 Chapter 1 of Eve of the Revolution. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Eve of the Revolution by Carl Becker. Chapter 1. A Patriot of 1763. His Majesty's reign, I predict, will be happy and truly glorious. Benjamin Franklin. The 29th of January, 1757, was a notable day in the life of Ben Franklin of Philadelphia, well known in the metropolis of America as printer and politician, and famous abroad as a scientist and friend of the human race. It was on that day that the Assembly of Pennsylvania commissioned him as its agent to repair to London in support of its petition against the proprietors of the province, who were charged with having obstinately persisted in manikling their deputies, the governors of Pennsylvania, with instructions inconsistent not only with the privileges of the people, but with the service of the crown. We may therefore, if we choose, imagine the philosopher on that day, being then in his 51st year walking through the streets of this metropolis of America, a town of something less than 20,000 inhabitants, to his modest home and there informing his dear Debbie, that her husband now apparently become a great man in a small world, was ordered immediately home to England. In those leisurely days, going home to England was no slight undertaking, and immediately when there was any question of a great journey meant as soon as the gods might bring it to pass. I'd agreed with Captain Morris of the packet at New York for my passage. He writes in the autobiography and my stories were put on board when Lord Luton arrived at Philadelphia expressly as he told me to endeavor an accommodation between the governor and the assembly that his majesty's service might not be obstructed by their dissensions. Franklin was the very man to effect an accommodation when he set his mind to it as he did on this occasion, but in the meantime he relates the packet had sailed with my sea stores, which was some loss to me and my only recompense was his lordship's thanks for my service, all the credit for obtaining the accommodation following to his share. It was now wartime and the packets were at the disposal of Lord Luton, commander of the forces in America. The general was good enough to inform his accommodating friend that of the two packets then at New York one was given out to sail on Saturday the 12th of April, but the great man added very confidentially, I may let you know entre new, that if you are there by Monday morning you will be in time but do not delay longer. As early as the 4th of April accordingly the provincial printer and friend of the human race accompanied by many neighbors to see him out of the province left Philadelphia. He arrived at Trenton well before night and expected in case the roads were no worse to reach Woodbridge by the night following. In crossing over to New York on the Monday some accident at the ferry delayed him so that he did not reach the city till nearly noon and he feared that he might miss the packet after all. Lord Luton had so precisely mentioned Monday morning, happily no such thing the packet was still there it did not sail that day or the next either and as late as the 29th of April Franklin was still hanging about waiting to be all for it was wartime and the packets waited the orders of General Luton who ready in promises but still in execution was said to be like St. George on the signs always on horseback but never rides on. Franklin himself was a deliberate man and at the last moment he decided for some reason or other not to take the first packet behold him therefore waiting for the second through the month of May and the greater part of June this tedious state of uncertainty and long waiting during which the agent of the province of Pennsylvania running back and forth from New York to Woodbridge spent his time more uselessly than ever he remembered was duly credited to the perversity of the British general. But at last they were off and on the 26th of July three and a half months after leaving Philadelphia Franklin arrived in London to take up the work of his mission and there he remained always expecting to return shortly but always delayed for something more than five years. These were glorious days in the history of Old England the most heroic since the reign of good Queen Bess when the provincial printer arrived in London the king and the politicians had already been forced through multiplied reverses in every part of the world to confer power upon William Pitt a disagreeable man indeed but still a great genius and warlord who soon turned to feed into victory it was the privilege of Franklin here in the capital of the empire to share the exaltation engendered by those successive conquests they gave India and America to the little island kingdom and made Englishmen in horse Walpole's phrase heirs apparent of the Romans no Britain rejoiced more sincerely than this provincial American in the extension of the empire he labored with good will and good humor and doubtless with good effect to remove popular prejudice against his countrymen and he wrote a masterly pamphlet to prove the wisdom of retaining Canada rather than Guadeloupe at the close of the war confidently assuring his readers that the colonies would never even when once the French danger was removed united against their own nation which protects and encourages them with which they have so many connections and ties of blood interest and affection and which is well known they all love much more than they love one another Franklin at least loved Old England and it might well be maintained that these were the happiest years of his life he was mentally so cosmopolitan so much of these in the world that here in London he readily found himself at home indeed the business of his particular mission strictly attended to occupied no great part of his time he devoted long days to his beloved scientific experiments and carried on a voluminous correspondence with David Hume and Lord Cames and with many other men of note in England France and Italy he made journeys to Holland to Cambridge to ancestral places and the homes of surviving relatives but mostly one may imagine he gave himself to a steady flow of that agreeable and instructive conversation of which he was so much the master and the devotee he was more famous than he knew and the reception that everywhere awaited him was flattering and as agreeable to his unworked and emancipated mind as it was flattering the regard and friendship I meet with he confesses and the conversation of ingenious men give me no small pleasure and at Cambridge my vanity was not a little gratified by the particular regard shown me by the chancellor and vice chancellor of the university and the heads of the colleges as the years passed the sense of being at ease among friends grew stronger the serene and placid letters to dear Debbie became rather less frequent the desire to return to America was much attenuated how delightful indeed was this old England of all the enviable things England has he writes I envy at most its people why should this little island enjoy in almost every neighborhood more sensible virtuous and elegant minds than we can collect in ranging 100 leagues of our vast forests what a proper place for a philosopher to spin out the remnant of his days the idea had occurred to him he was persistently urged by his friend William Strahan to carry it into effect and his other friend David Hume made him a pretty compliment on the same theme America has sent us many good things gold silver sugar tobacco but you are the first philosopher for whom we are beholden to her it is our own fault that we have not kept him whence it appears that we do not agree with Solomon that wisdom is above gold for we take good care never to send back an ounce of the latter which we once lay our fingers upon the philosopher was willing enough to remain and of the two objections which he mentioned to Strahan the rooted aversion of his wife to embarking on the ocean and his love for Philadelphia the latter for the moment clearly gave him less difficulty than the former I cannot leave this happy island and my friends in it without extreme regret he writes at the moment of departure I'm going from the old world to the new and I fancy I feel like those who are leaving this world for the next grief at the party fear of the passage hope for the future when on the 1st of November 1762 Franklin quietly slipped into Philadelphia he found that the new world had not forgotten him for many days his house was filled from morning to night with a succession of friends old and new come to congratulate him on his return excellent people all no doubt and yet presenting one may suppose a rather sharp contrast to the virtuous and elegant minds from whom he had recently parted in England the letters he wrote immediately following his return to America to his friends William Strahan and Mary Stevenson like something of the cheerful and contented good humor which is franklin's most characteristic tone his thoughts like those of a homesick man are ever dwelling on his English friends and he still nourishes the fond hope of returning bag and baggage to England for good and all the very letter which he begins by relating the cordiality of his reception in Philadelphia he closes by assuring strahan that in two years at father's I hope to settle all my affairs in such manner as that I may then conveniently remove to England provided he has as an afterthought we can persuade the good woman to cross the sea that will be the great difficulty it is not known whether it was this difficulty that prevented the imminent doctor revered into continents for his wisdom from changing the place of his residence dear Debbie as docile as a child in most respects very likely had settled prejudices of which the desire to remain on dry land may have been one and one of the most obstinate where it may be that franklin found himself too much occupied too much involved in affairs after his long absence to make even a beginning in his cherished plan or else as the months passed and he settled once more to the familiar humdrum life of the american metropolis sober second thought may have revealed to him what was doubtless a higher wisdom business public and private devours my time he writes in march 1764 I must return to England for repose with such thoughts I flattered myself and need some kind friend to put me often in mind that old trees cannot safely be transplanted perhaps after all dear Debbie was this kind friend in which case americans must all to this day be much indebted to the good woman at least it was no apprehension of difficulties arising between England and the colonies that induced franklin to remain in america the peace of paris he regarded as the most advantageous of any recorded in british annals very fitting to mark the close of a successful war and well suited to usher in the long period of prosperous felicity which should properly distinguish the reign of a virtuous prince never before in franklin's opinion were the relations between britain and our colonies more happy and there could be he thought no good reason to fear that the excellent young king would be distressed or his prerogative diminished by factitious parliamentary opposition you now fear for our virtuous young king that the faction forming will overpower him and render his reign uncomfortable he writes to stray him on the contrary i am of opinion that his virtue and the consciousness of his sincere intentions to make his people happy will give him firmness and steadiness in his measures and in the support of the honest friends he has chosen to serve him and when that firmness is fully perceived faction will dissolve and be dissipated like a morning fog before the rising sun leaving the rest of the day clear with the sky serene and cloudiness such after a few of the first years will be the future course of his majesty's reign which i predict will be happy and truly glorious a new war i cannot yet see reason to apprehend the peace will i think long continue and your nation be as happy as they deserve to be end of chapter one chapter two part one of eve of the revolution by carol becker this libra vox recording is in the public domain the burden of empire nothing of note in parliament except one slight day on the american taxes horrors wallpole there were plenty of men in england anytime before 1763 who found that an excellent arrangement which permitted them to hold office in the colonies while continuing to reside in london they were thereby unable to make debts and sometimes even to pay them without troubling much about their duties and one may easily think of them over their cleric as mr. tovelin says lamenting the cruelty of a secretary of state who hinted that for form's sake at least they had best show themselves once in a while in america they might have replied with junius it was not virginia that wanted a governor but a court favored that wanted a salary certainly virginia could do with a minimum of royal officials the most court favorites wanted salaries but without salaries an endowed gentleman could not conveniently live in london one of these gentlemen in the year 1763 was mr. groves vener bedford he was not to be sure a court favorite but a man now well along in years who had long ago been appointed to be collector of the customs at the port of philadelphia the appointment had been made by the great minister robert wophole for whom mr. bedford had unquestionably done some service or other and of whose son horace wophole the letter writer he had continued from that day to be a kind of dependent or protege being precisely the sort of unobtrusive factotum which that vestidious eccentric needed to manage his mundane affairs but now after this long time when the king's business was placed in the hands of george grenville who entertained the odd notion that a collector of the customs should reside at the port of entry where the customs were collected rather than in london where he drew his salary it was being noised about and was presently reported at strawberry hill that mr. bedford along with many other estimable gentlemen was forthwith to be turned out of his office to horace wophole it was a point of more than academic importance to know whether gentlemen were to be unceremoniously turned out of their offices as far back as 1738 while still a lad he had himself been appointed to be usher of the exchequer and as soon as he came of age he says i took possession of two other little patent places in the exchequer called comptroller of the pipe and clark of the streets all these places having been procured for him through the generosity of his father the duties of these offices one may suppose were not arduous for it seems that they were competently administered by mr. groves vener bedford in addition to his duties as collector of the customs at the port of philadelphia so well administered indeed that horace wophole's income from them which in 1740 was perhaps not more than 1500 pounds a year nearly doubled in the course of a generation and this income together with another thousand which he had annually from the collector's place in the custom house added to the interest of 20 000 pounds which he had inherited enabled him to live very well with immense leisure for writing odd books and letters full of extremely interesting comment on the levity and low aims of his contemporaries and so horace wophole good patron that he was an competent letter writer very naturally hearing that mr. bedford was to lose an office to which in the course of years he'd become much accustomed sat down and wrote a letter to mr. george grenville in behalf of his friend and servant though i am sensible i have no pretensions for asking you a favor yet i flatter myself i shall not be thought quite impertinent in interceding for a person who i can answer has neither been to blame nor any way to serve punishment and therefore i thank you sir will be ready to save him from prejudice the person i mean is my deputy mr groves vener bedford who above five and 20 years ago was appointed collector of the customs in philadelphia by my father i hear he is threatened to be turned out if the least fault can be laid to his charge i do not desire to have him protected if there cannot i'm too well persuaded sir of your justice not to be sure you will be pleased to protect him george grenville a dry precise man of great knowledge and industry almost always right in little matters and very patient of the misapprehensions of less exact people wrote in reply a letter which many would think entirely adequate to the matter in hand i've never heard he began of any complaint against mr groves vener bedford or of any desire to turn him out but by the office which you tell me he holds in north america i believe i know the state of the case which i will inform you of that you may be unable to judge of it yourself heavy complaints were last year made in parliament of the state of our revenues in north america which amounts between 1000 pounds and 2000 pounds a year the collecting of which costs upon the establishment of the customs in great britain between 7 000 pounds and 8 000 pounds a year this it was urged arose from the making all these offices sinecures in england when i came to the treasury i directed the commissioners of the customs to be written to that they might inform us how the revenue might be improved and to what causes they attributed the present diminished state of it the principal cause which they assigned was the absence of the officers who lived in england by leave of the treasury which they proposed should be recalled this we complied with and ordered them all to their duty and the commissioners of the customs to present others in the room of such as should not obey i take it for granted that this is mr bedford's case if it is it will be attended with difficulty to make an exception as they are every one of them applying to be accepted out of the orders if it is not so or if mr bedford can suggest to me any proper means of obviating it without overturning the whole regulation he will do me a sensible pleasure there is no evidence to show that mr bedford was able to do mr grenville this sensible pleasure the incident apparently closed was one of many indications that a new policy for dealing with america was about to be inaugurated and although grenville had been made minister for reasons that were remote enough from any question of efficiency in government no better man could have been chosen for applying to colonial administration the principles of good business management his connection with the treasury as well as the natural bent of his mind had made him confessedly the ablest man of business in the house of commons the governors of the bank of england very efficient men certainly held it a great point in the minister's favor that they could never do business with any man with the same ease they had done it with him undoubtedly the first axiom of business is that one's accounts should be kept straight one's books nicely balanced the second that one's assets should exceed one's liabilities mr grenville accordingly had studied the revenues with professional aciduity and something or professional ideas seemed to mingle in all his regulations concerning them he felt the weight of debt amounting of this time to 158 millions which oppressed his country and he looked to the amelioration of the revenue as the only mode of relieving it it is true there were some untouched sources of revenue still available in england as sinecures went in that day mr groves vener bedfords was not of the best and on any consideration of a matter from the point of view of revenue only grenville might well have turned his attention to a different class of officials for example to the master of the roles in ireland mr rigby who was also pay master of the forces and to whose credit they're stood at the bank of england as mr trivillian assures us a million pounds of the public money the interest of which was paid to him or to his creditors this was a much better thing than groves vener bedford had with his paltry collector ship at philadelphia and the interest on a million pounds more or less had it been diverted from mr rigby's pocket to the public treasury but perhaps have equaled the entire increase in the revenue to be expected from even the most efficient administration of the customs in all the ports of america in addition it should perhaps be said that mr rigby although excelled by none was by no means the only man in high place with a good degree of talent for exploiting the common chest the reform of such practices very likely was work for a statesman rather than for a man of business a good man of business called upon to manage the king's affairs was likely to find many obstacles in the way of depriving the pay master of the forces of his customary sources of income and mr grandville at least never attempted anything so hazardous scurrilous pamphleteers in fact had made it a charge against the minister that he had increased rather than diminished the evil of sinecures it had been written in pamphlets that four hundred thousand pounds a year was dealt out in pensions from which charged the able chancellor on the occasion of opening his first budget in the house of commons on the ninth of march 1764 defended himself by denying that the sums were so great as alleged it was scarcely inadequate defense but the truth is that grenville was sure to be less distressed by a bad custom no law forbidding than by a law good or bad not strictly enforced particularly if the law was intended to bring in a revenue instinctively therefore the minister turned to america where it was a notorious fact that there were revenue laws that had not been enforced these many years mr grenville we may suppose since it was charged against him in a famous epigram read the american dispatches with considerable care so that it is quite possible he may have chance to see and to shake his head over the sworn statement of mr samson to the a statement which throws much light upon colonial liberties and the practices of english officials in those days i samson to the so the statement runs clark to james cockle esquire collector of his master's these customs for the port of salem do declare on oath that ever since i've been in the office it had been customary for said cockle to receive of the masters of vessels entering from lisbon casks of wine boxes of fruit etc which was a gratuity for suffering their vessels to be entered with salt or ballast only and passing over unnoticed such cargos of wine fruit etc which are prohibited to be imported into his majesty's plantations part of which wine fruit etc is said james cockle used to share with governor benard and i further declare that i used to be the negotiator of this business and receive the wine fruit etc and dispose of them agreeable to mr cockle's orders witness my hand samson to the the curious historian would like much to know in case mr granville did see the declaration of samson to the whether he saw also a letter in which governor benard gave it as his opinion and if the colonial governments were to be refashioned it should be on a new plan since there is no system in north america fit to be made a module of secretary granville whether or not he ever saw this letter from governor benard was familiar with the ideas which inspired it most crown officials in america and the governors above all finding themselves little more than executive agents of the colonial assemblies had long clamored for the remodeling of colonial governments the charters they said should be recalled the functions of the assemblies should be limited and more precisely defined judges should be appointed at the pleasure of the king and judges and governors alike should be paid out of a permanent civil list in england drawn from revenue raised in america in urging these changes crown officials in america were powerfully supported by men of influence in england by halifax since the day some 15 years before when he was appointed to the office of colonial secretary by the brilliant charles townsen who in the year 1763 as first lord of the treasury imbutes ministry had formulated a bill which would have been highly pleasing to governor bernard had it been passed into law and now similar schemes were being urged upon grenville by his own colleagues notably by the earl of halifax who is said to have become in a formal interview with the first minister extremely heated and eager in the matter but all to no purpose mr grenville was well content with the form of the colonial governments being probably a pope's opinion that the system that is best administered is best in grenville's opinion the massachusetts government was good enough and all the trouble arose from the inattention of royal officials to their manifest duties and from the pleasant custom of depositing at governor bernard's backdoor sundry pipes of wine with the compliments of mr cockle most men in england agreed that such pleasant customs have been tolerated long enough to their suppression the first minister accordingly gave his best attention and while mr rigby continued to enjoy great perquisites in england many obscure customs officials such as groves and earth bedford were ordered to their post to prevent small speculations in america to assist them or their successors in this business ships of war were stationed conveniently for the intercepting of smugglers general ritz were authorized to facilitate the search for goods illegally entered and the governors his excellency governor bernard among the number were newly instructed to give their best efforts to the enforcement of the trade acts all this was but an incident to be sure in the minister's general scheme for ameliorating the revenue it was not until the 9th of march 1764 that grenville not disguising how much he was hurt by abuse opened his first budget fully for brevity was not as failing and still with great ardent ability although ministers were to be congratulated he thought on the revenue being managed with more frugality than in the late rain the house scarcely need be told that the war had greatly increased the debt an increase not to be placed at a lower figure than some 70 odd millions and so on account of this great increase in the debt and in spite of gratifying advances in the customs duties and the salutary cutting off of the german subsidies taxes were now the house would easily understand necessarily much higher than formally our taxes he said exceeded by three millions what they were in 1754 much money doubtless could still be raised on the land tax if the house was at all disposed to put on another half shilling in the pound ministers could take it quite for granted however that country squires sitting on the benches would not be disposed to increase the land tax but would much prefer some skill for manipulation of the colonial customs provided only there was someone who understood that art well enough to explain to the house where such duties were meant to fall and how much they might reasonably be expected to bring in and there in fact was mr grand fill explaining it all with art and ability for which task indeed there could be none superior to his majesty's chancellor of the exchequer who had so long studied the revenue with professional assiduity the items of the budget rather dull reading now and none to illuminating fell pleasantly upon the ears of country squires sitting there on the benches and the particular taxes no doubt seemed reasonably clear to them even if they had no perfect understanding of the laws of incidents in as much as some of the new duties apparently fell upon the distant americans who were known to be rich and were generally thought on no less an authority than jasper maudit agent of the province of massachusetts bay to be easily able and not unwilling to pay considerable sums towards amily raiding the revenue it was odd perhaps that americans should be willing to pay but that was no great matter if they were able since no one could deny their obligation and so country squires and london merchants to listen comfortably to the reading of the budget so well designed to relieve the one of taxes and swell the profits flowing into the coffers of the other that a duty of two pounds nineteen shillings nine pence per hundred weight of war duper be laid upon all foreign coffee imported from any place except great britain into the british colonies and plantations in america that a duty of six pence per pound weight be laid upon all foreign indigo imported into the said colonies and plantations that a duty of seven pounds per ton be laid upon all wine of the growth of the madures or of any other island or place lawfully imported from the respective place of the growth of such wine into the said colonies and plantations that a duty of ten shillings per ton be laid upon all portugal spanish or other wine except french wine imported from great britain into the said colonies and plantations that a duty of two shillings per pound weight be laid upon all rot silks bengals and stuffs mixed with silker herba of the manufacturer persia china or east india imported from great britain to the said colonies and plantations that a duty of two shillings six pence per piece be laid upon all calicoes the list no doubt was a long one and quite right to thought country squires all of whom to a man were willing to pay no more land tax other men besides country squires were interested in mr granville's budget notably the west indian sugar planters virtually and actually represented in the house of commons and voting there this day many of them were rich men no doubt but sugar planting they would assure you in confidence was not what it had been and if they were well off after a fashion they might have been much better off but for the shameless frauds which for 30 years have made a dead letter of the molasses act of 1733 it was notorious that the merchants of the northern and middle colonies regarding either the acts of trade nor the dictates of nature had every year carried their provisions and fish to the foreign islands receiving in exchange molasses cock and eel medical drugs and gold and silver and bullion and coin with molasses the thrifty new englanders made great quantities of inferior ron the common drink of that day regarded as essential to the health of sailors engaged in fishing off the grand banks and by far the cheapest and most effective instrument for procuring niggers in africa or for inducing the western indians to surrender their valuable first for some trumpery of colored cloth or spangled bracelet all this thriving traffic did not benefit british planters who had molasses of their own and a superior quality of rum which they were not unwilling to sell such traffic since it did not benefit them british planters were disposed to think must be bad for england they were therefore willing to support mr grenville's budget which proposed that the importation of foreign rum into any british colony be prohibited in future and which further proposed that the act of george the second chapter 13 be continued with the modifications to make it effective the modifications of chief importance being the additional duty of 22 shillings per hundred weight upon all sugar and the reduction by one half of the prohibited duty of six pence and all foreign molasses imported into the british plantations it was a matter of minor importance doubtless but one to which they had no objections since the minister made a point of it that the produce of all the duties which should be raised by virtue of the sedact made in the sixth year of his late majesties reign be paid into the receipt of his majesties six checker and they're reserved to be from time to time disposed of by parliament towards deferring the necessary expenses of defending protecting and securing the british colonies and plantations in america end of chapter two part one chapter two part two of eve of the revolution by carl becker this lever vox recording is in the public domain chapter two part two with singularly little debate honorable and right honorable members were ready to vote this new sugar act having the minister's word for it that it would be enforced the revenue thereby much improved and a sudden stop put to the long established illicit traffic with the foreign islands a traffic so beneficial to the northern colonies so prejudicial to the empire and the pockets of planters thus it was that mr grenville came opportunity to the aid of the spanish authorities who for many years had employed their guard at costas in a vain effort to suppress this very traffic conceiving it oddly enough to be injurious to spain and highly advantageous to britain it may be that the spanish authorities regarded the west indian trade as a commercial system rather than as a means of revenue this aspect of the matter the commercial effects of his measures mr grenville at all events managed not to take sufficiently into account which was rather odd seeing that that he professed to hold the commercial system embodied in the navigation and trade acts in such high esteem as a kind of english palladium no one could have wished less than grenville to lay sacrilegious hands on this palladium have less intended to throw sand into the nicely adjusted bearings of the empire's smoothly working commercial system if he managed nevertheless to do something of this sort it was doubtless by virtue of being such a good man of business by virtue of viewing the art of government too narrowly as a question of revenue only for the moment preoccupied as they were with the quest to revenue the new measures seemed to mr grenville and to the squires and planters who voted them well adapted to raising a moderate sum part only of some 350 000 pounds for the just and laudable purpose of defraying the necessary expenses of defending protecting and securing the british colonies and plantations in america the problem of colonial defense so closely connected with the question of revenue was none of grenville's making but was the legacy of the war and of that peace of paris which had added an immense territory to the empire when the diplomats of england and france had last discovered in some mysterious manner that it had pleased the most high to defuse the spirit of union and concord among the princes the world was informed that as the price of a christian universal and perpetual peace france would see to england what had remained to her of nova scotia canada and all the possessions of france on the left bank of the mississippi except the city of new orleans and the island on which it stands that she would cede also the islands of granada and the grenadines the islands of saint vencent dominica and tobago and the river senegal with all its forts and factories and that she would for the future be content so far as her activities in india were concerned with the five factories which she possessed there at the beginning of the year 1749 the average britain as well as honorable and right honorable members of the house had known that england possessed colonies and had understood that colonies as a matter of course existed to supply him with sugar and rice indigo and tobacco and in return to buy at a good price whatever he might himself wish to sell beyond all this he had given slight attention to the matter of colonies until the great pit had somewhat stirred his slow imagination with talk of empire and destiny it was doubtless a liberalizing as well as a sobering revelation to be told that he was the heir apparent of the romans with the responsibilities that are implied in having a high mission in the world now that his attention was called to the matter it seemed to the average britain that in meeting the obligation of this high mission and in dealing with this far-flung empire a policy of efficiency such as that advocated by mr. grenville might well replace a policy of salutary neglect and if the national debt had doubled during the war as he was authoritatively assured why indeed should not the americans grown rich under the fostering care of england and lately freed from the menace of france by the force of british arms be expected to observe the trade acts and to contribute their fair share to the defense of that new world of which they were the chief beneficiaries if americans were quite ready in their easygoing way to take chances in the matter of defense hoping that things will turn out for the best in the future as they had in the past british statesman and right honorable members of the house viewing the question broadly and without provincial illusions understood that a policy of preparedness was the only salvation a policy of muddling through would no longer suffice as it had done in the good old days before the country squires and london merchants realized that their country was a world power in those days when their shrewd robert wallpole refused to meddle with schemes for taxing america the accepted theory of defense was a simple one if britain police the sea and kept the bourbons in their place it was thought that the colonies might be left to manage the indians for a traders whose lure the red man could not resist and settlers occupying the lands beyond the mountains so it was said would do the business in 1749 500 000 acres of land had been granted to the ohio company in the king's interest and to cultivate a friendship with the nations of indians inhabiting those parts and as late as 1754 the board of trade was still encouraging the rapid settling of the west in as much as nothing can more effectively tend to defeat the dangerous designs of the french on the eve of the last french war it may well have seemed to the board of trade that this policy was being attended with gratifying results in the year 1749 la calis sonnier the acting governor of canada commission celeron de blin via to take possession of the ohio valley which he did inform descending the river to the marme and so to lake eerie and home again having a convenient points proclaimed the sovereignty of louis the 15th over that country and having laid down as evidence of the accomplished fact certain led plates bearing all inspiring inscriptions some of which have been discovered and are preserved to this day it was nonetheless a dangerous junket everywhere blam via found the indians of hostile mind everywhere in every village almost he found english traders plying their traffic and cultivating a friendship with the indians so that upon his return in 1750 in spite of that lead plate so securely buried he must knees right in his journal all i can say is that the nations of those countries are ill-disposed towards the french and devoted to the english during the first years of the war all this devotion was nevertheless seemed to be of little worth like providence the indians were sure to side with the big battalions for want of a few effective garrisons at the beginning the english found themselves deserted by their quantum allies and although they recovered this fossil allegiance as soon as the french garrisons were taken it was evident enough in the late years of the war that fear alone inspired the red man's loyalty the indian apparently did not realize that this early date that his was an inferior race destined to be supplanted of a primitive and uncultivated intelligence it was not possible for him to foresee the beneficent designs of the ohio company or to observe with friendly curiosity the surveyors who came to draw imaginary lines through the virgin forest and therefore even in an age when the natural rights of man were being loudly proclaimed the nations of indians inhabiting those parts were only too ready to believe what the virginia traders told them of the pennsylvania's what the pennsylvania traders told them of the virginians that the fair words of the english were but a kind of mask to conceal the greed of men who had no other desire than to deprive the red man of his beloved hunting grounds as it was that the industrious men with pedantic minds who day by day read the dispatches that accumulated in the office of the board of trade became aware during the years from 1758 to 1761 that the old policy of defense was not altogether adequate the granting of lands hitherto unsettled so the board reported in 1761 appears to be a measure of the most dangerous tendency in december of the same year all governors were accordingly forbidden to pass grants or encourage settlements upon any lands within the said colonies which may interfere with the indians bordering upon them the policy thus initiated found final expression in the famous proclamation of 1763 in the early months of grandville's ministry by the terms of the proclamation no further grants were to be made within lands which not having been ceded to or purchased by us are reserved to the said indians that is to say all the lands lying to the westward of the sources of the rivers which fall into the sea from the west or the northwest all persons who had either willfully or inadvertently ceded themselves on the reserve lands were required forthwith to remove themselves and for the future no man was to presume to trade with the indians without first giving bond to observe such regulations as we shall at any time think fit to direct for the benefit of the said trade all these provisions were designed to the end that the indians may be convinced of our justice and determined resolution to remove all reasonable cause of discontent by royal act the territory rest of the allerganies to the mississippi from florida to 50 degrees north latitude was thus closed to settlement for the present and reserved to the indians having thus taken measures to protect the indians against the colonists the mother country was quite ready to protect the colonists against the indians rash americans were apt to say the danger was over now that the french were expelled from canada this statement was childish enough in view of the late pontiac uprising which was with such great difficulty suppressed if indeed one could say that it was suppressed by a general as efficient even as amherst with seasoned british troops at his command the red man even if he is submitted outwardly harbored in his vengeful heart the rankling memory of many griefs real or imaginary and he was still easily swayed by his ancient but now humiliated french friends who had been expelled from canada only indeed in a political sense but were still very much there as promoters of trouble what folly therefore to talk of withdrawing the troops from america no sane man but could see that under the circumstances such a move was quite out of the question it would materially change the circumstances undoubtedly if americans could ever be induced to undertake in any systematic and adequate manner to provide for their own defense in their own way in that case the mother country would be only too glad to withdraw her troops of which indeed she had none too many but it was well known what the colonists could be relied upon to do or rather what they could be relied upon not to do in the way of cooperatives effort ministers had not forgotten that on the eve of the last war at the very climax of the danger the colonial assemblies had rejected a plan of union prepared by benjamin franklin the one man if any man there was to bring the colonies together they have rejected the plan as involving two great concentration of authority and they were unwilling to barter the various jot or tittle of their much prized provincial liberty for any amount of protection and if they rejected this plan a very mild and harmless plan ministers were bound to think it was not likely they could be induced in time of peace to adopt any plan that might be thought adequate in england such a plan for example was that prepared by the board of trade by which commissioners appointed by the governors were empowered to determine the military establishment and to apportion the expense of maintaining it among the several colonies on the basis of wealth and population assemblies which for years past have systematically deprived governors of all discretionary power to expend money raised by the assemblies themselves which surely never surrender to governors the power of determining how much assemblies should raise for governors to expend doubtless it might be said with truth that the colonies had voluntarily contributed more than their fair share in the last war but it was also true that pit and pit alone could get them to do this the king could not always count on there being in england a great genius like pit and besides he did not always find it convenient for reasons which could be given to employ a great genius like pit a system of defense had to be designed for normal times and normal men and in normal times with normal men at the helm ministers were agreed the american attitude towards defense was very cleverly described by franklin everyone cries a union is absolutely necessary but when it comes to the manner and form of the union their weak noddles are perfectly distracted noddles of ministers however were in no way distracted but saw clearly that if americans could not agree on any plan of defense there was no alternative but an interposition of the authority of parliament such interposition recommended by the board of trade and already proposed by charles tounson in the last ministry was now taken in hand by grenville the troops were to remain in america the mutiny act which required soldiers and barracks to be furnished with provisions and utensils by local authorities and which is a matter of course went where the army went was supplemented by the quartering act which made further provision for the billeting and supplying of the troops in america and for raising some part of the general maintenance fund ministers could think of no tax more equitable or easier to be levied and collected than a stamp tax some such tax stamp tax repolled tax had often been recommended by colonial governors as a means of bringing the colonies to a sense of their duty to the king to awaken them to take care of their lives and their fortunes a crown officer in north carolina mr mccullough was good enough to assure mr charles jenkinson one of the secretaries of the treasury backing up his assertion with sundry statistical exhibits that a stamp tax on the continental colonies would easily yield 60 000 pounds and twice that some have extended to the west indies as early as september 23 1763 mr jenkinson acting on an authorization of the treasury board accordingly wrote to the commissioners of stamped duties directing them to prepare for their lordship's consideration of draft of an act for imposing proper stamp duties on his majesty's subjects in america and the west indies mr grenville who was not in any case the man to do things in a hurry nevertheless proceeded very leisurely in the matter he knew very well that pit had refused to burn his fingers with any stamp tax and some men such as his friend and secretary mr jackson for example and the earl of hillsborough advised him to abandon the project altogether while others urged delay at least in order that americans might have an opportunity to present their objections if they had any it was decided therefore to postpone the matter for a year and in presenting the budget on march 9 1764 the first minister merely gave notice that it may be proper to charge certain stamp duties in the said colonies and plantations of all the plans for taxing america he said this one seemed to him the best yet he was not wedded to it and would willingly adopt any other preferred by the colonists if they could suggest any other of equal efficacy meanwhile he wished only to call upon honorable members of the house to say now if any were so minded that parliament had not the right to impose any tax external or internal upon the colonies to which solemn question asked in full house there was not one negative nor any reply except alderman beckford saying as we are stout i hope we shall be merciful it soon appeared that americans did have objections to a stamp tax whether it were equitable or not they would rather it should not be late really preferring not to be ditched up in any sauce whatever however fine the tax might as ministers said be easily collected or its collection might perhaps be attended with certain difficulties in either case it would remain for reasons which they were ready to advance a most objectionable tax certain colonial agents then in england accordingly sought an interview with the first minister in order to convince him if possible of this fact grenville was very likely more than ready to grant them an interview relying upon the strength of his position on his tenderness for the subjects in america and upon his well-known powers of persuasion to bring them to his way of thinking to get from the colonial agents a kind of ascent to his measure would be to win a point of no slight strategic value there being at least a modicum of truth in the notion that just government springs from the consent of the government i have proposed the resolution the minister explained to the agents from a real regard and tenderness for the subjects in the colonies it is highly reasonable they should contribute something towards the charge of protecting themselves in an aid of the great expense great prudent has put herself to on their account no tax appears to me so easy and equitable as a stamp duty it will fall only upon property will be collected by the fewest officers and will be equally spread over america and the rest indies it doesn't require any number of officers vested with extraordinary powers of entering houses or extend the sort of influence which i never wish to increase the colonists now have it in their power by agreeing to this tax to establish a precedent for their being consulted before any taxes imposed upon them by parliament for their approbation of it being signified to parliament next year will afford a forcible argument for the like proceeding in all such cases if they think of any other mode of taxation more convenient to them and make any proposition of equal efficacy with the stamp duty i will give it all due consideration the agents appear at least to have been silenced by the speech which was one must admit so fabbily and so very reasonable in tone and doubtless grenville fought them convinced to since he always so perfectly convinced himself that all of us he found it possible for this or for some other reason to put the whole matter out of his mind until the next year the patriotic american historian well instructed in the importance of the stamp act has at first the difficulty in understanding how it could occupy among the things that interested english statesman at this time are strictly subordinate place and he wonders greatly as he runs with eager interest through the correspondence of grenville for the year 1764 to find it barely mentioned there whether the king received him less coldly today than the day before yesterday was apparently more in the minister's mind than any possibility that the stamp act might be received rather warmly in the colonies the contemporaries of grenville even pit himself have almost as little to say about the coming great event all of which compels the historian reviewing the matter judiciously to reflect sadly that englishmen of that day were not as fully aware of the importance of the measure before it was passed as good patriots have since become there is much to confirm this notion in the circumstances attending the passage of the bill through parliament in the winter of 1765 grenville was perhaps further reassured in spite of persistent rumors of much high talk in america by the results of a second interview which he had with the colonial agents just before introducing the measure into the house of commons i take no pleasure he again explained in his reasonable way in bringing upon myself their resentments it is my duty to manage the revenue i have really been made to believe that considering the whole circumstances of the mother country in the colonies the latter canon ought to pay something to the common cause i know of no better way than that now pursuing to lay such attacks if you can tell of a better i will adopt it franklin who was present with the others on this occasion ventured to suggest that the usual constitutional way of obtaining colonial support through the king's requisition would be better can you agree as grenville on the proportions each colony should raise no they could not agree as franklin was bound to admit knowing the fact better than most men and if no adequate answer was forthcoming from franklin a man so ready in expedience and so practiced in the subtleties of dialectic it is no great wonder that grenville thought the agents now fully convinced by his reasoning which after all was only an impersonal formulation of the inexorable logic of the situation proceeding thus leisurely having taken so much pains to illicit reasonable objection and none being forthcoming grenville quite sure of his ground brought in from the ways and means committee in february 1765 the 55 resolutions which required that stamped paper printed by the government and sold by officers appointed for that purpose be used for nearly all legal documents for all customs papers for appointments to all officers carrying a salary of 20 pounds except military and judicial offices for all grants of privilege and franchises made by the colonial assemblies for licenses to retail liquors for all pamphlets advertisements handbills newspapers almanacs and trial lenders and for the sale of packages containing playing cards and dice the expediency of the act was now explained to the house as it had been explained to the agents that the act was legal which few people in fact denied grenville doing everything thoroughly and with system proceeded to demonstrate also the colonies claim he said the privilege of all british subjects of being taxed only with their own consent well for his part he hoped they might always enjoy that privilege may this sacred pledge of liberty grant the minister with unwanted eloquence be preserved in violet to the utmost courage of our dominions and to the latest pages of our history but americans were clearly wrong in supposing the stamp act would deprive them of the rights of englishmen for upon any ground on which it could be said that englishmen were represented it could be maintained and he was free to assert that americans were represented in parliament which was the common council of the whole empire the measure was well received mr jackson supposed the parliament had a right to tax america but he much doubted the expediency of the present act if it was necessary as ministers claim to tax the colonies the latter should be permitted to elect some part of the parliament otherwise the liberties of america do not say will be lost but will be in danger the one notable event of this slight day was occasioned by a remark of Charles Townsend who asked with some asperity whether these american children planted by our care nourished by our indulgence to a degree of strength and opulence and protected by our arms would now be so infelial as to grudge to contribute their might to relieve us from the heavy burden under which we lie upon which colonel isik baare sprang to his feet and delivered an impassioned unpremeditated reply which stirred the dollhouse for perhaps three minutes they planted by your care no your oppression planted them in america they fled from your tyranny to a then uncultivated inhospitable country where they exposed themselves to almost all the hardships to which human nature is liable they nourished up by your indulgence they grew by your neglect of them as soon as you began to care about them that care was exercised in sending person to rule them in one department and another who were perhaps the deputies of deputies to some members of this house sent to spy out their liberties to misrepresent their actions and to pray upon that men whose behavior on many occasions has caused the blood of these sons of liberty to recoil within them they protect about your arms they have nobly taken up arms in your defense have exerted a valour amidst their constant laborious industry for the defense of a country whose frontier was drenched in blood while its interior parts yielded all its little savings to your emolument a very warm speech and a capital hit to thought the honorable members of the house as they settled comfortably back again to endure the routine of a dull day towards midnight after seven hours of language debate an adjournment was carried as everyone foresaw it would be by a great majority 205 to 49 in support of the ministry on the 13th of february the stamp act bill was introduced and read for the first time without debate it passed the house on the 27th on the 8th of march it was approved by the lords without protest amendment debate or division and two weeks later the king being then temporarily out of his mind the bill received the royal assent by commission at a later day when the fatal effects of the act were about to apparent it was made of charge against the ministers that they have persisted in passing the measure in the face of strong opposition but it was not so as to the fact of a strenuous opposition to the stamp act said berth in his famous speech on american taxation i said as a stranger in your gallery when it was under consideration far from anything inflammatory i never heard a more languid debate in this house in fact the affair passed with so very very little noise that in town they scarcely knew the nature of what you were doing so far as men concerned themselves with the doings of parliament the colonial measures of grenville were greatly applauded and that not alone by men who were ignorant of america thomas pownall once governor of massachusetts well acquainted with the colonies and no bad friend of their liberties published in april 1764 a pamphlet on the administration of the colonies which he dedicated to george grenville the great minister who he desired might live to see the power prosperity and honor that must be given to his country by so great an important event as the interweaving the administration of the colonies into the british administration end of chapter two part two chapter three part one of eve of the revolution by carl becker this libra vox recording is in the public domain chapter three part one the rights of a nation british subjects by removing two america cultivating a wilderness extending the domain and increasing the wealth commerce and power of the mother country at the hazard of their lives and fortunes ought not and in fact do not thereby lose their native rights benjamin franklin it was the misfortune of grenville that this interweaving as pownall described it should have been undertaken at a most inopportune time when the very conditions which made englishmen conscious of the burden of empire were giving to americans a new and highly stimulating sense of power and independence the marvelous growth of the colonies in population and wealth much commented upon by all observers and asserted by ministers as one principle reason why americans should pay taxes was indeed well worth some consideration a million and a half of people spread over the atlantic seaboard might be thought no great number but it was a new thing in the world well worth noting which had in fact been carefully noted by benjamin franklin in a pamphlet on the increase of mankind peopling of countries etc that within three quarters of a century the population of the continental colonies had doubled every 25 years whereas the population of old england during a hundred years past had not doubled once and now stood at only some six and a half millions if this should go on and considering the immense stretches of free land beyond the mountains no one could suppose that the present rate of increase would soon fall off it was not unlikely that in another century the center of empire following the course of the sun would come to rest in the new world with these facts in mind one might indeed say that a people with so much vitality and expansive power was abundantly able to pay taxes but perhaps it was also a fair inference if anyone was disposed to press the matter that unless it was so minded such a people was already or assuredly soon would be equally able not to pay them people in new countries being called provincial being often told in effect that having made their bed they may lie in it easily maintain their self-respect if they are able to say that the bed is indeed a very comfortable one if therefore americans have been giving to boasting their growing wealth was not any more than their increasing numbers a thing to be passed over in silence in every colony the starving time even if it had ever existed was now no more than an ancient tradition every man of industry has it in his power to live well according to we have smith of new york and many are the instances of persons who came here distressed in their poverty who now enjoy easy and plentiful fortunes if americans were not always aware that they were rich men individually they were at all events well instructed by old world visitors who came to observe them with a certain air of condescension that collectively at least their material prosperity was a thing to be envied even by more advanced and more civilized peoples therefore any man called upon to pay a penny tax and finding his pocket bear might take a decent pride in the fact which none need doubt since foreigners like peter calm found it so that the english colonies in this part of the world have increased so much in their riches that they almost by with old england that the colonies might possibly buy with old england was a notion which good americans could contemplate with much equanimity and even if the swedish traveler according to a habit of travelers had stretched the facts a point or two it was still abundantly clear that the continental colonies were thought to be even by englishmen themselves of far greater importance to the mother country than they had formally been very old men could remember the time when english statesmen and economists leo and colonies as providentially designed to promote the increase of trade had regarded the northern colonies as little better than heavy encumbrances on the empire and their commerce scarcely worth the cost of protection it was no longer so it could no longer be said that two-thirds of colonial commerce was with the tobacco and sugar plantations or that jamaica took off more english exports than the middle and northern colonies combined but it could be said and was now being loudly proclaimed when it was a point of debate whether to keep canada or guadeloupe that the northern colonies had already outstripped the islands as consumers of english commodities of this fact americans themselves were well aware the question whether it was for the interest of england to keep canada or guadeloupe which was much discussed in 1760 called forth the notable pamphlet from franklin entitled the interest of great britain considered in which he arranged in convenient form for the benefit of englishmen certain statistics of trade from these statistics it appeared that whereas in 1748 english exports to the northern colonies and to the west indies stood at some 830 000 pounds and 730 000 pounds respectively 10 years later the exports to the west indies were still no more than 877 571 pounds while those to the northern colonies had advanced to nearly two millions nor was it likely that this rate of increase would fall off in the future the trade to our northern colonies said franklin is not only greater but yearly increasing with the increase of the people the occasion for english goods in north america and the inclination to have and use them is it must be for ages to come much greater than the ability of the people to buy them for english merchants the prospect was therefore an inviting one and if canada rather than guadeloupe was kept at the close of the war it was because statesmen and economists were coming to estimate the value of colonies in terms of what they could buy and not merely as of old in terms of what they could sell from this point of view the superiority of the continental over the insular colonies was not to be doubted americans might well find great satisfaction in this disposition of the mother country to regard her continental colonies so highly and to think their trade of so much moment to her all of which nevertheless doubtless inclined them sometimes to speculate on the delicate question whether in case they were so important to the mother country they were not perhaps more important to her than she was to them the consciousness of rapidly increasing material power which was greatly strengthened by the last french board did nothing to dull the sense of rights but it was on the contrary a market stimulus to the mind and formulating a plausible if theoretical justification of desired aims doubtless no american would say that being able to pay taxes was a good reason for not paying them or that obligations might rightly be ignored as soon as one was in a position to do so successfully but that he should not lose his native rights any american could more readily understand when he recall that his ancestors had without assistance from the mother country transformed a wilderness into populace and thriving communities whose trade was now becoming indispensable to britain therefore in the summer of 1764 before the doctrine of colonial rights had been very clearly stated or much refined every american knew that the sugar act and also the proposed stamp act were grievously burdensome and that in some way or other and for reasons which he might not be able to give with precision they involved an infringement of essential english liberties most men in the colonies at this early date would doubtless have agreed with the views expressed in a letter written to a friend in england by thomas hutchinson of boston who was later so well hated by his compatriots for not having changed his views with the progress of events the colonists at hutchinson claim a power of making laws and a privilege of exemption from taxes unless voted by their own representatives nor are the privileges of the people less affected by duties laid for the sake of the money arising from them than by an internal tax not one-tenth part of the people of great britain have a voice in the elections to parliament and therefore the colonies can have no claim to it but every man of property in england may have his voice if he will besides acts of parliament do not generally affect individuals and every interest is represented but the colonies have an interest distinct from the interest of the nation and shall the parliament be at once party and judge the nation treats through colonies as a father who should sell the services of his sons to reimburse him what they had cost him but without the same reason for none of the colonies except george and halifax occasioned any charge to the crown or kingdom in the settlement of them the people of new england fled for the sake of civil and religious liberty multitudes flocked to america with this dependence that their liberties should be safe they and their posterity have enjoyed them to their content and therefore have endured with greater cheerfulness all the hardships of settling new countries no ill use has been made of these privileges but the domain and wealth of great britain have received amazing addition surely the services we have rendered the nation have not subjected us to any forfeitures i notice that the colonies are a charge to the nation and they should contribute to their own defense and protection but during the last war they annually contributed so largely that the parliament was convinced the burden would be insupportable and from year to year made them compensation in several of the colonies for several years together more men were raised in proportion than by the nation in the trading towns one fourth part of the profit of trade besides impost and excise was annually paid to the support of the war and public charges in the country towns a farm which would hardly rent for 20 pounds a year paid 10 pounds in taxes if the inhabitants of britain had paid in the same proportion there would have been no great increase in the national debt nor is there occasion for any national expense in america for 100 years together the new england colonies received no aid in their wars with the indians assisted by the french those governments now molested are as able to defend their respective frontiers and had rather do the whole of it by a tax of their own raising than pay their proportion in any other way moreover it must be prejudicial to the national interest to impose parliamentary taxes the advantages promised by an increase of the revenue are all fallacious and elusive you will lose more than you will gain britain already reaps the profit of all their trade and of the increase of their substance by cherishing their present turn of mind you will serve your interest more than by your present schemes thomas hutchinson or any other man might write a private letter without committing his country or with due caution to his correspondent even himself but for effective public and official protest the colonial assemblies were the proper channels and very expert they were in the business after having for half a century more devoted themselves with singleness of purpose to the guardianship of colonial liberties until now liberties have been cheaply threatened by the insidious designs of colonial governors who were for the most part appointed by the crown and very likely therefore to be infected with the spirit of prerogative than which nothing could be more dangerous as everyone must know who recalled the great events of the last century with those great events the eminent men who directed the colonial assemblies heads or signs or protégés of the best families in america men of wealth and not without reading were entirely familiar they knew as well as any man that the liberties of englishmen had been vindicated against royal prerogative only by depriving one king of his head and another of his crown and they needed no instruction in the significance of the glorious revolution the high justification of which was to be found in the political gospel of john lock whose book they had commonly bought and conveniently placed on their library shelves more often than not it is true colonial governors were but ordinary englishmen with neither the instinct nor the capacity for tyranny intent mainly upon getting their salaries paid and laying by a competence against the day when they might return to england but if they were not kings at least they had certain royal characteristics and a certain flavor of despotism clinging as it were to their official robes and reviving in sensitive provisional minds the memory of bygone parliamentary battles was an ever-present stimulus to the eternal vigilance which was well known to be the price of liberty and so throughout the eighteenth century little colonial aristocracies played their part in imagination clothing their governors in the decaying vesture of old world tyrants and themselves assuming the homespun garb half roman and half puritan of a virtuous republicanism small matters were thus stamped with great character to debate a point of procedure in the boston or weemsburg assembly was not to be sure as high a privilege as to obstruct legislation in rustminster but many of the best american families fashioning their minds as well as their houses on good english models thought of themselves in withholding a governor's salary or limiting his executive power as but re-enacting on a lesser stage the great parliamentary struggles of the 17th century it was the illusion of sharing in great events rather than any low mercenary motive that made americans guard with jealous care their legislative independence a certain hypersensitiveness in matters of taxation they knew to be the virtue of men standing for liberties which englishmen had once won and might lose before they were aware as a matter of course therefore the colonial assemblies protested against the measures of grenville the general court of massachusetts instructed its agent to say that the sugar act would ruin the new england fisheries upon which the industrial prosperity of the northern colonies depended what they would lose was set down with some care and precise figures the fishing trade estimated at 164 000 pounds per annum the vessels employed in it which would be nearly useless at 100 000 pounds their provisions used in it the cask for packing fish and other articles at 22 700 pounds and upwards to all which there was to be added the loss of the advantage of sending lumber horses provisions and other commodities to the foreign plantations as cargoes the vessels employed to carry the fish to spain and portugal the dismissing of 5000 seamen from their employment besides many other losses all arising from the very simple fact that the british islands to which the trade of the colonies was virtually confined by the sugar act could furnish no sufficient market for the products of new england to say nothing of the middle colonies nor a tithe of the molasses and other commodities now imported from the foreign islands in exchange other things taken in exchange silver in coin and bullion was not the least important since it was essential for the remittances to england for goods imported into the provinces remittances which during the last 18 months it was said had been made in specie to the amount of 150 000 pounds besides 90 000 pounds in treasurer's bills for the reimbursement money any man must thus see since even governor bernard was convinced of it that the new duties would drain the colony of all its hard money and so as the governor said there would be an end of the specie currency in massachusetts and with her trade have gone and her hard money entirely so the old bay colony would have to manufacture for herself those very commodities which english merchants were so desirous of selling in america their sugar act was thus made out to be even from the point of view of english merchants and economic blunder but in the eyes of vigilant bostonians it was something more and much worse than an economic blunder vigilant bostonians assembled in town meeting in may 1764 in order to instruct their representatives how they ought to act in these serious times and knowing that they ought to protest but perhaps not knowing precisely on what grounds they committed the drafting of their instructions to samuel adams a middle-aged man who had given much time to the consideration of political questions and above all to this very question of taxation upon which he had wonderfully clarified his ideas by much meditation and the writing of effective political pieces for the newspapers through the eyes of samuel adams therefore vigilant bostonians saw clearly that the sugar act to say nothing of the stamp act was not only an economic blunder but a menace to political liberty as well if our trade may be taxed so the instructions ran why not our lands why not the produce of our lands and everything we possess or make use of this we apprehend annihilates our charter right to govern and tax ourselves it strikes at our british privileges which as we have never forfeited them we hold in common with our fellow subjects who are natives of great britain if taxes are laid upon us in any shape without our having a legal representative where they are laid are we not reduced from the character of free subjects to the miserable state of tributary slaves very formidable questions couched in high sounding phrases and representing well enough informant in substance the state of mind of colonial assemblies in the summer of 1764 in respect to the sugar act and the proposed stamp act yet these resounding phrases doubtless meant something less to americans of 1764 than one is apt to suppose the rights of freemen has so often in the proceedings of colonial assemblies as well as in the newspaper communications of many our brutus and cater been made to depend upon withholding a governor's salary or defining precisely how he should expend a hundred pounds or so that moderate terms could hardly be trusted to cope with the serious business of parliamentary taxation reduced from the character free subjects to the miserable state of tributary slaves was in fact hardly more than a conventional and dignified way of expressing a firm but entirely respectful protest the truth is therefore that while everyone protested in such spirited terms as might occur to him few men in these early days suppose the new laws would not take effect and fewer still counsel the right or believed in that practicability of forcible resistance we yield obedience to the act granting duties to clear the massachusetts assembly that parliament lay what duties they please on us said james Otis it is our duty to submit and patiently bear them till they be pleased to relieve us franklin assured his friends that the passage of the stamp act could not have been prevented any more easily than the sun setting recommended that they endure the one miss chance with the same equanimity with which they face the other necessity and even saw certain advantages in the way of self-discipline which might come of it through the practice of a greater frugality not yet perceiving the dishonor attaching to the function of distributing stamps he did his two friends jared ingress all of connecticut and john hughes of pennsylvania the service of procuring for them the appointment to the new office and richard henry lee as good a patriot as any man and therefore of necessity as some pains later to explain his motives in the matter applied for the position in virginia richard henry lee was no friend of tyrants but an american freeman less distinguished as yet than his name which was a famous one and not without offense to be omitted from any list of the old dominion's best families the best families of the old dominion tidewater tobacco planters of considerable estates admirers and imitators of the minor aristocracy of england took it as a matter of course that the political fortunes of the province were committed to their care and for many generations had successfully maintained the public interest against the double danger of executive tyranny and popular licentiousness it is therefore not surprising that the many obscure freeholders minor planters and lesser men who failed the house of burgesses had followed the able leadership of that little coterie of interrelated families comprising the virginia aristocracy john robinson speaker of the house and treasure of the colony of good repute still in the spring of 1765 was doubtless the head in front of this aristocracy the inner circle of which would also include payton randall then king's attorney and edmund pendleton well known for his cool persuasiveness in debate the learned constitutional lawyer richard bland the sturdy and honest but ungraceful robert carter nicolas and george with noblest roman of them all steeped in classical lore with a thin sharp base of a caesar and for virtuous integrity of very kato conscious of their english heritage they weren't once proud of their loyalty to britain and jealous of their well-won provincial liberties as became british-american freeman that had already drawn a proper memorial against the sugar act and were now as they leisurely gathered at williams bergen the early weeks of may 1765 unwilling to protest again at present for they had not as yet received any reply to their former dignified and respectful petition to this assembly of the burgesses in 1765 there came from the back country beyond the first falls of the virginia rivers the frontier of that day many deputies who must have presented in dress and manners as well as in ideas a sharp contrast to the eminent leaders of the aristocracy among them was thomas marshal father of a famous son and patrick henry a young man of 29 years a heaven-born orager and destined to be the leader and interpreter of the silent simple folk of the old dominion in hanover county in which this tribute of the people was born and reared in which he now represented there were as in all the back country counties few great estates and few slaves no notable country seats with pretension to architectural excellence no modestly dressed aristocracy with leisure for reading and the cultivation of manners becoming a gentleman beyond the tide water men for the most part earned their bread by the sweat of their brows live the life and esteem the virtues of a primitive society embrace their minds with a tonic of calvin's theology a tonic somewhat tempered in these late enlightened days by a more humane philosophy and the friendly emotionalism of simple folk living close to nature free burgesses from the back country set apart in dress and manners from the great planters less learned and less practiced in oratory and the subtle art of condescension and patronage than the cultivated men of the inner circle were nevertheless staunch defenders of liberty and american rights and were perhaps beginning to question in these days of popular discussion whether liberty could very well flourish among men whose wealth was derived from the labor of negro slaves or be well guarded under all circumstances by those who regarding themselves as superior to the general run of men might be in danger of mistaking their particular interests for the common welfare and indeed it now seemed that these great men who sent their sons to london to be educated whoever year shipped their tobacco to england and bought their clothes of english merchants with whom their credit was always good were grown something to timid on account of their loyalty to britain in the great question of asserting the rights of america genre jacuzzo would have well understood patrick henry one of those passionate temperaments whose reason functions not on the service of knowledge but of good instincts and fine emotions a nature to be easily possessed of an exalted enthusiasm for popular rights and for celebrating the virtues of the industrious poor this enthusiasm in the case of patrick henry was intensified by his own eloquence which had been so effectively exhibited in the famous parson's cause and in opposition to the shady scheme which the old leaders in the house of burgesses had contrived to protect john robinson the treasurer from being exposed to a charge of embezzlement such courageous exploits widely noise abroad had won for the young man great applause and had got him a kind of party of devoted followers in the back country and among the yeomanry and young men throughout the province so that to take the lead and to stand boldly forth as the champion of liberty and the submerged rights of mankind seemed to patrick henry a kind of mission laid upon him in virtue of his heavenly gift of speech by that providence which shapes the destinies of men it was said that mr. henry was not learned in the law but he had read in coke upon littleton that an active parliament against magna carter or common right or reason is void which was clearly the case of the stamp act on the fly leaf of an old copy of that book this unlearned lawyer accordingly wrote out some resolutions a protest which he showed to his friends george johnston and john fleming for their approval their approval once obtained mr. johnston moved with mr. henry a second that the house of burgesses should go into committee of the whole to consider the steps necessary to be taken in consequence of the resolutions charging certain stamp duties in the colonies which was accordingly done on the 29th of may upon which day mr. henry presented his resolutions the 29th of may was late in that session of the virginia house of burgesses and most likely the resolutions would have been rejected if some two-thirds of the members who knew nothing of mr. henry's plans and suppose the business of the assembly finished had not already gone home among those who had thus departed it is not likely that there were many of patrick henry's followers yet even so there was much opposition the resolutions were apparently refashioned in committee of the whole for preamble was omitted outright and four resolves were made over into five which were presented to the house on the day following young mr. jefferson at that time a law student and naturally much interested in the business of lawmaking heard the whole of this day's famous debate from the door of communication between the house and the lobby the five resolutions he afterwards remembered were opposed by randolph bland pendle clendicle is with and all the old members whose influence in the house had till then been unbroken not from any question of our rights but on the ground that the same sentiments had been at their preceding session expressed in a more conciliatory form to which the answers were not yet received but torrents of sublime eloquence from mr. henry backed by the solid reasoning of johnston prevailed it was in connection with the fifth resolution upon which the debate was most bloody that patrick henry is said to have declared that park when and caesar had each his brutish charles the first is cromwell and george the third upon which cries of trees and were heard from every part of the house trees and or not the resolution was carried although by one vote only and the young law student standing at the door of the house heard patin randolph say as he came hastily out into the lobby by god i would have given 500 guineas for a single vote and no doubt he would at that moment being then much heated next day mr. randolph was probably much cooler and so apparently were some others who in the enthusiasm of debate and under the compelling eye of patrick henry had voted for the last defiant resolution thinking the matter settled patrick henry had already gone home to recommend himself to his constituents as his enemies thought by spreading treason but the matter was not yet settled early on that morning of the 31st before the house assembled the young law student who was so curious about the business of lawmaking saw colonel peter randolph of his majesty's council standing at the clerk's table thumbing over the volumes of journals to find a precedent for expunging a vote of the house whether the president was found young law student did not afterwards recollect but it is known that on motion of patin randolph the fifth resolution was that day erased from the record mr. henry was not then present he had been seen on the afternoon before passing along the street on his way to his home in louisa clad in a pair of leather breaches his saddlebags on his arm leading a lean horse the four resolutions thus adopted as the deliberate and formal protest of the old dominion were as mild and harmless as could well be they asserted no more than that the first adventures and settlers of virginia brought with them and transmitted to their posterity all the privileges at any time enjoyed by the people of great britain that by two royal charters they had been formally declared to be as surely possessed of these privileges as if they had been born and were then abiding within the realm that the taxation of the people by themselves or by persons chosen by themselves to represent them is the only security against a burden some taxation and the distinguishing characteristic of british freedom without which the ancient constitution cannot exist and that the loyal colony of virginia had in fact without interruption enjoyed this inestimable right which had never been forfeited or surrendered nor ever hitherto denied by the kings or the people of britain no treason here expressed or implied nor any occasion for 500 guineas passing from one hand to another to prove that the province of virginia was still the ancient and loyal old dominion end of chapter three part one