clearly right as the former. America, by her own internal industry,
and unknown to all the powers of Europe, was, at the beginning of the
dispute, arrived at a pitch of greatness, trade and population, beyond
which it was the interest of Britain not to suffer her to pass, lest she
should grow too powerful to be kept subordinate. She began to view
this country with the same uneasy malicious eye, with which a covetous
guardian would view his ward, whose estate he had been enriching himself
by for twenty years, and saw him just arriving at manhood. And America
owes no more to Britain for her present maturity, than the ward would
to the guardian for being twenty-one years of age. That America hath
flourished at the time she was under the government of Britain, is
true; but there is every natural reason to believe, that had she been an
independent country from the first settlement thereof, uncontrolled by
any foreign power, free to make her own laws, regulate and encourage her
own commerce, she had by this time been of much greater worth than now.
The case is simply this: the first settlers in the different colonies
were left to shift for themselves, unnoticed and unsupported by any
European government; but as the tyranny and persecution of the old world
daily drove numbers to the new, and as, by the favor of heaven on their
industry and perseverance, they grew into importance, so, in a like
degree, they became an object of profit to the greedy eyes of Europe.
It was impossible, in this state of infancy, however thriving and
promising, that they could resist the power of any armed invader that
should seek to bring them under his authority. In this situation,
Britain thought it worth her while to claim them, and the continent
received and acknowledged the claimer. It was, in reality, of no very
great importance who was her master, seeing, that from the force and
ambition of the different powers of Europe, she must, till she acquired
strength enough to assert her own right, acknowledge some one. As well,
perhaps, Britain as another; and it might have been as well to have been
under the states of Holland as any. The same hopes of engrossing and
profiting by her trade, by not oppressing it too much, would have
operated alike with any master, and produced to the colonies the same
effects. The clamor of protection, likewise, was all a farce; because,
in order to make that protection necessary, she must first, by her own
quarrels, create us enemies. Hard terms indeed!
To know whether it be the interest of the continent to be independent,
we need only ask this easy, simple question: Is it the interest of a man
to be a boy all his life? The answer to one will be the answer to both.
America hath been one continued scene of legislative contention from
the first king's representative to the last; and this was unavoidably
founded in the natural opposition of interest between the old country
and the new. A governor sent from England, or receiving his authority
therefrom, ought never to have been considered in any other light
than that of a genteel commissioned spy, whose private business was
information, and his public business a kind of civilized oppression. In
the first of these characters he was to watch the tempers, sentiments,
and disposition of the people, the growth of trade, and the increase of
private fortunes; and, in the latter, to suppress all such acts of the
assemblies, however beneficial to the people, which did not directly
or indirectly throw some increase of power or profit into the hands of
those that sent him.
America, till now, could never be called a free country, because her
legislation depended on the will of a man three thousand miles distant,
whose interest was in opposition to ours, and who, by a single "no,"
could forbid what law he pleased.
The freedom of trade, likewise, is, to a trading country, an article of
such importance, that the principal source of wealth depends upon it;
and it is impossible that any country can flourish, as it otherwise
might do, whose commerce is engrossed, cramped and fettered by the
laws and mandates of another--yet these evils, and more than I can here
enumerate, the continent has suffered by being under the government of
England. By an independence we clear the whole at once--put
an end to the business of unanswered petitions and fruitless
remonstrances--exchange Britain for Europe--shake hands with the
world--live at peace with the world--and trade to any market where we
can buy and sell.
III. The necessity, likewise, of being independent, even before it was
declared, became so evident and important, that the continent ran the
risk of being ruined every day that she delayed it. There was reason to
believe that Britain would endeavor to make an European matter of it,
and, rather than lose the whole, would dismember it, like Poland, and
dispose of her several claims to the highest bidder. Genoa, failing in
her attempts to reduce Corsica, made a sale of it to the French, and
such trafficks have been common in the old world. We had at that time no
ambassador in any part of Europe, to counteract her negotiations, and
by that means she had the range of every foreign court uncontradicted
on our part. We even knew nothing of the treaty for the Hessians till it
was concluded, and the troops ready to embark. Had we been independent
before, we had probably prevented her obtaining them. We had no credit
abroad, because of our rebellious dependency. Our ships could claim no
protection in foreign ports, because we afforded them no justifiable
reason for granting it to us. The calling ourselves subjects, and at
the same time fighting against the power which we acknowledged, was
a dangerous precedent to all Europe. If the grievances justified the
taking up arms, they justified our separation; if they did not justify
our separation, neither could they justify our taking up arms. All
Europe was interested in reducing us as rebels, and all Europe (or the
greatest part at least) is interested in supporting us as independent
States. At home our condition was still worse: our currency had no
foundation, and the fall of it would have ruined Whig and Tory alike. We
had no other law than a kind of moderated passion; no other civil
power than an honest mob; and no other protection than the temporary
attachment of one man to another. Had independence been delayed a few
months longer, this continent would have been plunged into irrecoverable
confusion: some violent for it, some against it, till, in the general
cabal, the rich would have been ruined, and the poor destroyed. It is to
independence that every Tory owes the present safety which he lives
in; for by that, and that only, we emerged from a state of dangerous
suspense, and became a regular people.
The necessity, likewise, of being independent, had there been no rupture
between Britain and America, would, in a little time, have brought one
on. The increasing importance of commerce, the weight and perplexity of
legislation, and the entangled state of European politics, would daily
have shown to the continent the impossibility of continuing subordinate;
for, after the coolest reflections on the matter, this must be allowed,
that Britain was too jealous of America to govern it justly; too
ignorant of it to govern it well; and too far distant from it to govern
it at all.
IV. But what weigh most with all men of serious reflection are, the
moral advantages arising from independence: war and desolation have
become the trade of the old world; and America neither could nor can be
under the government of Britain without becoming a sharer of her
guilt, and a partner in all the dismal commerce of death. The spirit
of duelling, extended on a national scale, is a proper character for
European wars. They have seldom any other motive than pride, or any
other object than fame. The conquerors and the conquered are generally
ruined alike, and the chief difference at last is, that the one marches
home with his honors, and the other without them. 'Tis the natural
temper of the English to fight for a feather, if they suppose that
feather to be an affront; and America, without the right of asking why,
must have abetted in every quarrel, and abided by its fate. It is a
shocking situation to live in, that one country must be brought into all
the wars of another, whether the measure be right or wrong, or whether
she will or not; yet this, in the fullest extent, was, and ever would
be, the unavoidable consequence of the connection. Surely the Quakers
forgot their own principles when, in their late Testimony, they called
this connection, with these military and miserable appendages hanging to
it--"the happy constitution."
Britain, for centuries past, has been nearly fifty years out of every
hundred at war with some power or other. It certainly ought to be a
conscientious as well political consideration with America, not to
dip her hands in the bloody work of Europe. Our situation affords us
a retreat from their cabals, and the present happy union of the states
bids fair for extirpating the future use of arms from one quarter of
the world; yet such have been the irreligious politics of the present
leaders of the Quakers, that, for the sake of they scarce know what,
they would cut off every hope of such a blessing by tying this continent
to Britain, like Hector to the chariot wheel of Achilles, to be dragged
through all the miseries of endless European wars.
The connection, viewed from this ground, is distressing to every man
who has the feelings of humanity. By having Britain for our master, we
became enemies to the greatest part of Europe, and they to us: and the
consequence was war inevitable. By being our own masters, independent of
any foreign one, we have Europe for our friends, and the prospect of an
endless peace among ourselves. Those who were advocates for the British
government over these colonies, were obliged to limit both their
arguments and their ideas to the period of an European peace only; the
moment Britain became plunged in war, every supposed convenience to us
vanished, and all we could hope for was not to be ruined. Could this be
a desirable condition for a young country to be in?
Had the French pursued their fortune immediately after the defeat of
Braddock last war, this city and province had then experienced the woful
calamities of being a British subject. A scene of the same kind might
happen again; for America, considered as a subject to the crown
of Britain, would ever have been the seat of war, and the bone of
contention between the two powers.
On the whole, if the future expulsion of arms from one quarter of the
world would be a desirable object to a peaceable man; if the freedom of
trade to every part of it can engage the attention of a man of business;
if the support or fall of millions of currency can affect our interests;
if the entire possession of estates, by cutting off the lordly claims
of Britain over the soil, deserves the regard of landed property; and if
the right of making our own laws, uncontrolled by royal or ministerial
spies or mandates, be worthy our care as freemen;--then are all men
interested in the support of independence; and may he that supports it
not, be driven from the blessing, and live unpitied beneath the servile
sufferings of scandalous subjection!
We have been amused with the tales of ancient wonders; we have read,
and wept over the histories of other nations: applauded, censured, or
pitied, as their cases affected us. The fortitude and patience of the
sufferers--the justness of their cause--the weight of their oppressions
and oppressors--the object to be saved or lost--with all the
consequences of a defeat or a conquest--have, in the hour of sympathy,
bewitched our hearts, and chained it to their fate: but where is the
power that ever made war upon petitioners? Or where is the war on which
a world was staked till now?
We may not, perhaps, be wise enough to make all the advantages we ought
of our independence; but they are, nevertheless, marked and presented
to us with every character of great and good, and worthy the hand of
him who sent them. I look through the present trouble to a time of
tranquillity, when we shall have it in our power to set an example of
peace to all the world. Were the Quakers really impressed and influenced
by the quiet principles they profess to hold, they would, however
they might disapprove the means, be the first of all men to approve of
independence, because, by separating ourselves from the cities of Sodom
and Gomorrah, it affords an opportunity never given to man before of
carrying their favourite principle of peace into general practice, by
establishing governments that shall hereafter exist without wars. O! ye
fallen, cringing, priest-and-Pemberton-ridden people! What more can we
say of ye than that a religious Quaker is a valuable character, and a
political Quaker a real Jesuit.
Having thus gone over some of the principal points in support of
independence, I must now request the reader to return back with me to
the period when it first began to be a public doctrine, and to examine
the progress it has made among the various classes of men. The area I
mean to begin at, is the breaking out of hostilities, April 19th, 1775.
Until this event happened, the continent seemed to view the dispute as
a kind of law-suit for a matter of right, litigating between the old
country and the new; and she felt the same kind and degree of horror,
as if she had seen an oppressive plaintiff, at the head of a band of
ruffians, enter the court, while the cause was before it, and put the
judge, the jury, the defendant and his counsel, to the sword. Perhaps a
more heart-felt convulsion never reached a country with the same
degree of power and rapidity before, and never may again. Pity for the
sufferers, mixed with indignation at the violence, and heightened with
apprehensions of undergoing the same fate, made the affair of Lexington
the affair of the continent. Every part of it felt the shock, and all
vibrated together. A general promotion of sentiment took place: those
who had drank deeply into Whiggish principles, that is, the right and
necessity not only of opposing, but wholly setting aside the power of
the crown as soon as it became practically dangerous (for in theory
it was always so), stepped into the first stage of independence; while
another class of Whigs, equally sound in principle, but not so sanguine
in enterprise, attached themselves the stronger to the cause, and fell
close in with the rear of the former; their partition was a mere point.
Numbers of the moderate men, whose chief fault, at that time, arose from
entertaining a better opinion of Britain than she deserved, convinced
now of their mistake, gave her up, and publicly declared themselves
good Whigs. While the Tories, seeing it was no longer a laughing matter,
either sank into silent obscurity, or contented themselves with coming
forth and abusing General Gage: not a single advocate appeared to
justify the action of that day; it seemed to appear to every one with
the same magnitude, struck every one with the same force, and created in
every one the same abhorrence. From this period we may date the growth
of independence.
If the many circumstances which happened at this memorable time, be
taken in one view, and compared with each other, they will justify a
conclusion which seems not to have been attended to, I mean a fixed
design in the king and ministry of driving America into arms, in order
that they might be furnished with a pretence for seizing the whole
continent, as the immediate property of the crown. A noble plunder for
hungry courtiers!
It ought to be remembered, that the first petition from the Congress
was at this time unanswered on the part of the British king. That the
motion, called Lord North's motion, of the 20th of February, 1775,
arrived in America the latter end of March. This motion was to be laid,
by the several governors then in being, before, the assembly of each
province; and the first assembly before which it was laid, was the
assembly of Pennsylvania, in May following. This being a just state of
the case, I then ask, why were hostilities commenced between the time
of passing the resolve in the House of Commons, of the 20th of February,
and the time of the assemblies meeting to deliberate upon it? Degrading
and famous as that motion was, there is nevertheless reason to believe
that the king and his adherents were afraid the colonies would agree
to it, and lest they should, took effectual care they should not, by
provoking them with hostilities in the interim. They had not the least
doubt at that time of conquering America at one blow; and what they
expected to get by a conquest being infinitely greater than any thing
they could hope to get either by taxation or accommodation, they seemed
determined to prevent even the possibility of hearing each other, lest
America should disappoint their greedy hopes of the whole, by listening
even to their own terms. On the one hand they refused to hear the
petition of the continent, and on the other hand took effectual care the
continent should not hear them.
That the motion of the 20th February and the orders for commencing
hostilities were both concerted by the same person or persons, and not
the latter by General Gage, as was falsely imagined at first, is evident
from an extract of a letter of his to the administration, read among
other papers in the House of Commons; in which he informs his masters,
"That though their idea of his disarming certain counties was a right
one, yet it required him to be master of the country, in order to enable
him to execute it." This was prior to the commencement of hostilities,
and consequently before the motion of the 20th February could be
deliberated on by the several assemblies.
Perhaps it may be asked, why was the motion passed, if there was at the
same time a plan to aggravate the Americans not to listen to it? Lord
North assigned one reason himself, which was a hope of dividing them.
This was publicly tempting them to reject it; that if, in case the
injury of arms should fail in provoking them sufficiently, the insult
of such a declaration might fill it up. But by passing the motion and
getting it afterwards rejected in America, it enabled them, in their
wicked idea of politics, among other things, to hold up the colonies to
foreign powers, with every possible mark of disobedience and rebellion.
They had applied to those powers not to supply the continent with arms,
ammunition, etc., and it was necessary they should incense them against
us, by assigning on their own part some seeming reputable reason why.
By dividing, it had a tendency to weaken the States, and likewise to
perplex the adherents of America in England. But the principal scheme,
and that which has marked their character in every part of their
conduct, was a design of precipitating the colonies into a state which
they might afterwards deem rebellion, and, under that pretence, put an
end to all future complaints, petitions and remonstrances, by seizing
the whole at once. They had ravaged one part of the globe, till it could
glut them no longer; their prodigality required new plunder, and through
the East India article tea they hoped to transfer their rapine from that
quarter of the world to this. Every designed quarrel had its pretence;
and the same barbarian avarice accompanied the plant to America, which
ruined the country that produced it.
That men never turn rogues without turning fools is a maxim, sooner or
later, universally true. The commencement of hostilities, being in the
beginning of April, was, of all times the worst chosen: the Congress
were to meet the tenth of May following, and the distress the continent
felt at this unparalleled outrage gave a stability to that body which
no other circumstance could have done. It suppressed too all inferior
debates, and bound them together by a necessitous affection, without
giving them time to differ upon trifles. The suffering likewise softened
the whole body of the people into a degree of pliability, which laid the
principal foundation-stone of union, order, and government; and which,
at any other time, might only have fretted and then faded away
unnoticed and unimproved. But Providence, who best knows how to time her
misfortunes as well as her immediate favors, chose this to be the time,
and who dare dispute it?
It did not seem the disposition of the people, at this crisis, to
heap petition upon petition, while the former remained unanswered. The
measure however was carried in Congress, and a second petition was sent;
of which I shall only remark that it was submissive even to a dangerous
fault, because the prayer of it appealed solely to what it called the
prerogative of the crown, while the matter in dispute was confessedly
constitutional. But even this petition, flattering as it was, was
still not so harmonious as the chink of cash, and consequently not
sufficiently grateful to the tyrant and his ministry. From every
circumstance it is evident, that it was the determination of the British
court to have nothing to do with America but to conquer her fully and
absolutely. They were certain of success, and the field of battle was
the only place of treaty. I am confident there are thousands and tens of
thousands in America who wonder now that they should ever have thought
otherwise; but the sin of that day was the sin of civility; yet it
operated against our present good in the same manner that a civil
opinion of the devil would against our future peace.
Independence was a doctrine scarce and rare, even towards the conclusion
of the year 1775; all our politics had been founded on the hope of
expectation of making the matter up--a hope, which, though general on
the side of America, had never entered the head or heart of the British
court. Their hope was conquest and confiscation. Good heavens! what
volumes of thanks does America owe to Britain? What infinite obligation
to the tool that fills, with paradoxical vacancy, the throne! Nothing
but the sharpest essence of villany, compounded with the strongest
distillation of folly, could have produced a menstruum that would have
effected a separation. The Congress in 1774 administered an abortive
medicine to independence, by prohibiting the importation of goods,
and the succeeding Congress rendered the dose still more dangerous by
continuing it. Had independence been a settled system with America, (as
Britain has advanced,) she ought to have doubled her importation, and
prohibited in some degree her exportation. And this single circumstance
is sufficient to acquit America before any jury of nations, of having
a continental plan of independence in view; a charge which, had it been
true, would have been honorable, but is so grossly false, that either
the amazing ignorance or the wilful dishonesty of the British court is
effectually proved by it.
The second petition, like the first, produced no answer; it was
scarcely acknowledged to have been received; the British court were too
determined in their villainy even to act it artfully, and in their rage
for conquest neglected the necessary subtleties for obtaining it. They
might have divided, distracted and played a thousand tricks with us, had
they been as cunning as they were cruel.
This last indignity gave a new spring to independence. Those who knew
the savage obstinacy of the king, and the jobbing, gambling spirit of
the court, predicted the fate of the petition, as soon as it was sent
from America; for the men being known, their measures were easily
foreseen. As politicians we ought not so much to ground our hopes on
the reasonableness of the thing we ask, as on the reasonableness of
the person of whom we ask it: who would expect discretion from a fool,
candor from a tyrant, or justice from a villain?