Passage of the stamp act.

Opposition to it.

documents, stamps furnished by the British Government.' It was a wrong, unwise, and most mischievous measure.

7. The passage of the Stamp Act [1765] created the most intense indignation in America. Otis, in Massachusetts, and Patrick

Henry, in Virginia, vehemently denounced it. a ready response in the breasts of the people.

Their words found
Associations were

1. The stamps were upon blue paper, in the form seen in the engraving on page 117, and were to be attached to every piece of paper or parchment on which a legal instrument was written. For these stamps, Government charged specific prices: for example, for a common property deed, one shilling and sixpence for a diploma or a certificate of a college degree, two pounds, etc., etc.

2. Verse 5, page 117.

3. Henry was a member of the Virginia assembly. He introduced a series of resolutions, highly tinctured with rebellious doctrines. He asserted the general rights of all the colonies; then the exclusive right of the Virginia assembly to tax the people of that province, and boldly declared that the people were not bound to obey any law relative to taxation which did not proceed from their representatives. The last resolution declared that whoever should dissent from the doctrines inculcated in the others, should be considered an "enemy of the colonies." The introduction of these resolutions produced great excitement and alarm. Henry supported them with all the power of his wonderful eloquence. Some rose from their seats, and others sat in breathless silence. At length, when, alluding to tyrants, he exclaimed, "Cæsar had his Brutus, Charles the First his Cromwell, and George the Third" there was a cry of "Treason! treason!" He paused a moment, and said-"may profit by their example. If that be treason, make the most of it." A part of his resolutions were adopted, and these formed the first gauntlet of defiance cast at the feet of the British monarch. Their power was felt throughout the land. The head of the speaker in the above picture is a correct likeness of Patrick Henry.

Opposition to the Stamp Act.

England's tender spot.

formed of those who were called Sons of Liberty, and pledges were made to resist the law. The stamps were seized and destroyed when they reached the seaboard towns; and the agents, called "stamp distributors," appointed to sell them, were so much despised and insulted that they quickly relinquished the business.

8. The first day of November, 1765, was the appointed time for the Stamp Act to go into effect. Already a convention of delegates from several colonies had assembled in New York city [October 7], and in three well-written papers they ably set forth the grievances and rights of the colonies, and petitioned the king and Parliament for redress of the former and acknowledgment of the latter. This convention, or congress, was in session fourteen days, and was followed by firm action, in opposition to the law, on the part of the people. All business was suspended on the 1st of November. Bells tolled funeral knells, flags were hoisted at halfmast, the courts were closed, and there was deep silence in the land. Then followed an outburst of honest indignation and defiance. The Sons of Liberty put forth new efforts. Mobs assailed the houses of British officials in the cities, and burned loyalists in effigy;' and the people leagued against British commerce. They agreed to import nothing from Great Britain, to the dismay of her merchants and manufacturers.2

9. England was touched in a tender point-her commerce; and her merchants and manufacturers joined with the Americans in a demand for the repeal of the Stamp Act. The Government was compelled to listen; and on the 6th of March, 1766, the obnoxious

1. Public indignation is thus sometimes manifested. A figure of a man, intended to represent the obnoxious individual, is paraded, and then hung upon a scaffold, or burned at a stake, as an intimation of the deserved fate of the person thus represented. It was a common practice in England at the time in question, and has been often done in our own country since.

2. The newspapers of the day contain many laudatory notices of the conformity of wealthy people to these agreements. On one occasion, forty or fifty young ladies, who called thenselves "Daughters of Liberty," met at the house of Rev. Mr. Morehead, in Boston, with their spinning wheels, and spun two hundred and thirty-two skeins of yarn, during the day, and presented them to the pastor. It is said "there were upward of one hundred spinners in Mr. Morehead's Society." "Within eighteen months," wrote a gentleman at Newport, R. I., "four hundred and eighty-seven yards of cloth, and thirty-six pairs of stockings, have been spun and knit in the family of James Nixon, of this town." That wool might not become scarce, the use of sheep-flesh for food was discontinued.

3. Half a million of dollars were due to them by the colonists, at that time, not a dollar of which could be collected under the existing state of things.

QUESTIONS.-7. What were the effects of the Stamp Act? 8. What can you tell of a convention in New York? What followed? 9. How was England touched by the Stamp Act? What was done?

The Declaratory Act.

New oppressive measures.

The colonies sensible of danger.

act was repealed. Pitt was then in the Parliament, and, with Burke, Barré, and others, was chiefly instrumental in accomplishing that result. repeal gave joy in England and America.

WILLIAM PITT.

The

10. New trouble soon appeared. While Pitt applauded the Americans for resisting the stamp tax, he appended to the repeal bill a declaration that the British Parliament had the right "to bind the colonies in any manner whatsoever." Without this concession to British pride, it was said, the repeal bill could not have become law. But Pitt's expedient was hurtful; for under the sanction of that Declaratory Act, as it was called, the British ministry planned and executed measures for taxing the Americans quite as odious in principle as the stamp tax. To overcome expected opposition, British troops were sent to America [June, 1766], and a Mutiny Act was passed, which provided for their partial subsistence by the colonists.

11. This palpable attempt to enslave the Americans filled them with burning indignation. The most determined opposition everywhere appeared; yet the ministry persevered in their schemes. In June [1767] a tax was levied on several articles imported into the colonies. In July an act was passed establishing a board of trade and commissioners of customs in the colonies, who should be independent of the colonial legislatures. A few days afterward [July, 1767], Parliament passed an act forbidding the assembly of New York performing any legislative act whatsoever, because that body had formally refused to comply with the requirements of the Mutiny Act.

12. The colonists were now thoroughly aroused to a sense of danger, and the bond of union between them grew stronger every day. A nation was rapidly germinating. The colonial assemblies first protested. New non-importation associations were formed.'

1. Verse 8, page 119.

QUESTIONS.-10. What can you tell about the repeal of the Stamp Act? What did the British ministry now do? 11. What new measures did the ministry attempt? 12. What were the effects?

Non-importation leagues.

Boldness of the Massachusetts assembly.

A crisis.

Pamphlets and newspapers boldly instigated the people to resistance by passionate appeals to their feelings and judgment, and defining their rights. The assembly of Massachusetts went a step farther. They issued a Circular Letter [February, 1768] to the other colonial assemblies, asking them to coöperate in efforts to obtain a redress of grievances. The latter made a cordial response; and early in 1768 almost every colonial assembly had boldly expressed the conviction that Parliament had no right to tax the colonies without their consent.

13. The bold act of Massachusetts was resented by the ministry. They ordered the assembly, in the

name of the king, to rescind the Circular Letter. That body, by an almost unanimous vote [June 30, 1769], voted not to rescind, and declared that order from the British ministry to be another evidence of the determination of the Government to enslave the colonists by restricting the freedom of speech and action of their representatives.'

SAMUEL ADAMS.

14. The ministry and the colonists were now fairly at issue. The former, having resolved to use coercive measures, became more regardless than ever of even the forms of justice, and they began to treat the colonists as rebellious subjects. They warned the several colonial assemblies not to imitate the disobedience of Massachusetts; and the royal governors were instructed to use all the means at their command to enforce the submission of the people.

2

15. A crisis was soon reached.

The new commissioners of customs arrived at Boston in May, 1768. The people held them in detestation, and very soon gave a signal illustration of it. The

"When 1. James Otis and Samuel Adams were the principal speakers on this occasion. Lord Hillsborough [colonial secretary] knows," said the former, "that we will not rescind our acts, he should apply to Parliament to rescind theirs. Let Britons rescind their measures, or the colonies are lost to them forever."

2. Verse 12, page 120.

3. Verse 11, page 120.

QUESTIONS.-12. What did the Massachusetts and other colonial assemblies do? 13. What did the ministry require? What did the Massachusetts assembly do? 14. What course did the ministry pursue?

Patriotism of the people.

The Government an oppressor.

Royal troops in Boston. commissioners seized a sloop [June, 1768] laden with wine, which belonged to John Hancock, one of the leaders of the popular sentiment in Massachusetts, because that gentleman refused to pay the duty on the cargo on her arrival. The commissioners were personally assailed by a mob; their houses were injured; and they were compelled to seek safety in Castle William, a small fort on an island in the harbor.

16. The royal governor, Bernard, now called troops to Boston to overawe the people. General Gage' came with them late in September. They were seven hundred in number. They entered the city on the quiet Sabbath, with drums beating and colors flying, and with all the insolence of conquerors taking possession of a captured city. The inhabitants felt deeply outraged, but were compelled to see their beautiful Commons converted into a campground for mercenaries, without power to repel the indignity. But the assembly of Massachusetts refused to afford food or shelter for these royal troops, because they came as instruments of oppression.'

3

17. The home government proceeded to punish Massachusetts for its obstinacy. An old law of Henry the Eighth was revived, by which the governor of the refractory colony should be required to arrest and send to England for trial, on a charge of treason, the ringleaders in the recent tumults in Boston. The assembly boldly denied the right of the king to take an offender from the country for trial, and reasserted the chartered privileges of the people. A minority in the British House of Commons took the same position. Burke denounced the revival of the old statute, and said: "Can you not trust the juries of that country? If you have not a party among two millions of people, you must either change your plan of government or renounce the colonies forever."

18. It soon became apparent to the colonists that to preserve

1. Verse 42, page 111.

2. As the people refused to supply the troops with quarters, they were placed, some in the State House, some in Faneuil Hall, and others in tents on the Common. Cannon were planted at different points; sentinels challenged the citizens as they passed; and the whole city had the appearance of a camp.

3. Verse 15, page 121.

QUESTIONS.-15. What happened in Boston? What can you tell of a mob there? 16. What did the governor of Massachusetts do? What can you tell of royal troops in Boston? 17. How was Boston punished? What law was revived? What did Burke say?