James Otis, a distinguished American patriot, was born February 5,
1724-5, at Great Marshes, in what is now called West Barnstable, Mass.
His family was one of the most respectable in the colony, and of
English origin. In June, 1739, he entered Cambridge college. The first
two years of his collegiate course are said to have been given more to
amusement than to study, his natural disposition being vivacious and
ardent; but subsequently he was distinguished for his application and
proficiency. After finishing his course at the university, he devoted
eighteen months to the pursuit of various branches of literature, and
then entered upon the study of the law in 1745, in the office of Mr.
Gridley. Under that eminent lawyer he employed his legal novitiate,
and then went to Plymouth, where he was first admitted to the bar. The
two years, however, of his residence in that town, were more occupied
in study than in practice, so that, when he removed to Boston, in
1750, he was well qualified to assume a high rank in his profession.
This he quickly did: his practice became very extensive. On one
occasion, he went, in the middle of the winter, to Halifax, in
consequence of urgent solicitation, to defend three men accused of
piracy, and procured their acquittal. Although his professional
engagements were so numerous, he cultivated his taste for literature,
and, in 1760, published a treatise, entitled the Rudiments of Latin
Prosody, with a Dissertation on Letters and the Principles of Harmony,
in poetic and prosaic Composition, collected from the best Writers. He
also composed a similar work on Greek prosody, which remained in
manuscript, and perished with all his papers. It was never printed, as
he said, because ‘there were no Greek types in the country, or, if
there were, no printer knew how to set them.’
In 1755, he married Miss Ruth Cunningham, the daughter of a
respectable merchant, who brought him a dowry at that time considered
very large. Amid all the embarrassments which his affairs subsequently
experienced, in consequence of his entire devotion to the concerns of
the public, he sacredly preserved the fortune which he received with
his wife, to whom it returned after his death. The public career of
Mr. Otis dates from the period when he made his famous speech against
the ‘writs of assistance,’ for which an application had been made, by
the officers of the customs, to the superior court of Massachusetts,
in pursuance of an order in council, sent from England, to enable them
to carry into effect the acts of parliament regulating the trade of
the colonies. When that order arrived, Otis was advocate-general, and
was, consequently, requested to lend his professional assistance in
the matter; but, deeming the writs to be illegal and tyrannical, he
refused, and resigned his station. He was then applied to, to argue
against the writs, which he immediately undertook to do, in
conjunction with Mr. Thacher, and in opposition to his former
preceptor, Mr. Gridley, the attorney-general. Of the discourse which
he pronounced, president Adams the elder says, ‘Otis was a flame of
fire; with a promptitude of classical allusions, a depth of research,
a rapid summary of historical events and dates, a profusion of legal
authorities, a prophetic glance of his eyes into futurity, and a rapid
torrent of impetuous eloquence, he hurried away all before him.
American independence was then and there born. Every man, of an
immense crowded audience, appeared to me to go away as I did, ready to
take arms against writs of assistance.’ The court adjourned for
consideration, and, at the close of the term, the chief-justice,
Hutchinson, delivered the opinion: ‘The court has considered the
subject of writs of assistance, and can see no foundation for such a
writ; but, as the practice in England is not known, it has been
thought best to continue the question to the next term, that, in the
mean time, opportunity may be given to know the result.’ When the next
term came, however, nothing was said about the writs; and though it
was generally understood that they were clandestinely granted by the
court, and that the custom-house officers had them in their pockets,
yet it is said that they were never produced or executed. Otis had now
fully committed himself against the designs of the British ministry,
and thenceforward bent all his energies to maintain the freedom of his
country. At the next election of members of the legislature, in May,
1761, he was chosen, almost unanimously, a representative from Boston,
and soon became the leader, in the house, of the popular party. For
the detail of his course, during the period in which he was a
representative, we must refer our readers to the biography of him by
Mr. Tudor. In 1765, Mr. Otis was chosen, by the Massachusetts
legislature, one of the members of a committee appointed to meet the
committees of the legislatures of other colonies at New York, in
consequence of the passage of the stamp-act by parliament. They met in
convention October 19, in the same year, and named three committees to
prepare addresses to the king, lords and commons. On the last Mr. Otis
was placed. In this convention, Mr. Otis made the acquaintance of many
distinguished men, from different colonies, and subsequently
maintained, with several of them, a friendship and correspondence.
In May, 1767, after the repeal of the stamp-act, Mr. Otis was elected
speaker of the house of representatives; but he was negatived by the
governor, who entertained a peculiar animosity towards him, from his
indefatigable endeavors to defeat every plan of encroachment. In the
summer of 1769, the vehement temper of Mr. Otis was so much wrought
upon by the calumnies which he discovered that the commissioners of
the customs in Boston had transmitted to England concerning him, by
which, indeed, they sought to have him tried for treason, that he
inserted an advertisement in the Boston Gazette, denouncing them in
severe terms. The next evening he happened to go to the British
coffee-house, where one of the commissioners, a Mr. Robinson, was
sitting with a number of officers of the army, navy and revenue. As
soon as he entered, an altercation arose, which was quickly terminated
by a blow from Robinson’s cane. Otis immediately returned it with a
weapon of the same kind, when the lights were extinguished, and he was
obliged to defend himself, single-handed, against numbers. After some
time the combatants were separated. Robinson retreated by a back
passage, and Otis was led home, wounded and bleeding. He received a
deep cut on his head; and to this has been partly attributed the
derangement under which he afterwards labored. Soon after this
transaction, he instituted an action against Robinson, and obtained an
award of £2,000 sterling damages, which, however, he gave up on
receiving a written apology, in which the defendant acknowledged his
fault and begged his pardon.
In 1770, he retired into the country on account of his health. At the
election in 1771, he was again chosen a representative; but this was
the last year that he took a part in public concerns, except
occasionally to appear at a town-meeting. He withdrew, also, almost
entirely, from the practice of his profession. His mind became
seriously affected, and continued so, with some lucid intervals, until
his death. Sometimes he was in a frenzied state; at others, he
exhibited rather the eccentricity of a humorist than absolute
derangement. The two last years of his life were passed at Andover.
After he had been there for some time, he was supposed to be
completely restored, and returned to Boston. He resumed his
professional engagements, and pleaded a cause in the court of common
pleas, in which he displayed considerable power, but less than was his
wont. The interval of reason was not, however, of long duration, and
he was induced to go back to Andover. Six weeks after his return, he
was killed by a stroke of lightning, in the sixtieth year of his age,
May 23, 1783.
The chief defect of Mr. Otis’ character was his irascibility. His
merits are well summed up in the following extract from the work of
Mr. Tudor, to which we have before alluded:――‘In fine, he was a man of
powerful genius and ardent temper, with wit and humor that never
failed; as an orator, he was bold, argumentative, impetuous and
commanding, with an eloquence that made his own excitement
irresistibly contagious: as a lawyer, his knowledge and ability placed
him at the head of his profession; as a scholar, he was rich in
acquisition, and governed by a classic taste; as a statesman and
civilian, he was sound and just in his views; as a patriot, he
resisted all allurements that might weaken the cause of that country
to which he devoted his life, and for which he sacrificed it.’ It is
greatly to be regretted that, during his derangement, he destroyed all
his papers; sufficient evidence, however, of his power as a writer,
remains in the various state papers of which he was the author whilst
a member of the legislature, though they were subjected to the
revising pen of Samuel Adams, whose patient temper permitted him to
undergo the labor of correcting and polishing, which the ardor of the
other disdained.