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Chapter 47:
Great Britain Centres in itself power over its Colonies. —Hillsborough's Administration of the Colonies con-cluded.
June.
1771—August, 1772.
the
King steadily pursued the system of concen-
Chap. XLVII.} 1771.
June. |
trating all power over the Colonies; but so gradually that a sudden, complete collision with ancient usage was avoided.
If the
Charter of the Province had been taken away,
1 even the moderate would have held themselves absolved from their allegiance.
2 But the appointment of a native Bostonian as Governor, seemed to many a pledge of relenting; and his plausible professions hushed the people into silence.
‘The glorious spirit of liberty is vanquished and left without hope but in a miracle,’ said desponding patriots.
‘I confess,’ said
Samuel Adams, ‘we have, as
Wolfe expressed it, a choice of difficulties.
Too many flatter themselves that their pusillanimity is true prudence; but in perilous times like these, I cannot conceive
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of prudence without fortitude.’
3 He persever-
Chap. XLVII.} 1771.
June. |
ed; but
John Adams retired from ‘the service of the people,’ and devoting himself to his profession,
4 for a time ceased even to employ his pen in their defence.
5 Otis who had returned to the Legislature, disordered in mind, and jealous of his declining influence, did but impede the public cause.
In
Hancock, also, vanity so mingled with patriotism, that the
Government hoped to separate him from its uncompromising opponents.
6
The Assembly which for the third year was convened at
Cambridge, overruled the advice of
Samuel Adams, and was proceeding with business.
Yet it adopted the Protest in which he drew the distinction between the existence of a prerogative and its abuse; and significantly inquired, what would follow in
England, if a
British King should call a Parliament in
Cornwall and keep it there seven years. Nor did he omit to expose the rapid consolidation of power in the hands of the executive by the double process of making all civil officers dependent for support solely on the
King, and giving to arbitrary instructions an authority paramount to the
Charter and the laws.
The Protest had hardly been adopted, when the
application of its doctrines became necessary.
The Commissioners of the Customs had through
Hutchinson7 applied for an exemption of their salaries from
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the colonial income tax; and
Hillsborough, disregard-
Chap. XLVII.} 1771. July. |
ing a usage of more than fifty years, commanded the compliance of the legislature.
The engrossed taxbill for the year was of the same tenor with the annual Acts from time immemorial.
The assessors had moreover rated the
Commissioners with extreme moderation.
Persons who had less income, were taxed as much as they, so that it did not even appear that any regard was had to their salaries.
8 Paxton's provincial tax for all his personal estate and all his income, was for the last year less than three pounds sterling; and what he paid to the town and county not much more.
9 And to defeat this little tax, in itself so reasonable, so consonant to usage, and in its apportionment so forbearing,
Hutchinson, on the fourth of July, greatly against his own judgment, negatived the Bill, and declared his obligation under his instructions to negative any other, drawn in the same usual terms.
The stopping supplies by a veto of the Crown was unknown in
England; an order from the
King to exempt special individuals from their share of taxation was unconstitutional; the exemption, if submitted to by the Assembly, would have been an acquiescence in an unwarrantable instruction; and a formal recognition of the system of parliamentary taxation.
Samuel Adams perceived all the danger, and on the next day, the
House replied in his words: ‘We know of no
Commissioners of his Majesty's Customs, nor of any revenue his Majesty has a right to establish in
North America; we know and feel a tribute levied
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405]
and extorted from those, who, if they have property,
Chap. XLVII.} 1771. July. |
have a right to the absolute disposal of it. To withhold your assent to this bill, merely by force of instruction, is effectually vacating the
Charter and giving instructions the force of laws, within this Province.
If such a doctrine shall be established, the representatives of a free people would be reduced to this fatal alternative,—either to have no taxes levied and raised at all, or to have them raised and levied in such a way and manner, and upon those only whom his Majesty pleases.’
10 At the first meeting of the Assembly, loyalty had visibly prevailed, and the decided patriots were in a minority; necessity had extorted the most explicit assertion of colonial rights, and an unanswerable exposition of the limit of the prerogative.
In closing the session
Hutchinson put at issue the respect for monarchy itself.
‘I know,’ said he, ‘that your messages and resolves of the last year were very displeasing to the
King;
11 I shall transmit my messages, and this your extraordinary answer to be laid before him.’
Thus the Province was led to speculate on the personal opinions of their Sovereign, and to inquire into the use of regal power itself; while the
King regarded the contest with
Massachusetts as involving not only the power of
Great Britain and the rights of the Crown, but his personal honor.
Wise men saw the event that was approaching, but not that it was so near.
‘Out of the eater cometh forth meat,’ said
Cooper the clergyman;
12 and
Franklin
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foretold a bloody struggle, in which ‘
America's
Chap. XLVII.} 1771. July. |
growing strength and magnitude,’
13 would give her the victory.
The progress of opinion was marked by the instructions of the
House to its Agent, which unreservedly embodied the principle that colonial legislation was free of Parliament and of royal instructions.
They were drawn by
Samuel Adams, who had long before said in
Town Meeting; ‘Independent we are, and independent we will be.’
‘I doubt,’ said
Hutchinson, ‘whether there is a greater incendiary than he in the
King's dominions.’
14 At least his intrepidity could not be
questioned.
His language became more explicit as danger drew nearer.
In August,
Boston saw in its harbor twelve vessels of war, carrying more than two hundred and sixty guns, commanded by Mon. tagu, the brother of
Sandwich.
15
Yet there was no one salient wrong, to attract the sudden and universal attention of the people.
The Southern Governors felt no alarm.
Eden from
Maryland congratulated Hillsborough, on the return of confidence and harmony.
16 ‘The people,’ thus
Johnson, the
Agent of
Connecticut wrote after his return home, ‘appear to be weary of their altercations with the
Mother Country; a little discreet conduct on both sides, would perfectly reestablish that warm affection and respect towards
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Great Britain, for which this country was once so
Chap. XLVII.} 1771. Sept. |
Remarkable.’
17
Hutchinson, too, reported ‘a disposition in all the Colonies to let the controversy with the kingdom subside.’
18 The
King sent word to tempt
Hancock by marks of favor.
‘
Hancock and most of the party,’ said the
Governor, ‘are quiet; and all of them, except
Adams, abate of their virulence.
Adams would push the Continent into a rebellion to-morrow, if it was in his power.’
19 While
America generally was so tranquil,
Samuel Adams continued musing till the fire within him burned; and the thought of correspondence and union among the friends of liberty flashed upon his mind.
‘It would be an arduous task,’ he said, meditating a project which required a year's reflection for its maturity, ‘to awaken a sufficient number in the colonies to so grand an undertaking.
Nothing, however, should be despaired of. We have nothing,’ he continued, ‘to rely upon but the interposition of our friends in Britain, of which I have no expectation, or the last Appeal.
20 The tragedy of American freedom is
nearly completed.
A tyranny seems to be at the very door.
They who lie under oppression deserve what they suffer; let them perish with their oppressors.
Could millions be enslaved if all possessed the independent spirit of
Brutus, who to his immortal
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honor, expelled the tyrant of
Rome, and his royal
and rebellious race?
The liberties of our country are worth defending at all hazards.
If we should suffer them to be wrested from us, millions yet unborn may be the miserable sharers in the event.
21 Every step has been taken but one; and the last appeal would require prudence, unanimity, and fortitude.
America must herself, under God, finally work out her own salvation.’
22
While these opinions were boldly uttered, Hutch-
inson, in the annual Proclamation which appointed the Festival of Thanksgiving and which used to be read from every pulpit, sought to ensnare the clergy by enumerating as a cause for gratitude, ‘that civil and religious liberties were continued,’ and ‘trade enlarged.’
He was caught in his own toils.
All the
Boston ministers except one refused to read the paper; when
Pemberton, of whose church the
Governor was a member, began confusedly to do so; the patriots of his congregation, turning their backs on him, walked out of meeting in great indignation; and nearly all the
Ministers agreed on the
Thanksgiving Day ‘to implore of Almighty God the restoration of lost liberties.’
23
Nowise disheartened,
Hutchinson waited eagerly
and confidently ‘to hear how the extravagance of the Assembly in their last session would be resented by the
King;’ now striving to set
Hancock more and
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more against
Adams; now seeking to lull the people
into security; now boasting of his band of writers on the side of Government, Church, a professed patriot, being of the number; now triumphing at the spectacle of
Otis, who was carried into the country, bound hand and foot as a maniac; now speculating on the sale of cheap teas at high prices; now urging the
Government in
England to remodel all the
New England Provinces, even while he pretended that they were quiet and submissive.
His only fears were lest the advice he had sent to the Ministry should become known in
America, and lest
Temple, who had gone to
England and bore him contemptuous hatred, should estrange from him the confidence of
Whately.
Confirmed by the seeming tranquillity in
America, and by the almost unprecedented strength of the Ministry in Parliament,
Hillsborough gave free scope to the conceit, wrongheadedness, obstinacy and passion, which marked his character, and perplexed and embarrassed affairs by the perverse and senseless
24 exercise of authority.
To show his firmness, he still required the Legislature of Massachusetts to exempt the
Commissioners from taxation, or the tax bill should be negatived; while
Gage was enjoined to attend to the security of the fortress in
Boston harbor.
In
Georgia, Noble
Wimberly Jones, a man of exemplary life and character, had been elected Speaker.
Wright, who reported him to be ‘a very strong Liberty Boy,’ would not consent to the choice; and the
House voted the interference a
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breach of their privileges.
25 Hillsborough had censur-
ed their unwarrantable and inconsistent arrogance.
26 He now directed the
Governor ‘to put his negative upon any person whom they should next elect for Speaker, and to dissolve the Assembly in case they should question the right of such negative.’
27
The affections of
South Carolina were still more
thoroughly alienated.
Its public men were ruled by their sense of honor, and felt a stain upon it as a wound.
A Carolinian in the time of
Lyttleton, had been abruptly dismissed from the
King's Council; and from that day it became the pride of native Carolinians not to accept a seat in that body.
28 The members of the Assembly ‘disdained to take any pay for their attendance.’
29 Since March 1771, no legislative Act had been perfected,
30 because the
Governor refused to pass any appropriations which should cover the grant of the Assembly to the Society for the
Bill of Rights; but the patriot planters ever stood ready to lend their private credit and purses to the wants of their own colonial Agents or Committees.
To extend the benefit of Courts of Justice into the interior, the Province, at an expense of five thousand pounds,
31 bought out the monopoly of
Richard Cumberland as Provost by patent for the whole; and had offered to establish salaries for the
Judges, if the Commissions of those Judges were but made permanent as in
England.
At last, in 1769,
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trusting to the honor of the Crown, they voted perpe-
tual grants of salaries.
When this was done,
Rawlins Lowndes and others, their own judges, taken from among themselves, were dismissed; and an Irishman, a Scotchman, and a Welshman were sent over by Hillsborough to take their places.
32 ‘We, none of us,’ said the planters, ‘can expect the honors of the
State; they are all given away to worthless, poor sycophants.’
33 The Governor,
Lord Charles Greville Montagu, had no Palace at
Charleston; he uttered a threat to convene the
South Carolina Assembly at
Port Royal, unless they would vote him a house to his mind.
34 This is the culminating point of administrative insolence.
The system of concentrating all colonial power in
England was resisted also at the
West.
35 In
Illinois the corruption and favoritism of the military commander compelled the people to a remonstrance.
The removal of them all to places within the limits of some established Colony, was the mode of pacification which Hillsborough deliberately approved.
The Spanish jurisdiction across the river offered so near a sanctuary, that such a policy was impracticable.
An establishment by the Crown upon the lowest plan of expense, and without any intermixture of popular power, was thought of. ‘A regular constitutional Government for them,’ said
Gage, ‘cannot be suggested.
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They don't deserve so much attention.’
‘I
Chap. XLVII.} 1772.
March |
agree with you,’ rejoined Hillsborough; ‘a regular Government for that District would be highly improper.’
The people of
Illinois, weary of the shameless despotism which aimed only at forestalling tracts of land, the monopoly of the
Indian trade, or the ruin of the
French villages, took their cause into their own hands; they demanded institutions like those of
Connecticut, and set themselves inflexibly against any proposal for a Government, which should be irresponsible to themselves.
In 1771, they had assembled in a
General Meeting, and had fixed upon their scheme; they never departed from it; ‘expecting to appoint their own Governor and all civil Magistrates.’
36 The rights of freemen were demanded as boldly on the
Prairies of
Illinois as in
Carolina or
New England.
Towards the people at
Vincennes,
Hillsborough was less relenting; for there was no Spanish shore to which they could fly. They were, by formal proclamation, peremptorily commanded to retire within the jurisdiction of some one of the Colonies.
37 But the men
38 of
Indiana were as unwilling to abandon their homes in a settlement already seventy years old,
39 as those of
Illinois to give up the hope of freedom.
The spirit of discontent pervaded every village in the wilderness; and what allegiance would men of French origin bear to a
British King who proposed to take away their estates and to deny them liberty?
The log cabins having been planted,
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and hopes of self-government called into existence, it
Chap. XLVII.} 1772.
April. |
was beyond the power of the
British King to remove the one or the other.
The inhabitants of
Virginia were controlled by the central authority on a subject of still more vital importance to them and their posterity.
Their halls of legislation had resounded with eloquence directed against the terrible plague of negro slavery.
Again and again they had passed laws, restraining the importations of negroes from
Africa; but their laws were disallowed.
How to prevent them from protecting themselves against the increase of the overwhelming evil was debated by the
King in Council, and on the tenth day of December, 1770, he issued an instruction, under his own hand, commanding the
Governor, ‘upon pain of the highest displeasure, to assent to no law, by which the importation of slaves should be in any respect prohibited or obstructed.’
40 In April 1772, this rigorous order was solemnly debated in the Assembly of Virginia. ‘They were very anxious for an Act to restrain the introduction of people, the number of whom already in the Colony, gave them just cause to apprehend the most dangerous consequences, and therefore made it necessary that they should fall upon means not only of preventing their increase, but also of lessening their number.
The interest of the country,’ it was said, ‘manifestly requires the total expulsion of them.’
41
Jefferson, like
Richard Henry Lee, had begun his
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legislative career by efforts for emancipation.
To the
Chap. XLVII.} 1772.
April. |
mind of
Patrick Henry, the thought of slavery darkened the picture of the future, even while he cherished faith in the ultimate abolition of an evil, which, though the law sanctioned, religion opposed.
42 To have approached Parliament with a Petition against the Slave-Trade might have seemed a recognition of its supreme legislative power;
Virginia, therefore, resolved to address the
King himself, who in Council had cruelly compelled the toleration of the nefarious traffic.
They pleaded with him for leave to protect themselves against the crimes of commercial avarice, and these were their words:
The importation of slaves into the Colonies from the Coast of Africa, hath long been considered as a trade of great inhumanity; and, under its present encouragement, we have too much reason to fear, will endanger the very existence of your Majesty's American dominions.
We are sensible that some of your Majesty's subjects in Great Britain may reap emoluments from this sort of traffic; but when we consider, that it greatly retards the settlement of the Colonies with more useful inhabitants, and may in time have the most destructive influence, we presume to hope that the interest of a few will be disregarded, when placed in competition with the security and happiness of such numbers of your Majesty's dutiful and loyal subjects.
Deeply impressed with these sentiments, we most humbly beseech your Majesty to remove all those restraints on your Majesty's Governors of this Colony
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which inhibit their assenting to such laws, as might check so very pernicious a commerce.
In this manner
Virginia led the host, who alike condemned slavery and opposed the Slave-Trade.
Thousands in
Maryland and in
New Jersey, were ready to adopt a similar Petition; so were the Legislatures of
North Carolina, of
Pennsylvania, of
New-York.
Massachusetts, in its towns and in its Legislature, unceasingly combated the condition as well as the sale of slaves.
There was no jealousy among one another in the strife against the crying evil;
Virginia harmonized all opinions, and represented the moral sentiment and policy of them all. When her Prayer reached
England,
Franklin through the Press called to it the sympathy of the people; again and again it was pressed upon the attention of the
Ministers.
But the
Government of that day was less liberal than the tribunals; and while a question respecting a negro from
Virginia led the courts of law to an axiom, that, as soon as any slave sets his foot on English ground, he becomes free, the
King of
England stood in the path of humanity, and made himself the pillar of the colonial Slave-Trade.
Wherever in the Colonies a disposition was shown for its restraint, his servants were peremptorily ordered to maintain it without abatement.
But he blushed to reject the solemn appeal of
Virginia personally to himself, and evaded a reply.
43
For the last five years there had been no contested election in
Boston.
Deceived by the apparent tranquillity, the friends of Government attempted to
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defeat the choice of
Samuel Adams as Representative.
The effort failed; he had more than twice and a half as many votes as his opponent,
44 and the malice of his enemies rendered him still dearer to the people.
The Legislature was for the fourth year, convened
at
Cambridge; but the
Governor had grown weary of his pretensions, and with a very ill grace, against his declared purpose, adjourned the session to the accustomed House in
Boston.
The long altercation on that subject subsided; but the system of British supremacy was sure to produce new collisions.
Inhabitants of
Providence, in Rhode Island, had in the last March, complained to the
Deputy Governor of the conduct of
Lieutenant Dudingston,
Commander of the
Gaspee, who obstructed their vessels and boats, without showing any evidence of his authority.
Hopkins, the
Chief Justice, on being consulted, gave the opinion, ‘that any person who should come into the Colony and exercise any authority by force of arms, without showing his commission to the
Governor, and if a Custom House officer, without being sworn into his office, was guilty of a trespass, if not piracy.’
The Governor, therefore, sent a sheriff on board the
Gaspee, to ascertain by what orders the
Lieutenant acted; and
Dudingston referred the subject to the
Admiral.
The
Admiral answered from
Boston: ‘The
Lieutenant,
Sir, has done his duty.
I shall give the
King's officers directions, that they send every man taken in molesting them to me. As sure as the people of
Newport attempt to rescue any vessel, and any of them
45
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are taken, I will hang them as pirates.’
46 Dudings-
Chap. XLVII.} 1772.
June. |
ton seconded the insolence of his superior officer, insulted the inhabitants, plundered the islands of sheep and hogs, cut down trees, fired at market boats, detained vessels without a colorable pretext, and made illegal seizures of goods of which the recovery cost more than they were worth
47
On the ninth of June, the
Providence Packet was returning to
Providence, and proud of its speed, went gayly on, heedless of the
Gaspee.
Dudingston gave chase.
The tide being at flood, the Packet ventured near shore; the
Gaspee confidently followed; and drawing more water ran aground on Nauquit, a little below Pantuxet.
The following night a party of men in six or seven boats, led by
John Brown and
Joseph Brown of
Providence, and
Simeon Potter of
Bristol, boarded the stranded schooner, after a scuffle in which
Dudingston was wounded, took and landed its crew, and then set it on fire.
48 The whole was conducted on a sudden impulse;
49 yet
Sandwich who was spoken of for the place of Colonial
Secretary of State, resolved never to leave pursuing the Colony of
Rhode Island, until its Charter should be taken away.
50 ‘A few punished at Execution Dock, would
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be the only effectual preventive of any further at-
Chap. XLVII.} 1772.
June. |
tempt,’ wrote
Hutchinson, who wished to see a beginnin of taking men prisoners, and carrying them directly to
England.
51 There now existed a statute authorizing such a procedure.
Two months before, the
King had assented to an Act for the better securing Dock-yards, ships and stores, which extended to the Colonies, made death the penalty for destroying even the oar of a cutter's boat, or the head of an empty cask belonging to the fleet, and subjected the accused to a trial in any county in
Great Britain.
Of this statute, which violated every safeguard of
justice and might be still more mischievous as a precedent, the Assembly of Massachusetts at that time took no notice, confining its attention to the gradual change in the
Constitution of the Colony, effected by the payment of the
King's civil officers through warrants under his sign manual, drawn on a perennial fund raised by an Act of Parliament.
They regarded the
Charter as ‘a most solemn compact,’ which bound them to
Great Britain.
By that Charter they held, they were to have a Governor and Judges, over whom the power of the
King was protected by the right of nomination, the power of the Colony by the exclusive right of providing support.
These views were embodied
52 by
Hawley in a Report to the Assembly,
53 and on the tenth of July, adopted by a vote of eighty-five to nineteen.
It followed, and was so
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resolved, that a Governor who like
Hutchinson was
Chap. XLVII.} 1772. July. |
not dependent on the people for support, was not such a Governor as the people had consented to, at the granting of the
Charter; the
House most solemnly protested ‘that the innovation was an im portant change of the
Constitution, and exposed the Province to a despotic administration of Government.’
The inference was unavoidable.
If the principle contained in the Preamble to
Townshend's Revenue Act should be carried out, obedience would no longer be due to the
Governor, and the rightful dependence on
England would be at an end.
Deceived by the want of organized union among the Colonies,
Hutchinson sent word to Hillsborough, that ‘if the nation would arouse and unite in measures to retain the Colonies in subordination, all this new doctrine of independence would be disavowed, and its first inventors be sacrificed to the rage of the people whom they had deluded.’
54 The
Secretary, on his
part, was proceeding with eager haste to carry
Townshend's system into effect; and on the seventh of August, he announced, that the
King, with the ‘entire concurrence of Lord North,
55 had made provision for the support of his law servants in the Province of
Massachusetts Bay.’
56 It was almost a special provision for
Hutchinson's family.
It marks the character of the people, that this act, constituting judges, who held their offices at the
King's pleasure,
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stipendiaries of the Crown, was selected as the crisis
of revolution.
Meantime Hillsborough was left with few supporters except the herd of flatterers who had soothed his vanity, and by their misrepresentations made him subservient to their selfishness.
The
King, having become convinced that he had weakened the respect of the Colonies for a royal Govern ment, was weary of him; his colleagues disliked him, and conspired to drive him into retirement.
57 The occasion was at hand.
Franklin had negotiated with the Treasury for a grant to a Company of about twenty-three millions of acres of land, south of the
Ohio and west of
the Alleghanies;
Hillsborough, from the fear that men in the backwoods would be too independent, opposed the project.
58 Franklin persuaded
Hertford, a friend of the
King's,
Gower the
President of the Council, Camden, the
Secretaries of the Treasury,
59 and others to become shareholders in his scheme; by their influence, the
Lords of Council disregarded the adverse report of the Board of Trade, and decided in favor of planting the new Province.
60 Hillsborough was too proud to brook this public insult; and the
King, soothing his fall by a patent for a British Earldom, accepted his resignation.
But his system remained behind him. When he was gone, Thurlow
61 took care that the grant for the
Western Province
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should never be sealed; and the amiable
Dartmouth,
who became
Secretary for the Colonies, had been taught to believe,
62 like Lord North and the
King, that it was necessary to carry out the policy of consolidation, as set forth in
Townshend's Preamble.
