Account of a Declaration: Gloss

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Proceedings of the First Continental Congress

The first Continental Congress met in Carpenter's Hall in Philadelphia, from September 5, to October 26, 1774. Carpenters Hall was also the seat of the Pennsylvania Congress. All of the colonies except Georgia sent delegates. These were elected by the people, by the colonial legislatures, Carpenters Hall, Philadelphia

or by the committees of correspondence of the respective colonies. The colonies presented there were united in a determination to show a combined authority to Great Britain, but their aims were not uniform at all. Pennsylvania & New York sent delegates with firm instructions to seek a resolution with England. The other colonies voices were defensive of colonial rights, but pretty evenly divided between those who sought legislative parity, and the more radical members who were prepared for separation. Virginia's delegation was made up of a most even mix of these & not incidentally, presented the most eminent group of men in America. Colo. George Washington, Richard Henry Lee, Patrick Henry, Edmund Pendleton, Colo. Benjamin Harrison, Richard Bland, and at the head of them Peyton Randolph—who would immediately be elected president of the convention.
The objectives of the body were not entirely clear but, with such leadership as was found there, a core set of tasks was carried out. It was agreeable to all that the King & Parliament must be made to understand the grievances of the colonies & that the body must do everything possible to communicate the same to the population of America, and to the rest of the world.

The first few weeks were consumed in discussion & debate. The colonies had always, up to this time, acted as independent entities. There was much distrust to overcome. The first matter to be considered by all was A Plan of Union of Great Britain and the Colonies, offered by Joseph Galloway of Pennsylvania. The plan was considered very attractive to most of the members, as it proposed a popularly elected Grand Council which would represent the interests of the colonies as a whole, and would be a continental equivalent to the English Parliament. Poised against this would be a President General, appointed by the crown, to represent the authority of the king in America. Conflict in Boston overcame the effort at conciliation. The arrival of the Suffolk County (Boston) resolves just prior to the vote on the Plan of Union, caused it to be discarded by a narrow margin.

On October 14, the Declaration and Resolves established the course of the congress, as a statement of principles common to all of the colonies. Congress voted to meet again the following year if these grievances were not attended to by England.

Several days later, on the 20th, came The Association which was patterned after the Virginia Association and others that followed. This was a pact for non importation of English goods, to establish mechanisms throughout the colonies to enforce and regulate the resistance to Great Britain, & to keep the channels of communication open. It was to become effective on December 1, 1774 unless parliament should rescind the Intolerable Acts.

MORE...

By the end of 1774

-ToKind.

Delegates:

New-Hampshire
John Sullivan, Nathaniel Folsam

Massachusetts Bay
John Adams, Samuel Adams, Thomas Cushing, Robert Treat Paine

Rhode Island
Stephen Hopkins, Samuel Ward

Connecticut
Eliphalet Dyer, Roger Sherman, Silas Deane

New York
Isaac Low, John Alsop, John Jay, James Duane, William Floyd, Henry Wisener, S. Bocrum

New-Jersey
James Kinsey, William Livingston, Stephen Crane, Richard Smith

Pennsylvania
Joseph Gallaway, John Dickinson, Charles Humphreys, Thomas Miffin, Edward Biddle, John Morton, George Ross

Delaware
Casar Rodney, Thomas Keane, George Read

Maryland
Matthew Tilghman, Thomas Johnson, William Paca, Samuel Chase

Virginia
Peyton Randolph, Richard Henry Lee, George Washington, Patrick Henry, Richard Bland, Benjamin Harrison, Edmund Pendleton

North-Carolina
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, R. Caswell

South-Carolina
Henry Middleton, Thomas Lynch, Christopher Gadsden, John Rutledge, Edward Rutledge

The Prime Ministry of Lord North: On 31 January, 1770, Lord North ascended to the Prime Ministry of Great Britain. He was favored by King George III and his strength in leadership did return some stability to the Parliament following a series of disastrous Prime Ministries. The Stamp Act & all of the Townshend Duties, save the one on tea, had been repealed. The Declaratory Act still stood, although it was little more than a statement. For about three years, Lord North managed to restrain the activities of the Parliament so as not to feed American colonial resentment. He brought this about, in part, by finding other mechanisms to generate revenue to pay off Britain's massive National debt (see the Seven Years' War.) He successfully employed a lottery to raise revenue without increasing English land taxes, & removing the pressure to resume or increase taxes on the colonies. However, in an effort to salvage the East India Tea Company, North miscalculated the strength of colonial sentiments. The Tea Act of 1773, designed to rescue the near bankrupt company, was to generate capitol from the colonies by shipping surplus tea there directly and selling it through a network of consignment agents. The intention was to remove the Townshend tea duty (the last remaining "external tax".) Lord North intervened on this point however—the tax was not eliminated, but merely reduced by half. The patriot movement in Massachusetts saw this act as creating a practical monopoly on the sale of tea for the East India Company, and as a shallow ploy to mollify the colonies into the continued payment of taxes to Britain. Agitation in Massachusetts proceeded anew, eventually bringing about the Boston Tea Party. This lead to the Coercive Acts (Intolerable Acts) which were calculated to force Massachusetts into compliance with British authority, but ultimately brought on the War of Independence. -ToKind.

The Raleigh Tavern: The Apollo Room, of the Raleigh Tavern in Jamestown, was the meeting place for radical members of the House of Burgesses in 1769 when the Governor of Virginia dissolved them for seeming contempt. Here they formed an early non-importation association in Virginia.
This was not to be the last occasion on which the Apollo room served revolutionary purposes. In 1773 the Burgesses met, under the leadership of Patrick Henry, to consider a committee of correspondence through which the resistance in Virginia would coordinate with groups in other colonies. In May of 1774, members once again found refuge at the Raleigh, when then Governor Lord Dunmore dissolved the Burgesses, as a result of their defiant resolutions against the Boston Port Bill.
The Raleigh, established in 1717, had long served as a focal point for community life. Named after the founder of the Virginia colony, Sir Walter Raleigh, it was the sight of a great many Balls, banquets, community meetings, and business gatherings. The original structure apparently survived until 1859, when it burned down. The illustration here was crafted by Benson Lossing around 1848. -ToKind.

The Gaspee Affair ·1772 ·: The Sons of Liberty were very active throughout the colonies, and the British officers charged with enforcing the customs laws and the Stamp Act were becoming aggressive. In June of 1772, a dramatic event was to demonstrate the severity of the crisis. A Lieutenant William Duddington, of Her Majesties Ship Gaspee, was charged with patrolling the waters of Narragansett Bay, off Rhode Island. Duddington had earned a reputation as an overzealous enforcer; boarding & detaining vessels and confiscating cargoes, often without charge, and without recourse for merchants who's goods were impounded. Losses were mounting and it was widely believed that these harassments were directed specifically at members of the Sons of Liberty.
On June 9, 1772, a local vessel out of Newport was under way to Providence when its captain baited the HMS Gaspee and lead Duddington into shallow waters near Warwick. The Gaspee ran aground at a place that is now known as Gaspee point. News of the grounding quickly reached Providence and a party of fifty five, lead by a man named John Brown, planned an attack on the ship. The following evening they surrounded and boarded the Gaspee, wounding Duddington and capturing the entire crew. All were hauled ashore and abandoned, to watch as the Gaspee was looted and then burned.
The boldness of this attack was even more remarkable in that none of the attackers made any effort to hide their identities. Duddington and crew were able to point out most of the participants readily. However, this did them little good because the local courts, too, were antagonistic toward the Royal Navy. Rather than attempt to prosecute the attackers, charges were brought against Lt. Duddington for illegally seizing goods. When this news reached Parliament, there was outrage. A special commission, under the authority of the vice-admiralty courts, was sent to apprehend the perpetrators of the Gaspee affair, and to haul them back to England for trial. Though the identities of the perpetrators were widely known, the investigation was fruitless. No arrest was ever made. Sources: Burning of the Gaspee -ToKind.

The French & Indian War 1754—1763 (The Seven Years War): The Seven Years war (1689–1763) was a massive conflict involving Austria, England, France, Great Britain, Prussia, and Sweden. The conflict was played out in Europe, India, and North America. In Europe, Sweden , Austria, and France were allied to crush the rising power of Frederick the Great, King of Prussia. The English and the French battled for colonial domination in North America, the Caribbean, and in India. The English did ultimately come to dominate the colonial outposts, but at a cost so staggering that the resulting debt nearly destroyed the English government. It was that debt that caused the escalation of tensions leading to the Revolutionary War. Parliament was desperate to obtain two objectives; first, to tax the colonies to recover monies expended on the battle over North America, and second to restore the profitability of the East India Company in an effort to recover monies spent on the battle over India.
The French and Indian War, as it was referred to in the colonies, was the beginning of open hostilities between the colonies and Gr. Britain. England and France had been building toward a conflict in America since 1689. These efforts resulted in the remarkable growth of the colonies from a population of 250,000 in 1700, to 1.25 million in 1750. Britain required raw materials including copper, hemp, tar, and turpentine. They also required a great deal of money, and so they provided that all of these American products be shipped exclusively to England (the Navigation Acts). In an effort to raise revenue and simultaneously interfere with the French in the Caribbean, a 6 pence tax on each gallon of molasses was imposed in 1733 (the Molasses Act, see note: The Sugar Act). Enforcement of these regulations became difficult, so the English government established extensive customs services, and vice-admiralty courts empowered to identify, try, and convict suspected smugglers. These devices were exclusive of, and superior to, the colonial mechanisms of justice.
The colonies were wholly interested in overcoming the French in North America and appealed to the King for permission to raise armies and monies to defend themselves.* Despite sincere petitions from the royal governors, George II was suspicious of the intentions of the colonial governments and declined their offer. English officers in America were also widely contemptuous of colonials who volunteered for service. A few of the men who signed the Declaration had been members of volunteer militia who, as young men, had been dressed down & sent home when they applied for duty. Such an experience was not uncommon. It led communities throughout the colonies to question British authorities who would demand horses, feed, wagons, & quarters—but deny colonials the right to fight in defense of the Empire, a right which they considered central to their self-image as Englishmen. -ToKind.

Non-importation Agreements

Colonial resistance to British control took many forms, perhaps the most effective was the general success of the non-importation agreements. Such agreements appeared as early as 1766. They had a chilling effect on the British Merchants who traded with the colonies. The Stamp Act was repealed, eventually, based on appeals from Merchants who lost money shipping goods to a land that would not receive them. Not incidentally, the customs offices in the colonies could not collect taxes on goods that were either not allowed ashore at all, or were never sold. Non-importation agreements reached ultimate effect in response to the Townshend Revenue Act, when in 1768 Boston passed the act seen below. Every port city and nearly every region would soon adopt acts like this one. Finally, in 1774, the first Continental Congress of the colonies would pass The Association, a colony-wide prohibition against any trade with Great Britain. -ToKind.

BOSTON NON-IMPORTATION AGREEMENT

August 1, 1768

The merchants and traders in the town of Boston having taken into consideration the deplorable situation of the trade, and the many difficulties it at present labours under on account of the scarcity of money, which is daily increasing for want of the other remittances to discharge our debts in Great Britain, and the large sums collected by the officers of the customs for duties on goods imported; the heavy taxes levied to discharge the debts contracted by the government in the late war; the embarrassments and restrictions laid on trade by several late acts of parliament; together with the bad success of our cod fishery, by which our principal sources of remittance are like to be greatly diminished, and we thereby rendered unable to pay the debts we owe the merchants in Great Britain, and to continue the importation of goods from thence; We, the subscribers, in order to relieve the trade under those discouragements, to promote industry, frugality, and economy, and to discourage luxury, and every kind of extravagance, do promise and engage to and with each other as follows:

First, That we will not send for or import from Great Britain, either upon our own account, or upon commission, this fall, any other goods than what are already ordered for the fall supply.

Secondly, That we will not send for or import any kind of goods or merchandize from Great Britain, either on our own account, or on commissions, or any otherwise, from the 1st of January 1769, to the 1st of January 1770, except salt, coals, fish hooks and lines, hemp, and duck bar lead and shot, woolcards and card wire.

Thirdly, That we will not purchase of any factor, or others, any kind of goods imported from Great Britain, from January 1769, to January 1770.

Fourthly, That we will not import, on our own account, or on commissions or purchase of any who shall import from any other colony in America, from January 1769, to January 17 70, any tea, glass, paper, or other goods commonly imported from Great Britain.

Fifthly, That we will not, from and after the 1st of January 1769, import into this province any tea, paper, glass, or painters colours, until the act imposing duties on those articles shall be repealed.

In witness whereof, we have hereunto set our hands, this first day of August, 1768.

The Sons of Liberty: In Boston in early summer of 1765 a group of shopkeepers and artisans who called themselves The Loyal Nine, began preparing for agitation against the Stamp Act. As that group grew, it came to be known as the Sons of Liberty. And grow it did! These were not the leading men of Boston, but rather workers and tradesmen. It was unseemly that they would be so agitated by a parliamentary act. Though their ranks did not include Samuel and John Adams, the fact may have been a result of a mutually beneficial agreement. The Adams' and other radical members of the legislature were daily in the public eye; they could not afford to be too closely associated with violence, neither could the secretive Sons of Liberty afford much public exposure. However, amongst the members were two men who could generate much public sentiment about the Act. Benjamin Edes, a printer, and John Gill of the Boston Gazette produced a steady stream of news & opinion. Within a very short time a group of some two thousand men had been organized under Ebenezer McIntosh, a South Boston shoemaker.
The first widely known acts of the Sons took place on August 14, 1765, when an effigy of Andrew Oliver (who was to be commissioned Distributor of Stamps for Massachusetts) was found hanging in a tree on Newbury street, along with a large boot with a devil climbing out of it. The boot was a play on the name of the Earl of Bute and the whole display was intended to establish an evil connection between Oliver and the Stamp Act. The sheriffs were told to remove the display but protested in fear of their lives, for a large crowd had formed at the scene. Before the evening a mob burned Oliver's property on Kilby street, then moved on to his house. There they beheaded the effigy and stoned the house as its occupants looked out in horror. They then moved to nearby Fort Hill were they built a large fire and burned what was left of the effigy. Most of the crowd dissipated at that point; however, McIntosh and crew, then under cover of darkness, ransacked Oliver's abandoned home until midnight. On that evening it became very clear who ruled Boston. The British Militia, the Sheriffs and Justices, kept a low profile. No one dared respond to such violent force.
By the end of that year the Sons of Liberty existed in every colony. Their most popular objective was to force Stamp Distributors throughout the colonies to resign. The groups also applied pressure to any Merchants who did not comply with the non-importation associations. Wherever these groups existed they were either directed in secret by leading men in the community or actually lead by them. However, there were opportunists everywhere, too, who would use the name Sons of Liberty to carry out acts of revenge and other violence not related to the cause. For example, in South Carolina a group of sailors, calling themselves The Sons of Liberty, formed a mob to coerce money from people on the streets*. Such behavior could certainly undermine the cause, so the Sons spent a great deal of time policing themselves & pretenders. This was the origin on names such as "True Sons," and "True-born Sons" of Liberty.
The success of these movements in undermining the Stamp Act cannot be attributed to violence alone. Their most effective work was performed in newsprint. A great many of the Sons were printers and publishers themselves & even those who were not, were sympathetic to the cause. It was they who would pay the most in duties, after all. Nearly every newspaper in the colonies carried daily reports of the activities of the Sons. Accounts of the most dramatic escapades spread throughout the colonies. In one most remarkable incident, an account of the Virginia Stamp Act Resolutions was printed far & wide. It is not certain how many of the editors who reprinted it were aware of the status of the resolutions, but seven were printed, while only five actually passed (the fifth was was in fact rescinded the the day after adoption.) The ultimate effect of such propaganda was to embolden both citizens and Legislatures in every colony. When the Stamp Act became effective on the 1st of November, 1765, nearly all of these papers went right on publishing without the required Stamp.
In the early months of 1766 there was such chaos that many of the royal governors had gone into hiding. The Sheriffs and Militia that they might have counted on to keep the peace were mostly members of the Sons of Liberty. Governors were afraid to unlock the weapons stores. Few royal troops were available & they were vastly outnumbered in any case. The Sons of Liberty had displaced the royal government in nearly every colony. The Stamp Act Congress had concluded its business, but there was little hope that its petition to Gr. Britain would be heard. Correspondence between the various groups began, toward the mutual support and defense of the cause. It was expected that eventually British troops would land & attempt to reassert control. So it was that the first efforts to unite the colonies were not undertaken by their respective legislatures, but by these independent radical groups. The various Sons throughout the colonies began to correspond and develop a larger organization. -Reference: TAR. -ToKind.

Committees of Correspondence: The Committees of Correspondence were formed throughout the colonies as a means of coordinating action against Gr. Britain. Many were formed by the legislatures of the respective colonies, others by extra-governmental associations such as the Sons of Liberty in the various colonies. In any case, the members of these organizations represented the leading men of each colony. It took some time, and finally an act as dramatic as the Boston Port Bill, to coordinate the colonies in action against Gr. Britain. -ToKind.

The Tea Act · 1773 ·: The Tea Act, passed by Parliament in May of 1773, would launch the final spark to the revolutionary movement in Boston. The act was not intended to raise revenue in the American colonies, and in fact imposed no new taxes. It was designed to prop up the East India Company which was floundering financially and burdened with eighteen million pounds of unsold tea. This tea was to be shipped directly to the colonies, and sold at a bargain price. The Townshend Duties were still in place; however, and the radical leaders in America found reason to believe that this act was a maneuver to buy popular support for the taxes already in force. The direct sale of tea, via British agents, would also have undercut the business of local merchants.
Colonists in Philadelphia and New York turned the tea ships back to Britain. In Charleston the cargo was left to rot on the docks. In Boston the Royal Governor was stubborn & held the ships in port, where the colonists would not allow them to unload. Cargoes of tea filled the harbor, and the British ship's crews were stalled in Boston looking for work and often finding trouble. This situation lead to the Boston Tea Party. -ToKind.

The Boston massacre ·1770·: The occupation of Boston Massachusetts by British troops in 1768 was not met by open resistance from the natives. -ToKind.

The Sugar Act · 1764 ·: (Titled The American Revenue Act of 1764) On April 5, 1754, Parliament passed a modified version of the Molasses Act (1733), which was about to expire. Under the Molasses Act colonial merchants had been required to pay a tax of six pence per gallon on the importation of foreign molasses. But because of corruption, they mostly evaded the taxes & undercut the intention of the tax—that the English product would be cheaper than that from the French West Indies. This hurt the British West Indies market in molasses and sugar and the market for rum, which the colonies had been producing in quantity with the cheaper French molasses. The First Lord of the Treasury, and Chancellor of the Exchequer Lord Grenville was trying to bring the colonies in line with regard to payment of taxes. He had beefed up the Navy presence and instructed them to become more active in customs enforcement. Parliament decided it would be wise to make a few adjustments to the trade regulations. The Sugar Act reduced the rate of tax on molasses from six pence to three pence per gallon, while Grenville took measures that the duty be strictly enforced. The act also listed more foreign goods to be taxed including sugar, certain wines, coffee, pimiento, cambric and printed calico, and further, regulated the export of lumber and iron. The enforced tax on molasses caused the almost immediate decline in the rum industry in the colonies. The combined effect of the new duties was to sharply reduce the trade with Madeira, the Azores, the Canary Islands, and the French West Indies (Guadelupe, Martinique and Santo Domingo (now Haiti)), all important destination ports for lumber, flour, cheese, and assorted farm products. The situation disrupted the colonial economy by reducing the markets to which the colonies could sell, and the amount of currency available to them for the purchase of British manufactured goods. This act, and the Currency Act, set the stage for the revolt at the imposition of the Stamp Act. -ToKind.

The Currency Act · 1764 ·: The colonies suffered a constant shortage of currency with which to conduct trade. There were no gold or silver mines and currency could only be obtained through trade as regulated by Great Britain. Many of the colonies felt no alternative to printing their own paper money in the form of Bills of Credit. But because there were no common regulations and in fact no standard value on which to base the notes, confusion ensued. The notes were issued by land banks, or loan offices, which based the value of mortgaged land. Some notes payed interest, others did not, some could be used only for purchase and not to repay debt. Some were issued only for public debts & could not be used in private transactions. There was no standard value common to all of the colonies. British merchant-creditors were very uncomfortable with this system, not only because of the obvious complexity, but because of the rapid depreciation of the notes due to regular fluctuations in the colonial economy. On September 1, 1764, Parliament passed the Currency Act, effectively assuming control of the colonial currency system. The act prohibited the issue of any new bills and the reissue of existing currency. Parliament favored a "hard currency" system based on the pound sterling, but was not inclined to regulate the colonial bills. Rather, they simply abolished them. The colonies protested vehemently against this. They suffered a trade deficit with Great Britain to begin with & argued that the shortage of hard capital would further exacerbate the situation. Another provision of the Currency Act established what amounted to a "superior" Vice-admiralty court, at the call of Navel commanders who wished to assure that persons suspected of smuggling or other violations of the customs laws would receive a hearing favorable to the British, and not the colonial, interests. -ToKind.

The Vice-Admiralty Courts: Vice-Admiralty courts existed throughout the empire. They served one purpose only, to resolve disputes among merchants and seamen. At the end of the French and Indian War eleven such courts were in operation in British America. Each court served a certain region, some of them handled several colonies, while Pennsylvania had its own. These courts were different in operation from the Common-Law courts. They did not use a jury system, the judge heard all evidence and testimony and handed down a ruling. For most of the history of the colonies, these courts were occupied only with commercial matters. Judges were appointed from the local population and paid from the treasuries of the colonies served. During the French and Indian War their jurisdiction was expanded to the business of condemning enemy ships, impounded by the British, and to disposal of their contents. When Gr. Britain decided to step up enforcement of the Trade and Navigation acts (see The Sugar Act, Œconomy of Empire,) the authority of the courts was further expanded to include enforcement of customs and criminal charges for smuggling &ct. In many cases the jurisdiction of Vice-Admiral and Common-Law courts overlapped. Customs officials and merchants could bring action in whichever court they thought would bring the most favorable resort. This presented an apparent injustice from the perspective of those charged. They argued that the lack of a trial-by-jury was an infringement of their "constitutional" rights. However the distinction was minor in practise because all of the judges were drawn from the local population. A provision of the Currency Act established a "super" Vice-Admiralty court in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1764. This court had jurisdiction from the Floridas to Newfoundland and the judge was appointed and sent directly from England. The new court did not supercede the authority of the existing courts. Rather it was to be used on occasions when officials felt that the local courts might rule against them. This court could be used not only to prosecute, but to persecute those thought to be enemies of Gr. Britain. Officers could require anyone charged to transport themselves to distant Nova Scotia, to appear before an obviously biased court. The legal concept of the Vice-Admiralty courts was that a defendant was assumed guilty until he proved himself innocent. Failure to appear as commanded resulted in an automatic guilty verdict. -ToKind.

(The Albany Convention) It should also be noted here that the good intentions of colonial leaders only went so far. Though these petitions were offered, repeated attempts to organize the colonies met with jealous resistance. In June of 1774, representatives from seven colonies met with 150 Iroquois Chiefs in Albany, New York. The purposes of the Albany Convention were twofold; to try to secure the support and cooperation of the Iroquois in fighting the French, and to form a colonial alliance based on a design by Benjamin Franklin. The plan of union was passed unanimously. But when the delegates returned to their colonies with the plan, not a single provincial legislature would ratify it. Franklin's plan resembled the Articles of Confederation, and would have provided for coordinated taxation and militia forces to defend the frontiers. -ToKind.

Page 196, The American Revolution: A Narrative, Critical and Bibliographical History, by Mellon Chamberlain.

*The date 1762 was given here in three different renditions of Jefferson's Autobiography. I have edited it to 1772 for the following reasons: The date is inconsistent with "...was considered at our session of the spring of 1773 as demanding attention." Any incident over ten years in the past would have been of little interest, even to the House of Burgesses. Though the vice-admiralty courts were established throughout the colonies shortly after the French and Indian War, I was unable to locate any specific incident concerning a court of inquiry in Rhode Island in 1762. The Gaspee affair, in 1772, did result in a special court of inquiry, charged with the authority that Jefferson describes here. -ToKind.