Part 6 (2/2)

The Stamp Act Congress.-The Ma.s.sachusetts a.s.sembly answered the call of Virginia by inviting the colonies to elect delegates to a Congress to be held in New York to discuss the situation. Nine colonies responded and sent representatives. The delegates, while professing the warmest affection for the king's person and government, firmly spread on record a series of resolutions that admitted of no double meaning. They declared that taxes could not be imposed without their consent, given through their respective colonial a.s.semblies; that the Stamp Act showed a tendency to subvert their rights and liberties; that the recent trade acts were burdensome and grievous; and that the right to pet.i.tion the king and Parliament was their heritage. They thereupon made ”humble supplication” for the repeal of the Stamp Act.

The Stamp Act Congress was more than an a.s.sembly of protest. It marked the rise of a new agency of government to express the will of America. It was the germ of a government which in time was to supersede the government of George III in the colonies. It foreshadowed the Congress of the United States under the Const.i.tution. It was a successful attempt at union. ”There ought to be no New England men,” declared Christopher Gadsden, in the Stamp Act Congress, ”no New Yorkers known on the Continent, but all of us Americans.”

The Repeal of the Stamp Act and the Sugar Act.-The effect of American resistance on opinion in England was telling. Commerce with the colonies had been effectively boycotted by the Americans; s.h.i.+ps lay idly swinging at the wharves; bankruptcy threatened hundreds of merchants in London, Bristol, and Liverpool. Workingmen in the manufacturing towns of England were thrown out of employment. The government had sown folly and was reaping, in place of the coveted revenue, rebellion.

Perplexed by the storm they had raised, the ministers summoned to the bar of the House of Commons, Benjamin Franklin, the agent for Pennsylvania, who was in London. ”Do you think it right,” asked Grenville, ”that America should be protected by this country and pay no part of the expenses?” The answer was brief: ”That is not the case; the colonies raised, clothed, and paid during the last war twenty-five thousand men and spent many millions.” Then came an inquiry whether the colonists would accept a modified stamp act. ”No, never,” replied Franklin, ”never! They will never submit to it!” It was next suggested that military force might compel obedience to law. Franklin had a ready answer. ”They cannot force a man to take stamps.... They may not find a rebellion; they may, indeed, make one.”

The repeal of the Stamp Act was moved in the House of Commons a few days later. The sponsor for the repeal spoke of commerce interrupted, debts due British merchants placed in jeopardy, Manchester industries closed, workingmen unemployed, oppression inst.i.tuted, and the loss of the colonies threatened. Pitt and Edmund Burke, the former near the close of his career, the latter just beginning his, argued cogently in favor of retracing the steps taken the year before. Grenville refused. ”America must learn,” he wailed, ”that prayers are not to be brought to Caesar through riot and sedition.” His protests were idle. The Commons agreed to the repeal on February 22, 1766, amid the cheers of the victorious majority. It was carried through the Lords in the face of strong opposition and, on March 18, reluctantly signed by the king, now restored to his right mind.

In rescinding the Stamp Act, Parliament did not admit the contention of the Americans that it was without power to tax them. On the contrary, it accompanied the repeal with a Declaratory Act. It announced that the colonies were subordinate to the crown and Parliament of Great Britain; that the king and Parliament therefore had undoubted authority to make laws binding the colonies in all cases whatsoever; and that the resolutions and proceedings of the colonists denying such authority were null and void.

The repeal was greeted by the colonists with great popular demonstrations. Bells were rung; toasts to the king were drunk; and trade resumed its normal course. The Declaratory Act, as a mere paper resolution, did not disturb the good humor of those who again cheered the name of King George. Their confidence was soon strengthened by the news that even the Sugar Act had been repealed, thus practically restoring the condition of affairs before Grenville and Townshend inaugurated their policy of ”thoroughness.”

Resumption of British Revenue and Commercial Policies

The Townshend Acts (1767).-The triumph of the colonists was brief. Though Pitt, the friend of America, was once more prime minister, and seated in the House of Lords as the Earl of Chatham, his severe illness gave to Townshend and the Tory party practical control over Parliament. Unconvinced by the experience with the Stamp Act, Townshend brought forward and pushed through both Houses of Parliament three measures, which to this day are a.s.sociated with his name. First among his restrictive laws was that of June 29, 1767, which placed the enforcement of the collection of duties and customs on colonial imports and exports in the hands of British commissioners appointed by the king, resident in the colonies, paid from the British treasury, and independent of all control by the colonists. The second measure of the same date imposed a tax on lead, gla.s.s, paint, tea, and a few other articles imported into the colonies, the revenue derived from the duties to be applied toward the payment of the salaries and other expenses of royal colonial officials. A third measure was the Tea Act of July 2, 1767, aimed at the tea trade which the Americans carried on illegally with foreigners. This law abolished the duty which the East India Company had to pay in England on tea exported to America, for it was thought that English tea merchants might thus find it possible to undersell American tea smugglers.

Writs of a.s.sistance Legalized by Parliament.-Had Parliament been content with laying duties, just as a manifestation of power and right, and neglected their collection, perhaps little would have been heard of the Townshend Acts. It provided, however, for the strict, even the harsh, enforcement of the law. It ordered customs officers to remain at their posts and put an end to smuggling. In the revenue act of June 29, 1767, it expressly authorized the superior courts of the colonies to issue ”writs of a.s.sistance,” empowering customs officers to enter ”any house, warehouse, shop, cellar, or other place in the British colonies or plantations in America to search for and seize” prohibited or smuggled goods.

The writ of a.s.sistance, which was a general search warrant issued to revenue officers, was an ancient device hateful to a people who cherished the spirit of personal independence and who had made actual gains in the practice of civil liberty. To allow a ”minion of the law” to enter a man's house and search his papers and premises, was too much for the emotions of people who had fled to America in a quest for self-government and free homes, who had braved such hards.h.i.+ps to establish them, and who wanted to trade without official interference.

The writ of a.s.sistance had been used in Ma.s.sachusetts in 1755 to prevent illicit trade with Canada and had aroused a violent hostility at that time. In 1761 it was again the subject of a bitter controversy which arose in connection with the application of a customs officer to a Ma.s.sachusetts court for writs of a.s.sistance ”as usual.” This application was vainly opposed by James Otis in a speech of five hours' duration-a speech of such fire and eloquence that it sent every man who heard it away ”ready to take up arms against writs of a.s.sistance.” Otis denounced the practice as an exercise of arbitrary power which had cost one king his head and another his throne, a tyrant's device which placed the liberty of every man in jeopardy, enabling any petty officer to work possible malice on any innocent citizen on the merest suspicion, and to spread terror and desolation through the land. ”What a scene,” he exclaimed, ”does this open! Every man, prompted by revenge, ill-humor, or wantonness to inspect the inside of his neighbor's house, may get a writ of a.s.sistance. Others will ask it from self-defense; one arbitrary exertion will provoke another until society is involved in tumult and blood.” He did more than attack the writ itself. He said that Parliament could not establish it because it was against the British const.i.tution. This was an a.s.sertion resting on slender foundation, but it was quickly echoed by the people. Then and there James Otis sounded the call to America to resist the exercise of arbitrary power by royal officers. ”Then and there,” wrote John Adams, ”the child Independence was born.” Such was the hated writ that Townshend proposed to put into the hands of customs officers in his grim determination to enforce the law.

The New York a.s.sembly Suspended.-In the very month that Townshend's Acts were signed by the king, Parliament took a still more drastic step. The a.s.sembly of New York, protesting against the ”ruinous and insupportable” expense involved, had failed to make provision for the care of British troops in accordance with the terms of the Quartering Act. Parliament therefore suspended the a.s.sembly until it promised to obey the law. It was not until a third election was held that compliance with the Quartering Act was wrung from the reluctant province. In the meantime, all the colonies had learned on how frail a foundation their representative bodies rested.

Renewed Resistance in America

From an old print Samuel Adams The Ma.s.sachusetts Circular (1768).-Ma.s.sachusetts, under the leaders.h.i.+p of Samuel Adams, resolved to resist the policy of renewed intervention in America. At his suggestion the a.s.sembly adopted a Circular Letter addressed to the a.s.semblies of the other colonies informing them of the state of affairs in Ma.s.sachusetts and roundly condemning the whole British program. The Circular Letter declared that Parliament had no right to lay taxes on Americans without their consent and that the colonists could not, from the nature of the case, be represented in Parliament. It went on shrewdly to submit to consideration the question as to whether any people could be called free who were subjected to governors and judges appointed by the crown and paid out of funds raised independently. It invited the other colonies, in the most temperate tones, to take thought about the common predicament in which they were all placed.

The Dissolution of a.s.semblies.-The governor of Ma.s.sachusetts, hearing of the Circular Letter, ordered the a.s.sembly to rescind its appeal. On meeting refusal, he promptly dissolved it. The Maryland, Georgia, and South Carolina a.s.semblies indorsed the Circular Letter and were also dissolved at once. The Virginia House of Burgesses, thoroughly aroused, pa.s.sed resolutions on May 16, 1769, declaring that the sole right of imposing taxes in Virginia was vested in its legislature, a.s.serting anew the right of pet.i.tion to the crown, condemning the transportation of persons accused of crimes or trial beyond the seas, and beseeching the king for a redress of the general grievances. The immediate dissolution of the Virginia a.s.sembly, in its turn, was the answer of the royal governor.

The Boston Ma.s.sacre.-American opposition to the British authorities kept steadily rising as a.s.semblies were dissolved, the houses of citizens searched, and troops distributed in increasing numbers among the centers of discontent. Merchants again agreed not to import British goods, the Sons of Liberty renewed their agitation, and women set about the patronage of home products still more loyally.

On the night of March 5, 1770, a crowd on the streets of Boston began to jostle and tease some British regulars stationed in the town. Things went from bad to worse until some ”boys and young fellows” began to throw s...o...b..a.l.l.s and stones. Then the exasperated soldiers fired into the crowd, killing five and wounding half a dozen more. The day after the ”ma.s.sacre,” a ma.s.s meeting was held in the town and Samuel Adams was sent to demand the withdrawal of the soldiers. The governor hesitated and tried to compromise. Finding Adams relentless, the governor yielded and ordered the regulars away.

The Boston Ma.s.sacre stirred the country from New Hamps.h.i.+re to Georgia. Popular pa.s.sions ran high. The guilty soldiers were charged with murder. Their defense was undertaken, in spite of the wrath of the populace, by John Adams and Josiah Quincy, who as lawyers thought even the worst offenders ent.i.tled to their full rights in law. In his speech to the jury, however, Adams warned the British government against its course, saying, that ”from the nature of things soldiers quartered in a populous town will always occasion two mobs where they will prevent one.” Two of the soldiers were convicted and lightly punished.

Resistance in the South.-The year following the Boston Ma.s.sacre some citizens of North Carolina, goaded by the conduct of the royal governor, openly resisted his authority. Many were killed as a result and seven who were taken prisoners were hanged as traitors. A little later royal troops and local militia met in a pitched battle near Alamance River, called the ”Lexington of the South.”

The Gaspee Affair and the Virginia Resolutions of 1773.-On sea as well as on land, friction between the royal officers and the colonists broke out into overt acts. While patrolling Narragansett Bay looking for smugglers one day in 1772, the armed s.h.i.+p, Gaspee, ran ash.o.r.e and was caught fast. During the night several men from Providence boarded the vessel and, after seizing the crew, set it on fire. A royal commission, sent to Rhode Island to discover the offenders and bring them to account, failed because it could not find a single informer. The very appointment of such a commission aroused the patriots of Virginia to action; and in March, 1773, the House of Burgesses pa.s.sed a resolution creating a standing committee of correspondence to develop cooperation among the colonies in resistance to British measures.

The Boston Tea Party.-Although the British government, finding the Townshend revenue act a failure, repealed in 1770 all the duties except that on tea, it in no way relaxed its resolve to enforce the other commercial regulations it had imposed on the colonies. Moreover, Parliament decided to relieve the British East India Company of the financial difficulties into which it had fallen partly by reason of the Tea Act and the colonial boycott that followed. In 1773 it agreed to return to the Company the regular import duties, levied in England, on all tea transs.h.i.+pped to America. A small impost of three pence, to be collected in America, was left as a reminder of the principle laid down in the Declaratory Act that Parliament had the right to tax the colonists.

This arrangement with the East India Company was obnoxious to the colonists for several reasons. It was an act of favoritism for one thing, in the interest of a great monopoly. For another thing, it promised to dump on the American market, suddenly, an immense amount of cheap tea and so cause heavy losses to American merchants who had large stocks on hand. It threatened with ruin the business of all those who were engaged in clandestine trade with the Dutch. It carried with it an irritating tax of three pence on imports. In Charleston, Annapolis, New York, and Boston, captains of s.h.i.+ps who brought tea under this act were roughly handled. One night in December, 1773, a band of Boston citizens, disguised as Indians, boarded the hated tea s.h.i.+ps and dumped the cargo into the harbor. This was serious business, for it was open, flagrant, determined violation of the law. As such the British government viewed it.

Retaliation by the British Government

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