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The Great Republic by the Master Historians
The Growth of Discontent
by Bancroft, Hubert H.
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[One important result of the dissensions between America and England, and of the
revolutionary sentiment which was rapidly extending, was the growth of a
powerful school of oratory, the necessary outcome of political agitation.
Numbers of glowing orators appeared, whose eloquent appeals did much towards
spreading the flame of discontent and sustaining the people in their ardent
resistance to the tyranny of the British Parliament. The most important of these
political leaders and orators were natives of Virginia, Massachusetts, and South
Carolina. In Virginia the brilliant declamations of Patrick Henry were
firebrands of revolution. Other skilled and accomplished orators were Edmund
Pendleton, Richard Bland, George Wythe, Peyton Randolph, and Richard Henry Lee.
Two other Virginians of extraordinary abilities we may here name, George
Washington, already the greatest soldier in America, and Thomas Jefferson, a man
of remarkable powers, all of which were steadily exerted in the cause of
American liberty.
To the skill and ardor of Otis and Thacher, as defenders of the rights of their
countrymen, we have already adverted. Not less ardent and fearless was Samuel
Adams, one of the greatest of ante-Revolutionary Americans. Other prominent
leaders in Massachusetts were John Hancock, Thomas Cushing, and James Bowdoin,
merchants; Samuel Cooper, a clergyman; Josiah Quincy and Robert Treat Paine,
lawyers; and John Winthrop, a Harvard professor. The notable orators of South
Carolina were John Rutledge, whose powers rivalled those of Patrick Henry;
Christopher Gadsden, a fearless republican; Henry Laurens, David Ramsay, and
Edward Rutledge, brother of John, and whose eloquence was as graceful as his
brother's was impetuous. We might add to these names those of men of equal
ability, daring and patriotism in the other provinces, but it will suffice here
to name Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, to whose services in the cause of
liberty we have already given some attention, and who, mentally, was one of the
greatest men that the world has ever produced. To his name may be added that of
Thomas Paine, an advocate of liberty of remarkable brilliance of style and
uncompromising courage in publishing his sentiments. Of the stirring events
which followed the repeal of the Stamp Act we give a brief but lucid review from
Lodge's "Short History of the English Colonies in America."]
The sound of the rejoicings called forth by the repeal of the Stamp Act had
hardly died away before it was seen how little had really been gained beyond
immediate and temporary relief. The Stamp Act was gone, but the Declaratory Act,
and the Sugar Act, and the Mutiny Act, requiring quarters to be provided for
English troops, and recently extended to the colonies, remained unmodified and
unchanged. The Rockingham ministry was dissolved; Pitt came again to the helm,
and was made the Earl of Chatham. The clouds of his strange illness gathered
about the prime minister, and the conduct of affairs fell into the hands of
Charles Townshend, a believer in the Stamp Act, and with no faith in Pitt's
distinction between internal and external taxation. He was determined to pursue
the policy of Grenville, and laid his plans to quarter garrisons in the large
towns of America and have them supported by the colonial Assemblies, and to
exact a revenue from the colonies. The trouble had, indeed, already begun in New
York, where the Assembly, which had passed a limited act for the supply of two
regiments in December, 1766, refused to provide for quartering troops, and stood
firm through a long controversy with Sir Henry Moore. In the following spring,
Parliament, under the lead of Townshend, suspended the legislative powers of New
York, as a punishment for their disobedience. This was a warning which could not
be mistaken. In the other colonies, even when requisitions were complied with,
there was careful evasion of obedience to the terms of the act, and sympathy
with New York spread far and wide, carrying with it deep disquiet and
indignation. Not content with beginning to enforce the Mutiny Act, Townshend
carried measures to impose port duties on wine, oil, and fruit from Spain and
Portugal, and on glass, paper, lead, colors, and tea. The revenue thus raised
was to be used for the payment of the crown officers, and for the establishment
of a civil list. This was a blow at the most vital rights of the colonies, for
it took from them the control of their governments. The new policy, unchecked by
the death of Townshend in the autumn of 1767, excited the utmost apprehension in
America, and fanned into flame the smouldering embers of the opposition to the
Stamp Act. Again non-importation agreements were discussed, but without
combination or effect; and Massachusetts, thoroughly alarmed at the prospect of
independent crown officers, determined on stronger measures. The Assembly
resolved to send a petition to the king, and letters to the statesmen of
England. In the petition, drawn, probably, by Samuel Adams, the Assembly set
forth the conditions of their settlement, argued against taxation without
representation, and protested against the presence of a standing army, and the
project of rendering the judicial and executive officers independent of the
people. They followed this action by a resolve inviting the other colonies to
unite with them in petitions to the king against the new taxation. At every step
Bernard and Hutchinson resisted the Assembly, which moved forward steadily,
cautiously, and firmly, making no mistakes, and giving no openings. Bernard and
the crown officers met the action of the Assembly by a counter-memorial,
inveighing against the freedom and independent temper of the colonists, and
advising the immediate presence of fleets and armies,--supporting their requests
with tales of projected riots, for the people had begun to be restless, although
there was really no danger of any serious outbreak.
Hillsborough, the new Secretary of State, and the king's friends were indignant
at the action of Massachusetts, and letters were sent to the other colonies
denouncing the Massachusetts circular, and to Bernard instructing him to order
the House to rescind their resolve, and, if they refused, to dissolve them.
Meantime, the excitement increased. John Hancock's sloop Liberty was seized, on
the ground of evasion of the customs. There was a slight disturbance, and
revenue officers, in pretended fear of their lives, took refuge on the Romney
man-of-war, while the town and the governor quarrelled about the affair. When
the general court met, strengthened by the sympathy of Connecticut and New
Jersey, and by the letter of Virginia, where their principles had been sustained
by resolutions of the Burgesses, Hillsborough's letter was presented. The House,
by an overwhelming vote, refused to rescind; the court was dissolved, and
Massachusetts was left without a legislature. Boston town meeting took into its
hands the power which Hillsborough and Bernard sought to crush. They called a
convention of delegates from the towns of the province while troops were on
their way to Massachusetts; and this convention came together, demanded in vain
a general court, passed strong resolutions against taxation and a standing army,
and adjourned. while the Council refused to make provision for the expected
soldiers until the barracks were filled, and the old beacon was prepared as in
the days of Andros. Soon after the convention dissolved, two regiments,
presently increased to four, and artillery, landed and marched into the town.
The Council refused quarters until the barracks were occupied; and, after
camping for some time in the open air, the troops were finally quartered and
supplied at the expense of the crown. No measure could possibly have been taken
better calculated to produce civil war. The troops were sent to overawe, and
they merely irritated the people. Into a peaceful town, into a province which
had simply remonstrated and petitioned legally and properly in defence of their
rights, were suddenly thrust royal regiments. The strong feeling of independence
in a country where garrisons were absolutely unknown was outraged, while the bad
character and licentious habits of the soldiery incensed a rigid, austere, and
sober people. Attempts at military coercion and the presence of troops were sure
to breed trouble; and, worse than this, they not only awakened the sympathy of
the other colonies, but alarmed them for their own safety. It was outside
pressure and peril in its strongest form, and nothing tended so strongly to
produce the union which alone could be fatal to English rule.
In Virginia, when the Burgesses met, resolutions were passed declaring against
taxation, and asserting the right to trial by a jury of the vicinage, and to
combination among the colonies. Botetourt dissolved the Assembly, and the
Burgesses met in convention and formed a stringent non-importation agreement.
Virginia carried with her the Southern colonies, and her example was followed in
Delaware and Pennsylvania, and when the general court came together again in
Massachusetts they promptly adopted the resolutions. Some of the troops had been
withdrawn; but two regiments were kept on Bernard's request, and he and the
legislature were in no good humor when they met at Cambridge, whither the
governor adjourned them. The House refused flatly to provide for troops, or to
give a salary for the year to Bernard, who was recalled, and who soon after,
having prorogued the refractory Assembly, departed from Boston, amid the noisy
rejoicings of the populace, leaving Hutchinson to rule in his stead. While
Massachusetts and Virginia were thus coming together and preparing the American
Union, the ministry in England, halting and undecided, rather frightened at the
results of their energetic policy, and desperately embroiled with Wilkes,
decided to recede. They sent a circular to the colonies, promising to lay no
more taxes, and to repeal the duties on glass, paper, and colors, retaining only
that on tea. Their action was that of well-meaning, narrow, and weak men. They
should either then and there have enforced their policy at the point of the
bayonet, or they should have fully and frankly given way on every point. To save
their pride, maintain their doctrines, and please the king, they retained one
paltry tax, yielding perhaps three hundred pounds a year, but which carried the
vital principle with it as surely and clearly as revenue involving millions. The
course of the ministry had slowly brought the conflict to the point at which
complete victory on one side or the other was alone possible. The colonies were
fully alive to the situation, and saw that while one tax remained nothing had
been gained. The non-importation agreements spread everywhere, and were strongly
enforced, and all society was drawn into a refusal to use tea. Conflicts with
the revenue officers in Rhode Island and elsewhere grew more and more frequent,
and the relations of the people with the soldiery in New York and Boston more
and more strained. In New York there were violent affrays between the soldiers
and the people over the erection of the liberty-pole, and there was fighting in
the streets. These outbreaks heightened the feeling in Boston, where the
soldiers were taunted and insulted, and where recurring fights between populace
and red-coats showed that a crisis was at hand. On the 3d of March there was an
ugly brawl, and on the evening of the 5th there was another fray, and trouble
with the sentry. Before quiet was restored there was renewed fighting, and a
crowd gathered round the sentry in King Street. Alarmed and angry, the man
called out the guard; the mob rapidly increased; insults were followed by
missiles; one soldier discharged his gun; there was a scattering fire from the
troops, and three of the citizens were killed and two mortally wounded. Blood
had been shed, and it looked as if civil war had begun. The regiments were
turned out, the people poured into the streets; it was a mere chance that the
American Revolution was not then to open. But Hutchinson appeared in the balcony
of the State-House, promised an investigation, and besought peace. The people
dispersed, and war was for the moment averted; but nothing could efface the
memory of this affray. Regular troops had fired upon the citizens, human life
had been sacrificed, and the exaggerated title of the "Boston Massacre" showed
the importance attached to this event, which served for years to keep alive and
develop resistance to England.
The morning after the massacre the select-men waited on Hutchinson and urged the
removal of the troops. At eleven the town meeting came together, and chose a
committee, with Samuel Adams at its head, to wait upon the governor and demand
the withdrawal of the troops. Hutchinson wished to delay and postpone. He
offered to have the Twenty-Ninth Regiment, which had fired on the people,
removed to the Castle, and the other put under proper restraint. The committee
went back through thronged streets, and made its report, which was pronounced
unsatisfactory, and a new committee, again headed by Adams, went back to the
governor. The interview which followed in the council-chamber, as the daylight
slowly faded, was one of the great dramatic scenes of the American Revolution.
In that moment Samuel Adams was pre-eminent, and all the greatness and force of
his mind and character concentrated to raise him up as the great tribune of the
people. The incarnation of right and justice, the true champion of the people,
he stood before the fit representative of a weak, vacillating, proud, and stupid
ministry, and made the representative quail before him. "If you can remove one,
you can remove both," he said to Hutchinson; "there are three thousand people in
yonder town meeting; the country is rising; night is falling; and we must have
an answer." Hutchinson hesitated a moment, trembled, and gave way. Before a week
elapsed, all the troops were withdrawn; and meantime they had watched the
funerals of their victims, seen their companions arrested for murder, beheld a
town meeting called to hurry their departure, and had been kept under strict
guard by the militia of the town they went forth to garrison. Staying and going
were alike full of humiliation and defeat. It was a great triumph; and as the
news of the events at Boston spread, a strong sense of relief filled the
colonies.
Henry C. Lodge
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