XXX. June 25. July 23. Legislature, at a late session, in spite of Wentworth's CHAPTER attempts to prevent it, had appointed a Committee of Correspondence, in consequence of which he had dis- 1774. solved them. A meeting of the committee, held at June 8. Portsmouth, to appoint delegates to Congress, was dispersed by Governor Wentworth and the sheriff; but the business was completed by a convention of delegates which met at Exeter. Similar conventions, for the same July 21. purpose, were held in Maryland and New Jersey. The Assembly of New York, at a session early in the year, had appointed a Committee of Correspondence; but as that committee declined to assume the nomination of delegates to Congress, that business was undertaken by the city committee of fifty-one, in conjunction with a committee of mechanics. Some difficulty occurred in respect to this nomination between those who preferred. M'Dougall, an old leader of the "Sons of Liberty," and the more moderate friends of John Jay, a rising young lawyer of Huguenot descent, a son-in-law of William Livingston. The dispute was finally settled by opening a poll, at which the mayor and aldermen presided, and all who paid taxes were allowed to vote. Philip Livingston, John Alsop, Isaac Low, James Duane, and John Jay, the delegates thus chosen, were July 28. adopted by the city of Albany, and by some towns in Westchester and Dutchess. The counties of Orange, Kings, and Suffolk sent separate delegates; the rest of the province was unrepresented. Upon Governor Penn's refusal to call a special session of the Assembly, the inhabitants of Philadelphia met in town meeting, and ap- June 18. pointed a committee for the city and county. Upon their invitation, a "committee for the province of Pennsylvania," composed of delegates elected in the several counties, assembled at Philadelphia. They passed res- July 15. CHAPTER olutions in support of the rights of the colonists, and XXX. recommended to the Assembly, which, notwithstanding 1774. Penn's late refusal, had just been called together, in conJuly 21. sequence of an alarm of Indian war on the western frontier, the appointment of delegates to the Congress-a recommendation speedily complied with by that body. Aug. 1. In Delaware, the members of Assembly, called together by a circular letter from the speaker, made a similar appointment. Aug. 1. The Virginia Convention, besides choosing seven delegates to the proposed Congress, adopted resolutions to import no more slaves, nor British goods, nor tea; and, if colonial grievances were not speedily redressed, to export no more tobacco to England; and not to deal with any merchant who should refuse to come into this agreement. In spite of Governor Martin's efforts to prevent it, a like conAug. 25. vention, by which a like appointment was made, and sim ilar resolutions were adopted, was soon after held at Newbern, in North Carolina, by invitation of the Committee. of Vigilance for Wilmington. A public meeting, attended by persons from all parts of the province, held at July 6. Charleston, in South Carolina, had resolved to support Massachusetts in the vindication of her rights; had appointed a general committee of ninety-nine members; and had selected delegates to the proposed Congress-a Aug. 2. selection presently ratified by the Assembly, the consequence of which was a dissolution. The influence of Governor Wright prevented the election of delegates from Georgia. Among the new counselors appointed by writ of manAug. 1. damus, under the act which now came into force for remodeling the government of Massachusetts, was Ruggles, formerly president of the Stamp Act Congress. The greater part accepted and were sworn in; but they XXX. became at once objects of bitter public odium. In the CHAPTER western part of the province a session of the Superior Court was broken up; and even in Boston the juries re- 1774. fused to be sworn, lest, by consenting to act, they should recognize the authority of the new government. In spite of Gage's denunciation of such assemblages as seditious and treasonable, town meetings and county conventions were held throughout the province to protest against the new system. Alarmed at the spirit thus evinced, having removed the seat of government from Salem back to Boston, Gage began to fortify Boston Neck, the only land avenue to the town. He also sent a body of soldiers to the upper Sept. 1. part of Charlestown, to seize a quantity of powder stored there belonging to the province. The news of this seizure brought together a tumultuous assembly from Middlesex county, which proceeded to Cambridge, where several of the new counselors resided, surrounded their houses, and compelled them to resign. A rumor spreading that the ships of war in Boston harbor were bom- Sept. 2. barding the town, bodies of armed men from Connecticut marched into Massachusetts, but returned on finding the rumor false. Tarrings and featherings, and other acts of violence, became so common, that all suspected partisans of the mother country were obliged to seek refuge with the troops. The convention for Suffolk county, to which Boston belonged, in their meeting at Milton, resolved that "no Sept. 6. obedience was due to either or any part of the recent acts of Parliament." They recommended the meeting of a provincial Congress, and exhorted all tax collectors not to pay over any money in their hands till the gov ernment should be constitutionally organized. Such of the new counselors as should persist in refusing to resign, CHAPTER were pronounced "obstinate and incorrigible enemies of XXX. their country." Similar resolutions were passed in the 1774. other counties. Those of Suffolk were forwarded to the Sept. 5. Continental Congress, already assembled at Philadelphia. That Congress consisted of fifty-three delegates, the leading men of twelve provinces, Georgia, alone of the originally British colonies, being unrepresented. Besides others of less note, there were present in this assembly the two Adamses, of Massachusetts; Sherman and Deane, of Connecticut; Philip Livingston, Jay, and Duane, of New York; William Livingston, of New Jersey; Galloway, of Pennsylvania; Rodney, Read, and M'Kean, of Delaware; Chase, of Maryland; Randolph, Richard Henry Lee, Washington, and Henry, of Virginia; the two Rutledges, and Gadsden, of South Carolina. The post of honor was freely conceded to Virginia by the choice of the now aged Peyton Randolph as president. Charles Thompson, late master of the Quaker academy at Philadelphia, was chosen secretary. Samuel Adams, himself a stiff Congregationalist, moved the appointment of an Episcopal chaplain, and Jacob Duchè, a popular preacher of Philadelphia, was accordingly appointed. As no means were at hand to estimate the relative importance of the colonies, it was agreed that each province should have a single vote. All proceedings were to be with closed doors, and nothing was to be published except by order. Upon receipt of the Suffolk resolutions, the Congress resolved that the whole continent ought to support Massachusetts in resistance to the unconstitutional change in her government; and that any person accepting office under the new system ought to be held in detestation as a public enemy. A correspondence was presently entered into with General Gage, remonstrating against the fortification of Boston, and his arbitrary exercise in other CHAPTER respects of the illegal power he had assumed. XXX. A committee of two from each province reported, in 1774. the form of a series of resolves, accepted and adopted by the Congress, a "Declaration of Colonial Rights." The enjoyment of life, liberty, and property were claimed in this Declaration as natural rights. The privilege of being bound by no law to which they had not consented by their representatives was claimed for the colonists in their character of British subjects. The sole and exclusive power of legislation for the colonies was declared. to reside in their respective Assemblies, reserving to Parliament the enactment of such laws only as might be essential to the bona fide regulation of trade, but excluding all taxation, internal or external. The common law of England was claimed as the birthright of the colonists, including the right of trial by a jury of the vicinage, the right of public meetings, and of petition. A protest was made against standing armies maintained in the colonies without their consent; and a similar protest against legislation by councils dependent on the crown-this last in allusion to the Quebec Act. All immunities hitherto enjoyed in the colonies, whether by charter or custom, were claimed as established rights, beyond the power of the mother country to abrogate. Eleven acts of Parliament, passed since the accession of George III.—the Sugar Act, the Stamp Act, the two Quartering Acts, the Tea Act, the Act Suspending the New York Legislature, the two Acts for the trial in Great Britain of offenses committed in America, the Boston Port Bill, the Act for Regulating the Government of Massachusetts, and the Quebec Act-were enumerated. in conclusion as having been passed in derogation of the rights of the colonies. |