[1] In citing the "Madison Papers," I have constantly referred to the edition contained in the fifth (supplementary) volume of Mr. Jonathan Elliot's "Debates," &c., because it is more accessible to general readers. The accuracy of that publication, and its full and admirable Index, make it a very important volume to be consulted in connection with the subject of this work. In this relation, I may suggest the desirableness of a new and carefully revised edition of the Journals of the old Congress;—an enterprise that should be the care of the national government. A great magazine of materials for our national history, from the first Continental Congress to the adoption of the Constitution, exists in those Journals.
[2] Story's Commentaries on the Constitution, § 160.
[3] That a union of the colonies into one general government, for any purpose, could not take place without the sanction of Parliament, was always assumed in both countries. The sole instance in which a plan of union was publicly proposed and acted upon, before the Revolution, was in 1753-4, when the Board of Trade sent instructions to the Governor of New York to make a treaty with the Six Nations of Indians; and the other colonies were also instructed to send commissioners to be present at the meeting, so that all the provinces might be comprised in one general treaty, to be made in the King's name. It was also recommended by the home government, that the commissioners at this meeting should form a plan of union among the colonies for their mutual protection and defence against the French. Twenty-five commissioners assembled at Albany in May, 1754, from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. In this body, a plan of union was digested and adopted, which was chiefly the work of Dr. Franklin. It was agreed that an act of Parliament was necessary to authorize it to be carried into effect. It was rejected by all the colonial Assemblies before which it was brought, and in England it was not thought proper by the Board of Trade to recommend it to the King. In America it was considered to have too much of prerogative in it, and in England to be too democratic. It was a comprehensive scheme of government, to consist of a Governor-General, or President-General, who was to be appointed and supported by the crown, and a Grand Council, which was to consist of one member chosen by each of the smaller colonies, and two or more by each of the larger. Its duties and powers related chiefly to defence against external attacks. It was to have a general treasury, to be supplied by an excise on certain articles of consumption. See the history and details of the scheme, in Sparks's Life and Works of Franklin, I. 176, III. 22-55; Hutchinson's History of Massachusetts, III. 23; Trumbull's History of Connecticut, II. 355; Pitkin's History of the United States, I. 140-146. In 1788, Franklin said of it: "The different and contradictory reasons of dislike to my plan make me suspect that it was really the true medium; and I am still of opinion it would have been happy for both sides, if it had been adopted. The colonies so united would have been sufficiently strong to have defended themselves: there would have been no need of troops from England: of course the subsequent pretext for taxing America, and the bloody contest it occasioned, would have been avoided. But such mistakes are not new: history is full of the errors of states and princes." (Life, by Sparks, I. 178.) We may not join in his regrets now.
[4] It is not certain by whom the first suggestion of a Continental Congress was made. Thomas Cushing, Speaker of the Massachusetts Assembly, and a correspondent of Dr. Franklin, appears to have expressed to him the opinion, previously to the date of Franklin's official letter quoted in the text, that a congress would grow out of the committees of correspondence which had been recommended by the Virginia House of Burgesses. But Mr. Sparks thinks that no other direct and public recommendation of the measure can be found before the date of Franklin's letter to the Massachusetts Assembly. Sparks's Life of Franklin, I. 350, note. In the early part of the year 1774, the necessity of such a congress began to be popularly felt throughout all the colonies. Sparks's Washington, II. 326.
[5] These delegates were Peyton Randolph, Richard Henry Lee, George Washington, Patrick Henry, Richard Bland, Benjamin Harrison, and Edmund Pendleton.
[6] Thomas Cushing, Samuel Adams, Robert Treat Paine, James Bowdoin, and John Adams.
[7] The delegates in the Congress of 1774 from New Hampshire were appointed by a Convention of Deputies chosen by the towns, and received their credentials from that Convention. In Rhode Island, they were appointed by the General Assembly, and commissioned by the Governor. In Connecticut, they were appointed and instructed by the Committee of Correspondence for the Colony, acting under authority conferred by the House of Representatives. In New York, the mode of appointment was various. In the city and county of New York, the delegates were elected by popular vote taken in seven wards. The same persons were also appointed to act for the counties of West Chester, Albany, and Duchess, by the respective committees of those counties; and another person was appointed in the same manner for the county of Suffolk. The New York delegates received no other instructions than those implied in the certificates, "to attend the Congress and to represent" the county designated. In New Jersey, the delegates were appointed by the committees of counties, and were simply instructed "to represent" the Colony. In Pennsylvania, they were appointed and instructed by the House of Assembly. In the counties of New Castle, Kent, and Sussex on Delaware, delegates were elected by a convention of the freemen assembled in pursuance of circular letters from the Speaker of the House of Assembly. In Maryland, the appointment was by committees of the counties. In Virginia, it was by a popular convention of the whole Colony. In South Carolina, it was by the House of Commons. Georgia was not represented in this Congress.
[8] Journals, I. 1, 12.
[9] The President and Secretary appear to have been chosen viva voce or by a hand vote. John Adam's Works, II. 365.
[10] Adams, II. 366.
[11] This opinion, we are told by Mr. Adams, was advanced by Patrick Henry. See notes of the debate, in Adams, II. 366, 368.
[12] See the very interesting notes of their debates in Adams's Works, II. 366, 370-377.
[13] Journals, I. 10.
[14] The instructions embraced in the credentials of the delegates to the first Congress were as follows:—New Hampshire,—"to devise, consult, and adopt such measures as may have the most likely tendency to extricate the colonies from their present difficulties; to secure and perpetuate their rights, liberties, and privileges; and to restore that peace, harmony, and mutual confidence which once happily subsisted between the parent country and her colonies." Massachusetts,—"to deliberate and determine upon wise and proper measures, to be by them recommended to all the colonies, for the recovery and establishment of their just rights and liberties, civil and religious, and the restoration of union and harmony between Great Britain and the colonies, most ardently desired by all good men." Rhode Island,—"to meet and join with the other commissioners or delegates from the other colonies in consulting upon proper measures to obtain a repeal of the several acts of the British Parliament for levying taxes upon his Majesty's subjects in America without their consent, and particularly the commercial connection of the colonies with the mother country, for the relief of Boston and the preservation of American liberty." Virginia,—"to consider of the most proper and effectual manner of so operating on the commercial connection of the colonies with the mother country, as to procure redress for the much injured Province of Massachusetts Bay, to secure British America from the ravage and ruin of arbitrary taxes, and speedily to procure the return of that harmony and union so beneficial to the whole empire, and so ardently desired by all British America." South Carolina,—"to consider the acts lately passed and bills depending in Parliament with regard to the port of Boston and Colony of Massachusetts Bay, which acts and bills, in the precedent and consequences, affect the whole continent of America;—also the grievances under which America labors by reason of the several acts of Parliament that impose taxes or duties for raising a revenue, and lay unnecessary restraints and burdens on trade;—and of the statutes, parliamentary acts, and royal instructions, which make an invidious distinction between his Majesty's subjects in Great Britain and America; with full power and authority to concert, agree to, and effectually prosecute such legal measures as, in the opinion of the said deputies and of the deputies so to be assembled, shall be most likely to obtain a repeal of the said acts and a redress of these grievances." The delegates from New York and New Jersey were simply instructed "to represent" those colonies in the Congress. Journals, I. 2-9.
[15] Letter of the Congress to Governor Gage, October 10, 1774. Journals, I. 25, 26.
[16] Additions were made to it.
[17] Works of John Adams.
[18] See the origin of these expressions explained, in Adams's Works, II. 373-375.
[19] Journals, I. 29.
[20] Ibid. They adopted also an Address to the People of Great Britain, and a Petition to the King, embodying similar principles with those asserted in the Declaration of Rights. Ibid. 38, 67.
[21] Journals, I. 21.
[22] This association, signed by the delegates, of Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina, as well as of the other colonies, contained, among other things, the following agreement:—"We will neither import nor purchase any slaves imported after the first day of December next; after which time we will wholly discontinue the slave-trade, and will neither be concerned in it ourselves, nor will we hire our vessels, nor sell our commodities or manufactures, to those who are concerned in it." Journals, I. 33.
[23] Journals, I. 56. Oct. 22, 1774.
[24] Peyton Randolph, President of the first and reëlected President of the second Congress, died very suddenly at Philadelphia on the 22d of October, 1775, and was succeeded in that office by John Hancock. Mr. Randolph was one of the most eminent of the Virginia patriots, and an intimate friend of Washington. Richard Henry Lee wrote to Washington, on the day after his death, that "in him American liberty lost a powerful advocate, and human nature a sincere friend." He was formerly Attorney-General of Virginia, and in 1753 went to England as agent of the House of Burgesses, to procure the abolition of a fee, known as the pistole fee, which it had been the custom of the Governors of Virginia to charge for signing land patents, as a perquisite of their office. He succeeded in getting the fee abolished in cases where the quantity of land exceeded one hundred acres. He was commander of a company of mounted volunteers called the Gentlemen Associators, who served in the French war. He was President of the Virginia Convention, as well as a Delegate in Congress, at the time of his death. Sparks's Washington, II. 58, 161; III. 139, 140; XII. 420.
[25] In Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, they were made in December; in Connecticut, in November; in New Jersey, in January; in South Carolina, in February; in the Lower Counties on Delaware and in Virginia, in March; in North Carolina, on the 5th of April; and in New York, on the 22d of April.
[26] Virginia renewed her delegation for one year from the 11th of August, 1775, and Maryland hers with powers to act until the 25th of March, 1776. These new delegations, as well as that of Georgia, appeared on the 13th of September, 1775. On the 16th of September, a renewed delegation appeared from New Hampshire, without limitation of time; Connecticut sent a new delegation on the 16th of January, 1776, and Massachusetts did the same on the 31st of January, for the year 1776. The persons of the delegates were not often changed.
[27] Journals, I. 81, 82.
[28] May 15, 1775. Journals, I. 162.
[29] Journals, I. 112.
[30] Form of enlistment, Journals, I. 118.
[31] Ibid.
[32] See note at end of the chapter.
[33] Secret Journals of Congress, I. 18; Pitkin's History of the United States, I. 334, 335.
[34] Journals, I. 122.
[35] June 16-July 4, 1775. Journals, I. 112-133.
[36] Journals, I. 125, June 23, 1775. Ibid., I. 185, July 29, 1775.
[37] Ibid.
[38] Journals, I. 186, July 29, 1775. Michael Hillegas and George Clymer, Esquires, were elected Treasurers.
[39] Journals, I. 177, 178, July 26, 1775. Dr. Franklin was elected Postmaster-General for one year, and until another should be appointed by a future Congress.
[40] Journals, I. 106.
[41] Journals, I. 170.
[42] Journals, I. 285.
[43] Journals, I. 161, 162.
[44] Journals, II. 112, 141, 163, 201, 255, 302, 304.
[45] Journals, I. 213; II. 5.
[46] June 9, 1775.
[47] November 3, 1775.
[48] December 4, 1775.
[49] Journals, I. 115.
[50] Journals, I. 231, 235, 279.
[51] Annual Register.
[52] May 10, 1776. Journals, II. 166, 174.
[53] Richard Henry Lee, the mover of this resolution, was born on the 20th of June, 1732, at Stratford, Westmoreland County, Virginia. His earlier education was completed in England, whence he returned in his nineteenth year. Possessed of a good fortune, he devoted himself to public affairs. At the age of twenty-five, he entered the House of Burgesses, where he became a distinguished advocate of republican doctrines, and a strenuous opponent of the right claimed by Parliament to tax the colonies, of the Stamp Act, and of the other arbitrary measures of the home government, coöperating with Patrick Henry in all his great patriotic efforts. He was the author of the plan adopted by the House of Burgesses in 1773, for the formation of committees of correspondence, to be organized by the colonial legislatures, and out of which grew the plan of the Continental Congress. In 1774, he was elected one of the delegates from Virginia to the Congress, in which body, from his known ability as a political writer and his services in the popular cause, he was placed on the committees to prepare the addresses to the King, to the People of Great Britain, and to the People of the Colonies, the last of which he wrote. In the second Congress, he was selected to move the resolution of Independence; and besides serving on other very important committees, he furnished, as chairman of the committee instructed to prepare them, the commission and instructions to General Washington. As mover of the resolution of Independence, he would, according to the usual practice, have been made chairman of the committee to prepare the Declaration; but on the 10th of June, the day when the subject was postponed, he was obliged to leave Congress, and return home for a short time, on account of the illness of some member of his family. He came back to Congress and remained a member until June, 1777, when he went home on account of ill health. In August, 1778, he was again elected a member, and continued to serve until 1780; but from feeble health was compelled to take a less active part than he had taken in former years. He was out of Congress from 1780 until 1784, when he was elected its President, but retired at the end of the year. He was opposed to the Constitution of the United States, but voted in Congress to submit it to the people. After its adoption, he was elected one of the first Senators under it from Virginia, and in that capacity moved and carried several amendments. In 1792, his continued ill health obliged him to retire from public life. He died June 19, 1794.
[54] Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and R. R. Livingston.
[55] See note at the end of the chapter.
[56] On the 24th of June, 1776, the Congress declared, by resolution, that "all persons abiding within any of the United Colonies, and deriving protection from the laws of the same, owed allegiance to the said laws, and were members of such colony; and that all persons passing through or making a temporary stay in any of the colonies, being entitled to the protection of the laws, during the time of such passage, visitation, or temporary stay, owed, during the same, allegiance thereto." Journals, II. 216.
[57] The title of "The United States of America" was formally assumed in the Articles of Confederation, when they came to be adopted. But it was in use, without formal enactment, from the date of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. On the 9th of September, 1776, it was ordered that in all continental commissions and other instruments, where the words "United Colonies" had been used, the style should be altered to the "United States." Journals, II. 349.
[58] Journals, II. 263, 320; III. 123, 502, 513.
[59] From June 11, 1776, to November 17, 1777.
[60] Sparks's Washington, III. 20, note.
[61] Works, III. 20.
[62] Ibid. 46.
[63] Ibid. 47.
[64] Ibid. 55.
[65] Ibid. 56.
[66] Letters of General Washington to the President of Congress, September 21, 1775 (Works, III. 98); October 30, 1775 (Ibid. 137); November 8, 1775 (Ibid. 146).
[67] Letters of General Washington to Joseph Reed, November 8, 1775 (Works, III. 150); November 28, 1775 (Ibid. 177); and to the President of Congress, December 4, 1775 (Ibid. 184); to Governor Cooke of Connecticut, December 5, 1775 (Ibid. 188).
[68] Journals of Congress, II. 208, September 29, 1775.
[69] Writings of Washington, III. 123, note.
[70] February 9, 1776 (Works, III. 278).
[71] Mr. Jefferson once said to my kinsman, Mr. George Ticknor, that when they had any doubtful and difficult measure to carry in this Congress, they counted the four New England colonies, and Virginia, as sure; and then they looked round to see where they could get two more, to make the needful majority.
[72] The General Assembly of New York met on the 10th of January, 1775, and by a small majority refused to approve of the non-importation association formed by the first Congress, and also declined to appoint delegates to the second Congress, which was to assemble in May. They adopted, however, a list of grievances, which was substantially the same with that which had been put forth by the first Congress. Towards the close of the session, in the absence of some of the patriotic members, petitions to the King and to Parliament were adopted, which differed somewhat from the principles contained in their list of grievances, and in which they disapproved "of the violent measures that had been pursued in some of the colonies." But the people of New York generally conformed to the non-importation agreement; and on the 20th of April they met in convention and appointed delegates to the second Congress, "to concert and determine upon such matters as shall be judged most advisable for the preservation and reëstablishment of American rights and privileges." Pitkin's History of the United States, I. 324.
[73] "I do not mean," the orders continued, "that they should be kept in close confinement. If either of these bodies should incline to send them to any interior towns, upon their parole not to leave them until they are released, it will meet with my concurrence. For the present, I shall avoid giving you the like order in respect to the Tories in Portsmouth; but the day is not far off, when they will meet with this, or a worse fate, if there is not a considerable reformation in their conduct." Writings of Washington, III. 158, 159.
[74] Writings of Washington, III. 230, note.
[75] Writings of Washington, III. 230, note. See also Marshall's Life of Washington, II. 285-287.
[76] Writings of Washington, III. 230.
[77] Ibid., note.
[78] Journals of Congress, II. 7-9. January 3, 1776. Congress had, on the 2d of January, passed resolves, recommending to the different assemblies, conventions, and committees or councils of safety, to restrain the Tories, and had declared that they ought to be disarmed, and the more dangerous of them kept in custody. For this purpose, the aid of the continental troops stationed in or near the respective colonies was tendered to the local authorities. Journals, II. 4, 5.
[79] The resolves of the Congress on this subject amounted to an outlawry of the persons against whom they were directed. They were introduced by a preamble, reciting the disaffection of a majority of the inhabitants of Queen's County, evinced by their refusal to elect deputies to the convention of the colony, by their public declaration of a design to remain inactive spectators of the contest, and their general want of public spirit; and declaring, that "those who refuse to defend their country should be excluded from its protection, and prevented from doing it injury." The first resolve then proceeded to declare that all the inhabitants of Queen's County named in a list of delinquents published by the Convention of New York be put out of the protection of the United Colonies, that all trade and intercourse with them cease, and that no inhabitant of that county be permitted to travel or abide in any part of the United Colonies, out of that county, without a certificate from the Convention or Committee of Safety of New York, setting forth that such inhabitant is a friend to the American cause, and not of the number of those who voted against sending deputies to the Convention; and that any inhabitant found out of the county, without such certificate, be apprehended and imprisoned three months. The second resolve declared that any attorney or lawyer who should commence, prosecute, or defend any action at law, for any inhabitant of Queen's County who voted against sending deputies to the Convention, ought to be treated as an enemy to the American cause. The fourth resolve directed that Colonel Nathaniel Heard, of Woodbridge, N. J., should march, with five or six hundred minute-men, to the western part of Queen's County, and that Colonel Waterbury, of Stamford, Connecticut, with the same number of minute-men, march to the eastern side; that they confer together and endeavor to enter the county on the same day, and that they proceed to disarm every person in the county who voted against sending deputies to the Convention, and cause them to deliver up their arms and ammunition on oath, and confine in safe custody, until further orders, all those who should refuse compliance. These resolves were passed on the 3d of January, 1776, and were reported by a committee on the state of New York. On the 10th of January, on account of "the great distance from Colonel Heard to Colonel Waterbury, and the difficulty of coöperating with each other in their expedition into Queen's County," Congress directed Lord Stirling to furnish Colonel Heard with three companies from his command, who were to join Colonel Heard with his minute-men, and proceed immediately on the expedition; and also directed Heard to inform Waterbury that his services would not be required. Journals, II. 21.
[80] He received this impression from General Lee, who wrote on the 16th of January and informed him that Colonel Waterbury had "received orders to disband his regiment, and the Tories are to remain unmolested till they are joined by the King's assassins." Sparks's Life of Gouverneur Morris, I. 75.
[81] Letter to General Lee, January 23, 1776. Writings of Washington, III. 255.
[82] Marshall's Life of Washington, II., Appendix, xvii.
[83] Letter to General Lee, January 31, 1776. Writings of Washington, III. 275.
[84] February 6, 1776. Journals, II. 51.
[85] Sparks's Life of Gouverneur Morris, I. 75, 76. They wished to "save appearances with the [enemy's] ships of war, till at least the month of March."
[86] January 26, 1776. Journals, II. 39.
[87] January 30.
[88] March 14, 1776. Journals, II. 91.
[89] Letter of General Washington to the President of Congress.
[90] Resolve passed October 5, 1775. Journals of Congress, II. 197.
[91] These vessels were fitted out from the ports of Salem, Beverly, Marblehead, and Plymouth. They were officered and manned chiefly by sea-captains and sailors who happened to be at that time in the army. They sailed under instructions from General Washington, to take and seize all vessels in the ministerial service, bound into or out of Boston, having soldiers, arms and ammunition, or provisions on board, and to send them into the nearest port, under a careful prize-master, to wait his further directions. The first person commissioned in this way by the Commander-in-chief was Captain Nicholas Broughton of Marblehead, who sailed in the schooner Hannah, fitted out at Beverly; and in his instructions he was described as "a captain in the army of the United Colonies of North America," and was directed to take the command of "a detachment of said army, and proceed on board the schooner Hannah, lately fitted out, &c. at the continental expense." Another of these vessels, called the Lee, was commanded by Captain John Manly. The names of three others of them were the Harrison, the Washington, and the Lynch. The name of the sixth vessel is not known, but the names of the four other captains were Selman, Martindale, Coit, and Adams. (Writings of Washington, III. 516.) When Washington received directions from the President of Congress to send two vessels to the mouth of the St. Lawrence, he wrote, on the 12th of October, that one of these vessels was then out, and that two of them would be despatched as directed, immediately. (Ibid., III. 124.) In the course of a few weeks, they were all out.
[92] Letter to the President of Congress, November 11, 1775. Writings of Washington, III. 154.
[93] Journals, I. 260.
[94] On the 4th of December, he repeated his former recommendation to the President of Congress. (Writings of Washington, III. 184.) On the 26th of December, he wrote to Richard Henry Lee, in Congress, begging him to use his influence in having a court of admiralty or some power appointed to hear and determine all matters relative to captures; saying, "You cannot conceive how I am plagued on this head, and how impossible it is for me to hear and determine upon matters of this sort, when the facts, perhaps, are only to be ascertained at ports forty, fifty, or more miles distant, without bringing the parties here [Cambridge] at great trouble and expense. At any rate, my time will not allow me to be a competent judge of this business." Ibid., III. 217.
[95] Letter to the President of Congress, February 9, 1776. Ibid., III. 282. Letter to Joseph Reed, February 10, 1776. Ibid., III. 284.
[96] Ibid., III. 370.
[97] This was the emission ordered on the 23d of June, 1775. There were forty-nine thousand bills of each denomination from one dollar to eight dollars, inclusive, and eleven thousand eight hundred bills of the denomination of twenty dollars. The form of the bills was as follows (Journals, I. 126):—
Continental Currency.
No. ________________ Dollars.
This Bill entitles the Bearer to receive ________________ Spanish milled Dollars, or the value thereof in Gold or Silver, according to the Resolutions of the Congress, held at Philadelphia on the 10th day of May, A. D. 1775.
[98] Journals, I. 177.