Protocols of Liberty by William B. Warner

Author:William B. Warner [Warner, William B.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, General, United States, Revolutionary Period (1775-1800), Literary Criticism, American, Political Science, History & Theory
ISBN: 9780226061405
Google: VWJJAAAAQBAJ
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Published: 2013-09-20T04:11:13+00:00

FIGURE 4.1. Boston Committee of Correspondence broadside of the resolves of the House of Burgesses instituting the Virginia Committee of Correspondence are here embedded in a letter “from a Gentleman of distinction in Virginia” (almost certainly Richard Henry Lee) “to his Friend in this Town” (Thomas Cushing Jr.), which is then embedded in a printed letter to the committees of correspondence (or the selectmen) of the various towns (here Westminster) of Massachusetts, signed by the clerk of the Boston committee, William Cooper. Photograph courtesy of the American Antiquarian Society.

By April 9, 1774, Richard Henry Lee had written twice to Boston, once by private letter to Samuel Adams, and once in a semi-official letter to Thomas Cushing, enclosing the resolves of the Virginia Committee of Correspondence. Aware of the arrival of Lee’s private letter to Adams, the Boston committee requested that its chairman, Samuel Adams, draft an official reply to Lee. I will quote from the April 10, 1774, letter at some length because it not only contains an extensive and systematic statement of the revolutionary imperative to network; it also performs the networking it describes. The letter uses six distinct threads to secure a strong bond between Adams and Lee, Massachusetts and Virginia.

Building a framework for trusted communication through expressions of esteem: “I had frequently heard of your Character and Merit, as a warm Advocate for Virtue and Liberty” (S. Adams 1904, 3:25). The Boston Committee of Correspondence, which held a “special meeting” on your resolves, “desired” me “to assure you of their veneration for your most ancient colony, and their unfeigned esteem for the gentlemen of your committee” (27). The epithet “ancient” grants Virginia its pride of place as the first successful English colony in America.

Urging the practice of general communication among the colonies: “I have often thought it a misfortune, or rather a fault in the friends of American independence and freedom, their not taking care to open every channel of communication. The colonies are all embarked in the same [ship] bottom. The liberties of all are alike invaded by the same haughty power: the conspirators against their common rights have indeed exerted their brutal force, or applied their insidious arts, differently in the several colonies, as they thought would best serve their purpose of oppression and tyranny. How necessary then is it; that All should be early acquainted with the particular circumstances of Each, in order that the wisdom & strength of the whole may be employed upon every proper occasion.” Only communication that is timely, particular, and extends to “all” the colonies will enable each colony to face the “brutal force” or the “insidious arts” of Britain’s “haughty power.”

Noting that in facing British power separately, the record of the colonies has been uneven: Adams wishes that “the little colony” of Rhode Island “had shown more firmness” in the face of the Gaspée commission; the “compliance of New York” in providing “annual provision for a military force”; the “timidity of some colonies and the silence of other colonies is discouraging.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.