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correspondence say, in one of their replies, "A large number show that a uniformity of sentiment, though expressed in a variety of language, runs through them all: freedom from every legislation on earth but that of this province is the general claim." And the committee, as if to meet a growing ultraism, wrote, "We do not aim at freedom from law and lawful authority, but from the tyrannical edicts of a British parliament and ministry." The movement received warm commendation in the press, and in other colonies; and the members, cheered by the uprising and the union, placed on their records an expression of the faith," that Providence would crown the efforts of the colonies with success, and thus their generation would furnish the example of public virtue worthy of the imitation of all posterity."1

The Tories took a different view of the signs of the times. Hutchinson, keenly sensitive to any supposed invasion of the national sovereignty, but extremely dull to any violations of constitutional rights, saw in the Boston report a culmination of the theory as to local powers, which he characterized as a total independence of parliament; and regarded the movement "as tending to sedition and mutiny." He said, "The contagion which had begun in Boston was spreading through the towns."-"They succeed in their unwearied endeavors to propagate the doctrine

1 The same faith is seen in the press. The "Boston Gazette" of Jan. 11, 1773, says, "It must afford the greatest pleasure to the friends of liberty and the constitution, to perceive the country so thoroughly awakened to a sense of their danger; that almost every town have or are about calling meetings, to express their sentiments at this alarming crisis; that union and good sense, patriotism and spirit, already manifested in all parts of this province, must, under Providence, work out our political salvation, in spite of all the efforts of our enemies to prevent it."

of independence upon parliament, and the mischiefs of it every day increase."-"What can be more insolent than the resolves passing every day in the province." -"Every day, through the unwearied pains of the leaders of the opposition, made proselytes to these new opinions of government." He wrote (Jan. 7,

1773), that "he had discovered that the same persons who laid this dangerous plot of drawing in all the towns in the province" meant, when this was done, to issue a circular from the House of Representatives, and to endeavor to effect the same thing in all the assemblies on the continent. He said that, since he had been governor, he had avoided, as far as it was possible, the points of controversy between the kingdom and the colonies; but a measure had been entered upon, which, if pursued, must work a total separation from Great Britain; and, were he to do nothing, he might be charged with conniving at proceedings which he ought to have opposed with all the means at hand. He therefore determined, in a consultation with his confidential friends, though not with the advice of his council, to present the Administration side to the general court. Though it might not have the effect he could wish on the assembly, still he hoped it might change the minds of the people. In brief, the governor, in this official way, resolved to make an appeal to public opinion.

Hutchinson accordingly (Jan. 6, 1773) opened the session of the general court with a speech, containing an elaborate defence of the theory of the supremacy of parliament in all cases whatsoever, and an arraignment of the towns which had denied this theory. He reached the conclusion, that, in consequence, the bonds

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of government were weakened, and its authority was made contemptible. It was a subtle and thorough presentation of the Tory side of the controversy, which was much praised by the friends of the author, though deeply regretted in England. The House returned a keen, searching, triumphant reply, which was an uncommonly able exposition of the Whig side, and elicited the warmest eulogies from the patriots. John Adams related, years afterwards, that the committee charged with framing this reply invited him to aid them; and that, at their first meeting, they exhibited a draft, neatly and elegantly prepared, which, at the instance of Samuel Adams, had been drawn up by Warren. "It was," Adams says, "full of those elementary principles of liberty, equality, and fraternity which have since made a figure in the world, principles which are founded in nature, and eternal, unchangeable truth, but which must be well understood and cautiously applied." It contained, however, no answer to the governor's constitutional points. Adams criticised it freely; and, by request, revised it. He drew a line over the eloquent parts of "the oration," introduced legal and constitutional authorities, and met with the committee several evenings until the reply was completed. He He says, "The effect on public opinion was beyond expectation.” There is undoubtedly a certain correctness in the long relation of Adams. Warren probably, on some occasion, prepared such an "oration," and Adams rendered the critical service which he described; but he attributes to this reply an effect on public opinion that can only be ascribed to the Boston town-meeting of November; and, according to Bancroft, this mas

terly answer of the House was from the pen of Samuel Adams.1

"I have stopped the progress of the towns for the present," Hutchinson wrote (Feb. 18, 1773), "and I think I have stopped the prosecution of another part of the scheme, which was for the assembly to invite every other assembly on the continent to assent to the same principles. This part has been acknowledged to me by the speaker [Cushing], who is in all these measures." The quietness that continued in other colonies favored this view. "A general state of quiescence," Arthur Lee wrote to Joseph Reed (Feb. 18, 1773), "seems to prevail over the whole empire, Boston only excepted. I admire the perseverance with which they pursue the object of having

1 The relation of John Adams may be seen in his Works (ii. 311, 318). Bancroft (vi. 448), says that Samuel Adams had the aid of Joseph Hawley. Hutchinson addressed two elaborate speeches to the House on the question of legislative supremacy, and the House returned answers to both the last answer was on the 2d of March. The fac-simile, in Adams's Works, of a note of Samuel Adams, shows that John Adams was consulted on both occasions. This note was written when Samuel Adams was preparing the second reply, and relates to a statement which he made in the first reply, on the authority of John Adams. Hutchinson, on the 10th of March, said that the replies to the House were written by Samuel Adams, "with the aid of Hawley and the lawyer Adams.". "They have," he says, "such an opinion of them, that they have ordered the whole controversy to be printed in a pamphlet for the benefit of posterity." Lord Dartmouth disapproved of the governor's course. In a letter of June 14, 1773, Hutchinson wrote to Lord Dartmouth, "It gives me pain that any step which I have taken with the most sincere intention to promote His Majesty's service should be judged to have a contrary effect." On the same day he wrote to the undersecretary, J. Pownall, "I had the fullest evidence of a plan to engage the colonies in a confederacy against the authority of parliament. The towns of this province were to begin; the assemblies to confirm their doings, and to invite the other colonies to join."

The controversy was elicited by the Boston town-meeting of November. The town also, in March, replied to Hutchinson. Samuel Adams was the chairman of the committee, and Warren was a member of it. Perhaps it was on this occasion that Warren composed "the oration," and John Adams sat with the committee from evening to evening until an answer to Hutchinson was prepared.

their violated rights redressed."1 Hutchinson had neither intimidated the metropolis, nor stopped the meetings in the country. Boston had its usual annual commemoration of the massacre,' when Warren was on the committee that matured the business; and, three days later (March 8), he was appointed a member of an able committee, Samuel Adams being the chairman, to vindicate the November town-meeting from the aspersions of Hutchinson. This committee, in an elaborate paper, advocated the right of the towns to assemble to consider political matters, went

1 Samuel H. Parsons, of Providence, R.1., in a letter to Samuel Adams, March 3, 1773, says, "When the spirit of patriotism seems expiring in America in general, it must afford a very sensible pleasure to the friends of American liberty to see the noble efforts of our Boston friends in the support of the rights of America, as well as their unshaken resolution in opposing any, the least invasion of their charter privileges." He suggested an annual meeting of commissioners of the colonies, and dwells on the New-England Confederacy of 1643.

2 The oration on this anniversary was delivered by Dr. Benjamin Church, who was a member of the committee of correspondence, became subsequently a member of the provincial congress and the general court, and, in October, 1775, was convicted of holding a secret correspondence with the enemy.

Hutchinson (see note on p. 224) says, that he had, as early as the 6th of January, 1773, the fullest evidence of the plans of the patriots. Later, he sent (Oct. 19, 1773) to Lord Dartmouth a copy of a letter, written by the Massachusetts agent in London (Franklin) to Speaker Cushing, elaborately urging the necessity of a congress; probably the letter dated July 7, 1773, printed in Sparks's "Franklin," viii. 60. Hutchinson not only did not name the person who supplied him with the copy of this letter, but asked Lord Dartmouth not to let it be known that he (Hutchinson) supplied the copy, saying, if it were known, that "it might be the means of preventing any further useful intelligence which he might otherwise have from the same person."

Who was this person? It is stated by Dr. Cooper, in a letter, that Church had an understanding with Hutchinson as to the delivery of the 5th of March oration; and that Church did this service to throw the patriots off their guard. Paul Revere says (1 Mass. Hist. Coll., v. 106), that words uttered on an evening in 1774, at a caucus at the Green Dragon, were reported to him the next day, through a Tory channel, and by a Whig at heart, though of Tory connections. Revere relates other circumstances connected with Church, and says, "I know that Dr. Warren had not the greatest affection for him."

There is little doubt that the person who supplied Hutchinson with information was Dr. Church.

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