WRITS OF ASSISTANCE AND THE STAMP ACT
The men who, whether in America or England, took sides with the king or
the colonies as Tories and Whigs, or as "prerogative men" and "friends
of liberty," fall naturally into two classes. A line of cleavage could
be seen at the time, and can even be traced now, among the supporters of
either side, according as they followed principle or self-interest.
There were those who sought profit in supporting the colonies, as well
as those who knowingly faced loss in defending the king. It is well for
Americans to remember, therefore, that while many sided with the king
for what they could get, there were others whose minds could not
conceive a country without a king, or a subject with inalienable rights.
The best of the Tories honestly believed the Whig agitation to be
"unnatural, causeless, wanton, and wicked."[10] Such Americans were, in
the inevitable struggle, truly martyrs to their beliefs.
Nevertheless, just as there was naturally more profit or prominence (and
the two were often the same) on the king's side, so his party had the
more self-seekers. "The cause is not worth dying for," said Ingersoll,
facing the Connecticut farmers, and spoke the sentiment of all the
stamp-officers who resigned their positions at the demand of the people.
The cause, however, did seem worth working for. There were many, in
England and America, who, like those whom Otis saw around him, "built
much upon the fine salaries they should receive from the plantation
branch of the revenue." Position, pay, and the chance to exploit the
revenues as this was done in England, were the temptations which brought
many to the side of the king, and which made men unite to urge upon him
the acts which he desired for less selfish reasons.
Urged by principle, then, or excited by self-interest, the proposers of
new measures were strong. The earliest act of the king's reign showed
what could and what would be done, and brought upon the Boston stage the
first of the actors in the drama. On the one hand were the governor, the
justices, and the minor officials, on the other the people's
self-appointed--but willingly accepted--leaders.
Francis Bernard was the first Massachusetts governor under George III.
Bernard arrived August 2, 1760; the old king died on October 25; and in
November the customs officials, stimulated by orders from home to
enforce the provisions of the Sugar Act of 1733, petitioned for "writs
of assistance," to empower them to summon help in forcible entries in
search of smuggled goods. Now there can be no doubt that there was
smuggling in the colony, even in Boston itself. On the other hand, the
officials were inquisitorial and rapacious. Once they were armed with
writs of assistance, no dwelling would be safe from entry by them. The
struggle was at once begun, and in the council chamber of the old Town
House was fought out before the eyes of the province.
The scene is pictured on the walls of the modern State House. Chief
among the justices sat Thomas Hutchinson, a man of property and
education, and an excellent historian, but the very type of
office-holder, and by prejudice and interest a partisan of the king.
Against him stood James Otis, the first of the Massachusetts orators of
liberty, a man of good family, and, like so many of the patriot leaders,
a lawyer. His speech was the first definite pronouncement for a new
order of things.
"I am determined," he said, "to sacrifice estate, ease, health,
applause, and even life, to the sacred calls of my country." He referred
to the "kind of power, the exercise of which cost one king of England
his head and another his throne." Such language, publicly spoken, was
new. His argument was, to Englishmen, irrefutable. No precedent, no
English statute, could stand against the Constitution. "This writ, if
declared legal, totally annihilates" the privacy of the home.
"Custom-house officers might enter our houses when they please, and we
could not resist them. Upon bare suspicion they could exercise this
wanton power.... Both reason and the Constitution are against this
writ.... Every act against the Constitution is void."[11] The speech,
continued for four hours, was a brilliant example of keen logic combined
with burning eloquence.
This is Otis's great service to the cause of the Revolution. Fiery and
magnetic, but moody and eventually unbalanced, he gave place in the
public confidence to men perhaps of lesser talents, but with equal zeal
and steadier purpose. Yet his service was invaluable. His speech
expressed for his countrymen the indignation of the hour, and it pointed
the way to younger men. To one at least of his hearers, John Adams, it
was "like the oath of Hamilcar administered to Hannibal."[12] To many it
was the final appeal that settled them in their patriotism. For history
the scene has been called the beginning of the Revolution.
Yet it had no immediate results, for Hutchinson--and the service was
forgotten by neither his friends nor his opponents--secured delay of
judgment in the case until the English courts could uphold him against
his wavering associates. Nevertheless, it is safe to assume that the
public indignation secured moderate measures on the part of the customs
officials, since we hear of few complaints. And the affair had its
influence on the public attitude toward the Stamp Act, five years later.
The Stamp Act was the first definite assertion of the right to tax
America. In 1763 the Sugar Act had been reenacted, but its provisions,
taxing only importations from foreign colonies, yielded little revenue.
The king's treasury was already feeling the drains upon it, and a pack
of eager office-seekers was clamoring to be let loose upon the revenues
of the colonies. Together the king and his friends pushed through
Parliament the legislation which was to secure their purposes. To meet
any such danger as in the recent French and Indian wars, ten thousand
soldiers were to be quartered on the colonies, which were to pay for
their maintenance. Certain sops to public sentiment were given, in the
shape of concessions, yet new restrictions were laid on foreign trade.
And finally and most important, a stamp-tax, the easiest to collect, was
laid on business and legal formalities of all kinds. After its passage
no land title might be passed, no legal papers issued, no ship might
clear from a home port, without a stamp affixed to the necessary
documents. Not even inheritances might be transferred, nor marriages be
legalized.
This was the first internal taxation laid by England on America. A word
is necessary as to the meaning of the phrase in those days. An external
tax, perhaps merely an export duty, was levied and paid in England; its
effect was seen in higher prices in the colonies. Internal taxation
would include all taxes actually paid in America on goods coming from
England. The provisions of the Sugar Act were regarded as "trade
restrictions," and not as intended to raise an English revenue.
There is perhaps no better place to discuss the justice of the
Revolution than right here. Even to-day the illegality, the utter
wrongfulness of the American position, is occasionally raised among us
by those who see the great obligations to the mother country under which
the colonies lay, and who recall the needless hardships suffered by the
wretched Tories, the martyrs of a lost cause. Doubtless wrongs were
inflicted in the course of the struggle, and the great expenditures of
England were in large part unrequited. But it must be remembered that
the world had not yet reached the point where the losers in a war were
gently treated, and that no amount of financial obligation will ever
compel to the acceptance of political servitude. By habit of mind and
force of circumstances America had developed a political theory
puzzlingly novel to the old world and as yet not thoroughly understood
by the new. It was upon this unformulated theory that all future
differences were to arise. It interfered in all affairs in which the
question arose: Should the colonies be governed, and especially should
they be taxed, without a voice in their own affairs?
No one in England doubted that Parliament had a right to tax America
without its consent. Customs restrictions were long familiar. As to
internal taxation, why, it was asked, should the colonies have a voice
in Parliament? Birmingham and Manchester, great centres of population,
were not represented, while that uninhabited heap of stones, Old Sarum,
sent a member to the Commons. Resting on these abuses, even Pitt and
Burke were content to argue that taxation of America was just. For them
it was a question whether that right should be exercised.
With the best will in the world to be on good terms with the mother
country, America could not agree in such reasoning. The case had nothing
to do with obligations. As for these, the colonists knew that England
would never have won against the French in Canada without their aid. But
that was not the question. Should those who for a hundred and
thirty-five years had paid no tax to England pay one now? Were the
people who for seventy years had drawn a fine distinction between paying
their governor of their own accord and paying him at the command of the
king, and who in every year of royal governorship had made their
contention plain--were they to be satisfied to pay taxes because
Birmingham did?
Undoubtedly there were other causes for discontent. "To me," says
Sabine, in the preface to his "American Loyalists," "the documentary
history, the state papers of the period teach nothing more clearly than
this, namely, that almost every matter brought into discussion was
practical, and in some form or other related to LABOR, to some branch
of COMMON INDUSTRY." He reminds us that twenty-nine laws limited
industry in the colonies, and concludes that "the great object of the
Revolution was to release LABOR from these restrictions." Undoubtedly
these restrictive laws had their effect upon the temper of the people.
Undoubtedly also there was much fear lest there should be established in
the colonies a bureaucracy of major and minor officials, corruptly, as
in England, winning fortunes for themselves. Yet the question of
taxation, a matter of merely theoretical submission, which produced no
hardship and would not impoverish the country, was the main cause of
trouble. The two branches of the race had long unconsciously parted
their ways, and the realization of it was upon them.
Upon the proposal of the Stamp Act the colonies did everything in their
power to prevent the passage of the bill. They urged that internal
taxation had never been levied before. Protests, arguments, and
petitions were sent across the water, but in vain. The Commons fell
back upon its custom "to receive no petition against a money bill," and
would listen to nothing. "We have the power to tax them, and we will tax
them."[13] And following this utterance of one of the ministry, the bill
was passed.
It is interesting to note that no resistance to the tax was expected.
Its operation was automatic; there was no hardship in its provisions; of
course the colonists would yield. Even Franklin, who should have known
his countrymen better, expected submission. "The sun is down," he wrote,
but "we may still light candles. Frugality and industry will go a great
way toward indemnifying us." His correspondent, Charles Thomson, had in
this case the truer foresight, and predicted the works of darkness.[14]
Throughout the colonies there was not only sorrow, but anger. When even
Hutchinson had protested against the Stamp Act, it can be seen how the
Whigs would feel. Non-importation agreements were widely signed, and
people accustomed to silks and laces prepared to go into homespun. But
the act, passed in February, 1765, was not to go into effect until
November. Before that date, much could be done.
What was done came from the lower as well as the upper classes. The
people acted promptly. One colony after another sent crowds to those who
had accepted, in advance, the positions of stamp-officers. One by one,
under persuasion or intimidation, the officers resigned until none were
left. In New York the governor fled to the military for protection, and
from the parapet of the fort looked helplessly on while the people burnt
before his eyes his own coach, containing images of himself and the
devil. But before this happened, Boston, first of all the capitals to
take a positive stand, began to draw upon itself the particular
resentment of the king.
Early in August came to Boston the news of the nomination of its
stamp-collector, Andrew Oliver, long prominent upon the Tory side. The
lower class of the inhabitants, after a week of delay, stirred itself to
action. On the 14th the image of Oliver was seen hanging on the bough of
a large elm, then known as the Great Tree. Hutchinson ordered the image
down, but as the sheriff did not act, Bernard summoned his council, and
until evening fruitlessly endeavored to urge them to action. Then the
populace, having themselves removed the image, came to the Town House,
and, passing directly through it, shouted to the council, still sitting
upstairs, "Liberty, property, and no stamps!" Proceeding with perfect
order, the crowd next tore down the frame of a building which Oliver was
suspected of raising to use as his office, and, carrying the beams to
Fort Hill, burnt them and the image before Oliver's house.
Hutchinson, who never lacked personal courage, called on the militia
colonel to summon his men and disperse the crowd, but the colonel
replied that his drummers were in the mob. Hutchinson then went with
the sheriff to order the crowd to disperse, but was himself forced to
depart in order to escape violence. The next day Bernard, the governor,
whose courage left him at the very thought of another such night, fled
to Castle William, behind whose ancient walls he considered himself
safe. Oliver hastily resigned his office, lest the mob should visit him
again.
[Illustration: THE HUTCHINSON HOUSE]
The people were not satisfied with the conduct of Hutchinson, who,
although he had actually opposed the passage of the Stamp Act, was
under suspicion of secretly abetting and profiting by it. After twelve
days there was a second outbreak; the mob began by burning the records
of the vice-admiralty court, went on to invade the house of the
comptroller of customs, and finally, worked to the usual pitch of a
mob's courage, attacked Hutchinson's house. With his family he escaped,
but the mob broke into the handsome mansion, and sacked it thoroughly.
His library, with priceless manuscripts concerning the history of the
colony, was scattered in the mud of the street.
This was the most disgraceful event that happened in Boston during all
the long period preceding the Revolution. It was due to popular feeling,
wrongly directed; and to new working-men's organizations, not as yet
understanding the task that was before them. These organizations, as yet
almost formless, and never so important that records were kept, called
themselves the Sons of Liberty, after a phrase used by Isaac Barre, in a
speech in Parliament opposing the Stamp Act. The tree on which they had
hung the image of Oliver was from this time called Liberty Tree.
The better class of Boston citizens at once, in a town meeting called
the following morning, declared their "detestation of these violent
proceedings," and promised to suppress them in future. We shall see that
one more such outbreak, and one only, was made by a Boston mob. There is
here suggested an unwritten, perhaps never to be written, chapter of the
history of this time. By what means did the Boston leaders, Samuel Adams
chief among them, manage to control the Boston workmen? However it was
done, by what conferences and through what reasoning, it is safe to say
that the loose organizations of the Sons of Liberty, and still another
set of clubs, the caucuses which met in various parts of the town, were
utilized to control the lower classes. We know the names of a few of the
leaders of the workmen: Edes the printer, Crafts the painter, and, most
noted of them all, Paul Revere the silversmith. These sturdy men, and
others in different trades, were the means of transmitting to the
artisans of Boston the thoughts and desires of the upper-class Whigs.
The organization was looser than that of a political party of to-day,
but as soon as it was completed, it produced a subordination, secrecy,
and self-control which cannot be paralleled in modern times.
The opposition to the Stamp Act continued. More formidable than mobs
were the actions of the town meetings and legislatures. Protests and
declarations were solemnly drawn up; for the first time was heard the
threat of disaffection. Representatives from nine provinces met in the
Stamp Act Congress, and passed resolutions against the new taxation.
It was impossible for England to ignore the situation. Reluctantly--it
was an act which the king never forgot nor forgave--more than a year
after its passage, when it was proved that its enforcement was
impossible, the Stamp Act was repealed.
This was the time for England to change her whole policy. Not Boston
alone, but all America, had declared against American taxation. The
principles of liberty had again and again been clearly pointed out.
Further, there would have been no disgrace in admitting a mistake. The
whole colonial question was new in human history, for Roman practice was
inadmissible. "The best writers on public law," reasoned Otis, "contain
nothing that is satisfactory on the natural rights of colonies.... Their
researches are often but the history of ancient abuses."[15] The natural
rights of man should have been allowed to rule, as in the course of
time, with England's other colonies, they came to do.
But, for better or for worse, sides had been taken. Few thought of
turning back. In England there were no breaks in the ranks of the king's
supporters; in America the office-holding class, the "best families,"
the people of settled income and vested rights, were as a rule,
selfishly or unselfishly, for the king. Already "mobocracy," "the
faction," "sedition," were familiar terms among them. England was ready
to take, and the American Tories were ready to applaud, the next step.
And Boston was being marked down as the most obnoxious of the towns of
America.[16]
FOOTNOTES:
[10] The adjectives are those of _Massachusettensis_, the ablest Tory
pamphleteer, as quoted in Frothingham's "Siege," 33.
[11] "Memorial History of Boston," iii, 5.
[12] "Memorial History of Boston," iii, 7.
[13] Bancroft's "United States," v, 247.
[14] Fiske, "American Revolution," illustrated edition, i, 17.
[15] Bancroft's "United States," v, 203.
[16] The Castle, or Castle William, referred to in this chapter, was the
old fort on Castle Island. It was never put to any other use than as a
barracks and magazine.