oa. 28. 20. act had quieted; but did not live to fee the fatal confequences which have followed, as he died the fourth of September. A few gentlemen at a private club in Boston, having fuggefted a non-importation agreement, the thought was improved upon, till at length the inhabitants, at a town meeting, agreed upon measures to promote industry, œconomy, and manufactures; thereby to prevent the unneceffary importation of European commodities. They alfo voted, that a fubfcription paper fhould be prepared, and a committee appointed to procure fubfcriptions to it; by which the parties engaged to encourage the ufe and confumption of all articles manufactured in any of the British American colonies; and after the thirty-first of December following, not to purchafe certain enumerated articles imported from abroad. The failure of expected fuccefs from these measures, and an apprehenfion of difagreeable confequences from an ineffectual oppofition, were probably the motives that Nov. induced Mr. Otis, at a fubfequent town-meeting, to make a long speech on the fide of government, wherein he afferted the king's right to appoint officers of the cuftoms, in what number and by what denomination he pleased; and that as to the new duties, it would be very imprudent in the town to make an oppofition to them, when every town in the province, and every other province in America feemed to acquiefce in them and Dec. be contented. But the propofed measures were afterward approved of and adopted at Providence and Newport. 1768. The Connecticut towns and New York followed the ex Jan. ample. Still the bufinefs labored without being pro ductivę ductive of any important effects. This engaged the attention of one captain Malcolm, a fmall trader, who about eighteen months before had made himself famous by a violent and fuccessful refistance with fword and piftol, to the custom-house officers, when endeavouring to fearch his houfe for uncustomed goods, under the authority of a writ of affiftance. Having, about the middle of February, fafely run the cargo of a schooner from Fyall, confifting of about fixty pipes of wine, he within two or three days procured a meeting of fome merchants and traders, at which he prefided. Nothing was determined upon more, than the calling of a general meeting of the merchants on Friday, March the fourth. This may be ftiled the first movement of the merchants against the new acts of parliament. The refult of this meeting was, that a fubfcription for not importing any English goods, except for the fifhery, for eighteen months, should be prepared and carried round the town. It met with no great encouragement, and many declined fubfcribing. On this, all engines were fet to work; fome were threatened and made afraid for their perfons and houses; others for their trade and credit. By fuch means the fubfcription was filled. But the merchants of New York and Philadelphia declining to concur in the meafure, thofe of Bofton were obliged to give it up for the prefent. However they renewed it within a few months, as you will learn below. The New England fpirit of patriotism and economy was greatly approved of at Philadelphia; and it was faid, that "If America is faved from its impending danger, New England will be its acknowledged guardian." Periodi→ cal pieces were published at Boston, on the nature and extent of British parliamentary power. Hints were thrown out about independency: and intimations given, that freemen were not to be governed any more than taxed but by their own confent, in real or virtual reprefentatives. The power of British legislation over the Americans was queftioned, and virtually denied. Matters were brought to this length, by broaching anew a difpute that should never have been moved again; and which might happily have lain dormant for half a century or more, had no fresh attempt been made to tax the Americans. Before the ftamp-act, they allowed the mother country a certain prerogative over them. They acquiefced in the parliament's right to make many acts, binding them in divers internal matters, and regulating their trade. They did not reafon neither then nor immediately after the repeal," if the parliament has no right to tax us internally, they have none to tax us externally, or to make any other law to bind us." They admitted the diftinction between internal and external taxation, and between raifing money from the regulation of trade, and railing it for the purposes of a revenue. The wisdom of parliament fhould have abode by their conceffions, and have adopted and confirmed their diftinction. But being obliged to enter afresh the field of political controverfy, great numbers began to think, that the want of representation in parliament freed them abfolutely from any obedience to the power of the British legislature; and that there was no real, and only a nominal difference between internal and external taxation, agreeable to what was infifted upon by the party oppofing the repeal of the ftamp-act. John Dickinson efq; began fo early as in November 1767 to employ his pen pen against the acts which had been paffed, in a feries of Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania to the Inhabitants of the British Colonies. They amounted to twelve; and in them he ably maintained the rights of the colonists. He closed with a postscript in these words: "Is there not the greatest reafon to hope, if the univerfal fense of thefe colonies is immediately exprest by refolves of the affemblies in support of their rights, by instructions to their agents on the fubject, and by petitions to the crown and parliament for redrefs, that those measures will have the fame fuccefs now that they had in the time of the ftamp-act?". The inhabitants of Boston were so fenfible of the eminent fervice he did to the common cause, that they wrote to him upon the occafion. In his answer, April the eleventh, he faid, " Never will my heart become infenfible till infenfible of all worldly things, of the unspeakable obligation I owe to the inhabitants of the Massachusetts Bay, for the vigilance with which they have watched over, and the magnanimity with which they have maintained, the liberties of the British colonies on this continent." It was probably owing to Mr. Dickinson's publications, that the Pennfylvania affembly, early in February, before they knew what measures the Maffachusetts Bay, or any other colony, would pursue, took into confideration the act impofing duties on paper, glafs, &c. and gave pofitive instructions to their agents, to unite with other agents in applying to parliament and praying relief. It may be justly concluded, from governor Bernard's letters to lord Shelburne, that the Massachusetts affembly were inclined to bury in oblivion the difcords occafioned by the stamp-act, and to efcape other fubjects of Jan. 21. future controverfy, had not the late chancellor un- "They have acted in all things, even in their remonftrance, with temper and moderation: they have avoided fome fubjects of difpute, and have laid a foundation for removing some causes of former altercation †." "I will make fuch a prudent and proper ufe of the letter as, I hope, will perfectly restore the peace and tranquillity of this province, for which purpose confiderable fteps have been made by the house of reprefentatives." The Massachusetts house of representatives, in a debate upon the "expediency of writing to the affemblies of the other colonies upon the continent, with refpect to the importance of joining with them," put a question on the propofition of writing letters, defiring thofe affemblies to join them, which was negatived for this very reafon, because containing the propofition of joining. The house thought exceptions might be taken at it, as having a tendency to form combinations; and that it might be confidered at home as the appointing another January 21, 1768. + January 30. February 2. congrefs. |