commissioners of customs to break up this practice frequently led to collisions; but no flagrant outbreak occurred until the seizure of John Hancock's sloop "Liberty" (June 10, 1768), laden with a cargo of Madeira wine. The officer in charge, refusing a bribe, was forcibly locked up in the cabin, the greater part of the cargo was removed, and the remainder entered at the custom-house as the whole cargo. This led to seizure of the vessel, said to have been the first made by the commissioners, and for security she was placed under the guns of the "" Romney," a man-of-war in the harbor. For this the revenue officers were roughly handled by the mob Their boat was burned, their houses threatened, and they, with their alarmed families, took refuge on board the "Romney," and finally in the Castle. These proceedings undoubtedly led to the sending additional military forces to Boston in September.3 The General Court was in session at the time, but no effectual proceedings were taken against the rioters. Public sympathy was with them in their purposes, if not in their measures. But the inhabitants of Boston, in town meeting on the 14th, in an address to Governor Bernard, probably drawn by Otis, among other matters complained of being invaded by an armed force. With grim humor, the address represents the commissioners, who had fled for safety to the Castle, as having "of their own notion " relinquished the exercise of their commission, and expressed the hope that they would never resume it, and demanded of the governor to give immediate order for the removal of the "Romney" from the harbor. Some weeks 1 Abstracts of these papers convey no adequate idea of their strength. They must be read in their completeness, and so read, in connection with Lord Mansfield's speech in the House of Lords, one sees the arguments of each party stated at their best. 2 Hutchinson's History, iii. 188. 3 Gordon, i. 231. Governor Bernard has given an account of these transactions in a series of letters addressed to Shelburne or Hillsborough, and published in a collected volume. It is a graphic narrative, in many cases of events in which he had participated, or which he had learned from eye-witnesses. Apparently they are as fair as other partisan accounts of the transactions, which may be found in various histories. The truth yet waits to be told; but it will not be accurately told by one who assigns all sublimated virtues to one party, and the most malignant depravity to the other. 4 See Hutchinson's History, iii. 192, and 488 for the address. later (June 30) the Council passed the customary resolution, setting forth "their utter abhorrence and detestation" of the riotous proceedings, and desiring that the governor, through the attorney-general, would prosecute all guilty persons, that they and "their abettors might be brought to condign punishment." 1 When the circular letter was laid before the ministry, April 15, 1768, it caused great excitement in parliamentary circles, and led to the gravest mistake which was made by the government during the entire Revolutionary period. Other measures, perhaps without exception, had a show of necessity; nor, as the British Constitution was then interpreted by the highest authority, were they clearly unconstitutional. But when the Earl of Hillsborough, speaking for the king, June 21, 1768, required the Massachusetts House of Representatives to rescind their circular letter on pain of immediate dissolution, there was a violation of the constitutional right of the House to express their opposition to measures deemed injurious to their constituents, and to communicate their sentiments to other colonies whose interests were similarly affected. Equally unwise was Hillsborough's letter to the colonial assemblies, requiring them to disregard the Massachusetts circular. Responses to the circular letter, when they expressed the sentiments of the assemblies rather than those of the royal governors, were in full sympathy with Massachusetts.2 The representatives, says Bernard, "have been much elated, within these three or four days, by some letters they have received in answer to the circular letter," and Hutchinson thought that "the strength which would be derived from this union confirmed many who would otherwise have been wavering."4 But when Governor Bernard (June 21, 1768) communicated to the House instructions from the king to rescind the circular letter, and recommended immediate action as of important consequence to the province, no doubt it caused anxiety. Under a similar pressure New York had receded. The House apprehended the gravity of the situation, and took seven or eight days for consideration, and even then desired to consult their constituents. But when Bernard informed them that further delay would be considered as a refusal, they voted, 92 to 17, not to rescind, and "the number 92," Hutchinson says, "was auspicious, and 17 of ill omen, for many months after, not only in Massachusetts Bay, but in most of the colonies on the continent." They doubtless were influenced by Otis, who spoke with great power, and, according to Bernard, unsparingly denounced the ministry and "passed an encomium on Oliver Cromwell." 6 Massachusetts deliberately disobeyed the king's command, and defied his power. Before dissolution, the House agreed (June 30, 1768) upon a message to the governor, arguing the question very fully, and declaring their refusal to rescind; a letter to the Earl of Hillsborough; and a 5 4 History, iii. 196. 5 Ibid., iii. 197; see also Frothingham, 239. 6 Letters 40. Report and Resolves, in which they repeat the story of their grievances, doings, and rights with great fullness and ability.1 The effect of this action, so honorable to the House, was unfavorable upon the ministry. De Berdt, the London agent, in a letter to the House, August 12, 1768, giving the substance of a conversation with the Earl of Hillsborough, says that his lordship informed him that he would have used his influence for the repeal of the Townshend Acts, and believed he could have obtained it; but since the news respecting the non-rescinding of the circular letter, the matter was in doubt. "The crown must be supported, or we sink into a state of anarchy." In July, 1768, Generai Gage, then at New York, had been directed by the ministry to remove one or two regiments to Boston; and when the news of the riots of March 18 reached England, on August 14, two additional regiments were ordered from Ireland. When rumors of these orders became rife in Boston, there were indications that the country would be raised to prevent the landing of the troops; but different counsels prevailed. A town meeting was held in Faneuil Hall on the 12th and 13th of September, which agreed to call a meeting of the towns.2 Ninety-six towns and eight districts were finally represented in the convention which assembled at the time appointed (September 22). Their first act was a petition to the governor setting forth their apprehensions in respect to a standing army. This the governor refused to receive, but he expressed his opinion of the unauthorized meeting they were holding, directed them to separate instantly, and threatened to assert the prerogatives of the crown. After a recital of grievances, with declarations of loyalty and promises of assistance to civil magistrates in suppressing disorders, they adjourned on the 29th. Their proceedings were moderate, a moderation induced, as some supposed, by the arrival at Nantasket, September 28, from Halifax of a fleet of seven armed vessels, with nearly a thousand troops. If contempt of the royal prerogative, after the refusal to rescind the circular letter, could have been more pointedly expressed, it was by holding a provincial convention with 1 Mass. State Papers, 147. 2 Otis was chairman. On the first day several committees were appointed: one to learn from Governor Bernard the grounds of his apprehensions that additional regiments were expected; another to present a petition for convening the General Court "with the utmost speed;" and a third to take into consideration the state of public affairs, and report salutary measures at an adjourned meeting. The next day the governor replied that his information in regard to the troops was private: when he had public letters on the subject he would communicate them to the Council. As for calling another assembly, he could do nothing without his majesty's commands. Whereupon a series of resolutions and votes was passed to the effect that the inhabitants of Boston would defend the king, the char ter, and their own rights; that levying of money within the province, or keeping a standing army, except by consent of the General Assembly, was in violation of the charter and of natural rights; that the several towns be asked (the letter is in Hutchinson, iii. 492) to send delegates to a convention to be held on the 22d; that on account of a "prevailing apprehension, in the minds of many, of an approaching war with France," the inhabitants be provided with arms; and that the ministers in town set apart a day of fasting and prayer. A broadside of these proceedings was published, of which a fac-simile is in the Boston Public Library. 8 Hutchinson's History, iii. 212. They were the Fourteenth, Twenty-ninth, and part of the Fifty-ninth British regiments. out sanction of law. Between these measures and April 19, 1775, no step involving a new principle was taken. The burning of the "Gaspee" in 1772 and the destruction of the tea in 1773 were merely the filling in of a picture firmly sketched in outline. The refusal of the provincial council and of the town to provide for quartering the royal troops on their arrival was a practical nullification of the Mutiny Act, which served still further to strain the relations between Massachusetts and the British ministry. Parliament came together November 8, 1768. Both Houses were swift to condemn the late proceedings of the General Court of Massachusetts and of the town of Boston. On December 15 these acts were made the basis of eight resolutions, introduced by the Earl of Hillsborough, and an address to the king, moved by the Duke of Bedford, to obtain information respecting the actors in the riotous proceedings since December 10, 1767, with a view, if deemed advisable, of ordering their transportation to England for trial. These were passed by the House of Commons (January 26, 1769), after a debate in which the whole subject of American affairs was discussed.1 The news of these proceedings at first created some uneasiness in Boston among those implicated; but apprehension subsided when it was learned from their friends in England that the voting of Bedford's Address by the two Houses was merely political; 2 that lenient, not rigorous, measures were intended by the ministry; and that the late act laying duties would be repealed. This intelligence reassured the patriotic party, but correspondingly depressed the tories, who saw no hope in the vacillating policy of the ministry. A policy was much. needed. Chatham had resigned in October, 1768, and the Duke of Grafton became the nominal, as he had long been the real, head of the ministry. Lord North, Chancellor of the Exchequer, had charge of the revenue. The Duke of Grafton favored the total repeal of the Townshend duties, but Lord North favored the retention of that on tea, as a matter of principle; and so it was decided by a majority of one in the Cabinet Council. Parliament rose May 9, and four days later the Earl of Hillsborough reported to the several colonies the resolutions of the government on the circular letter. Lord Hillsborough's letter gave little comfort to the Massachusetts House of Representatives, whose firmness was commended by Pennsylvania and Virginia, and the threat of transportation of the Bostonians to England for trial under a statute of Henry VIII. called forth from the latter colony vigorous resolutions and an address to the king, May 16, 1769.* Jefferson has given the history of these resolutions.5 This action did not meet the approval of Lord Botetourt, the governor of Virginia, and he dissolved the House of Burgesses. This, however, did not prevent the delegates from meeting at the Apollo, in the Raleigh tavern, and, as citizens, 1 Parliamentary History, vol. xvi. 476 et seq.; Mahon's History, v. 240; Hutchinson's History, iii. 219. 2 W. S. Johnson, Trumbull Papers, 317. 3 Hutchinson's History, iii. 221. 5 Writings, i. 3 (Boston ed.). |