Volume Ii Part 9 (1/2)

On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia, rose in Congress, and, in obedience to the command of his State, moved a resolution ”that the united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States.” John Adams seconded the motion. It led to great debate, which evinced that New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and South Carolina were not yet quite ready for so radical a step. Postponement was therefore had till July 1st, a committee meantime being appointed to draft a declaration.

On July 2d, after further long debate, partic.i.p.ated in by John Adams, d.i.c.kinson, Wilson, and many other of the ablest men in Congress, not all, even now, favorable to the measure, the famous Declaration of Independence was adopted by vote of all the colonies but New York, whose representatives abstained from voting for lack of sufficiently definite instructions. We celebrate July 4th because on that day the doc.u.ment was authenticated by the signatures of the President and Secretary of Congress, and published, Not until August 2d had all the representatives affixed their names. Ellery stood at the secretary's side as the various delegates signed, and declares that he saw only dauntless resolution in every eye. ”Now we must hang together,” said Franklin, ”or we shall hang separately.”

The honor of writing the Declaration belongs to Thomas Jefferson, of Virginia, who was to play so prominent a part in the early political history of the United States. At this time he was thirty-three years old. He was by profession a lawyer, of elegant tastes, well read in literature, deeply versed in political history and philosophy. He was chosen to draft the instrument chiefly because of the great ability of other state papers from his pen. It is said that he consulted no books during the composition, but wrote from the overflowing fulness of his mind.

It is an interesting inquiry how far the language of the doc.u.ment was determined by utterances of a like kind already put forth by towns and counties. There had been many of these, and much discussion has occurred upon the question which of them was first. Perhaps the honor belongs to the town of Sheffield, Ma.s.s., which so early as January 12, 1773, proclaimed the grievances and the rights of the colonies, among these the right of self-government. Mendon, in the same State, in the same year pa.s.sed resolutions containing three fundamental propositions of the great Declaration itself: that all men have an equal right to life and liberty, that this right is inalienable, and that government must originate in the free consent of the people. It is worthy of note that the only important change made by Congress in what Jefferson had prepared was the striking out, in deference to South Carolina and Georgia, of a clause reflecting on slavery.

Copies of the immortal paper were carried post-haste up and down the land, and Congress's bold deed was everywhere hailed with enthusiastic demonstrations of joy. The stand for independence wrought powerfully for good, both at home and abroad. At home it a.s.sisted vacillating minds to a decision, as well as bound all the colonies more firmly together by committing them irreconcilably to an aggressive policy. Abroad it tended to lift the colonies out of the position of rebels and to gain them recognition among the nations of the earth.

Let us now inquire into the political character of these bodies of people which this Declaration by their delegates had erected into ”free and independent States.”

Five colonies had adopted const.i.tutions, revolutionary of course, before the decisive manifesto. There was urgent need for such action. The few remaining fragments of royal governments were powerless and decadent.

Anarchy was threatening everywhere. Some of the royal governors had fled. In South Carolina the judges refused to act. In other places, as western Ma.s.sachusetts, they had been forcibly prevented from acting. In most of the colonies only small parts of the old a.s.semblies could be gotten together.

New Hamps.h.i.+re led off with a new const.i.tution in January, 1776. South Carolina followed in March. By the close of the year nearly all the colonies had established governments of their own. New York and Georgia did not formally adopt new const.i.tutions until the next year. In Ma.s.sachusetts a popular a.s.sembly a.s.sumed legislative and executive powers from July, 1775, till 1780, when a new const.i.tution went into force. Connecticut and Rhode Island, as we have seen already, continued to use their royal charters--the former till 1818, the latter till 1842.

Nowhere was the general framework of government greatly changed by independence. The governors were of course now elected by the people, and they suffered some diminution of power. Legislatures were composed of two houses, both elective, no hereditary legislators being recognized. All the States still had Sunday laws; most of them had religious tests. In South Carolina only members of a church could vote.

In New Jersey an office-holder must profess belief in the faith of some Protestant sect. Pennsylvania required members of the legislature to avow faith in G.o.d, a future state, and the inspiration of the Scriptures. The new Ma.s.sachusetts const.i.tution provided that laws against plays, extravagance in dress, diet, etc., should be pa.s.sed.

Property qualifications continued to limit suffrage. Virginia and Georgia changed their land laws, abolis.h.i.+ng entails and primogeniture.

The sole momentous novelty was that everyone of the new const.i.tutions proceeded upon the theory of popular sovereignty. The new governments derived their authority solely and directly from the people. And this authority, too, was not surrendered to the government, but simply--and this only in part--intrusted to it as the temporary agent of the sovereign people, who remained throughout the exclusive source of political power.

The new instruments of government were necessarily faulty and imperfect.

All have since been amended, and several entirely remodelled. But they rescued the colonies from impending anarchy and carried them safely through the throes of the Revolution.

CHAPTER IV.

OUTBREAK OF WAR: WAs.h.i.+NGTON'S MOVEMENTS

[1775]

By the spring of 1775 Ma.s.sachusetts was practically in rebellion. Every village green was a drill-ground, every church a town a.r.s.enal. General Gage occupied Boston with 3,000 British regulars. The flames were smouldering; at the slightest puff they would flash out into open war.

On the night of April 18th people along the road from Boston to Concord were roused from sleep by the cry of flying couriers--”To arms! The redcoats are coming!” When the British advance reached Lexington at early dawn, it found sixty or seventy minute-men drawn up on the green.

”Disperse, ye rebels!” shouted the British officer. A volley was fired, and seven Americans fell dead. The king's troops, with a shout, pushed on to Concord. Most of the military stores, however, which they had come to destroy had been removed. A British detachment advanced to Concord Bridge, and in the skirmish here the Americans returned the British fire.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Map from the Mississippi to the Atlantic, Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico.]

Map of the United Colonies at the Beginning of the Revolution.

”By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Their flag to April's breeze unfurled, Here once the embattled farmers stood, And fired the shot heard round the world.”

[Footnote: From R. W. Emerson's Concord Hymn, sung at the completion of the Battle Monument near Concord North Bridge, April 19, 1836.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Sketch of Bunker Hill and Breed's Hill.]

A Profile View of the Heights of Charlestown.

The whole country was by this time swarming with minute-men. The crack of the rifle was heard from behind every wall and fence and tree along the line of march. The redcoats kept falling one by one at the hands of an invisible foe. The march became a retreat, the retreat almost a rout.