"Opposite to the northern shore of the peninsula upon which Boston stands, lies Charleston, divided from it by a river (Mystic) about the breadth of the Thames at London Bridge. Neither the British nor Provincial troops had hitherto bethought themselves of securing this place. In its neighbourhood, a little to the east, is a high ground called Bunker's Hill, which overlooks and commands the whole town of Boston.

"In the night of the 16th of June, a party of the Provincials took possession of this hill, and worked with so much industry and diligence, that by break of day they had almost completed a redoubt, together with a strong intrenchment, reaching half a mile, as far as the River Mystic to the east. As soon as discovered they were plied with a heavy and incessant fire from the ships and floating batteries that surrounded the neck on which Charleston is situated, and from the cannon planted on the nearest eminence on the Boston side.

"This did not, however, prevent them from continuing their work, which they had entirely finished by mid-day, when it was found necessary to take more effectual methods to dislodge them.

"For this purpose a considerable body was landed at the foot of Bunker's Hill, under the command of General Howe and General Pigot. The first was to attack the Provincial lines, the second the redoubt. The British troops advanced with great intrepidity, but on their approach were received with a fire behind from the intrenchments, that continued pouring during a full half hour upon them like a stream. The execution it did was terrible; some of the bravest and oldest officers declared that, for the time it lasted, it was the hottest service they had ever seen. General Howe stood for some moments almost alone, the officers and soldiers about him being nearly all slain or disabled; his intrepidity and presence of mind were remarkable on this trying occasion.

"General Pigot, on the left, was in the meantime engaged with the Provincials who had thrown themselves into Charleston, as well as with the redoubt, and met with the same reception as the right. Though he conducted his attack with great skill and courage, the incessant destruction made among the troops threw them at first into some disorder; but General Clinton coming up with a reinforcement, they quickly rallied and attacked the works with such fury that the Provincials were not able to resist them, and retreated beyond the neck of land that leads into Charleston.

"This was the bloodiest engagement during the whole war. The loss of the British troops amounted in killed and wounded to upwards of 1,000. Among the first were 19, and among the last 70 officers. Colonel Abercrombie, Major Pitcairn, of the Marines, and Majors Williams and Spenlowe, men of distinguished bravery, fell in this action, which, though it terminated to the advantage of the King's forces, cost altogether a dreadful price.

"The loss on the Provincial side, according to their account, did not exceed 500. This might be true, as they fought behind intrenchments, part of which were cannon proof, and where it was not possible for the musketry to annoy them. This accounts no less for the numbers they destroyed, to which the expertness of their marksmen chiefly contributed. To render the dexterity of these completely effectual, muskets ready loaded were handed to them as fast as they could be discharged, that they might lose no time in reloading them, and they took aim chiefly at the officers....

"The great slaughter occasioned on the left of the British troops, from the houses in Charleston, obliged them to set fire to that place. The Provincials defended it for some time with much obstinacy, but it was quickly reduced to ashes; and when deprived of that cover, they were immediately compelled to retire.

"But notwithstanding the honour of the day remained to the British troops, the Americans boasted that the real advantages were on their side. They had, said they, so much weakened their enemies in this engagement, as to put an entire stop to their operations. Instead of coming forth and improving their pretended victory, they did not dare to venture out of the trenches and fortifications they had constructed round Boston.

"The only apparent benefit gained by the troops was that they kept possession of the ground whereon Charleston had stood; they fortified it on every side, in order to secure themselves from the sudden attacks that were daily threatened from so numerous a force as that which now invested Boston....

"The Provincials, on the other hand, to convince the troops how little their success had availed them, raised intrenchments on a height opposite Charleston, intimating to them that they were ready for another Bunker's Hill business whenever they thought proper, and were no less willing than they to make another trial of skill.

"Their boldness increased to a degree that astonished the British officers, who had, unhappily, been taught to believe them a contemptible enemy, averse to the dangers of war, and incapable of the regular operations of an army. The skirmishes were now renewed in Boston Bay. The necessities of the garrison occasioned several attempts to carry off the remaining stock of cattle and other articles of provision the islands might contain. But the Provincials, who were better acquainted with the navigation of the bay, landed on these islands, in spite of the precaution of the numerous shipping, and destroyed or carried off whatever could be of use; they even ventured so far as to burn the light-house, situated at the entrance of the harbour, and afterwards made prisoners of a number of workmen that had been sent to repair it, together with a party of marines that guarded them." (Dr. Andrews' History of the Late War, etc., Vol. I., Chap. xiii., pp. 300-306; published under royal authority in 1785.)]

[Footnote 376: History of the United States, Vol. VII., Chap. xxv., pp. 271, 272.]

[Footnote 377: The Secretary of State had instructed Lord Dunmore to call the Assembly together, in order to submit to them a "conciliatory proposition," as it was called, which Lord North had introduced into Parliament—a proposition calculated to divide the colonies, and then reduce each of them to servitude; but the colonies saw the snare, and every one of them rejected the insidious offer. Lord Dunmore, in obedience to his instructions, assembled for the last time the Virginia House of Burgesses in June, 1775, to deliberate and decide upon Lord North's proposition. But while the Burgesses were deliberating upon the subject submitted to them, Lord Dunmore, agitated by his own fears, left with his family the seat of government, and went on board a ship of war. The House of Burgesses, however, proceeded in their deliberations; referred the subject to a Committee, which presented a report prepared by Mr. Jefferson, and adopted by the House, as a final answer to Lord North's proposal. They said, "Next to the possession of liberty, they should consider a reconciliation as the greatest of human blessings, but that the resolution of the House of Commons only changed the form of oppression, without lightening its burdens; that government in the colonies was instituted not for the British Parliament, but for the colonies themselves; that the British Parliament had no right to meddle with their Constitution, or to prescribe either the number or the pecuniary appointments of their officers; that they had a right to give their money without coercion, and from time to time; that they alone were the judges, alike of the public exigencies and the ability of the people; that they contended not merely for the mode of raising their money, but for the freedom of granting it; that the resolve to forbear levying pecuniary taxes still left unrepealed the Acts restraining trade, altering the form of government of Massachusetts, changing the government of Quebec, enlarging the jurisdiction of Courts of Admiralty, taking away the trial by jury, and keeping up standing armies; that the invasion of the colonies with large armaments by sea and land was a style of asking gifts not reconcilable to freedom; that the resolution did not propose to the colonies to lay open a free trade with all the world; that as it involved the interests of all the other colonies, they were in honour bound to share one fate with them; that the Bill of Lord Chatham on the one part, and the terms of Congress on the other, would have formed a basis for negotiation and a reconciliation; that leaving the final determination of the question to the General Congress, they will weary the King with no more petitions—the British nation with no more appeals." "What then," they ask, "remains to be done?" and they answer, "That we commit our injuries to the justice of the even-handed Being who doeth no wrong."

When the Earl of Shelburne read Mr. Jefferson's report, he said: "In my life I was never more pleased with a State paper than with the Assembly of Virginia's discussion of Lord North's proposition. It is masterly. But what I fear is, that the evil is irretrievable."

"At Versailles, the French Minister, Vergennes, was equally attracted by the wisdom and dignity of the document. He particularly noticed the insinuation that a compromise might be effected on the basis of the modification of the Navigation Acts; and saw so many ways opened of settling every difficulty, that it was long before he could persuade himself that the infatuation of the British Ministry was so blind as to neglect them all." (Bancroft's History of the United States, Vol. VII., Chap, xxxvii., pp. 386-388.)]

[Footnote 378: Bancroft's History of the United States, Vol. VII., Chap. xxv., p. 276.

"The offer of freedom to the negroes came very oddly from the representative of the nation which had sold them to their present masters, and of the King who had been displeased with the colony for its desire to tolerate that inhuman traffic no longer; and it was but a sad resource for a commercial metropolis, to keep a hold on its colony by letting loose slaves against its own colonists."—Ib., p. 276.

"Dunmore's menace to raise the standard of a servile insurrection and set the slaves upon their masters, with British arms in their hands, filled the South with horror and alarm. Besides, the retreat of the British troops from Concord raised the belief that the American forces were invincible; and the spirit of resistance had grown so strong, that some of the Burgesses appeared in the uniform of the recently instituted provincial troops, wearing a hunting shirt of coarse linen over their clothes, and a woodman's axe by their sides."—Ib., pp. 384, 385.]

[Footnote 379: "Meantime, Dunmore, driven from the land of Virginia, maintained command of the water by means of a flotilla composed of the Mercury, of 24 guns; the Kingfisher, of 16; the Otter, of 14, with other ships and light vessels, and tenders which he had engaged in the King's service. At Norfolk, a town of about 6,000 inhabitants, a newspaper was published by John Holt. About noon on the last day of September (1775), Dunmore, finding fault with its favouring (according to him) 'sedition and rebellion,' sent on shore a small party, who, meeting with no resistance, seized and brought off two printers and all the materials of the printing office, so that he could publish from his ship a Gazette on the side of the King. The outrage, as we shall see, produced retaliation." (Bancroft's History of the United States, Vol. VIII., Chap. lv., pp. 220, 221.)]

[Footnote 380: Bancroft's History of the United States, Vol. VIII., Chap. lv., pp. 221, 222.

The English Annual Register of 1776 states as follows the policy of Lord Dunmore, culminating in the successful defence of Hampton and the repulse of his ships:

"Whether Lord Dunmore expected that any extraordinary advantages might be derived from an insurrection of the slaves, or that he imagined there was a much greater number of people in the colony who were satisfied with the present system of government than really was the case (a mistake, and an unfortunate one, which, like an epidemical distemper, seems to have spread through all our official departments in America)—upon whatever grounds he proceeded, he determined, though he relinquished his government, not to abandon his hopes, nor entirely to lose sight of the country which he had governed. He, accordingly, being joined by those friends of government who had rendered themselves too obnoxious to the people to continue with safety in the country, as well as by a number of runaway negroes, and supported by the frigates of war which were upon the station, endeavoured to establish such a marine force as would enable him, by means of the noble rivers, which render the most valuable parts of that rich country accessible by water, to be always at hand and ready to profit by any favourable occasion that offered.

"Upon this or some similar system he by degrees equipped and armed a number of vessels of different kinds and sizes, in one of which he constantly resided, never setting his foot on shore but in a hostile manner. The force thus put together was, however, calculated only for depredation, and never became equal to any essential service. The former, indeed, was in part a matter of necessity; for as the people on shore would not supply those on board with provisions or necessaries, they must either starve or provide them by force.... These proceedings occasioned the sending of some detachments of the new-raised forces of the colonists to protect their coasts, and from these ensued a small, mischievous, predatory war, incapable of affording honour or benefit, and in which, at length, every drop of water and every necessary was purchased at the price or risk of blood.

"During this state of hostility, Lord Dunmore procured a few soldiers from different parts, with whose assistance an attempt (Oct. 25th) was made to burn a post town in an important situation called Hampton. It seems the inhabitants had some previous suspicion of the design, for they had sunk boats in the entrance of the harbour and thrown such other obstacles in the way as rendered the approach of the ships, and consequently a landing, impracticable on the day when the attack was commenced. The ships cut a passage through the boats in the night, and began to cannonade the town furiously in the morning; but at this critical period the townspeople were relieved from their apprehensions and danger by the arrival of a detachment of rifle and minute men from Williamsburg, who had marched all night to their assistance. These, joined with the inhabitants, attacked the ships so vigorously with their small arms that they were obliged precipitately to quit their station, with the loss of some men and of a tender, which was taken." (Annual Register, Vol. XIX., Fourth Edition, pp. 26, 27.)]

[Footnote 381: English Annual Register, Vol. XIX.]

[Footnote 382: British Annual Register, Vol. XIX., p. 31.

Mr. Bancroft's account of this barbarous conflagration is as follows:

"New Year's day, 1776, was the saddest day that ever broke on the women and children then in Norfolk; warned of their danger by the commander of the squadron, there was for them no refuge. The Kingfisher was stationed at the upper end of Norfolk; a little below her, the Otter; Belew, in the Liverpool, anchored near the middle of the town; and next him lay the Dunmore; the rest of the fleet was moored in the harbour. Between three and four in the afternoon, the Liverpool opened its fire upon the borough; the other ships immediately followed the example, and a severe cannonade was begun from about sixty pieces of cannon. Dunmore then himself, as night was coming on, ordered out several boats to burn warehouses on the wharves; and hailed to Belew to set fire to a large brig which lay in the dock. All the vessels of the fleet, to show their zeal, sent great numbers of boats on shore to assist in spreading the flames along the river; and as the buildings were chiefly of pine wood, the conflagration, favoured by the wind, spread with amazing rapidity, and soon became general. Women and children, mothers with little ones in their arms, were seen by the glare running through the shower of cannon balls to get out of their range. Two or three persons were hit; and the scene became one of extreme horror and confusion. Several times the British attempted to land, and once to bring cannon into the street; but they were driven back by the spirit and conduct of the Americans. The cannonade did not abate till ten at night; after a short pause it was renewed, but with less fury, and was kept up till two the next morning. The flames, which had made their way from street to street, raged for three days; till four-fifths, or, as some computed, nine-tenths of the houses were reduced to ashes and heaps of ruins." (History of the United States, Vol. VIII., Chap. lvi., pp. 230, 231.)]

[Footnote 383: History of the United States, Vol. VIII., Chap. lvi., p. 231.

The English Annual Register observes: "Such was the fate of the unfortunate town of Norfolk, the most considerable for commerce in the colony, and so growing and flourishing before these unhappy troubles, that in the two years from 1773 to 1775, the rents of the houses increased from L8,000 to L10,000 a year. However just the cause, or urgent the necessity, which induced this measure, it was undoubtedly a grievous and odious task to a Governor to be himself the principal actor in burning and destroying the best town in his government.

"Nor was the situation of other Governors in America much more eligible than that of Lord Dunmore. In South Carolina, Lord William Campbell, having as they said, entered into a negotiation with the Indians for coming in to the support of the Government in that province, and having also succeeded in exciting a number of those back settlers whom we have heretofore seen distinguished in the Carolinas, under the title of Regulators, to espouse the same cause, the discovery of these measures, before they were ripe for execution, occasioned such a ferment among the people, that he thought it necessary to retire from Charleston on board a ship of war in the river, from whence he returned no more to the seat of his government.

"Similar measures were pursued in North Carolina (with the difference that Governor Martin was more active and vigorous in his proceedings), but attended with as little success. The Provincial Congress, Committees, and Governor were in a continual state of the most violent warfare. Upon a number of charges, particularly of fomenting a civil war, and exciting an insurrection among the negroes, he was declared an enemy to America in general, and to that colony in particular, and all persons were forbidden from holding any communication with him. These declarations he answered with a proclamation of uncommon length, which the Provincial Congress resolved to be a false, scandalous, scurrilous and seditious libel, and ordered it to be burned by the hands of the common hangman.

"As the Governor expected, by means of the back settlers, as well as of the Scotch inhabitants and Highland emigrants, who were numerous in the province, to be able to raise a considerable force, he took pains to fortify and arm his palace at Newburn, that it might answer the double purpose of a garrison and a magazine. Before this could be effected, the moving of some cannon excited such a commotion among the people that he found it necessary to abandon the palace and retire on board a sloop-of-war in Cape Fear river. The people upon this occasion discovered powder, shot, ball, and various military stores and implements which had been buried in the palace garden and yard. This served to inflame them exceedingly, every man considering it as if it had been a plot against himself in particular.

"The Provincial Congress published an address to the inhabitants of the British empire, of the same nature with those we have formerly seen to the people of Great Britain and Ireland, containing the same professions of loyalty and affection, and declaring the same earnest desire of a reconciliation." (English Annual Register, Vol. XIX., pp. 31-33.)]

[Footnote 384: General Conway said: "The noble lord who has the direction of the affairs of this country tells you that the Americans aim at Independence. I defy the noble lord, or any other member of this House, to adduce one solid proof of this charge. He says: 'The era of 1763 is the time they wish to recur to, because such a concession on our part would be, in effect, giving up their dependence on this country.' I would ask the noble lord, Did the people of America set up this claim previous to the year 1763? No; they were then peaceful and dutiful subjects. They are still dutiful and obedient. (Here was a murmur of disapprobation.) I repeat my words; I think them so inclined; I am sure they would be so, if they were permitted: The acts they have committed arise from no want of either. They have been forced into them. Taxes have been attempted to be levied on them; their Charters have been violated, nay, taken away; administration has attempted to coerce them by the most cruel and oppressive laws."]

[Footnote 385: Annual Register, Vol. XIX., Chap. ix., pp. 57, 58, 63, 69, 70, 74, 75.]



CHAPTER XXV.

THE ASSEMBLING OF CONGRESS, MAY 10TH, 1776, AND TRANSACTIONS UNTIL THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, THE 4TH OF JULY.

It was under the circumstances stated in the preceding chapter, the General Congress, according to adjournment the previous October, reassembled in Philadelphia the 10th of May, 1776. The colonies were profoundly convulsed by the transactions which had taken place in Massachusetts, Virginia, North and South Carolina, by the intelligence from England, that Parliament had, the previous December, passed an Act to increase the army, that the British Government had largely increased both the army and navy, and on failure of obtaining sufficient recruits in England, Scotland, and Ireland, had negotiated with German princes, who traded in the blood of their down-trodden subjects, for seventeen thousand Hanoverian and Hessian mercenaries, to aid in reducing the American colonies to absolute submission to the will of the King and Parliament of Great Britain. It was supposed in England that the decisive Act of Parliament, the unbending and hostile attitude of the British Ministry, the formidable amount of naval and land forces, would awe the colonies into unresisting and immediate submission; but the effect of all these formidable preparations on the part of the British Government was to unite rather than divide the colonies, and render them more determined and resolute than ever to defend and maintain their sacred and inherited rights and liberties as British subjects.

The thirteen colonies were a unit as to what they understood and contended for in regard to their British constitutional rights and liberties—namely, the rights which they had enjoyed for more than a century—the right of taxation by their own elected representatives alone, the right of providing for the support of their own civil government and its officers—rights far less extensive than those which are and have long been enjoyed by the loyal provinces of the Canadian Dominion. There were, indeed, the Governors and their officers, sent from England—the favourites and needy dependents of the British Ministry and Parliament, sent out to subsist upon the colonists, but were not of them, had no sympathy with them, nor any influence over them except what they had over their dependents and the families with whom they had formed connections. They were noisy and troublesome as a faction, but not sufficient in numbers or influence to constitute a party, properly speaking.

There was like unity among the colonies in regard to the defence and support of the rights and liberties which they claimed. There was, indeed, doubt on the part of a few, and but a few, comparatively, as to the wisdom and expediency of taking arms and meeting the King's officers and troops in the field of battle in support of their rights; but all agreed that they should defend themselves and their property when attacked by the King's troops, whether attacked by the King's orders or not; for they held that their title to their property and constitutional rights was as sacred and divine as that of the King to his throne.[386]

The question of questions with the General Congress on its assembling in May, 1776, was what measures should be adopted for the defence of their violated and invaded rights, and upon what grounds should that defence be conducted? For the first time in the General Congress was it proposed to abandon the ground on which they had vindicated and maintained their rights as British subjects in their several Legislatures and Conventions for eleven years, and successfully defended them by force of arms for more than one year, or to avow entire separation from the mother country, and declare absolute independence as the ground of maintaining their rights and liberties?

There had long been some prominent men who held republican sentiments, and some newspapers had in 1775 mooted the idea of separation from the mother country. Such views prevailed widely in Massachusetts; there had always been a clique of Congregational Republicans and Separationists in Boston, from the days of Cromwell. They looked back upon the halcyon days when none but Congregationalists could hold office—civil, judicial, or military—or even exercise the elective franchise, and the disclaimers of any earthly king; and though the separation from the mother country and renunciation of monarchical government was carefully avoided in the official documents of Massachusetts, as it was disclaimed in the strongest terms in the official papers of other colonies, yet the sentiment of hostility to monarchy and of separation from England was artfully inculcated in resolutions, addresses, etc., prepared by Samuel Adams, and sent forth from the Massachusetts Convention.[388] He was a man of blameless life (no relation to John Adams)—a rigid religionist of the old Massachusetts Puritan stamp—a hater of England and of British institutions, able and indefatigable in everything that might tend to sever America from England, in regard to which his writings exerted a powerful influence. He was the Corypheus of the Separatist party in Boston, the Chairman of the Committee of Correspondence, and wrote the Massachusetts circulars to other colonies.

It was only early in May, 1776, that the question of independence was discussed in the General Congress. The Congress recommended those colonies whose Governors had left their governments, or were declared disqualified on account of their oppressive and cruel conduct, to form governments for themselves. This, however, was not understood as a declaration of independence, but a temporary measure of necessity, to prevent anarchy and confusion in the colonies concerned. This proceeding was immediately followed by a more comprehensive measure intended to feel the pulse of the colonies on the subject of independence.

The Congress had waited with considerable patience, and some anxiety, the result of the late session of Parliament; they had forborne to do anything which might not be justified upon the fair principles of self-defence, until it appeared that the Ministry was resolved that nothing short of the most abject submission should be the price of accommodation. Early in May, therefore, the Congress adopted a measure intended to sound the sentiments of the colonies on the subject of independence. They stated the rejection of their petitions, and the employment of foreign mercenaries to reduce them to obedience, and concluded by declaring it expedient that all the colonies should proceed to the establishment of such a form of government as their representatives might think most conducive to the peace and happiness of the people. This preamble and resolution were immediately forwarded; and in a few days afterwards Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia, gave notice to the Congress that he should, on an appointed day, move for a Declaration of Independence. This was accordingly done, but the consideration of the question was postponed until the 1st of July—so timid, so wavering, so unwilling to break the maternal connection were most of the members.[389]

It is clear that, so far from the Declaration of Independence being the spontaneous uprising of the colonies, as represented by so many American historians, that when it was first mooted in Congress the majority of the General Congress itself were startled at it, and were opposed to it. "On the 15th day of May, only four of the colonies had acted definitely on the question of independence. North Carolina had authorized her delegates to concur with the delegates from the other colonies 'in declaring independency;' Rhode Island had commissioned hers 'to join in any measures to secure American rights;' in Massachusetts, various towns had pledged themselves to maintain any declaration on which Congress might agree; and Virginia had given positive instructions to her delegates that Congress should make a declaration of independence. These proceedings were accompanied with declarations respecting a reservation to each colony of the right to form its own government, in the adjustment of the power universally felt to be necessary, and which was to be lodged in a new political unit, designated by the terms, 'Confederation,' 'Continental Constitution,' and 'American Republic.'"[390]

"On the 7th of June, Richard Henry Lee, in behalf of the Virginia delegates, submitted in Congress resolves on independence, a confederation, and foreign alliances. His biographer says that 'tradition relates that he prefaced his motion with a speech,' portraying the resources of the colonies and their capacity for defence, dwelling especially on the bearing which an independent position might have on foreign Powers, and concluded by urging the members so to act, that the day might give birth to an American Republic. The motion was:—

"'That these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is and ought to be totally dissolved.'

"'That it is expedient forthwith to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign alliances.'

"'That a plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective colonies for their consideration and approbation.'

"John Adams seconded the motion. The Journal of Congress says, 'that certain resolutions respecting independency being moved and seconded, they were postponed till to-morrow morning,' and that 'the members were enjoined to attend punctually at ten o'clock in order to take the same into their consideration. Jefferson says the reason of postponement was that the House were obliged to attend to other business. The record indicates that no speech was made on that day.

"The next day was Saturday. John Hancock, the President, was in the chair; and Charles Thompson was the Secretary. The resolves were immediately referred to a Committee of the Whole, in which Benjamin Harrison presided—the confidential correspondent of Washington, and subsequently Governor of Virginia. They were debated with animation until seven o'clock in the evening, when the President resumed the chair, and reported that the Committee had considered the matter referred to them, but, not having come to any decision, directed him to move for leave to sit again on Monday.

"In Congress, on Monday, Edward Rutledge moved that the question be postponed three weeks. The debate on this day continued until seven o'clock in the evening. Not a single speech of any member is known to be extant. Jefferson at the time summed up the arguments used by the speakers during both days. The result may be given in his words: 'It appearing, in the course of the debates, that the colonies of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and South Carolina were not yet matured for falling from the parent stem, but that they were fast advancing to that state, it was thought most prudent to wait awhile for them. It was agreed in Committee of the Whole to report to Congress a resolution, which was adopted by a vote of seven colonies to five, and this postponed the resolution on independence to the 1st day of July; and 'in meanwhile, that no time be lost, a Committee be appointed to prepare a declaration in conformity to it.' On the next day a Committee was chosen for this purpose by ballot: Thomas Jefferson, of Virginia; John Adams, of Massachusetts; Benjamin Franklin, of Pennsylvania; Roger Sherman, of Connecticut; and Robert R. Livingstone, of New York. [Such was the Committee that prepared the Declaration of Independence.] On the 12th a Committee of one from each colony was appointed to report the form of confederation, and a Committee of five to prepare a plan of treaties to be proposed to foreign Powers.

"When Congress postponed the vote on independence, the popular movement in its favour was in full activity. Some of the members left this body to engage in it. Others promoted it by their counsel."[391]

"On the day agreed upon for the consideration of Mr. Lee's motion, the 1st of July, Congress resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole; the debates on the question were continued with great warmth for three days. It had been determined to take the vote by colonies; and as a master-stroke of policy, the author of which is not known to history, it had been proposed and agreed, that the decision on the question, whatever might be the state of the votes, should appear to the world as the unanimous voice of the Congress. On the first question [of independence], six colonies were in the affirmative, and six in the negative—Pennsylvania being without a vote by the equal division of her delegates. In this state of the business, it appears, on the authority of evidence afterwards adduced before Parliament, that Mr. Samuel Adams once more successfully exerted his influence; and that one of the delegates of Pennsylvania was brought over to the side of independence. It is more probable, however, that the influence of Mr. Adams extended no further than to procure that one of the dissenting members withdraw from the House; and that the vote of Pennsylvania was thus obtained."[392]

It is thus seen that the Declaration of Independence, so far from being the spontaneous uprising of the American colonies, was the result of months of agitation by scarcely a dozen leaders in the movement, by canvassing at public meetings, and of delegates elected by them, not excelled by any political and nearly balanced parties in England or Canada in a life and death struggle for victory. In this case, the important question was to be decided by some fifty members of Congress; and when the first vote was given, after many weeks of popular agitation, and three days of warm discussion in Congress, there was a tie—six colonies for and six against the Declaration of Independence—after which a majority of one was obtained for the Declaration, by inducing the absence of certain members opposed to it; and then, when a majority of votes was thus obtained, others were persuaded to vote for the measure "for the sake of unanimity," though they were opposed to the measure itself.

It has indeed been represented by some American historians, that the vote of Congress for Independence was unanimous; but the fact is far otherwise. As the vote was taken by colonies, and not by the majority of the individual members present, as in ordinary legislative proceedings, the majority of the delegates from each colony determined the vote of that colony; and by a previous and very adroit proposal, an agreement was entered into that the vote of Congress should be published to the world as UNANIMOUS, however divided the votes of members on the question of Independence might be; and on this ground the signatures of those who had opposed it, as well as of those who voted in favour of it, were ultimately affixed to the Declaration, though it was published and authenticated by the signatures of the President, John Hancock, of Massachusetts, and Charles Thompson, of Philadelphia, as Secretary.

The Declaration of Independence, as thus adopted, is as follows:

"A Declaration by the Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled:

"When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to such separation.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; and whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, would dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly, all experience hath shown that mankind are more inclined to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed; but when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies, and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations; all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States: to prove this, let facts be exhibited to a candid world.

"He has refused his assent to laws the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

"He has forbidden his Governours to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operations till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

"He has refused to pass other laws, for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the rights of representation in the Legislature; a right inestimable to them, and formidable to tyrants only.

"He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depositories of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

"He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing, with manly firmness, his invasion on the rights of the people.

"He has refused, for a long time after such dissolution, to cause others to be elected, whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise—the State remaining, in the meantime, exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

"He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners, refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.

"He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.

"He has made judges dependent on his will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

"He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers, to harass our people and eat out their substance.

"He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies, without the consent of our Legislatures.

"He has affected to render the military independent of, and superior to, the civil power.

"He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws, giving his assent to their pretended acts of legislation.

"For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us.

"For protecting them, by a mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these States.

"For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world.

"For imposing taxes on us without our consent.

"For depriving us, in many cases, of the benefit of trial by jury.

"For transporting us beyond seas, to be tried for pretended offences.

"For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these colonies.

"For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments.

"For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

"He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection, and waging war against us.

"He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

"He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the work of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation.

"He has constrained our fellow-citizens, taken captive on the high seas, to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.

"He has excited domestick insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions.

"In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

"Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them, from time to time, of attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us; we have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here; we have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity; and we have conjured them, by the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connection and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.

"We therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, Free and Independent States; and that they are absolved from allegiance to the British Crown; and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; and that, as free and independent States, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honour."

* * * * *

Note.—This Declaration will be discussed in the next chapter.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 386: "The theory that the popular leaders were playing a game of hypocrisy may be tested in the case of Washington, whose sterling patriotism was not more conspicuous than his irreproachable integrity. The New York Provincial Congress, in an address to him (June 26th, 1775), on his way from Philadelphia to the American camp around Boston, say that accommodation with the mother country was 'the fondest wish of each American soul.' Washington, in reply, pledged his colleagues and himself to use every exertion to re-establish peace and harmony. 'When we assumed the soldier,' he said, 'we did not lay aside the citizen; and we shall most sincerely rejoice with you in that happy hour when the establishment of American liberty on the most solid and firm foundations shall enable us to return to our private stations, in the bosom of a free, peaceful, and happy country.'[387] There was no incompatibility in the position of military leader of a great uprising with a desire to preserve the old political ties. When the Barons of Runnymede, surrounded by their retainers, wrested from King John the great Charter, they meant not to renounce their allegiance, but simply to preserve the old government. Though an act of apparent rebellion, yet it was in the strictest sense an act of loyalty. So the popular leaders, in their attitude of armed resistance, were loyal to what they conceived to be essential to American liberty. They were asserting the majesty of constitutional law against those who would have destroyed it, and thus were more loyal to the Constitution than was George III. There really is no ground on which justly to question the sincerity of declarations like those of Congress and Washington. They aimed at a redress of grievances; and the idea was quite general, of a Bill of Rights, or an American Constitution, embodying the conditions on which the integrity of the empire might be preserved. This was their last appeal for a settlement on such a basis." (Frothingham's Rise of the Republic of the United States, Chap. xi., pp. 438, 439.)]

[Footnote 387: "The London Chronicle of August 8th, 1775, has the speech of the New York Provincial Congress, and the reply of Washington of the 26th of June, 1775."]

[Footnote 388: Mr. Bancroft, writing under date of October, 1775, says: "The Americans had not designed to establish an independent government; of their leading statesmen it was the desire of Samuel Adams alone; they had all been educated in the love and admiration of constitutional monarchy; and even John Adams and Jefferson so sincerely shrank back from the attempt at creating another government in its stead, that, to the last moment, they were most anxious to avert a separation, if it could be avoided without a loss of their inherited liberties." (History of the United States, Vol. VIII., Chap. li., p. 161.)]

[Footnote 389: Allan's American Revolution, Vol. I., pp. 342, 343.

"The interval was employed in unceasing exertions by the friends of independence to prepare the minds of the people for the necessity and advantages of such a measure. The press teemed with essays and pamphlets, in which all the arts of eloquence were used to ridicule the prejudices which supported an attachment to the King and Government of England. Among the numerous writers on this momentous question, the most luminous, the most eloquent, and the most forcible was Thomas Paine. His pamphlet entitled 'Common Sense' was not only read, but understood, by everybody; and those who regard the independence of the United States as a blessing will never cease to cherish the remembrance of Thomas Paine. Whatever may have been his subsequent career—in whatever light his religious principles may be regarded—it should never be forgotten that to him, more than to any single individual, was owing the rapid diffusion of those sentiments and feelings which produced the act of separation from Great Britain."—Ib., pp. 343, 344.]

[Footnote 390: Frothingham's Rise of the Republic of the United States, p. 512.]

[Footnote 391: Frothingham's Rise of the Republic of the United States, Chap. xi., pp. 513-517.]

[Footnote 392: Allan's American Revolution, Chap, xii., pp. 344, 345.

"The question before the Committee was the portion of the motion relating to independence, submitted by the Virginia delegates on the 7th of June. The New York members read their instructions, and were excused from voting. Of the three delegates from Delaware, Rodney was absent, Read in the negative, and thus the vote of that colony was lost. South Carolina was in the negative; and so was Pennsylvania, by the votes of Dickenson, Willing, Morris, and Humphries, against those of Franklin, Morton, and Wilson. Nine colonies—New Hampshire, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia—voted in the affirmative. The Committee rose, the President resumed the chair, and Harrison reported the resolution as having been agreed to. Edward Rutledge, of South Carolina, said that were the vote postponed till next day, he believed that his colleagues, though they disapproved of the resolution, would then join in it for the sake of unanimity. The final question, in accordance with this request, was postponed until the next day; but it was agreed to go into Committee on the draft of the Declaration.

"On the 2nd July, probably fifty members were present in Congress. After disposing of the business of the morning, it resumed the resolution on independence, and probably without much debate proceeded to vote. McKean sent an express to Rodney, at Dover, which procured his attendance, and secured the vote of Delaware in the affirmative; while the same result was reached for Pennsylvania by Dickenson and Morris absenting themselves, and allowing Franklin, Wilson, and Morton to give the vote against Willing and Humphries. The South Carolina delegates concluded to vote for the measure. Thus twelve colonies united in adopting the following resolution:

"'That these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.'" (Frothingham's Rise of the Republic of the United States, Chap. xi., pp. 537, 538.)

On the adoption of this resolution, continues the same historian, "Congress went immediately into Committee of the Whole to consider the draft of a Declaration of Independence, or the form of announcing the fact to the world. During the remainder of that day, and during the sessions of the 3rd and 4th, the phraseology, allegations, and principles of this paper were subjected to severe scrutiny. Its author relates: 'The pusillanimous idea that we had friends in England worth keeping terms with still haunted the minds of many. For this reason, those passages which conveyed censure on the people of England were struck out, lest they should give them offence. The clause, too, reprobating the enslaving of the inhabitants of Africa was struck out in complaisance to South Carolina and Georgia, who had never attempted to restrain the importation of slaves, and who, on the contrary, wished to continue it. Our northern brethren also, I believe, felt a little tender under these censures; for though their people had very few slaves themselves, yet they had been pretty considerable carriers of them to others.' (Memoirs of Jefferson, i. 15.) The striking out of the passage declaring the slave trade 'piratical warfare against human nature itself,' was deeply regretted by many of that generation. Other alterations were for the better, making the paper more dispassionate and terse, and—what was no small improvement—more brief and exact. On the evening of the 4th the Committee rose, when Harrison reported the Declaration as having been agreed upon. It was then adopted by twelve States, unanimously." [That is, by the majority of the delegates of twelve provinces, and, of course, reported as "unanimous," according to previous agreement.]—Ib., p. 539.]



CHAPTER XXVI.

DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE DISCUSSED.

The foregoing chapters bear ample testimony how heartily I have sympathized with our elder brother colonists of America, in their conception and manly advocacy and defence of their constitutional rights as British subjects; how faithfully I have narrated their wrongs and advocated their rights, and how utterly I have abhorred the despotic conduct of George the Third, and of his corrupt Ministers and mercenary and corrupted Parliament, in their unscrupulous efforts to wrest from the American colonists the attributes and privileges of British freemen, and to convert their lands, with their harbours and commerce, into mere plantations and instruments to enrich the manufacturers and merchants of England, and provide places of honour and emolument for the scions and protegees of the British aristocracy and Parliament. But I cannot sympathize with, much less defend, the leaders of the old American colonists in the repudiating what they had professed from their forefathers; in avowing what they had for many years denied; in making their confiding and distinguished defenders in the British Parliament—the Chathams, Camdens, Sherburnes, the Foxes, Burkes, and Cavendishes—liars in presence of all Europe; in deliberately practising upon their fellow-colonists what they had so loudly complained of against the King and Parliament of Great Britain; in seeking the alliance of a Power which had sought to destroy them for a hundred years, against the land of their forefathers which had protected them during that hundred years, and whose Administration had wronged and sought to oppress them for only twelve years.

After many years of anxious study and reflection, I have a strong conviction that the Declaration of American Independence, in 1776, was a great mistake in itself, a great calamity to America as well as to England, a great injustice to many thousands on both sides of the Atlantic, a great loss of human life, a great blow to the real liberties of mankind, and a great impediment to the highest Christian and Anglo-Saxon civilization among the nations of the world.

In this summary statement of opinion—so contrary to the sentiments of American historians and to popular feeling in the United States—I mean no reflection on the motives, character, patriotism, and abilities of those great men who advocated and secured the adoption of the Declaration of Independence in the General Congress of 1776. I believe America has never produced a race of statesmen equal in purity of character, in comprehensiveness of views, in noble patriotism and moral courage, to "the Fathers of the American Revolution." Their discussions of public questions, during the eleven years which preceded the Declaration of Independence, evince a clearness of discernment, an accuracy of statement, a niceness of distinction, a thorough knowledge of the principles of government, and the mutual relation of colonies and the parent State, elegance of diction, and force of argument, not surpassed in discussions of the kind in any age or country; their diplomatic correspondence displays great superiority in every respect over the English statesmen of the day, who sought to oppress them; the correspondence of Washington with General Gage commanded alike the admiration of Europe and the gratitude of America; the memorials and other public papers transmitted to England by the American Congress, and written by Jay and other members, drew forth from the Earl of Chatham, in the House of Lords, January 20th, 1775, the following eulogy: "When your lordships look at the papers transmitted to us from America—when you consider their decency, firmness, and wisdom, you cannot but respect their cause, and wish to make it your own. For myself, I must avow that in all my reading—and I have read Thucydides, and have studied and admired the master States of the world—for solidity of reason, force of sagacity, and wisdom of conclusion under a complication of difficult circumstances, no nation or body of men can stand in preference to the General Congress at Philadelphia. The histories of Greece and Rome give us nothing equal to it, and all attempts to impose servitude upon such a mighty continental nation must be vain."

"We shall be forced ultimately to retract; let us retract while we can, not when we must. These violent Acts must be repealed; you will repeal them; I pledge myself for it, I stake my reputation on it, that you will in the end repeal them."

(Those violent Acts were repealed three years afterwards.)

When the Earl of Shelburne read the reply, written by Jefferson, of the Virginia Legislature, to Lord North's proposition, his Lordship said: "In my life, I was never more pleased with a State paper than with the Assembly of Virginia's discussion of Lord North's proposition. It is masterly. But what I fear is that the evil is irretrievable."

Among the statesmanlike productions of that period, the correspondence of Franklin, the masterly letters of Dickenson, the letters and State papers of Samuel and John Adams, Jay and Livingstone, and of many others, exhibit a scholarly race of statesmen and writers of whom any nation or age might be proud.

But it must not be forgotten that the education of every one of these great men, and their training in public affairs, was under English constitutional government, for which every one of them (except Samuel Adams) expressed their unqualified admiration, and to which they avowed their unswerving attachment to within twelve months of the declaration of independence. Though the United States can boast of many distinguished scholars and politicians and jurists, I believe American democracy has never produced a generation of scholarly, able, and stainless statesmen, such as those who had received the whole of their mental, moral, and political training when America formed a part of the British empire.

It is not surprising, indeed, that the major part (for they were not unanimous) of so noble and patriotic a class of statesmen should, by the wicked policy and cruel measures against them by the worst administration of government that ever ruled England, be betrayed into an act which they had so many years disavowed. Placing, as they rightly did, in the foreground the civil and religious liberties of Englishmen as the first ingredient of the elements of political greatness and social progress, they became exasperated into the conviction that the last and only effective means of maintaining those liberties was to sever their connection with England altogether, and declare their own absolute independence. We honour the sentiments and courage which prompted them to maintain and defend their liberties; we question not the purity and patriotism of their motives in declaring independence as the means of securing those liberties; but we must believe that, had they maintained the integrity of their professions and positions for even a twelvemonth longer, they would have achieved all for which they had contended, would have become a free and happy country, as Canada now is, beside the mother country and not in antagonism to her, maintaining inviolate their national life and traditions, instead of forming an alliance for bloody warfare with their own former and their mother country's hereditary enemies.

It was unnatural and disgraceful for the British Ministry to employ German mercenaries and savage Indians to subdue the American colonists to unconditional obedience; but was it less unnatural for the colonists themselves to seek and obtain the alliance of the King of France, whose government was a despotism, and who had for a hundred years sought to destroy the colonists, had murdered them without mercy, and employed by high premiums the Indians to butcher and scalp men, women, and children of the colonists—indeed, to "drive them into the sea," and to exterminate them from the soil of America? Yet with such enemies of civil and religious liberty, with such enemies of their own liberties, and even their existence as Anglo-Saxons, the colonists sought and obtained an alliance against the mother country, which had effectually, and at an immense expenditure, defended them against the efforts of both France and Spain to destroy them. Had the American colonists maintained the position and professions after 1776, as they had maintained them before 1776, presenting the contrast of their own integrity and unity and patriotism to the perfidious counsels, mercenary and un-English policy of the British Ministry and Parliament, they would have escaped the disastrous defeats and bloodshed of 1777-8, and would have repeated the victories which they had gained over the English soldiers in 1775 and the early part of 1776. Unprepared and sadly deficient in arms and ammunition, they repulsed the regular English soldiers sent against them at Concord, at Lexington, at Bunker's Hill; they had shut up as prisoners the largest English army ever sent to New England, and, though commanded by such generals as Howe and Clinton, compelled their evacuation of the city of Boston. In the Southern States they had routed the English forces, and had compelled the Governors of Virginia and South and North Carolina to take refuge on board of English men-of-war. Before the declaration of independence, the colonists fought with the enthusiasm of Englishmen for Englishmen's rights, and the British soldiers fought without heart against their fellow-subjects contending for what many of both the soldiers and officers knew to be rights dear to all true Englishmen; but when the Congress of the American colonies declared themselves to be no longer Englishmen, no longer supporters of the constitutional rights of Englishmen, but separationists from England, and seeking alliance with the enemies of England, then the English army felt that they were fighting against enemies and not fellow-subjects, and fought with an energy and courage which carried disaster, in almost every instance, to the heretofore united but now divided colonists, until France and Spain came to their assistance.

With these preliminary and general remarks, we proceed to state more specifically the grounds on which we regard, as a calamity to the interests of true liberty and of civilization, the change of position, policy, and principles avowed by the General Congress in the Declaration of Independence, 1776.

I. The Declaration of Independence was a renunciation of all the principles on which the General Congress, Provincial Legislatures, and Conventions professed to act from the beginning of the contest. The foregoing pages present abundant testimony and illustration how earnestly, how constantly, how unanimously the American colonists expressed their attachment to the mother country and to the principles of the British Constitution—how indignantly they repelled, as an insult and a slander, every suspicion and statement that they meditated or desired independence, or that they would ever consent to sever the ties of their connection with the mother country and the glorious principles of her constitution of government.

In the same Congress of 1775, by which Washington was appointed Commander-in-Chief, the higher departments of the army were organized. Bills of credit to the amount of three millions were emitted to defray the expenses of the war, and after the battles of Lexington and Bunker's Hill, while the English army were shut in Boston by the Provincial volunteers, a declaration was signed by Congress, justifying their proceedings, but disdaining any idea of separation from England. They say, "We are reduced to the alternative of choosing an unconstitutional submission to the tyranny of irritated Ministers, or resistance by force. The latter is our choice. We have counted the cost of this contest, and find nothing so dreadful as voluntary slavery. Honour, justice, and humanity forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us....

"With hearts fortified with these animating reflections, we most solemnly, before God and the world, declare that, exerting the utmost energy of those powers which our beneficent Creator hath graciously bestowed upon us, the arms we have been compelled by our enemies to assume, we will, in defiance of every hazard, with unabating firmness and perseverance, employ for the preservation of our liberties; being with one mind resolved to die freemen rather than to live slaves.

"Lest this declaration should disquiet the minds of our friends and fellow-subjects in any part of the empire, we assure them that we mean not to dissolve that union which has so long and so happily subsisted between us, and which we sincerely wish to see restored. Necessity has not yet driven us to that desperate measure, or induced us to excite any other nation to war against them. We have not raised armies with ambitious designs of separating from Great Britain, and of establishing independent States. We fight not for glory or for conquest. We exhibit to mankind the remarkable spectacle of a people attacked by unprovoked enemies, without any imputation or even suspicion of offence. They boast of their privileges and civilization, and yet proffer no milder conditions than servitude or death.

"In our native land, in defence of the freedom that is our birthright, and which we ever enjoyed until the late violation of it, for the protection of our property acquired solely by the honest industry of our forefathers and ourselves, against violence actually offered, we have taken up arms. We shall lay them down when hostilities shall cease on the part of the aggressors, and all danger of their being renewed shall be removed, and not before."[393]

"Amidst these hostile operations, the voice of peace was yet heard—allegiance to the King was still acknowledged, and a lingering hope remained that an accommodation was not impossible. Congress voted a petition to his Majesty, replete with professions of duty and attachment; and addressed a letter to the people of England, conjuring them, by the endearing appellations of 'friends, countrymen, and brethren,' to prevent the dissolution of 'that connection which the remembrance of former friendships, pride in the glorious achievements of common ancestors, and affection for the heirs of their virtues had heretofore maintained.' They uniformly disclaimed any idea of independence, and professed themselves to consider union with England, on constitutional principles, as the greatest blessing which could be bestowed on them."[394]

It is needless to multiply authorities and illustrations; the whole tenor of the history of the colonies, as presented in the preceding chapters of this volume, evinces their universal appreciation of the principles of the British Constitution and their universal attachment to union with the mother country.[395]

Even in the spring of 1776, after months of agitation by advocates of separation in various colonies, a majority of the delegates in Congress were for weeks opposed to separation; and it required long preparation to familiarize the minds of its advocates to separation, and to reconcile any considerable number of colonists to hostile severance from the land of their forefathers. It may easily be conceived what must have been the shock to a large part, if not a majority, of the colonists, to have burst upon them, after weeks' secret session of Congress, a declaration which, under the term Independence, renounced all the principles and associations in which they had been educated, which they had often avowed and held dear from their ancestors, which proclaimed their mother country their enemy, and denounced connection with her a crime. Such a renunciation of the past, and wrenching from it, could not otherwise than weaken the foundations of society and the obligation of oaths, as may be seen by a comparison in these respects of the sacredness of laws and oaths, and their administration in America before and since the revolution.

II. The Declaration of Independence was a violation of good faith to those statesmen and numerous other parties in England who had, in and out of Parliament, supported the rights and character of the colonies during the whole contest. They had all done so upon the ground that the colonists were contending for the constitutional rights of Englishmen; that they intended and desired nothing more. On the ground that the colonists, like the barons of Runnymede, were contending for the sacred rights of Englishmen, and relying on the faith of their declaration that Englishmen they would ever remain, their cause was patriotically espoused and nobly vindicated in England by Lords Chatham, Camden, Shelburne, the Duke of Richmond, and others in the House of Lords; by Messrs. Burke and Fox, Lord John Cavendish, Mr. Dunning (afterwards Lord Ashburton), and others in the House of Commons; and by corporations of cities and towns, and multitudes out of Parliament. Lord Mahon, in the sixth volume of his History of England (pp. 35-37), relates that before the Earl of Chatham introduced his famous "Provincial Bill for Settling Troubles in America," and supported it by his masterly speeches in the Lords, he sent for Dr. Franklin, the principal representative of the colonists, to consult him and ascertain from him distinctly whether there was any tendency or danger of the American colonies separating from England, and was assured by Dr. Franklin that there was not the least feeling in that direction; that the American colonies were universally loyal to connection with the mother country, and desired and contended for nothing more than the constitutional rights of Englishmen.[396]

It was not till after this assurance, and it was under this conviction and with this object, that the Earl of Chatham delivered those appeals in behalf of America which electrified the British public, and gave tone to the subsequent debates in both Houses of Parliament. These eloquent and unanswerable defences of British rights, invaded and denied in regard to the persons of the American colonists, were delivered in 1775 and the early part of 1776; but scarcely had their echoes died away on the waves of the Atlantic, when news came from America that the Congress, so warmly eulogized in the British Parliament for its fidelity to English connection, as well as to the rights of England, had, after a secret session of two months, renounced all connection with England, and all acknowledgment of its authority and principles of government, thus fulfilling the statements and predictions of the parliamentary enemies of American rights, and presenting their advocates, Chatham, Camden, Burke, etc., as liars and deceivers before the British nation and in the face of all Europe. The Ministerial party triumphed; the advocates of colonial rights were confounded, and their influence in and out of Parliament was paralyzed. The power of the corrupt Ministers who had been oppressing the colonies for ten years, was tottering to their fall; they had played their last card; they had exhausted their credit; they had staked their existence on the truth of the statements they had made, and the accomplishment of the measures they had adopted; their measures had failed; they saw that half-armed colonists had everywhere repulsed the picked English generals and soldiers; their statements as to the intentions and principles of the colonists would have also been falsified had the Congress in 1776 adhered to the declaration of principles and avowal of purposes which it had made in 1775; the friends of American rights would have been triumphant, in and out of Parliament, in England, and 1777 would doubtless have witnessed the overthrow of the corrupt British Ministry, the constitutional freedom of the American colonies in connection with the unity of the empire, instead of seven years' bloody warfare, the destruction of the national life and of the oneness of the Anglo-Saxon race.

III. But the Declaration of Independence on the part of its authors was not only a violation of good faith to the statesmen and others in England who had advocated the constitutional rights of the colonists, it was also a violation both of good faith and justice to their colonial fellow-countrymen who continued to adhere to connection with the mother country upon the principles professed in all times past by the separationists themselves.[397]

The adherents of connection with England had, with the exception of certain office-holders and their relations, been as earnest advocates of colonial rights as had the leaders of the separation. The opponents of the constitutional rights of the colonies, in the colonies, were few and far between—not numerous enough to form a party, or even to be called a party. The Congress of 1775 declared the colonies to be "a unit" in their determination to defend their rights, but disdained the idea of separation from the mother country; and Mr. John Adams stated at the same time: "All America is united in sentiment. When a masterly statesman, to whom America has erected a statue in her heart for his integrity, fortitude, and perseverance in her cause, invented a Committee of Correspondence in Boston, did not every colony, nay, every county, city, hundred, and town upon the whole continent adopt the measure as if it had been a revelation from above? Look over the resolves of the colonies for the past year; you will see that one understanding governs, one heart animates the whole."[398]

Such were the sentiments and feelings of America in resisting the innovations upon their rights of a British Ministry, while they denied the idea of separation from the mother country as a calumny; and such were the grounds on which millions in England and Scotland, in and out of Parliament, supported them.[399]

"Though that measure (independence), a few months before, was not only foreign from their wishes, but the object of their abhorrence, the current suddenly became so strong in its favour that it bore down all opposition. The multitude was hurried down the stream; but some worthy men could not easily reconcile themselves to the idea of an eternal separation from a country to which they had long been bound by the most endearing ties." (Ramsay's History of the United States, Vol. II., pp. 161, 162.)

When, therefore, the Congress at Philadelphia voted, by a majority of one or two, but declaring that their vote should be published as unanimous, to renounce all the professions of the past of connection with the mother country, to declare her their enemy, and to avow eternal separation from her, it may be easily conceived how a large portion of the colonists would feel that their confidence had been betrayed; that the representations they had made to English statesmen would bear the stamp of untruth; that their hopes had been blasted, and that they were now to be treated as rebels and traitors for adhering to the faith of their forefathers; for, as Mr. Allan remarks, the Declaration of Independence "left no neutrals. He who was not for independence, unconditional independence, was an enemy."[400] Thus the many tens of thousands of colonists who adhered to the faith of their forefathers, and the traditions and professions of their own personal history, were, by a single act of Congress, declared "enemies" of their country, "rebels," and even "traitors," because they would not renounce their oath of allegiance, and swear allegiance to a self and newly-created authority, to relinquish the defence of the rights of Englishmen for the theory of republican independence, adherence to which had been advocated by the Chathams and Burkes in the British Parliament, in preference to the new doctrines propounded by the leaders in the Philadelphia Congress, for maintaining the unity and life of a great nation rather than dismember and destroy it. Was it doing as one would be done by? Was it not a violation of good faith, and hard treatment, for men to be declared by a new tribunal criminals in July, for maintaining what all had held to be loyal and patriotic in January? All the arguments and appeals of the Northern States against the separation of the Southern States from the Republic, as destructive of the life of the nation, in the recent civil war of 1864-1869, were equally strong, on the same ground, against the separation of the American colonies from the mother country in the civil war of 1776-1783. The United Empire Loyalists of that day were, as the conservators of the life of the nation, against the dismemberment of the empire, as are the Americans of the Northern States of the present day the conservators of the life of their nation in opposing the dismemberment of the Republic.

IV. But this is not all. This Declaration of the 4th of July, 1776, was the commencement of persecutions, proscriptions, and confiscations of property against those who refused to renounce the oaths which they had taken, as well as the principles and traditions which had, until then, been professed by their persecutors and oppressors as well as by themselves. The declaration of independence had been made in the name and for the professed purposes of liberty; but the very first acts under it were to deprive a large portion of the colonists not only of liberty of action, but liberty of thought and opinion—to extract from them oaths and declarations which could not have been sincere, and which could have been little better than perjuries, for the sole purpose of saving life, liberty, or property. They were a numerous and intelligent portion of the community; were equally interested in the welfare of the country as their assailants, instead of being designated by every epithet of opprobrium, and denied the freedom of opinion and privileges of citizenship.[401] Mr. Elliott remarks:—

"The Tories comprised a large number, among whom were many rich, cultivated, and kindly people; these last, above all, needed watching, and were most dangerous. In looking over the harsh treatment of the Tories by the rebels, it should be remembered that a covert enemy is more dangerous than an open one, and that the Tories comprised both of these. Many men of property and character in Massachusetts were in favour of England, partly from conviction and partly from fear. That large and often cultivated class called "Conservatives," who hold by the past rather than hope for the future, and are constitutionally timid, feared change; they were naturally Tories. Most of the Episcopalians in New England (though not in Virginia) opposed the revolutionary movements. They had felt the oppression and contempt of the New England Congregationalists, and looked to the English Government and the English Church for help. But in Virginia, where they were strong, this was not so; and there the Episcopalians were among the warmest asserters of the rights of man."

"In New York there was at first a very large proportion of Tories; in 1776, not less than twelve hundred and ninety-three persons, in the County of Queen's alone, professed themselves subjects to the King. In Suffolk County, eight hundred enrolled themselves as King's militia."

"In New Jersey, Governor Franklin, son of Benjamin Franklin, led the King's friends, and was active against the Americans until it became necessary to put him in confinement. The war carried on between Tories and Whigs was more merciless than any other, and more cruel and wanton than that of the Indians."

"Laws were made in Rhode Island against all who supplied the enemy with provisions, or gave them information.

"In Connecticut the Tories were not allowed to speak or write against Congress or the Assembly.

"In Massachusetts a man might be banished unless he would swear fealty to the cause of liberty.

"Severe laws were also passed against the Tories in New Hampshire, New York, New Jersey, and Virginia, and in nearly all the colonies now seaboard States.

"John Jay thought the Confiscation Act of New York inexcusable and disgraceful."[402]

Mr. Hildreth remarks: "Very serious was the change in the legal position of the class known as Tories—in many of the States a very large minority, and in all, respectable for wealth and social position. Of those thus stigmatized, some were inclined to favour the utmost claims of the mother country; but the greater part, though determined to adhere to the British connection, yet deprecated the policy which had brought on so fatal a quarrel. This loyal minority, especially its more conspicuous members, as the warmth of political feeling increased, had been exposed to the violence of mobs, and to all sorts of personal indignities, in which private malice or a wanton and violent spirit of mischief had been too often gratified under the guise of patriotism. By the recent political changes, Tories and suspected persons became exposed to dangers from the law as well as from mobs. Having boldly seized the reins of government, the new State authorities claimed the allegiance of all residents within their limits, and under the lead and recommendation of Congress, those who refused to acknowledge their authority, or who adhered to their enemies, were exposed to severe penalties, confiscation of property, imprisonment, banishment, and finally death."[403]

Thus was a large minority of the most wealthy and intelligent (their wealth and intelligence making them the greater criminals) inhabitants of the colonies, by the act of a new body not known to the Constitutions of any of their provinces, reduced to the alternative of violating their convictions, consciences, and oaths, or being branded and treated as enemies of their country, deprived not only of the freedom of the press and of speech, but made criminals for even neutrality and silence, and their property confiscated to defray the expenses of a war upon themselves. Had Congress, in July, 1776, maintained the principles and objects it avowed even in the autumn of 1775, there would have been no occasion of thus violating good faith and common justice to the large minority of the colonies; there is every reason to believe that there would have been a universal rallying, as there had been the year before, in defence of the constitutional rights of Englishmen and the unimpaired life of the empire; there would have been a far larger military force of enthusiastic and patriotic volunteers collected and organized to defend those rights than could ever afterwards be embodied to support independence; there would have been a union of the friends of constitutional liberty on both sides of the Atlantic; good faith would have been kept on both sides, and the "millions in England and Scotland," sustained by the millions in America, instead of being abandoned by them in the very crisis of the contest in the mother country, would have achieved in less than a twelvemonth a victory for freedom, for civilization, and for humanity, far beyond what had been accomplished in the English Revolution of 1688.

V. The Declaration of Independence was the commencement of weakness in the army of its authors, and of defeats in their fields of battle. The Declaration has been announced as the birth of a nation, though it was actually the dismemberment of a nation. It was hailed with every demonstration of joy and triumph on the part of those who had been prepared for the event, and no efforts were spared on the part of those who had advocated independence in the army, in the Congress, and in the provinces, to accompany the circulation of the Declaration with every enthusiastic expression of delight and anticipated free government, in which, of course, they themselves would occupy the chief places of profit and power. But this enthusiasm, notwithstanding the glowing descriptions of some American historians, was far from being general or ardent. Lord Mahon says: "As sent forth by Congress, the Declaration of Independence having reached the camp of Washington, was, by his orders (as commanded by Congress), read aloud at the head of every regiment. There, as in most other places, it excited much less notice than might have been supposed." An American author of our own day (President Reed), most careful in his statements, and most zealous in the cause of independence, observes that "No one can read the private correspondence of the times without being struck with the slight impression made on either the army or the mass of the people by the Declaration."[404]

The Adjutant-General, in his familiar and almost daily letters to his wife, does not even allude to it. But though there was little enthusiasm, there were some excesses. At New York a party of soldiers, with tumultuary violence, tore down and beheaded a statue of the King which stood upon Broadway, having been erected only six years before. Washington, greatly to his honour, did not shrink from the duty of rebuking them next day, in his General Orders, for their misdirected zeal.[405]

Within a few weeks after the Declaration of Independence, Washington's army, composed of forces raised before that Declaration, consisted of 27,000 men—a larger army than he was ever after able to assemble, and more than twice as large as he commanded within a few months afterwards.

It has been seen with what readiness, zeal, and enthusiasm thousands and tens of thousands of volunteers offered their services during the year 1775, and the first part of the year 1776, in defence of British liberty, in union with the friends of civil liberty and defenders of American liberty in England; but when, after the Declaration of the 4th of July, 1776, the cause became one of Congressional liberty instead of British liberty, of separation from the mother country instead of union with it, of a new form of government instead of one to which they had sworn allegiance, and which they had ever lauded and professed to love,—then, in these novel circumstances, the provincial army dwindled from day to day by desertions, as well as from other causes, and recruiting its ranks could only be effected by bounties in money and the promise of lands; the uninterrupted victories of the colonists during the twelve months previous to the Declaration of Independence were succeeded by uninterrupted defeats during the twelve months succeeding it, with the exception of the brilliant and successful surprise raids which Washington made upon Trenton and Princeton. But these exploits were wholly owing to Washington's skill, and sleepless energy, and heroic courage, with feeble forces, in contrast to the lethargy and self-indulgence of the English officers on the one hand and the inactivity of Congress on the other.

The first trial of strength and courage between the English and revolutionary forces took place in August, a few weeks after the Declaration of Independence, in the battle of Long Island, in which Washington's army was completely defeated; New York and all New Jersey soon fell into the hands of the British. For this success General Howe received the honour of knighthood, as did General Carlton for similar success in Canada—the one becoming Sir William Howe, and the other Sir Guy Carlton; but neither did much afterwards to merit the honour. The English officers seemed to have anticipated a pastime in America instead of hard fighting and severe service, and the German mercenaries anticipated rich plunder and sensual indulgence.

In the autumn and winter following Washington's defeat at Long Island and forced evacuation of New York, and indeed of New Jersey, Sir William Howe buried himself in self-indulgent inactivity for six months in New York; while a portion of his army sought quarters and plunder, and committed brutal acts of sensuality, in the chief places of New Jersey. Loyalty seems to have been the prevalent feeling of New Jersey on the first passing of the King's troops through it.[406]

This is stated on unquestionable authority (see the previous note); scarcely any of the inhabitants joined the American retreating army, while numbers were daily flocking to the royal army. But within twelve months, when that royal army passed through the same country, on the evacuation of Philadelphia by Sir Henry Clinton (Sir William Howe having returned to England), the inhabitants were universally hostile, instead of being universally loyal, as the year before. The royal historian says:

"In setting out on this dangerous retreat, the British general clearly perceived that it would be indispensably necessary to provide for all possible contingencies. His way lay entirely through an enemy's country, where everything was hostile in the extreme, and from whence no assistance or help of any sort was to be expected."[407]

The causes of this change in the feelings of the inhabitants of the Jerseys, in the space of a few months, in regard to the British army and mother country, will be a subject of future inquiry; but, in the meantime, the manifest failure of the revolutionary army to maintain its position during the twelve months following the Declaration of Independence, its declining numbers, and the difficulty of recruiting its ranks, show that the act of violent severance from the mother country did not spring from the heart and intellect of the colonists, but from a portion of them which had obtained all the resources of material and military power, under the profession of defending their rights as British subjects, with a view to ultimate reconciliation and union with the mother country; but had used their advantages to declare severance from the mother country, to excite hatred against it, and establish themselves in sovereignty over America. Referring to the state of the colonies toward the close of 1777, the latest American historian, Mr. Frothingham, says:

"This was a period of great political languor. The burden of the war was severely felt. The blaze of freedom, it was said, that burst forth at the beginning had gone down, and numbers, in the thirst for riches, lost sight of the original object. (Independent Chronicle, March 12, 1778.) 'Where,' wrote Henry Laurens (successor to John Hancock as the President of the Congress) to Washington, 'where is virtue, where is patriotism now, when almost every man has turned his thoughts and attention to gain and pleasures?'" (Letter, November 20, 1778.)[408]

VI. The Declaration of Independence was the avowed expedient and prelude to a sought-for alliance with France and Spain against the mother country, notwithstanding they had sought for a hundred years to extirpate the colonists, and had been prevented from "driving them into the sea" by the aid of the army and navy and vast expenditure of the mother country.

It seems difficult to reconcile with truthfulness, fairness, and consistency, the intrigues and proposed terms of alliance between the leaders of Congress and the King of France. These intrigues commenced several months before the Declaration of Independence, when the authors of it were disclaiming any wish or design to separate from England, and their desire for reconciliation with the mother country by a recognition of their rights as they existed in 1763. As early as December, 1775, six months before the Declaration of Independence, a Congress Secret Committee of Correspondence wrote to Arthur Lee, in London (a native of Virginia, but a practising barrister in London), and Charles Dumas, at the Hague, requesting them to ascertain the feeling of European Courts respecting America, enjoining "great circumspection and secrecy."[409] They hoped most from France; but opposition was made in Congress when it was first suggested to apply for aid to the ancient enemy both of the colonies and England. Dr. Zubly, of Georgia, said: "A proposal has been made to apply to France and Spain. I apprehend the man who would propose it (to his constituents) would be torn to pieces like De Witt." Within three months after the utterance of these words in Congress, M. de Bouvouloir, agent of the French Government, appeared in Philadelphia, held secret conferences with the Secret Committee, and assured them that France was ready to aid the colonies on such conditions as might be considered equitable. These conferences were so secret that De Bouvouloir says that "the Committee met him at an appointed place after dark, each going to it by a different road."[410]

A few weeks later, the Secret Committee appointed Silas Deane commercial agent to Europe (March 3), to procure military supplies, and to state to the French Minister, Count Vergennes, the probability of the colonies totally separating from England; that France was looked upon as the power whose friendship they should most desire to cultivate; and to inquire whether, in case of their independence, France would acknowledge it, and receive their Ambassadors.

In April, 1776, three months before the Declaration of Independence, the inquiry was made of Franklin, "When is the Continental Congress by general consent to be formed into a Supreme Legislature?" He replied, "Nothing seems wanting but that general consent. The novelty of the thing deters some; the doubt of success, others; the vain hope of reconciliation, many. Every day furnishes us with new causes of increasing enmity, and new reasons for wishing an eternal separation; so that there is a rapid increase of the formerly small party who were for an independent government."[411]

From these words of Dr. Franklin, as well as from the facts stated in the preceding pages, it is clear the Declaration of Independence was not the spontaneous voice of a continent, as represented by many American historians, but the result of a persistent agitation on the part of the leaders in Congress, and their agents and partizans in the several provinces, who now represented every act of the corrupt Administration in England as the act of the nation, and thus sought to alienate the affections of the colonists from the mother country. Upon Dr. Franklin's own authority, it is clear that he was opposed to any reconciliation with England and in favour of an "eternal separation" months before the Declaration of Independence; that the party "for an independent government" were "the formerly small party," but had "a rapid increase," which Dr. Franklin and his friends knew so well how to promote, while they amused and deceived the friends of the unity of the empire, in both England and America, by professing an earnest desire for reconciliation with the mother country.

The same double game was played against England by the French Government and the secret leaders of the American Congress, the latter professing a desire for reconciliation with England, and the former professing the warmest friendship for England and disapprobation of the separation of the colonies from England, while both parties were secretly consulting together as to the means of dismembering the British empire. "It was," says Dr. Ramsay, "evidently the interest of France to encourage the Americans in their opposition to Great Britain; and it was true policy to do this by degrees, and in a private manner, lest Great Britain might take the alarm. It is certain that Great Britain was amused with declarations of the most pacific disposition on the part of France, at the time the Americans were liberally supplied with the means of defence; and it is equally certain that this was the true line of policy for promoting that dismemberment of the British empire which France had an interest in accomplishing. It was the interest of Congress to apply to the Court of France, and it was the interest of France to listen to their application."[412]

The application for alliance with France to war with England was far from being the voice of America. The fact that it was under discussion in Congress three months before it could be carried, shows how strong must have been the opposition to it in Congress itself, and how vigorous and persevering must have been the efforts to manipulate a majority of its members into acquiescing in an application for arms, money, and men to a Government which was and had always been the enemy of civil and Protestant liberty—which had hired savage Indians to butcher and scalp their forefathers, mothers, and children, without regard to age or sex, and which had sought to destroy their very settlements, and drive them into the sea, while the British Government had preserved them from destruction and secured to them the American continent. It is easy to conceive how every British heart in America must have revolted at the idea of seeking to become brother warriors with the French against the mother country. Nor was the proceeding known in America until America was committed to it, for the Congress made itself a secret conclave; its sittings were held in secret; no divisions were allowed to be recorded; its debates were suppressed; its members were sworn to secrecy; the minorities had no means of making known their views to the public; it was decided by the majority that every resolution published should be reported as having been adopted unanimously, though actually carried by the slenderest majority. The proceedings of that elected Congress, which converted itself into a secret conclave, were never fully known until the present century, and many of them not until the present age, by the biographies of the men and the private correspondence of the times of the American Revolution. The United Empire Loyalists of those times were not permitted to speak for themselves, and their principles, character and acts were only known from the pens of their adversaries. Had the heart of America been allowed to speak and act, there would have been no alliance of America, France, and Spain against England; the American colonies would have achieved their own noblest freedom unstained by future bloodshed, and untainted by so unnatural an alliance; the Anglo-Saxon race and language would have been one, and greatly more advanced than it now is in the cause of the world's freedom and civilization.