COLONIAL DISCONTENTS.
Tidings of peace gladdened the colonies in the spring of 1763. The
definite treaty between England and France had been signed at
Fontainbleau. Now, it was trusted, there would be an end to these
horrid ravages that had desolated the interior of the country. The
month of May proved the fallacy of such hopes. In that month the
famous insurrection of the Indian tribes broke out, which, from the
name of the chief who was its prime mover and master-spirit, is
commonly called Pontiac's war. The Delawares and Shawnees, and other
of those emigrant tribes of the Ohio, among whom Washington had
mingled, were foremost in this conspiracy. Some of the chiefs who had
been his allies had now taken up the hatchet against the English. The
plot was deep laid, and conducted with Indian craft and secrecy. At a
concerted time an attack was made upon all the posts from Detroit to
Fort Pitt (late Fort Duquesne). Several of the small stockaded forts,
the places of refuge of woodland neighborhoods, were surprised and
sacked with remorseless butchery. The frontiers of Pennsylvania,
Maryland and Virginia were laid waste; and a considerable time elapsed
before the frontier was restored to tolerable tranquility.
Fortunately, Washington's retirement from the army prevented his being
entangled in this savage war, which raged throughout the regions he
had repeatedly visited, or rather his active spirit had been diverted
into a more peaceful channel, for he was at this time occupied in the
enterprise just noticed, for draining the great Dismal Swamp.
Public events were now taking a tendency which, without any political
aspirations or forethought of his own, was destined gradually to bear
him away from his quiet home and individual pursuits, and launch him
upon a grander and wider sphere of action than any in which he had
hitherto been engaged.
Whatever might be the natural affection of the colonies for the mother
country--and there are abundant evidences to prove that it was
deep-rooted and strong--it had never been properly reciprocated. They
yearned to be considered as children; they were treated by her as
changelings. Her navigation laws had shut their ports against foreign
vessels; obliged them to export their productions only to countries
belonging to the British crown; to import European goods solely from
England, and in English ships; and had subjected the trade between the
colonies to duties. All manufactures, too, in the colonies that might
interfere with those of the mother country had been either totally
prohibited or subjected to intolerable restraints. The acts of
Parliament imposing these prohibitions and restrictions had at various
times produced sore discontent and opposition on the part of the
colonies. There was nothing, however, to which the jealous
sensibilities of the colonies were more alive than to any attempt of
the mother country to draw a revenue from them by taxation. From the
earliest period of their existence they had maintained the principle
that they could only be taxed by a Legislature in which they were
represented.
In 1760 there was an attempt in Boston to collect duties on foreign
sugar and molasses imported into the colonies. Writs of assistance
were applied for by the custom-house officers, authorizing them to
break open ships, stores and private dwellings, in quest of articles
that had paid no duty; and to call the assistance of others in the
discharge of their odious task. The merchants opposed the execution of
the writ on constitutional grounds. The question was argued in court,
where James Otis spoke so eloquently in vindication of American rights
that all his hearers went away ready to take arms against writs of
assistance. Another ministerial measure was to instruct the provincial
governors to commission judges. Not as theretofore "during good
behavior," but "during the king's pleasure." New York was the first to
resent this blow at the independence of the judiciary. The lawyers
appealed to the public through the press against an act which
subjected the halls of justice to the prerogative. Their appeals were
felt beyond the bounds of the province, and awakened a general spirit
of resistance.
Thus matters stood at the conclusion of the war. One of the first
measures of ministers, on the return of peace, was to enjoin on all
naval officers stationed on the coasts of the American colonies the
performance, under oath, of the duties of custom-house officers, for
the suppression of smuggling. This fell ruinously upon a clandestine
trade which had long been connived at between the English and Spanish
colonies, profitable to both, but especially to the former, and
beneficial to the mother country, opening a market to her
manufactures. As a measure of retaliation the colonists resolved not
to purchase British fabrics, but to clothe themselves as much as
possible in home manufactures. The demand for British goods in Boston
alone was diminished upwards of 10,000 pounds sterling in the course
of a year.
In 1764 George Grenville, now at the head of government, ventured upon
the policy from which Walpole [his predecessor] had wisely abstained.
Early in March the eventful question was debated, "whether they had a
right to tax America." It was decided in the affirmative. Next
followed a resolution, declaring it proper to charge certain stamp
duties in the colonies and plantations, but no immediate step was
taken to carry it into effect. Mr. Grenville, however, gave notice to
the American agents in London that he should introduce such a measure
on the ensuing session of Parliament. In the meantime Parliament
perpetuated certain duties on sugar and molasses--heretofore subjects
of complaint and opposition--now reduced and modified so as to
discourage smuggling, and thereby to render them more productive.
Duties, also, were imposed on other articles of foreign produce or
manufacture imported into the colonies. To reconcile the latter to
these impositions, it was stated that the revenue thus raised was to
be appropriated to their protection and security; in other words, to
the support of a standing army, intended to be quartered upon them. We
have here briefly stated but a part of what Burke terms an "infinite
variety of paper chains," extending through no less than twenty-nine
acts of Parliament, from 1660 to 1764, by which the colonies had been
held in thraldom.
The New Englanders were the first to take the field against the
project of taxation. They denounced it as a violation of their rights
as freemen; of their chartered rights, by which they were to tax
themselves for their support and defence; of their rights as British
subjects, who ought not to be taxed but by themselves or their
representatives. They sent petitions and remonstrances on the subject
to the king, the lords and the commons, in which they were seconded by
New York and Virginia. All was in vain. In March, 1765, the act was
passed, according to which all instruments in writing were to be
executed on stamped paper, to be purchased from the agents of the
British government. What was more, all offences against the act could
be tried in any royal, marine or admiralty court throughout the
colonies, however distant from the place where the offence had been
committed; thus interfering with that most inestimable right, a trial
by jury.
It was an ominous sign that the first burst of opposition to this act
should take place in Virginia. That colony had hitherto been slow to
accord with the republican spirit of New England. Founded at an
earlier period of the reign of James I., before kingly prerogative and
ecclesiastical supremacy had been made matters of doubt and fierce
dispute, it had grown up in loyal attachment to king, church, and
constitution; was aristocratical in its tastes and habits, and had
been remarked above all the other colonies for its sympathies with the
mother country. Moreover, it had not so many pecuniary interests
involved in these questions as had the people of New England, being an
agricultural rather than a commercial province; but the Virginians are
of a quick and generous spirit, readily aroused on all points of
honorable pride, and they resented the stamp act as an outrage on
their rights.
Washington occupied his seat in the House of Burgesses, when, on the
29th of May, the stamp act became a subject of discussion. Among the
Burgesses sat Patrick Henry, a young lawyer who had recently
distinguished himself by pleading against the exercise of the royal
prerogative in church matters, and who was now for the first time a
member of the House. Rising in his place, he introduced his celebrated
resolutions, declaring that the General Assembly of Virginia had the
exclusive right and power to lay taxes and impositions upon the
inhabitants, and that whoever maintained the contrary should be deemed
an enemy to the colony. The speaker, Mr. Robinson, objected to the
resolutions, as inflammatory. Henry vindicated them, as justified by
the nature of the case; went into an able and constitutional
discussion of colonial rights, and an eloquent exposition of the
manner in which they had been assailed.
The resolutions were modified, to accommodate them to the scruples of
the speaker and some of the members, but their spirit was retained.
The Lieutenant-governor (Fauquier), startled by this patriotic
outbreak, dissolved the Assembly, and issued writs for a new election;
but the clarion had sounded.
Washington returned to Mount Vernon full of anxious thoughts inspired
by the political events of the day, and the legislative scene which he
witnessed. His recent letters had spoken of the state of peaceful
tranquillity in which he was living; those now written from his rural
home show that he fully participated in the popular feeling, and that
while he had a presentiment of an arduous struggle, his patriotic mind
was revolving means of coping with it. In the meantime, from his quiet
abode at Mount Vernon, he seemed to hear the patriotic voice of
Patrick Henry, which had startled the House of Burgesses, echoing
throughout the land, and rousing one legislative body after another to
follow the example of that of Virginia. At the instigation of the
General Court or Assembly of Massachusetts, a Congress was held in New
York in October, composed of delegates from Massachusetts, Rhode
Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware,
Maryland, and South Carolina. In this they denounced the acts of
Parliament imposing taxes on them without their consent, and extending
the jurisdiction of the courts of admiralty, as violations of their
rights and liberties as natural born subjects of Great Britain, and
prepared an address to the king, and a petition to both Houses of
Parliament, praying for redress. Similar petitions were forwarded to
England by the colonies not represented in the Congress.
The very preparations for enforcing the stamp act called forth popular
tumults in various places. In Boston the stamp distributor was hanged
in effigy; his windows were broken; a house intended for a stamp
office was pulled down, and the effigy burnt in a bonfire made of the
fragments. In Virginia, Mr. George Mercer had been appointed
distributor of stamps, but on his arrival at Williamsburg publicly
declined officiating. It was a fresh triumph to the popular cause. The
bells were rung for joy; the town was illuminated, and Mercer was
hailed with acclamations of the people. The 1st of November, the day
when the act was to go into operation, was ushered in with portentous
solemnities. There was great tolling of bells and burning of effigies
in the New England colonies. At Boston the ships displayed their
colors but half-mast high. Many shops were shut; funeral knells
resounded from the steeples, and there was a grand auto-da-fe, in
which the promoters of the act were paraded, and suffered martyrdom in
effigy. At New York the printed act was carried about the streets on a
pole, surmounted by a death's head, with a scroll bearing the
inscription, "The folly of England and ruin of America."
These are specimens of the marks of popular reprobation with which the
stamp act was universally nullified. No one would venture to carry it
into execution. In fact no stamped paper was to be seen; all had been
either destroyed or concealed. All transactions which required stamps
to give them validity were suspended, or were executed by private
compact. The courts of justice were closed, until at length some
conducted their business without stamps. Union was becoming the
watch-word. The merchants of New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and such
other colonies as had ventured publicly to oppose the stamp act,
agreed to import no more British manufactures after the 1st of January
unless it should be repealed. So passed away the year 1765.
The dismissal of Mr. Grenville from the cabinet gave a temporary
change to public affairs. The stamp act was repealed on the 18th of
March, 1766, to the great joy of the sincere friends of both
countries, still, there was a fatal clause in the repeal, which
declared that the king, with the consent of Parliament, had power and
authority to make laws and statutes of sufficient force and validity
to "bind the colonies, and people of America, in all cases
whatsoever." As the people of America were contending for principles,
not mere pecuniary interests, this reserved power of the crown and
Parliament left the dispute still open, and chilled the feeling of
gratitude which the repeal might otherwise have inspired. Further
aliment for public discontent was furnished by other acts of
Parliament. One imposed duties on glass, pasteboard, white and red
lead, painters' colors, and tea; the duties to be collected on the
arrival of the articles in the colonies; another empowered naval
officers to enforce the acts of trade and navigation. Another wounded
to the quick the pride and sensibilities of New York. The mutiny act
had recently been extended to America, with an additional clause,
requiring the provincial Assemblies to provide the troops sent out
with quarters, and to furnish them with fire, beds, candles, and other
necessaries, at the expense of the colonies. The Governor and Assembly
of New York refused to comply with this requisition as to stationary
forces, insisting that it applied only to troops on a march. An act of
Parliament now suspended the powers of the governor and Assembly until
they should comply.
Boston continued to be the focus of what the ministerialists termed
sedition. The General Court of Massachusetts, not content with
petitioning the king for relief against the recent measures of
Parliament, especially those imposing taxes as a means of revenue,
drew up a circular, calling on the other colonial Legislatures to join
with them in suitable efforts to obtain redress. In the ensuing
session, Governor Sir Francis Bernard called upon them to rescind the
resolution on which the circular was founded,--they refused to comply,
and the General Court was consequently dissolved. The governors of
other colonies required of their Legislatures an assurance that they
would not reply to the Massachusetts circular--these Legislatures
likewise refused compliance, and were dissolved. All this added to the
growing excitement.
Nothing, however, produced a more powerful effect upon the public
sensibilities throughout the country than certain military
demonstrations at Boston. [In consequence of repeated collisions
between the people of that place and the commissioners of customs, two
regiments of troops were sent from Halifax to overawe the disaffected
citizens. It was resolved in a town meeting that the king had no right
to send troops thither without the consent of the Assembly. The
selectmen accordingly refused to find quarters for the soldiers, and
while some encamped on the common, others were quartered, to the great
indignation of the public, in Faneuil Hall.]
Throughout these public agitations, Washington endeavored to preserve
his equanimity. Still he was too true a patriot not to sympathize in
the struggle for colonial rights which now agitated the whole country,
and we find him gradually carried more and more into the current of
political affairs. A letter written on the 5th of April, 1769, to his
friend, George Mason, shows the important stand he was disposed to
take. In the previous year the merchants and traders of Boston, Salem,
Connecticut and New York, had agreed to suspend for a time the
importation of all articles subject to taxation. Similar resolutions
had recently been adopted by the merchants of Philadelphia.
Washington's letter is emphatic in support of the measure. "At a
time," writes he, "when our lordly masters in Great Britain will be
satisfied with nothing less than the deprivation of American freedom,
it seems highly necessary that something should be done to avert the
stroke, and maintain the liberty which we have derived from our
ancestors."
Mason, in his reply, concurred with him in opinion. "Our all is at
stake," said he, "and the little conveniences and comforts of life,
when set in competition with our liberty, ought to be rejected, not
with reluctance but with pleasure." The result of the correspondence
was the draft by the latter of a plan of association, the members of
which were to pledge themselves not to import or use any articles of
British merchandise or manufacture subject to duty. This paper
Washington was to submit to the consideration of the House of
Burgesses, at the approaching session in the month of May.
The Legislature of Virginia opened on this occasion with a brilliant
pageant. While military force was arrayed to overawe the republican
Puritans of the east, it was thought to dazzle the aristocratical
descendants of the cavaliers by the reflex of regal splendor. Lord
Botetourt, one of the king's lords of the bed-chamber, had recently
come out as governor of the province. Junius described him as "a
cringing, bowing, fawning, sword-bearing courtier." The words of
political satirists, however, are always to be taken with great
distrust. However his lordship may have bowed in presence of royalty,
he elsewhere conducted himself with dignity, and won general favor by
his endearing manners.
He had come out, however, with a wrong idea of the Americans. They had
been represented to him as factious, immoral, and prone to sedition;
but vain and luxurious, and easily captivated by parade and splendor.
The latter foibles were aimed at in his appointment and fitting out.
It was supposed that his titled rank would have its effect. Then to
prepare him for occasions of ceremony, a coach of state was presented
to him by the king. His opening of the session was in the style of the
royal opening of Parliament. He proceeded in due parade from his
dwelling to the capitol, in his state coach, drawn by six milk-white
horses. Having delivered his speech according to royal form, he
returned home with the same pomp and circumstance.
The time had gone by, however, for such display to have the
anticipated effect. The Virginian legislators penetrated the intention
of this pompous ceremonial, and regarded it with a depreciating smile.
Sterner matters occupied their thoughts; they had come prepared to
battle for their rights, and their proceedings soon showed Lord
Botetourt how much he had mistaken them. Spirited resolutions were
passed, denouncing the recent act of Parliament imposing taxes; the
power to do which, on the inhabitants of this colony, "was legally and
constitutionally vested in the House of Burgesses, with consent of the
council and of the king, or of his governor, for the time being."
Copies of these resolutions were ordered to be forwarded by the
speaker to the Legislatures of the other colonies, with a request for
their concurrence.
Other proceedings of the Burgesses showed their sympathy with their
fellow-patriots of New England. A joint address of both Houses of
Parliament had recently been made to the king, assuring him of their
support in any further measures for the due execution of the laws in
Massachusetts, and beseeching him that all persons charged with
treason, or misprision of treason, committed within that colony since
the 30th of December, 1767, might be sent to Great Britain for trial.
As Massachusetts had no General Assembly at this time, having been
dissolved by government, the Legislature of Virginia generously took
up the cause. An address to the king was resolved on, stating, that
all trials for treason, or misprision of treason, or for any crime
whatever committed by any person residing in a colony, ought to be in
and before his majesty's courts within said colony; and beseeching the
king to avert from his royal subjects those dangers and miseries which
would ensue from seizing and carrying beyond sea any person residing
in America suspected of any crime whatever, thereby depriving them of
the inestimable privilege of being tried by a jury from the vicinage,
as well as the liberty of producing witnesses on such trial.
Lord Botetourt was astonished and dismayed when he heard of these
high-toned proceedings. Repairing to the capitol on the following day
at noon, he summoned the speaker and members to the council chamber,
and addressed them in the following words: "Mr. Speaker, and gentlemen
of the House of Burgesses, I have heard of your resolves, and augur
ill of their effects. You have made it my duty to dissolve you, and
you are dissolved accordingly."
The spirit conjured up by late decrees of Parliament was not so easily
allayed. The Burgesses adjourned to a private house. Peyton Randolph,
their late speaker, was elected moderator. Washington now brought
forward a draft of the articles of association, concerted between him
and George Mason. They formed the groundwork of an instrument signed
by all present, pledging themselves neither to import, nor use any
goods, merchandise, or manufactures taxed by Parliament to raise a
revenue in America. This instrument was sent throughout the country
for signature, and the scheme of non-importation, hitherto confined to
a few northern colonies, was soon universally adopted.
The popular ferment in Virginia was gradually allayed by the amiable
and conciliatory conduct of Lord Botetourt, His lordship soon became
aware of the erroneous notions with which he had entered upon office.
His semi-royal equipage and state were laid aside. He examined into
public grievances; became a strenuous advocate for the repeal of
taxes; and, authorized by his despatches from the ministry, assured
the public that such repeal would speedily take place. His assurance
was received with implicit faith, and for a while Virginia was
quieted.
[In the month of May the General Court of Massachusetts, hitherto
prorogued met according to charter. A committee immediately waited on
the governor declaring that it was impossible to do business with
dignity and freedom while the town was invested by sea and land, and a
military guard was stationed at the state-house; and they requested
the governor as his] majesty's representative, to have such forces
removed out of the port and gates of the city during the session of
the Assembly. The governor replied that he had no authority over
either the ships or troops. The court persisted in refusing to
transact business while so circumstanced, and the governor was obliged
to transfer the session to Cambridge. There he addressed a message to
that body in July, requiring funds for the payment of the troops, and
quarters for their accommodation. The Assembly, after ample discussion
of past grievances, resolved, that the establishment of a standing
army in the colony in a time of peace was an invasion of natural
rights; that a standing army was not known as a part of the British
constitution, and that the sending an armed force to aid the civil
authority was unprecedented, and highly dangerous to the people.
After waiting some days without receiving an answer to his message,
the governor sent to know whether the Assembly would, or would not,
make provision for the troops. In their reply, they followed the
example of the Legislature of New York, by declining to furnish funds
for the purposes specified, "being incompatible with their own honor
and interest, and their duty to their constituents." They were in
consequence again prorogued, to meet in Boston on the 10th of January.
So stood affairs in Massachusetts. In the meantime, the
non-importation associations, being generally observed throughout the
colonies, produced the effect on British commerce which Washington had
anticipated, and Parliament was incessantly importuned by petitions
from British merchants imploring its intervention to save them from
ruin.
Early in 1770, an important change took place in the British cabinet.
The Duke of Grafton suddenly resigned, and the reins of government
passed into the hands of Lord North. He was a man of limited capacity,
but a favorite of the king, and subservient to his narrow colonial
policy. His administration, so eventful to America, commenced with an
error. In the month of March an act was passed, revoking all the
duties laid in 1767, _excepting that on tea_. This single tax was
continued, as he observed, "to maintain the parliamentary right of
taxation,"--the very right which was the grand object of contest. Here
was the stumbling-block at the threshold of Lord North's
administration. In vain the members of the opposition urged that this
single exception, while it would produce no revenue, would keep alive
the whole cause of contention; that so long as a single external duty
was enforced, the colonies would consider their rights invaded, and
would remain unappeased. Lord North was not to be convinced. On the
very day in which this ominous bill was passed in Parliament, a
sinister occurrence took place in Boston. Some of the young men of the
place insulted the military while under arms; the latter resented it;
the young men, after a scuffle, were put to flight, and pursued. The
alarm bells rang, a mob assembled; the custom-house was threatened;
the troops, in protecting it, were assailed with clubs and stones, and
obliged to use their fire-arms before the tumult could be quelled.
Four of the populace were killed, and several wounded. The troops were
now removed from the town, which remained in the highest state of
exasperation; and this untoward occurrence received the opprobrious
and somewhat extravagant name of "the Boston massacre."
In Virginia the public discontents, which had been allayed by the
conciliatory conduct of Lord Botetourt, and by his assurances, made on
the strength of letters received from the ministry, that the
grievances complained of would be speedily redressed, now broke out
with more violence than ever. The Virginians spurned the mock-remedy
which left the real cause of complaint untouched. His lordship also
felt deeply wounded by the disingenuousness of ministers which had led
him into such a predicament, and wrote home demanding his discharge.
Before it arrived, an attack of bilious fever, acting upon a delicate
and sensitive frame, enfeebled by anxiety and chagrin, laid him in his
grave. He left behind him a name endeared to the Virginians by his
amiable manners, his liberal patronage of the arts, and, above all, by
his zealous intercession for their rights.