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Colonial Action
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The Stamp Act Congress
• Gordon Wood claimed that while the formation of Stamp Act
Congress was an “unprecedented display of colonial unity . . .
With its opening acknowledgement of ‘all due subordination
to that August Body the Parliament of Great Britain’, could not
fully express American hostility.” – Gordon Wood, The
American Revolution.
• The Stamp Act Congress declarations defined the American
position at the outset of the controversy, and despite
subsequent confusion and stumbling, the colonists never
abandoned this essential point.
• The Declarations of the Stamp Act Congress, 1765
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Stamp Act Congress
• What the thirteen colonies did next was not really
surprising: they sent representatives from their
colonies to attend a meeting at the urging of James
Otis.
• After years of being oppressed and manned by the
British crown, the Colonists felt that the time had come
for them to fight back and claim what is rightly theirs: a
land free of oppressors.
• The twenty-seven representatives came from only nine
colonies though; the other four were informed late but
couldn’t reach the meeting in time.
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Stamp Act Congress
• The meeting paved the way to the Declaration of Rights
and Grievances, which stated that there should be no taxes
imposed on Colonists without their consent or receive a tax
from a body which they have no representative in.
• The Stamp Act is one of the main reasons why the Colonists
even started to think of opposing the English crown at the
first place.
• In 1766, they repealed it and the Stamp Act Congress did a
fairly good job. They removed a law that had been nothing
but a burden to many Colonists, and did create a sense of
unity amongst the thirteen colonies.
• It was with the Stamp Act Congress that the thirteen
colonies realized that much could be done if they worked
together.
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John Dickinson, Letters from a farmer
in Pennsylvania
• For Dickinson “a ‘tax was a
tax’. Whatever its form,
Parliament had no right to
levy on the colonies . . .
‘Parliament … possesses a
legal authority to regulate
the trade of Great Britain,
and all her colonies’, but it
had no right to tax the
colonies in any way”. –
Edward Countryman, The
American Revolution.
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Townshend Act – Colonial Response
• It took the colonists nearly two years to mount
another effective boycott of British goods as an
incentive for the repeal of the Townshend duties.
• In December 1767, John Dickinson, published the
first of twelve Letters from a farmer in
Pennsylvania denouncing the new duties and
other government money raising measures.
• Dickinson wrote under a pseudonym but soon
came to be known as the farmer.
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1772 – The Committees of
Correspondence.
• Countryman states: “During the eight years that
followed the Stamp Act, Britain tried again and again
to make the colonies serve its interests. The result,
however, was the opposite.”
• Committees of Correspondence were created in
1772 to co-ordinate the activities of colonial
agitators and to organise public opinion against the
British Ministry.
• The first committee was established in Boston on the
idea of Samuel Adams. Patrick Henry and Thomas
Jefferson led the movement for their establishment
in Virginia.
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1772 – The Committees of
Correspondence.
• According to Countryman, a gathering of farmers in
Massachusetts met in their committees of correspondence
and resolved in favour of “‘wise, prudent and spirited
measures’” to keep the Intolerable Acts from going into
effect.
• From New York to the Carolinas, local communities
established committees of correspondence to keep abreast
of events. “Up and down the coast, people loaded vessels
with supplies for the relief of the ‘poor of Boston’.” – Edward
Countryman.
• By 1774, colonials decided that they needed a Continental
Congress to give direction to their movement.
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Committees of Safety
• These were first organised in 1775 – the first
one in Massachusetts in February, made up of
11 men with the authority to mobilize militia
and seize military stores.
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The First Continental Congress
• 56 delegates from 12 colonies met for the first
time at Carpenter’s Hall, Philadelphia on 5
September 1774.
• The decision was made that each delegate should
have one vote.
• In a set of declarations they denounced :
–
–
–
–
–
The Intolerable Acts
The Quebec Act
The extension of the Admiralty Courts
The dissolution of colonial assemblies.
The stationing of regular soldiers in colonial towns
during peace time.
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The First Continental Congress
• Mercy Otis Warren wrote in her History: “All
America . . . Waited in anxious hope and
expectation the decisions of a continental
congress”.
• One of the most significant weaknesses the
colonists faced on the outbreak of war was the
lack of a centralised government.
• While the 13 colonies had a long history of local
government, they also had a history of jealousy . .
. What problems might this present?
• Some historians have been surprised by the
ability to unite politically (given the previous
problems they had).
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The First Continental Congress
• They declared 13 parliamentary Acts since 1763
as unconstitutional.
• The delegates pledged to support economic
sanctions until these Acts were repealed.
• Ten resolutions set forth the rights of the
colonists as they saw them.
• They signed the Continental Association on 20
October 1774.
• The congressmen agreed to reconvene on 10 May
1775 if their grievances were not heard.
• They adjourned on 26 October 1774.
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Suffolk Resolves
• A product of the First Continental Congress they
emerged on 17 September 1774.
• They were drafted by Joseph Warren and adopted by a
convention in Suffolk County, Massachusetts.
• On the 9 September they were rushed to Philadelphia
by Paul Revere.
• The resolutions were presented by the radical
delegates and endorsed by the First Continental
Congress.
• They:
– declared the Intolerable (Coercive) Acts as unconstitutional
– urged Massachusetts to form a government and withhold
taxes from the Crown until the Acts were repealed.
– advised the people to arm and recommended economic
sanctions against British.
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Galloway Plan
• According to Gordon Wood, Joseph Galloway was
the leader of the Pennsylvania Assembly.
• He also stood as spokesman for the conservative
congressional delegates from the middle colonies.
• The Plan of Union that he proposed was presented
on 28 September 1774.
• An important feature of Galloway’s plan was that
the colonial government, while inferior to that of
Great Britain, would nevertheless have authority to
regulate:
– Commercial, civil, criminal, and police affairs when more
than a single colony was involved.
– The colonial government was to have veto power over all
Parliamentary legislation affecting the colonies.
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The Second Continental Congress
• Met on 10 May 1775 at the State House (later
Independence Hall) in Philadelphia.
• The delegates resolve that the colonies be put
in a state of military readiness (15 May).
• 29 May – adopt an address to ask the
Canadians to join the revolution.
• Also included: raised riflemen, draft rules for
the administration of the Congress, elect
George Washing Commander in Chief . . .
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The Second Continental Congress
• The Battle of Bunker Hill took place on 17 June
1775 and on 5 July Congress adopted the “Olive
Branch Petition” (drafted by John Dickinson).
• On 10 June 1775, George III wrote to the Earl of
Dartmouth that: “America must be a colony of
England or treated as an enemy. Distant
possessions standing upon an equality with the
superior state is more ruinous than being
deprived of such conventions.”
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The Second Continental Congress
• On 6 July 1775 the Congress adopts Dickenson’s
“Declaration of the Causes and Necessities of
Taking up Arms“ which explained and justified the
creation of an army to fight a government which
they still claimed allegiance to.
• The various versions of this document, at least
two, both argued that “although oppressive
British actions had driven the American colonies
into military action, reconciliation was still
possible.” – Steven C. Bullock, The American
Revolution.
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Further colonial responses…
• Dickinson’s ideas were not fully matched by the
colonist’s action . . .
• In 1765 the Stamp Act Congress had helped
establish a framework for intercontinental unity.
• In reality, the push for boycotts came from
individual colonial assemblies . . .
• “Shops selling British goods were smeared with
the mixture of mud and faeces called
‘Hillsborough paint’ to mock the British minister
for colonial affairs.” – Jack Rakove,
Revolutionaries.
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