The General Congress or Convention at Philadelphia, September and October, 1774.

The word Congress, in relation to the United States, is synonymous with the word Parliament in Great Britain, signifying the Legislature of the nation at large; but before the revolution the word Congress was used, for the most part, as synonymous with Convention—a voluntary meeting of delegates elected by towns or counties for certain purposes. A meeting of delegates from the several towns of a county was called a Congress, or Convention of such county; a meeting of delegates of the several towns of a province was called a Provincial Congress, or Convention; and a meeting of delegates of the several County Conventions in the several provinces was called a General or Continental Congress, though they possessed no legal power, and their resolutions and addresses were the mere expressions of opinion or advice.

Such was the Continental Congress that assembled in Philadelphia the 5th of September, 1774—not a legislative or executive body possessing or assuming any legislative or executive power—a body consisting of fifty-five delegates elected by the representatives of twelve out of the thirteen provinces—Georgia, the youngest and smallest province, not having elected delegates. The sittings of this body, or Congress, as it was called, continued about eight weeks, and its proceedings were conducted with all the forms of a Legislative Assembly, but with closed doors, and under the pledge of secrecy, until dissolved by the authority of the Congress itself.

Each day\'s proceedings was commenced with prayer by some[Pg 410] minister. Mr. Peyton Randolph, Speaker of the House of Burgesses of Virginia, was elected President, and Mr. Charles Thompson, of Pennsylvania, was chosen Secretary.

After deciding upon the mode of conducting the business, it was resolved, after lengthened discussion, that each colony should be equal in voting—each colony having one vote, whatever might be the number of its delegates.

This Congress consisted of the assembled representatives of the American colonies, and truly expressed their grievances, opinions, and feelings. As the proceedings were with closed doors, the utterances of individuals were not reported; but in the reported results of their deliberations there is not an opinion or wish expressed which does not savour of affection to the mother country and loyalty to the British Constitution. Down to this ninth or last year of the agitation which commenced with the passing of the Stamp Act, before bloody conflicts took place between British soldiers and inhabitants of Massachusetts, there was not a resolution or petition or address adopted by any Congress, or Convention, or public meeting in the colonies, that contained a principle or sentiment which has not been professed by the loyal inhabitants of British America, and which is not recognized at this day by the British Government and enjoyed by the people in all the provinces of the Dominion of Canada.

The correctness of these remarks will appear from a summary of the proceedings of this Continental Congress, and extracts from its addresses, which will show that the colonies, without exception, were as loyal to their constitutional sovereign as they were to their constitutional rights,[344] though in royal[Pg 411] messages and ministerial speeches in Parliament their petitions and remonstrances were called treason, and the authors of them were termed rebels and traitors. The principal acts of this Congress were a Declaration of Rights; an address to the King; an address to the people of Great Britain; a memorial to the Americans; a letter to the people of Canada. Non-importation and non-exportation agreements were adopted and signed by all the members; and Committees of Vigilance were appointed.

"Then on the 26th of October, the \'fifty-five\' separated and returned to their homes, determined, as they expressed it, \'that they were themselves to stand or fall with the liberties of America.\'"[345]

Among the first important acts of this Congress was the declaration of colonial rights, grievances, and policy. As this part of their proceedings contains the whole case of the colonies as stated by their own representatives, I will give it, though long, in their own words, in a note.[346] This elaborate and ably[Pg 412] written paper does not appear to contain a sentiment of treason, nor anything which the members of the Congress had not a right to express and complain of as British subjects; while they[Pg 413] explicitly recognized in Parliament all the authority which could be constitutionally claimed for it, and which was requisite for British supremacy over the colonies, or which had ever been exercised before 1764.

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On the 1st of October, the Congress, after long consideration, unanimously resolved—

"That a loyal address to his Majesty be prepared, dutifully requesting the Royal attention to the grievances which alarm and distress his Majesty\'s faithful subjects in North America,[Pg 415] and entreating his Majesty\'s gracious interposition to remove such grievances, and thereby to restore to Great Britain and the colonies that harmony so necessary to the happiness of the British empire, and so ardently desired by all America."

This address or petition, like all the papers emanating from this Congress, was written with consummate ability.[347] In this petition to the King, the Congress begged leave to lay their grievances before the Throne. After a particular enumeration of these, they observed that they wholly arose from a destructive system of colony administration adopted since the conclusion of the last war. They assured his Majesty that they had made such provision for defraying the charges of the administration of justice, and the support of civil government, as had been judged just, and suitable to their respective circumstances; and that for the defence, protection, and security of the colonies, their militia would be fully sufficient in time of peace; and in case of war, they were ready and willing, when constitutionally required, to exert their most strenuous efforts in granting supplies and raising forces. They said, "We ask but for peace, liberty, and safety. We wish not a diminution of the prerogative; nor do we solicit the grant of any new right in our favour. Your royal authority over us, and our connection with Great [Pg 416]Britain, we shall always carefully and zealously endeavour to support and maintain."[348] They concluded their masterly and touching address in the following words:

"Permit us, then, most gracious Sovereign, in the name of all your faithful people in America, with the utmost humility, to implore you, for the honour of Almighty God, whose pure religion our enemies are undermining; for your glory, which can be advanced only by rendering your subjects happy and keeping them united; for the interest of your family, depending on an adherence to the principles that enthroned it; for the safety and welfare of your kingdom and dominions, threatened with almost unavoidable dangers and distresses, that your Majesty, as the loving Father of your whole people, connected by the same bonds of law, loyalty, faith, and blood, though dwelling in various countries, will not suffer the transcendent relation formed by these ties to be farther violated in certain expectation of efforts that, if attained, never can compensate for the calamities through which they must be gained."[349]

Their address to the people of Great Britain is equally earnest and statesmanlike. Two or three passages, as samples, must suffice. After stating the serious condition of America, and the oppressions and misrepresentations of their conduct, and their claim to be as free as their fellow-subjects in Great Britain, they say:

"Are not the proprietors of the soil of Great Britain lords of their own property? Can it be taken from them without their consent? Will they yield it to the arbitrary disposal of any men or number of men whatsoever? You know they will not.

"Why then are the proprietors of the soil of America less lords of their property than you are of yours; or why should they submit it to the disposal of your Parliament, or any other Parliament or Council in the world, not of their election? Can the intervention of the sea that divides us cause disparity of rights; or can any reason be given why English subjects who[Pg 417] live three thousand miles distant from the royal palace should enjoy less liberty than those who are three hundred miles distant from it? Reason looks with indignation on such distinctions, and freemen can never perceive their propriety."

They conclude their address to their fellow-subjects in Great Britain in the following words:

"We believe there is yet much virtue, much justice, and much public spirit in the English nation. To that justice we now appeal. You have been told that we are seditious, impatient of government, and desirous of independence. Be assured that these are not facts, but calumnies. Permit us to be as free as yourselves, and we shall ever esteem a union with you to be our greatest glory and our greatest happiness; and we shall ever be ready to contribute all in our power to the welfare of the empire. We shall consider your enemies as our enemies, and your interest as our own.

"But if you are determined that your Ministers shall wantonly sport with the rights of mankind; if neither the voice of justice, the dictates of law, the principles of the Constitution, nor the suggestions of humanity can restrain your hands from shedding human blood in such an impious cause, we must then tell you that we will never submit to be hewers of wood and drawers of water to any Ministry or nation in the world.

"Place us in the same situation that we were at the close of the late war, and our former harmony will be restored."

The address of the members of this Congress to their constituents is a lucid exposition of the several causes which had led to the then existing state of things, and is replete with earnest but temperate argument to prove that their liberties must be destroyed, and the security of their persons and property annihilated, by submission to the pretensions of the British Ministry and Parliament. They state that the first object of the Congress was to unite the people of America, by demonstrating the sincerity and earnestness with which reconciliation had been sought with Great Britain upon terms compatible with British liberty. After expressing their confidence in the efficacy of the passive commercial resistance which had been adopted, they conclude their address thus:

"Your own salvation and that of your posterity now depend upon yourselves. You have already shown that you entertain[Pg 418] a proper sense of the blessings you are striving to retain. Against the temporary inconveniences you may suffer from a stoppage of trade, you will weigh in the opposite balance the endless miseries you and your descendants must endure from an established arbitrary power." ...

"Motives thus cogent, arising from the emergency of your unhappy condition, must excite your utmost diligence and zeal to give all possible strength and energy to pacific measures calculated for your relief. But we think ourselves bound in duty to observe to you, that the schemes agitated against the colonies have been so conducted as to render it prudent that you should extend your views to mournful events, and be in all respects prepared for every contingency. Above all things, we earnestly entreat you, with devotion of spirit, penitence of heart, and amendment of life, to humble yourselves, and implore the favour of Almighty God; and we fervently beseech His Divine goodness to take you into His gracious protection."

The letters addressed to the other colonies not represented in the Congress require no special reference or remark.

After completing the business before them, this first General Congress in America recommended that another Congress should be held in the same place on the tenth day of the succeeding May, 1775, "unless redress of their grievances should be previously obtained," and recommending to all the colonies "to choose deputies as soon as possible, to be ready to attend at that time and place, should events make their meeting necessary."

I have presented an embodiment of the complaints, sentiments, and wishes of the American colonies in the words of their elected representatives in their first General Congress. I have done so for two reasons: First, to correct as far as I can the erroneous impression of thousands of English and Canadian readers, that during the ten years\' conflict of words, before the conflict of arms, between the British Ministry and Parliament and Colonies, the colonists entertained opinions and views incompatible with subordination to the mother country, and were preparing the way for separation from it. Such an opinion is utterly erroneous. Whatever solitary individuals may have thought or wished, the petitions and resolutions adopted by the complaining colonists during these ten years of agitation breathe as pure a spirit of loyalty as they do of liberty; and[Pg 419] in no instance did they ask for more, or as much, as the inhabitants of the provinces of the Canadian Dominion this day enjoy.

My second reason for thus quoting the very words of the declarations and petitions of the colonists is to show the injustice with which they were represented and treated by the British Ministry, Parliament, and press in England.

It was hoped by the Congress that their address to the people of England would have a happy influence in favour of the colonies upon the public mind, and tell favourably on the English elections, which took place the latter part of the year 1774; but the elections were suddenly ordered before the proceedings of the Congress could be published in England. The elections, of course, resulted adversely to the colonies; and the new Parliament was more subservient to the Ministry against the colonies than the preceding Parliament.[350]

This new Parliament met the 30th day of November, when the King was advised to inform them, among other things, "that a most daring spirit of resistance and disobedience to the laws unhappily prevailed in the province of Massachusetts, and had broken forth in fresh violences of a very criminal nature; that these proceedings had been countenanced and encouraged in his other colonies; that unwarrantable attempts had been made to obstruct the commerce of his kingdom by unlawful combinations; and that he had taken such measures and given such orders as he judged most proper and effectual for carrying[Pg 420] into execution the laws which were passed in the last session of the late Parliament relative to the province of Massachusetts."[351]

Answers were adopted in both Houses of Parliament re-echoing the sentiments of the Royal Speech, but not without vehement debates. There was a considerable minority in both Lords and Commons that sympathised with the colonies, and condemned the Ministerial policy and the Acts of the previous Parliament complained of. In the Commons, the Minister was reminded of the great effects he had predicted from the American acts. "They were to humble that whole continent without further trouble; and the punishment of Boston was to strike so universal a panic in all the colonies that it would be totally abandoned, and instead of obtaining relief, a dread of the same fate would awe the other provinces to a most respectful submission."[352] But the address, re-echoing the Royal Speech for coercion, was adopted by a majority of two to one.

In the Lords a similar address was passed by a large majority; but the Lords Richmond, Portland, Rockingham, Stamford, Torrington, Ponsonby, Wycombe, and Camden entered upon the journals a protest against it, which concluded in the following memorable words:

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