Yale University Library
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39002035235903

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Barnard, Daniel D.
Aii Oration,
Albany, 1635.

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From the Library of
SIMEON E. BALDWIN, Y '61
Gift of his children
HELEN BALDWIN OILMAN
ROGER SHERMAN BALDWIN, Y '9o
1927

MR. BARNARD'S ORATION,
DELIVERED AT ALBANY,
OH THB
FOURTH OF JUI.Tr, 1835.

AN

ORATION,

DELIVERED BEFOUE

THE HONORABLE THE CORPORATION

wnmnMS&.m.Y? m® oswa© ©©snusaji®

THE CITY OF ALBANY,

ON THE

FOURTH OF JULY, 1835.

BY DANIEL D. BARNARD.

PUBLISHED AT THE REQUEST OP THE COMMITTEE ON THE PART
OP THE CORPORATION.

ALBANY:
PRINTED BY E. W. AND C. SKINNER.
1835.

ADVERTISEMENT BY THE AUTHOR.
This Oration is offered to the public as it was written ; con
siderable portions of it having been omitted in the delivery
on account of its length.
There are two or three points in this Address which it had
been my purpose to have explained and strengthened by elab
orate notes in an appendix, as I deemed them points of great
and growing interest and importance. But the publication
has been pressed, and causes beyond my control have prevent
ed the execution of my design. I can do little more now than
state that these points relate chiefly to the true theory of the
respective plans of government which are brought into com
parison in the course of my remarks, and what really consti
tutes the difference and distinction between them. It has
seemed' to me that many illustrious men, and multitudes of
honest ones, in this nation, have been misled, by the analo
gies that are found between certain of the outward forms of
the two systems, affording strong temptation, on account of
some apparent resemblances, to assimilate things which be
gin, continue and end in absolute contrast. Popular elec
tions, and the exercise of legislative power by the represen
tatives of the people, are among the analogous forms of pro
ceeding in these diverse -organizations. The President too,
as the head of the executive branch with us, is naturally com
pared with the king in whom resides all the fulness of exec
utive power, original, unabated, underived, except that a
nominal dependence on the Governor of the universe is de
cently confessed.
Now there are two very opposite classes of persons and
politicians who are injuriously affected in their opinions and
conduct by such views of these very opposite plans of go-

IV
vernment. One of these classes learns to be satisfied witr*
our system, if, in practice, it turns out to be only a little less
monarchal and aristocratical than that with which it is their
pleasure to compare it. The other class learns to be content
with nothing short of pushing the practice under our govern
ment, in every particular wherein a point of seeming compa
rison can be found with other governments, to the farthest
possible extreme, in order in this way to establish the differ
ence between them. 1 hold both classes to be equally wrong,,
and the influence of both as tending equally and manifestly
to the destruction of our peculiar organization, and of the
liberties and happiness of the American people. And I know
of no better, or other way, of correcting so fearful and hazard
ous a bias in the minds of men. and parties, as to bring back
public attention,, if possible, to the true basis on which ouf
system nests, and to. exhibit it in contrast with the true the
ory of the- opposite system, taking care to strip this latter of
the disguises which have been artfully thrown around it.
This will be found to have been kept in view in this discourse,
as far as the proper business of the occasion would allow.
I deem, it of the Tast importance that our experiment should;
be carried out as it was begun. On the one hand it was
never the design of this plan to place the power of the go
vernment temporarily or permanently in the hands of indi
viduals or of aristocratical associations beyond the effective
control of an intelligent and virtuous community; and on the
other, it was never intended that ours should be a govern
ment of brute numbers. And whatever person or party fa
vors either of these perversions of our noble system, merits,
not reprobation merely, but the deepest execration.

ORATION.

A national festival, fellow citizens, is by no
means an uncommon thing. But it is an uncom
mon thing for a nation to celebrate the birth-day
and establishment of actual, honest, well regulat
ed, constitutional liberty. This is our case ; and
by this is our national festival of The Fourth of
July, distinguished from that of any other nation
now or ever on the earth. And this difference is
not inconsiderable. For, other nations, the most
favored and the most free, whether on this side of
the Atlantic or the opposite, have been content to
celebrate events which, after all, were productive
of nothing better than partial and temporary re
lief — where the symptoms have been administered
to> instead of the 'disease, which perhaps was all
that could be done in the case, and where of course
there was alleviation but no cure. Such was the
English revolution of 1688. And such was the
French revolution of 1830. But such was not the
American revolution of 1776.

The event which we have now met to commem
orate is without a parallel. It was not the obtain
ing of a charter — a reluctant grant or concession
of rights wrung from the hand of a master ; it was
not the sudden relaxation of the iron grasp of op
pression ; it was not the receiving of a boon dropt
from any man's favor ; it was not the repeal of an
obnoxious statute ; it was not the plunge of the
steel into the heart of the betrayer, or the fall of
the bolt of vengeance on the bead of the spoiler ;
it was not the decapitation or the expulsion of one
tyrant that room might be made for another or for
many tyrants ; and finally, it was not the violent
casting off of a few burthens of a bad system which
had become absolutely intolerable, with intent to
keep that system with its remaining evils and make
them perpetual. There was a declaration of In
dependence — the severance of a mighty empire —
the birth of a new member in the family of nations.
And this was very much — but had this been all —
if this new nation had been to take its place be
side the others without any radical change in the
system of government — in short, if nothing had
been done but the renouncing of allegiance to
one set of rulers and the swearing of allegiance to
another — quite sure I am that 1 should not be stand
ing here to-day to offer to you my congratulations
on the events of the fourth of July 1776. No, my
friends — if there was on that day a public declar
ation that' the people of these states, in their po-
litica capacity, were and of right ought to be in-

dependent of the crown and authority of Great
Britain, there was also the more important declar
ation that they were and of right ought to be free.
If it was then announced that the form of govern
ment under which they had lived had become des
tructive of the proper ends of government, an in
tention was at the same time intimated to institute
a new government, with its powers organized in
such a form as should seem to them most likely to
effect their safety and happiness. If their purpose
was then announced of assuming a separate and
equal station among the nations of the earth, they
did at the same time announce to the world, as the
very point from which the frame of their govern
ment should take its rise, a new principle, which,
at least for centuries, had not been recognized
even as an admitted truth, and which had never
been regarded as an indispensable element in the
structure of a state — That principle was " that all
men are created equal."
I do not mean to say that this truth itself was
then first published to the world. As a natural
truth it resulted from the order of creation by which
the family of man took descent from a single pair.
As a religious truth it was proclaimed byJMoses
and the Prophets, and authoritatively taught in the
mission of Jesus Christ. But as a political truth —
as a truth which challenged the homage"of every
man, and of which every man who was the subject
of a social compact might claim the benefit — as a

truth which struck with palsy the right arm of hu
man power over the human subject, by a broad
challenge to the various pretences on which that
power had been set up and exercised — and above
all, as a truth which was to be the corner-stone of a
great political edifice, now to be erected for the
first time on such a principle — the announcement
was new — new in its terms, new in its import, and
new in the application that was to be made of it.
It may not ill comport with the object I have in
view to dwell for a moment longer on this great
characteristic principle of the Declaration — the
political equality of all men. This was not a sen
timent dictated by any spirit of levelling radical
ism. It was not intended thereby to declare that
all men are equally great or equally good, any
more than that all men are equally tall, equally
short, or equally fair ; nor was it intended to affirm
that the social state may be dispensed with, or that
governments are either useless or necessarily op
pressive ; nor that all, the simple and the wise, the
evil minded and the virtuous, have an equal right to
share in the administration of affairs ; nor that the
foundations of society must be broken up, its wealth
distributed or spoiled, its relations sundered, and
the refinements of life sacrificed. None of these
things were meant. But it was intended, by this
sentiment to express the terms on which men do,
or ought to meet in the formation of a social com
pact ; that the only condition on which they ought

to treat about the structure of a state is that of
perfect original equality of rights and privileges
among all the members — all agreeing however to
impose on themselves such restrictions and condi
tions in regard to the exercise of their natural
rights and privileges, as shall be deemed essential
to the safety and well being of the whole commu
nity ; that the law of the strongest is no longer
to be tolerated ; that no man, be he priest or
king, or by whatever name in the book of po
litical jugglery he may be called, can have an
original, natural or hereditary property in an
other man's person, services or effects ; and that
all the machinery contrived by his wit or malice
for driving forward the vessel of state On the
basis of such a claim, however gilded and bril
liant that machinery may be, however closely
jointed and hinged, however nicely lubricated, and
however smooth in operation and effect, is in
fraud of rights which will ultimately be vindicated,
and contains within itself the most fearful ele
ments, because dependent after all for its propul
sive energies, on that sort of physical power which
cannot always be managed or controlled — which
being too closely pent up and too far heated has
sometimes been known to rend the very heavens
with a fatal and destructive explosion. These
things were among the teachings of this doctrine
of equality as announced in the Declaration ; and
it taught also that as one man cannot have a na-
2

10
tural right of property in another man or in any
thing which belongs to him, so when the forms of
civil government should come to be settled they
should be so constructed as to recognize and pro
tect this natural equality, in a manner to consist
with the necessary provisions for mutual and uni
versal protection and the preservation of public or
der and peace. It was the natural and necessary
result of this doctrine, that the source of all politi
cal authority, of all political honors, and of all po
litical privileges, was at once found in a direction
opposite to that to which men had been accustom
ed to look for these blessings. Before that time,
particular individuals, particular families, and cer
tain limited associations, deemed themselves, and
were deemed, to be the original, undisputed and
exclusive possessors and inheritors of all political
power and privilege. The fountain was now
opened in a very different quarter. As for free
dom, with all the immunities implied in that com
prehensive term, men would henceforward regard
that as the inalienable gift of the God who created
them. And as for power and honors, hencefor
ward these could be exercised and enjoyed, on no
pretence whatever, but by warrant of authority
from the body of the people — the prevailing col
lective sense of the wisdom and intelligence of the
whole community to be gathered for this purpose
in some determinate and duly appointed mode of
procedure.

11
Such, my friends, is that sound doctrine of po
litical equality, contained in the Declaration, as I
understand it. And now, for the first time in the
flight of earthly years has this principle met with a
just and efficient recognition in an established
system of human government, by its adoption in
the constitution of these states and the constitu
tion of the United States.
The limits of this address will not allow me to
shew by any minute analysis and examination,
how well this principle is embraced and preserved
in our system. It will be seen at once, however,
that it is necessarily exclusive, if rightly adminis
tered, of every thing in the form of monopoly, and
every thing in the guise of peculiar privilege. By
giving to the frame of the organization such a de
sign as that its chief purpose and effect shall be to
embrace and cover the equal rights of all, there is
cut off at once the whole body of abuses which
grow out. of the unhallowed pretence that govern
ments are not constituted for the benefit of the peo
ple, but that the people are created for the benefit
of governments. By adopting constitutions, as
the written letters of instruction from the mass of
the community to those who may be entrusted with
the administration of affairs, prescribing with ex
actness the powers to be employed and the condi
tion and manner of their exercise, an end is put at
once to all pretences of original and inherent
authority, whether in individuals or in oligarchies,

12
and demonstration is at the same time made how
impossible it is that men should take by charter
from a monarch of earth any gift of freedom to
which they have not a prior and superior title
from the Monarch of Heaven. By establishing a
system of official accountability ; by providing for
the periodical termination of all official authority ;
by popular elections to fill up vacancies from the
ranks of the people, in which every citizen having
the requisite qualifications, in his intellectual and
moral character, and in the ties which bind him to
the country, has his equal and effective share ; by
this the whole doctrine of legitimate succession is
exploded, with all the absurd and abominable pre
tensions and practices which belong to it. And
with the fall of legitimate successions in any
country, where the danger of substitution from
aristocratical unions is at the same time taken
away, falls of necessary consequence that system
of burthens, exactions and impositions, the essen
tial badges of arbitrary power wherever exercised,
the natural result of the doctrine that men are not
created equal — a system which recognizes in the
sovereign a paramount title to every man's pro
perty and the returns of every man's labor in the
realm, and which is often employed in gathering up
the scanty earnings of honest industry, and the
poor reward bestowed on patient toil, throughout
the land, to be spent on projects of licentiousness,
ambition or revenge, or to be poured into the lap
of bloated and luxurious ease.

13
Thus, if our frame of government, as finally set
tled in the constitutions of these states and of the
union, does in fact embrace and carry out the
great leading doctrine of the Declaration to its
practical results, as we believe it does, it is im
possible not to be struck with the mighty differ
ence between that system and the prevalent sys
tems of government in the world before that day.
And this was the great achievement of the Revo
lution ; and this is the event, the most stupendous,
beyond all doubt, in the temporal history of man,
which we have met to commemorate ; and such is
the occasion and the subject of the American na
tional festival, so sublime, so exalted, so noble, so
distinguished from the festive occasions of the
other nations of the globe.
And, my friends, it is not to be doubted that a
day like this must have its peculiar and appropri
ate business, which is not to be disregarded by
one who occupies the position which has been as
signed to me in the ceremonies of its observance.
The day belongs first to our fathers, and after
wards to us. It may be improved to our profit,
but it is consecrated to their glory. We may en
joy our inheritance, but we must not rob them of
theirs. And, I confess, it seems to me by no
means difficult so to conduct our meditations, dur
ing the time allotted for this exercise, that both
objects shall be embraced, if not accomplished.
In doing this indeed, we cannot choose but walk
over well-trodden ground. Yet, for my part, I

14
console myself with reflecting that I am address
ing myself to Americans — to the children of the
sons of Liberty, and that no such heart can listen,
though it were for the thousandth time, to the
simple story of the sufferings and struggles of his
ancestors in their state of colonial dependence ;
that no such heart can recur, though for the
thousandth time, to the scenes on which they have
left the immortal stamp of their greatness and prow
ess and virtue ; or can hear repeated, though for
the thousandth time, the names of the statesmen,
the heroes and the battle-fields of their times ;
that no American heart can do this without warm
ing at once into involuntary and irrepressible en
thusiasm. I prefer, therefore to adopt the good old fash
ioned mode of address, used in times past on
these occasions, and to carry my own mind and
yours as much as possible back to the contempla
tion of the events — now beginning to grow old —
of colonial and revolutionary times. In this con
templation, it is my purpose to take the opportu
nity of illustrating, by the examples and the prac
tices afforded by the brief review, the beauties
and the blessings of those old forms of govern
ment, which prevailed with some modifications
every where up to the time of our Revolution, and
which continue to prevail every where, out of
our own country, with scarcely an exception
worth stopping to name.

If)
And I must take leave here to remark too that
in conducting a review of the atrocious passages
which mark the whole period of our connection
with Great Britain, I cannot claim the merit of
being affected with any excess of abounding ten
derness towards the government and the people
as they then existed in the land of our origin.
Nor can I learn to handle these passages with any
peculiar gentleness of touch or pressure, out of
an apprehension that I may, perchance, contribute
to revive or perpetuate the enmities which were
engendered by them. Those who look for friend
ship, beyond that of commercial relationship, be
tween two governments so opposite and so irre-
concileable with each other, as those of Great
Britain and the United States, will wait long for
the coming Of the promise and the confirmation
of their faith. Their ways are not as our ways.
I speak of the government and of the body of the
British nation which support it. They may not
choose to auarrel with us because they may have
learned already that it would not be for their in
terest ; but they do not love us. They will buy
with us, sell with us, talk with us, walk with us,
and so following — -and this will a Jew do with a
Christian ; perhaps they may eat with us, drink
with us, and pray with us, as one christian should
with another — but they do not love us ; the causes
of jealousy lie too deep, and for aught I can see
can never be removed while they adhere to their
political organization, and we adhere to ours. I
know there were British hearts in the time of the

16
Revolution, with too much nobleness of nature
not to appreciate the genius, the valor, and the
virtue of the men of the Revolution, and the great
ness of their cause. I have not forgotten Chat
ham ; I have not forgotten Burke ; and I have not
forgotten the noble exertions which both these
great men made, not in behalf of the colonists, but
to prevent the destruction of what they believed
to be the British constitution, and to preserve the
integrity of the British empire. These men be
longed, however, to their own country, and not to
our country. They were her champions and not
ours ; and the success of their counsels and ef
forts would have been our ruin.
As for Mr. Burke, while he argued with all the
vigor of his matchless skill against the ministerial
plans of colonial taxation, and rejoiced in the repeal
of the Stamp Act as a measure both of wisdom
and of justice, yet we must not forget, that he was
the apologist and the advocate of a most odious
measure of the administration with which he was
connected — a measure by which, in the spirit of
unaccountable infatuation, the whole merit of the
repeal of the Stamp Act was lost in the silly pride
of a declaration of parliamentary supremacy over
the colonies. It would be amusing if it was not hu
miliating, to contemplate the mighty Burke, speak
ing in behalf of this British mother, and proclaim
ing that though it would be very impolitic, perhaps
improper, in her to treat her children over the wa
ter with any species of cruelty, yet they must du-

17
tifully remember, that the venerable old lady has a
perfect constitutional right to exercise cruelty and
injustice towards them whenever she chooses.
As for Mr. Pitt, before the glories of that name
were merged in a title — it was nobly declared by
him, that that kingdom " had no right to lay a tax
upon the Colonies." But he was then in opposi
tion ; and certainly some changes did come over
the spirit of his constitutional opinions, when, as
was quaintly said of him at the time, he sunk into
a peerage, and stepping into office as the head of
an administration, called to his aid the counsels of
some of the bitterest enemies both of himself and
the Colonies. Whatever may have been his opin
ions both before arid after the period of his humilia
ting premiership, and however ardently and elo
quently those opinions may have been expressed,
yet it should not be forgotten that it was one of the
earliest acts of his administration, under the lead
too of Grenville — the odious author of the system of
colonial taxation by act of parliament — to pass a
law — who would believe it if it was not recorded ?
Yes, the parliament of Great Britain, controlled by
the Earl of Chatham, passes a law — to abolish the
legislature of the colony of New- York until that co
lony should consent under the order of parliament,
to make certain provision for the troops of his Brit-
tanic majesty, which he had chosen to quarter on
the people of that province. Nor ought the Earl
Of Chatham to be relieved of his share of the dis:]
tinction so justly earned by the brilliant, witty and
3

18
officious Charles Townsend, by his plan — perfect
ed and passed during this administration — "for
drawing a revenue from the Colonies without giv
ing them offence ;" a plan which was so eminently
successful, that it precipitated the war, and resulted
in the severance of the empire which it was inten
ded to preserve.
But it is time to address our minds more directly
to the consideration of those events which ought
to occupy a large share of our thoughts on this day.
I have referred to the distinction in principle and
and in fact, amounting indeed to broad contrast,
between our political organization, and the preva
lent political organizations of the other nations of
the earth. I desire also to have it noted as we
pass, that of the old systems, at the date of our re
volution, not one would compare, for liberahty and
freedom, with the actual government of Great
Britain. To say nothing of the oriental despot
isms, in no part of Europe were the people deemed
to be in the possession of the most common and
ordinary rights of humanity, except in England and
its dependencies. And yet a recurrence to facts
will show how little of the true doctrine of liberty
was recognized even by the British government,
and how strong and striking is the actual contrast
between their system and that under which we have
the happiness to live. We shall see what is the
difference between English freedom and American
freedom ; and we shall see this by taking a view of
the political condition of the Americans while they
were the subjects of the British crown.

19
As political equality — an equality of rights in all
things relating to life, liberty, property, and the
pursuit of happiness, with the governed and not the
governers recognized as the fountain of all author
ity, was the basis of our system, so the very reverse
of this proposition was the basis of the English
system. Down even to the time of the late reform
bill, no subject of England ever dreamed of insist
ing on the existence of a political right, except by
virtue of a charter, or of something in the nature of
a charter. And what are charters ? Royal grants
of specified privileges — as a jailor might say to the
miserable tenant of one of his dungeons, come out
of that wretched cell ; of my clemency I grant you
the liberty of the prison grounds for one hour eve
ry day. This is a royal charter ; and these char
ters are of the essence of the British constitution,
excluding, in their very terms, every idea of a claim
of right on the part of the subject, and substitut
ing for such right a boon, as from a superior to an
inferior, as from one who is rich to those who are
poor in the gifts of nature and freedom, to be held
on the uncertain and precarious tenure of the sov
ereign's good will and pleasure. This has been the
extent — no more — of all the freedom which Eng
lishmen have actually enjoyed since the great day
of Runnymede. From that day the English people
have claimed the privilege of granting away their
own money to the sovereign, whenever he should
demand it, because king John gave them leave to
do so. They have claimed the privilege of having
justice administered to them without the ceremony

20
of bribing the judges, because John consented and
agreed they should so have it. They have claim
ed the privilege of relief from unjust and arbitrary
imprisonments and of trial by jury, on the word
and promise of John. Happy, thrice happy peo
ple of England — fortunate and favored, above
your fellows, — in that God created John, and put
it into his heart to bestow on you the gift of free
dom ! To this it is doubtless owing, that although
John died and was buried, yet the liberties of
England have been preserved and perpetuated —
preserved too, amid perils by the house of Plan-
tagenet, and perils by the house of Tudor, and
perils by the house of Stuart, and perils finally, by
the committing of public authority to earthen ves
sels of German importation.
And now my friends we are prepared to see how
much of real freedom belonged to our fathers,
while they remained the subjects of the British
crown. And it is evident in the outset, that, so
long as that connection continued, they must take
their liberties, more or less, on the condition im
posed on all the subjects of England — under char
ters. The highest notion of liberty to which Eng
land had attained, was that of liberty by charter •
and the colonists of course, very well knew that
the highest order of liberty to be expected from
England by them, was liberty by charter. Hence
the anxieties and controversies, the hopes and the
apprehensions excited among them by the subject
of their charters.

21
The Colonies, it will be remembered, were not
all in like condition with respect to their govern
ments. In some there were governments, under
royal charters, granting certain authority and pow
ers directly to the people. Thus was Massachu
setts situated until her charter was taken away.
In others, there were governments under the ori
ginal proprietors, to whom the crown had been
pleased to grant the property, with charters con
ferring on them the power to establish the govern
ments. Such was the government of Maryland un
der Lord Baltimore. In others, the governments
were conducted by the viceroys of the king, with
such a share exercised by the people as the sover
eign saw fit to allow. Such was the government
of the colony of New-York from the time when the
Duke of York ascended the throne of England.
From the beginning, there was a common and
natural anxiety among the colonists to hedge
themselves in from too much royal inspection, by
special charters. Massachusetts obtained a char
ter from Charles I. within a year of the date of its
patent from the proprietors. Plymouth, although
having her own free constitution, framed on board
the May-Flower, before the colonists touched the
land, yet earnestly but in vain sought to obtain a
charter. Connecticut and New-Haven, Providence
and Rhode-Island governed themselves, as self con
stituted republics, for twenty-five years, and then
took their charters— some of these plantations
having despatched a special agent to the king for

22
the purpose. Such was the anxiety of the colo
nists to secure themselves in this mode against un
limited and arbitrary power. And whenever spe
cial charters were not obtained, they insisted nev
ertheless, as they did to the last, on the common
rights of English subjects ; and claimed, as beyond
all doubt they had a right to do, in common with
Englishmen every where, the broad protecting
shield of the charter of Runnymede. It would
have been strange indeed, if, while the British
throne was found to be high enough and broad
enough to overshadow the Pilgrims in their far dis
tant assylum in the wilderness, magna charta should
have been discovered to be a parchment of such
narrow dimensions that it could not be made to co
ver an inch of territory beyond the island of Great
Britain. At all events, the colonists were not the
men to submit to such constructions. They cover
ed themselves at all points as well as they could for
the day of their battles. As far as they were able
they caused themselves to be clothed with special
corporate powers, well aware that if these should
fail them, they could then fall back upon their re
served rights as Englishmen under the general con
stitution of the kingdom. We shall soon see how
much value ought to be placed on that sort of free
dom which depends for security on royal charters.
It would have been something to boast of, if when
the king had once made a solemn grant of political
privileges, the constitution and the law had forbid
the assumption of those powers. But directly the

23
contrary was the fact, at least so far as public cor
porations were concerned ; and nothing was neces
sary therefore, but to liken the Colonies which had
received charters, to the case of city and borough
corporations in England, and the power of absolute
and complete control was established in the king,
as effectually as though the farce of endowment by
charters had never been attempted — and whatever
the king might not find it convenient to do, in the
premises, in person, the courts would accomplish on
the motion of the king's Attorney General. Hence
we find that within five years, after Charles had
granted his charter to Massachusetts, constituting
that colony a complete republic, with authority to
the freemen to elect their officers, the governor
included, he unceremoniously puts the Prelate Laud
with others in commission over all the New-Eng
land Colonies, with power to make and unmake
governors, revoke privileges and liberties, and gen
erally to do in the premises whatsoever should
seem good in the eyes of their wisdom and purity.
Accident alone made this a barren sceptre in the
hands of the commissioners. They formed a
splendid scheme of administration. The charter
of Massachusetts was to have been cancelled — the
whole territory of New-England was to have been
divided into twelve lordships, and allotted in sever
alty to twelve of the original patentees of the Eng
lish Plymouth Company, to whom the freemen
should be tributary for their lands. A governor-
general was to have been appointed, and a new
city built as the seat of the empire. Within thirty

24
years of this period, no less than three other at
tempts were made, under similar commissions,
to arrest the Colonies in the exercise of their un
doubted privileges. These having failed, the sec
ond Charles, shortly after, took the franchises of
the Massachusetts Colony into his own possession,
through the forms of a judicial proceeding. Oth
er proceedings of a similar character against Con
necticut and Rhode-Island, followed on the acces
sion of James II. to the throne, and nothing re
mained to complete the subjugation of the whole
of New-England, but the presence of Sir Edmond
And'ross as governor-general. His oppressions and
atrocities were only ended by his violent arrest
and imprisonment, and by the English Revolution
of 1688, and the expulsion of his tyrant master
from the throne of his ancestors.
This event, the revolution, so much boasted
in England, certainly was the occasion of tempo
rary relief to the Colonies. But its real value to
the cause of freedom here — whatever it might have
been elsewhere — was not very considerable. The
new king, William, found reasons for delaying to
grant to Massachusetts the benefit of a new char
ter for three years ; it was finally granted only as a
fit occasion and means of compelling that colony
to surrender a portion of its ancient privileges ;
and before his reign was ended, a strong effort
was made, by a bill in parliament, utterly to abol
ish the charters of all the Colonies at a single
blow, and to reduce them to the state of mere de-

25
pendencies on the crown. This latter example,
by the way, was not lost on his German successor.
A similar attempt was made in the very beginning
of the reign of the first George. And if these be
nevolent attempts were not successful, it was not
because these sovereigns, or their advisers, enter
tained any doubt about the power of the crown or
the parliament to withdraw the light of the king's
favor opened on their subjects through the medi
um of charters, whenever it should be deemed fit
and convenient to do so.
The statements now made are enough to shew
of how little worth was that liberty which flowed
to British subjects from royal colonial charters.
But the colonists, as I have already intimated, had
another royal title to freedom which they were
never backward in asserting. Wherever coloni
al or proprietary charters had not been granted at
all, or had been withdrawn, the colonists still
claimed the benefits of magna charta and of the
constitution. Among the most important rights of
Englishmen, held by this tenure, was the right to
participate in the legislative power, so far at least,
as that power was employed in the regulation of
of internal government, and especially in the rais
ing of supplies and revenue. In England, this
right had come to be tolerably secure, from the
terrible examples of vengeance with which its vio
lations had been visited. And it was just the want
of such examples in the Colonies, which embolden
ed the worthy representatives of the monarch here,
4

26
openly to proclaim that the people of the colonies
enjoyed no immunities which did not flow from
the mere grace and will of the crown. It will be
seen however, that this genuine doctrine of roy
alty, however insisted on, did not deter the colo
nists from setting up their claims and actually exer
cising the right, through their representatives in
the colonial legislatures, wherever they were not
prevented or interrupted by tyranny or force. The
colony of New- York will afford us as good an ex
ample for illustration as any other. The people at
large in this colony never enjoyed the doubtful
blessing of a special charter. The government
was first proprietary, and afterwards royal — both,
from the surrender by the Dutch until 1688, under
that prince of tyrants, James II. ; and for twenty
years after it became an English colony, the colo
nists were not allowed the slightest share in the
government. The first English governor was the
sole and unassisted fountain of all law and of all
justice. The second condescended to take the
advice of his council, and actually called to his as
sistance a few justices of the peace—and under
both, taxes were not only levied, but actually laid
through the instrumentality of their sheriffs and
constables. The notorious Andross succeeded,
and signalized himself as usual. He interposed in
a controversy of ecclesiastical jurisdiction belong
ing to the Consistory of the Dutch Church at Al
bany, and arbitrarily imprisoned a magistrate of the
town. He controlled the court of assize by pre
siding in it in person ; he obtained supplies from

27
the people by forced benevolences ; and he en
larged his master's revenue from quit-rents, by
compelling the inhabitants to take new grants for
lands already patented to them by his predecessors.
These proceedings had thrown the colonists in
to a ferment, which manifested itself in an espe
cial manner on Long Island. And as the next
governor, Colonel Dongan, on his arrival in 1683,
happened to land in the midst of the malcontents
on the eastern end of the Island, he was induced,
evidently after taking counsel of his fears, to pro
mise that laws and taxes should be imposed for the
future, only by a general assembly. For the first
time in October of that year, an assembly of dele
gates from the people actually met at New- York.
But it was soon found that the power of the people
was merely nominal, and no legislative act under
this administration, has been deemed of sufficient
authority to be preserved and admitted to a place
in the body of our colonial laws.
The first time the people of this Colony were
admitted to any substantial participation in the
legislative power, was in 1691, and even then the
house of assembly was not organized without the
exclusion of the two Quaker members elected from
the county of Queens. At this time the so call
ed glorious revolution had been accomplished in
England, and English freedom had been establish
ed on the firm basis of one tyrant expelled and an
other imported. The Prince of Orange was on

28
the throne ; and Henry Sloughter — poor and ava
ricious, weak and licentious, a man who perform
ed the most awful function of human authority, the
signing of death-warrants, while, as his historian
says, "his excellency's reason was drowned in
his cups" — Henry Sloughter ruled over their ma
jesties' province of New- York. But, in spite of
discouragements, this first effective legislative as
sembly of the Colony, of immortal memory, put
forth its resolves and doctrines of freedom with
the most deliberate and unbending boldness. This
body numbered among its members a Graham, a
Van Cortland, a Kipp, a Beekman, and a Van
Schaick. These were the men, and their associ
ates, who were among the first to give a legislative
form to an American bill of rights. They propos
ed an act, declaring what were the rights and pri
vileges of the colonists, and that act passed into
a law. Amongst other things it, in effect, affirm
ed the right of the people to be represented in as
sembly, and repudiated the notion that their enjoy
ment of this right depended on the grace of the
crown. This was strong and offensive matter for
the digestive organs of William, especially as
there was no doubt some remaining irritation from
the contents of the chalice in which he had been
obliged to pledge the English nation at the time of
his accession. He succeeded, however, in keep
ing down the draught for five years, when his bile
rose, and he rejected the whole potion.
But it was not the abstract right only which was

29
disputed ; there was a constant effort to narrow
down the actual popular share in the legislative bu
siness of the country, and to make it as little avail
able to the people as possible. And from the time I
have referred to thence forward, the annals of this
colony are filled with the struggles of the people to
preserve their property and their freedom — such as
it was — from the rapacity and the tyranny of their
royal governors. Truth to say, these worthy rep
resentatives of the parent government were found
faithful in their vocation ; and in their dealings
with the colonial legislatures, not having the fear
of expulsion, nor the fear of the block, nor the
fear of God before their eyes ; there was no ex
ample of insolence or intolerance left them by
the Charleses and the Jameses of England, of
which they did not contrive to better the instruc
tion. The people might elect their members of
assembly ; but the governor claimed the right of
neglecting or refusing to call them together for
just as long a period as he thought proper. The
fitting time in his judgment, of course, might never
arrive, unless lie could be compelled by some state
necessity. To effect this object the people in
sisted that no money should be raised for the pub
lic service, but through their representatives in as
sembly. So far the point was carried ; and when
the exigencies of the state, or the private necessi
ties of the executive, which were always urgent —
for among these officials there was more than one
Cornbury, " hunted out of England by a host of
hungry creditors" — whenever these exigencies and

30
necessities became pressing, and arbitrary exac
tions began to be fruitless, or were discovered to
be hazardous, then it was that a consent might be
obtained to call together the assembly. Once in
session, this body generally took the precaution,
before they would enter on the business of the
supplies, to do themselves and their constituents
some justice, by passing acts for the correction of
abuses in the administration, and for the security
of their common rights. To acts of this descrip
tion, the titled and famishing beggars at the head
of the government were often compelled to yield
their assent. But they had a way of escape in re
serve. The supplies once obtained, the governor
had nothing to do but to dismiss the assembly
forthwith, and send home to England any obnox
ious laws which might have been passed with his
consent but against his will, to undergo capital ex
ecution there by the veto of the king.
But there were other methods still, of overrul
ing the effective power of the people in the admin
istration of their affairs. When the assemblies
came to the subject of the supplies, it was a favor
ite point with the governors to insist that a per
manent system should be adopted and the supplies
granted, at the least, for a series of years. If this
point was carried, the hated presence of an assem
bly might be dispensed with, and the commander
be left for a considerable time to tread the decks
alone, in all the pride and insolence of power.
But if this project failed, it was easy to take what-

31
ever the assembly should give, and then dismiss the
members to their homes. The point of attack
would now be changed. The old body of legisla
tors being disposed of by proclamation, the proper
writs are issued for a new election. The first thing
now to be done is, that the governor either in per
son, as Fletcher of this colony was accustomed to
do, or by his retainers, as others practised, should
take the field at the elections. Bearing a smile
about the lips, and a cloud on the brow ; carrying
a bribe in one hand and a scourge in the other ; sur
rounded by a multitude who are rejoicing in the
beams, direct or reflected, of royal favor ; and fol
lowed at a little distance, by other groups, who are
pressing forward to share in the sunshine, under
the firm conviction, that there is a sensible chilli
ness of the atmosphere in the shades of private
life, quite prejudicial to their delicate constitu
tions — under such circumstances and with such ap
pliances, he goes forth to meet the electors, and of
course not without considerable, though it may fall
short of complete success. Having done all that
authority and corruption can accomplish here, his
next step is to call the new members together and
make trial of their tempers. If a majority, ready
to betray the people and serve the king, have not
been already secured, a judicious and gentle ap
phcation of offices and rewards will probably prove
quite efficacious ; for experience has unfortunately
shewn, that in neaily every considerable body of
men there may alwa}rs be found here and there one
of such tender sensibilities as to be utterly incapa-

32
ble of holding out against such delicate attentions.
Having at last succeeded in finding an assembly
fitted to his purpose, the governor may now laugh
at the people, and bid them defiance. No assem
bly can be dissolved without his proclamation or
dismission ; and no new election can be held with
out his order. The people are excluded. Power,
unlimited and unchecked, settles in the person of
the governor ; and the very forms of freedom, in
some degree preserved, are made to stand as but
tresses for the support of a gloomy despotism.
But I must forbear to pursue this point ; for I am
admonished that it will soon be time for me to be
gin to think of relieving your patience. And yet,-
fellow citizens, it is impossible not to feel how lit
tle justice can be done to our theme, and how little
to the occasion of our meeting, within the brief
space to which this exercise must be confined. —
Nothing truly has ever so oppressed me, as the dif
ficulty of selection and of condensation, in my pre
paration for this occasion — to select from materials
where the metals are all gold and the stones all
sapphire ; and to condense and chain down thoughts
by the feeble instrumentality of language, which
crowd the mind and swell the heart to the very point
of bursting. Will you bear with me then, my friends,
while I pursue my general subject so far at least,
as to utter some things which cannot be wholly
omitted at tliis time, without a species of treason
to the day of independence and the cause of tou-
man freedom.

33
In all my references thus far to our colonial his
tory, it has been my object to shew hotv little real
security there is for the liberties of the people ifl
the most liberal and favorable of those systems of
government which prevailed every where previous
to our revolution. I do not allow that the colonists,
because situated at a distance, were exposed to great
er oppressions than the subjects of the same govern
ment who were seated under the shadow of the
throne at home, for any other reason than that their
rulers dared to deal with them in a manner in which
they did not dare to deal with the others. On the
contrary it seems to me, that the people of Eng
land and the people of America have both been
obliged " to bide their time" ; and that what the in
habitants of the British Island suffered in their day,
and what the American colonists endured in theirs,
was only the legitimate fruits of the system of go
vernment to which they were both subjected. The
British monarchs subsequent to the Stuarts have
been naturally cautious about trying experiments on
their people at home. One king a fugitive, and an
other wanting, his fair proportions by a head, of the
race which had immediately preceded their own,
were spectacles to cool their ardor, and cause some
sensible abatement in their demands. But the sys
tem remained and still remains. The king is still
king by the Grace of God, and therefore the peo
ple are free by the Grace of the king.* This is the
theory, talk as they will about the rights of Eng
lishmen ; and by how much better than this the prac-
* Note A.
5

34
tice is, by so much are the people gainers from hav
ing succeeded in shifting the securities they held,
from the king's word of promise and clemency on
to the king's fears and apprehensions. And here
is the secret of just the difference between their
condition and what was the condition of the colo
nists. Until 1688, there was no very great amount
of difference between them. After that, it was the
difference between a cautious government at home
and a fearless, reckless government here — a govern
ment here, which would not be convinced of the
hazards of their game — of the possibility of resist
ance — until the proofs were exhibited in blood.
I think I am justified therefore in attributing the
evils which the Colonies suffered at the hands of
the British government, not so much to any mal
administration, as to the very genius of the govern
ment itself. According to this system the people
are in some sort the property of the sovereign. For
his pleasure they were and are created. Doubtless
of all sensations in the human heart the most grate
ful is that of feeling power. This first necessity
of tyrants is supplied by an obedient and submis
sive people. And the next most important use of
the people undoubtedly is that of furnishing from
the store-house of their means and their industry,
whatever may be required to satisfy the need, and
to gratify the passions and the pride of their mas
ters. The British constitution, begotten, no body can
tell how, between the king and the people, after being

35
hunted through the mazes of royal charters, acts of
grace, books of irreconcilable precedents, bills of
rights, and statutes of parliament, here a little and
there a little, if found at all, is discovered to be a thing
so strangely put together, of such doubtful complex
ion, and of such a double aspect, that it is difficult
to determine which of the parties its features favor
most. Now it looks like oppression, and now it
looks like protection. At one moment its nurses
can discover some distinct traces of resemblance
to Liberty, at the next it is clearly the very child
of Despotism.
The great point in dispute, as you all very well
know, between the parent country and the colo
nies ; that which brought on the war ending in
total separation, was whether the Parliament had
a constitutional right to tax the Colonies without
their free consent in their own local legislatures.
About this there was great disagreement among
the English doctors — some of whom were so per
plexed that they disagreed with themselves. Sir
William Jones declared in the most positive man
ner against the right. But Edmund Burke was
so clear in favor of it that he joined in the pas
sage of a declaratory law to that effect. The
great William Pitt uttered his solemn conviction
that it was unconstitutional for Parliament to lay
a tax on the. Colonies ; but the same great man
found it perfectly constitutional for Parliament to
issue a peremptory order to a colonial assembly
to lay a specific tax on the Colony, for furnishing
" salt, vinegar, cider and beer" for the comfort of

36
his majesty's troops quartered on the province,
and in case of refusal, he found it also perfectly
constitutional for Parhament to abolish the colo
nial legislature, until the order should be complied
with. Now there is, in England, but one only mode of
determining all disputes about what is constitu
tional and what is not. Whatever measure is ad
opted, for the time being, by the king, or by king
lords and commons, and acquiesced in by the na
tion, that is constitutional — and the nation is to be
deemed to have acquiesced if it do not break out
into open rebellion, or at the least carry on its re
sistance with so high a hand as to compel the
king, or the king lords and commons, to recede.
Bearing this in mind, we have nothing to do, but
to run our thoughts over the tract of our colonial
annals, to satisfy ourselves that there is no spe
cies of fraud or of oppression, of wrong or of vio
lence, of insolence or of despotism, which may
not be inflicted on its subjects, by the govern
ment of England acting in the very spirit of its
its constitution.
Pursuing this suggestion, we are brought to
contemplate the condition of men, driven by per
secution and intolerance to forsake homes of
cultivation, refinement and endearment, and seek
their rest in a far distant wilderness, voluntarily
surrounding themselves with a neighborhood of
ferocious savages. Abandoned by those who
should have been their protectors, they give them-

37
selves up to the guidance of God, and, under him,
rely on themselves and their own resources. But
it is only for a season that they escape the notice
and the care of their guardians. The constitu
tional power of England, which first expelled
them from the land of their fathers, now follows
to seek them out in their new abode, to challenge
their allegiance, and reduce them to submission.
The farce of granting charters is acted over. It
is constitutional to give them ; it is constitutional
to take them aAvay. It is constitutional to govern
with them ; it is equally constitutional to govern
without them.
But in spite of discouragement and difficulty, the
colonies begin to put on the port and vigor of ma
turity ; and as they are the property of the mother
country, she must take care to make them useful
to herself. For this purpose it is constitutional in
her to publish orders and pass acts to regulate
their trade, and restrain their manufactures. As
customs paid in England are a source of revenue
to the king, the colonists are not to export any
thing to any country which is not first landed in
England and discharged of its tribute money there.
And as the resources of the king will always be
increased by increasing the ability of his subjects
in England to pay, the colonists shall contribute
to that ability. Their distant commerce shall be
carried on only in ships built in England. If they
would have wine, oil and spirits from Portugal,
they must receive them through a merchant in

38
England, that he may fatten on the commissions.
They may trap the beaver, which abound in their
country, but they shall send the fur to England to
be made into hats for their use. They may dig
and smelt the ore so abundant in their soil, but the
iron shall be sent to England to be converted into
implements, even the most common, for their ne
cessities. All this is constitutional. Nobody
doubts it — at least in ^England.
And other things are constitutional. England
has a host of high-born and noble paupers, and it
is her duty to provide for these. In the exercise
of her constitutional authority she remits these
leeches to her Colonies, to bear sway, and gorge
themselves on her subjects there. England too
has her convict-thieves, depredators, and robbers,
and she finds it perfectly constitutional to trans
port them to her American colonies, and plant
them there in companionship with her American
subjects. But the constitutional power of England displays
itself in other forms. War has been the pastime
of kings from the beginning. From the time when
the Prince of Orange was called to the throne
down to within twelve years of the breaking out of
our Revolution, a period of seventy-five years, there
were five general wars in Europe, occupying near
ly fifty out of the seventy-five years, in all of which
England was a party. These were wars of succes
sion, wars of ambition, wars of jealousy, wars of

39
rivalship ; wars involving the affairs of kings and
princes only, and in which the people had no con
cern — except to fight the battles, to bear the expen
ses and to endure the horrors. In one of these
wars, England, with the aid of the Americans, con
quered the Canadas. In another, she acquired a
monopoly for supplying the Spanish settlements
with negroes for thirty years. In the others she
gained nothing. But what was the condition of her
Colonies during these wars ? Spain, her enemy, had
possessions on one side of them ; France, her en
emy, had possessions on the other. Around them
and pressing closely upon them, was a savage pop
ulation, treacherous, merciless, implacable, gree
dy of spoil, and ravenous for blood. Spain fed the
malice of these demons in the South. France kin
dled their rage in the North and West. The work
of death and desolation began. There was the
knife for the scalp, the hatchet for the brain, the
brand for the dwelling, and the stake and the fag -
got for the victim. The aged, the infirm, the de
fenceless ; the mother, and her infant born and un
born — these were the objects of attack ; and no
thing was heard of but burnings, and butcheries, and
tortures, and captivities. During the whole period
of seventy-five years just referred to, the colonists
had scarcely an interval of actual or unapprehen
sive quiet ; and no quarter of the country was ex
empt from murderous incursions. The awful tem
pest of blood and fire which fell on Schenectady in
the first of these wars, was repeated on the settle-

10
ments about Casco, and on Deerfield and Haver
hill, and Roanoke, in the next. Then came the
wars in which the Spaniards themselves in one
quarter, and the French themselves in another, took
a chief part, though still aided by the Indians ; and
it were endless to recount how the Americans act
ed and suffered in them all. Suffice it, that the
kings of England engaged in these wars in the ex
ercise of a constitutional authority which was nev
er disputed — no matter though the inevitable con
sequence was to involve their American Colonies
in a series of calamities and distresses too horrible
for thought or endurance. The last of these wars
to which I have referred, that of 1756, was indeed
brought on in consequence of French encroach
ments on the American possessions of the king of
England. The chief points of direct encroachment
were at Nova-Scotia, on the Ohio River, and on
our own northern and western frontiers. With
Nova-Scotia, the colonists had no other concern
than such as they had, being subjects of the British
king, with his possessions in Germany. The oth
er encroachments concerned them more nearly —
but then the constitutional power of the parent go
vernment had been exercised in a way which led to
these very encroachments, and produced that aw
ful train of sufferings, exertions and sacrifices which
fell, in consequence, on the ill-fated Colonies. —
Early in the reign of the first George, it was pro
posed, from Virginia to the government at home,
that a purchase of land should be made from the
Indians on the Ohio and a settlement planted there,

41
which at the time might have been easily accom
plished, and which would have defeated the de
signs of the French, even then well understood,
and given security to the border settlements of the
states in that quarter. But, besides that the go
vernment found it always politic and constitutional
to confine their American Colonies as far as possi
ble to the sea-board, on account of the conven
ience of bringing her naval and military persua
sives to bear on any spirit of disobedience which
might manifest itself among them ; besides this, it
so happened that the apprehensions and ambition of
the new king furnished him, about that time, with
reasons of state for keeping well with the court of
France ; and hence it became entirely constitu
tional for his ministers to discourage all attempts
to interrupt the French in their design on the
Ohio ; and even to allow them, shortly after, with
out a word of remonstrance or of disapprobation,
but on the contrary by connivance and tacit con
sent, to enter on the territory of his majesty's pro
vince of New- York, and there to erect a fort — that
of Crown Point — and plant their batteries almost
within ear-shot of the peaceful dwellings of his
faithful subjects of that colony. This very con
duct of the king and his advisers opened the way
to an attempt to establish a long projected connec
tion, by military posts and papal stations, between
the French possessions on the great River of the
north, and the French possessions on the great
River of the south — by which the English Colonies
would have been enclosed and penned up for easy
6

42
destruction on a kind of narrow isthmus, between
a wall, stretching from the gulf of St. Lawrence to
the gulf of Mexico, planted with cannon, and
guarded by the bayonet and scalping knife on the
one side, and the ocean with an extended, expos
ed and indefensible coast on the other. It was
this constitutional conduct of the sovereign, who
claimed the allegiance of the colonists, opening
the way to so much exposure and to so much im
minent danger, which led to the celebrated con
vention held at Albany in 1754, and to the forma
tion by that convention of a plan of union for the
mutual defence and security of the Colonies. That
union was acknowledged by the paternal govern
ment to be indispensable to their safety — Yet, at
such a moment, with the cloud fully charged and
the bolt just ready to fall on their defenceless heads,
at such a moment did this humane government, in
the exercise of its constitutional authority, forbid
that projected union, except on the condition that
the colonists should then, in the day of their ex
tremity, yield to it the right to impose taxes on them
by act of Parliament ! These infamous terms were
of course indignantly rejected, to the immortal hon
or of the colonists ; and nothing was left for them
to do but to make the best preparation they were
able for the bloody conflict which could no longer
be delayed. Long before war was actually de
clared between France and England, it became
necessary to put on the armor and light the torch
in this region. In 1755, the Baron Dieskau with
a heavy force, was sweeping from the north down

43
on the place where we are now assembled, with in
tent to wrap this city in flames. No less than six
thousand provincials assembled at Albany, and
marched out to give the enemy battle, whom they
defeated with signal slaughter on the banks of Lake
George. This afforded temporary relief ; but the
war was to be prosecuted. In the next year, there
fore, twenty-one thousand provincial troops were
ready for service ; but it was constitutional for the
government to place the command in incompetent
hands, and nothing was accomplished. In the
next, as little was done, except that the miserable
Earl of Loudon, having drawn off his main forces
from the proper defences of the country for a boot
less expedition to Halifax, left an army, chiefly of
provincials, to be surrendered to the enemy at Fort
William Henry, and then given up to an indiscri
minate massacre by their Indian allies.* In the
next year, the command was transferred from Lou
don to Abercrombie, to give to this new general
an opportunity to sacrifice two thousand lives,
every one as valuable as his own, in a rash and
hopeless assault on Ticonderoga. In the next
year, happily, the tide of war turned under better
auspices, and Canada fell. But it was yet four
years before it was found convenient or practic
able for the king of England to make peace with
his enemy the king of France — during all which
period the colonists, especially at the south, did
not escape the perils of a state of war — and when
at last the subject of peace came to be agitated,
» Note B.

44
it was seriously and anxiously debated in England
whether the interest of the government did not re
quire that Canada should be again yielded up to
France, to serve again in her hands, with the help
of the Indians and the emissaries of the Pope, as
a salutary check on the too rapid and dangerous
growth and expansion of colonial population and
power ! Doubtless it would have been perfectly
constitutional to have done so.
But, finally, the peace of 1763 was concluded,
and the government of England was left free to fol
low its inclinations in the exercise of new constitu
tional powers over the Colonies. Scarcely was the
war ended, when the king, feeling the pressure of
burthens from the conflicts which he and his prede
cessors had sustained with their continental neigh
bors for three-quarters of a century nearly in suc
cession, resolved to rob his Colonies for relief.
The more effectually to prevent any freedom in
their trade and to secure its benefits to England,
the government first determined on a rigorous en
forcement of its navigation acts. The masters of
vessels were commissioned as custom-house offi
cers, to seize and bring in for condemnation all ves
sels and cargoes of a suspected character ; and to
make the condemnation quite secure, the right to
try the questions at issue by a jury was taken away,
and jurisdiction committed exclusively to a judicia
ry of the king's appointment, whose powers were
enlarged expressly to meet the case. Then came

45
the Stamp Act striking at the legal validity of writ
ten contracts which had not paid tribute to the king.
Then came the Declaratory Law affirming the right
of taxation ; and then came the commentary on
that declaration in the shape of a duty — madly per
severed in — on tea. Following the resistance
which these constitutional proceedings met with,
came the act to shut up a Harbour which God and
the ocean had opened ; the act to subject the peo
ple of Massachusetts to a corrupt and pensioned
judiciary ; the act to exempt the king's servants in
that colony from trial and withdraw them to Eng
land for protection ; the act to abolish the legisla
ture of New- York ; and finally the act to starve
New-England into submission by interrupting their
fisheries. But enough was not yet done, and the constitu
tional resources of England are not easily exhaust
ed. British troops are now poured into the Colo
nies. The affair of Lexington follows, and eight
American citizens are murdered at the first fire.
Charlestown is wrapped in flames ; and American
blood is spilled like water at Bunker's Hill. All
this is but the beginning of that constitutional ar
gument which, by the space of seven years, the
military barristers of the court of England were
instructed to address to America to persuade her
to submit to taxation and plunder at the instance
and pleasure of the king and parliament of Great
Britain. This argument was continued in every
possible form which could suggest itself to those

46
skilled in this kind of casuistry ; and so animated
and enlivened was it throughout, and so full of
characteristic episode by the burning of towns, vil
las and cottages, by cold-blooded murders, by
shameless violations, and by the torturing, poison
ing and starvation of prisoners, that one is led ir
resistibly to the conclusion that those by whom it
was conducted had received their latest and most
effective lessons from the examples and practice
of the unhumanized wretches with whom they were
associated, and who are known to take their chief
delight in cruelty and blood. It may safely be af
firmed that in no civilized age or country had war
been carried on with such ruthless and gratuitous
barbarity. Whatever may have been the charac
ter of this contest before the Declaration of Inde
pendence, after that and from that moment, it wag
a war waged by one independent nation on another
independent nation for the purpose of conquest.
Yet the British still affected to treat the resistance
of the Americans as a rebellion ; and on this pre
tence, there was no mischief and no cruelty which
they did not feel at liberty to practice. The very
commencement of the campaign of 1776, was mark
ed with atrocities. Soon after the taking of New-
York, nearly one-third of that city was burned
down. It was pretended by the enemy that the fire
was kindled by Americans ; and a British historian
of the period relates that many individuals, on a
bare and unsupported suspicion, of course without
trial, without proof, and without any opportunity

47
for defence, were unceremoniously and inhumanly
precipitated into the flames which was consuming
their dwellings. In no case did there seem to be
any disposition to soften the asperities and rigors
of war ; on the contrary every opportunity was
taken to aggravate its horrors. This was mani
fested on the very first movements of the combined
army after the landing of his majesty's German
mercenaries at Long Island. The familiar jour
nal of an Englishman, now just published, alluding
to these movements, cooly relates that on surpriz
ing some American out-posts, " the men were all
put to death with the bayonet." A near relative
of my own, and an eye witness to the retreat of
the American army from Long Island on that me
morable occasion, has often related to me a scene
of horror which occurred in the morning after Gen
eral Washington had effected his wonderful escape
and the transit of his troops from Long Island to
the city of New- York. It will be recollected that
this escape was effected in the night, and so silent
and complete was it, that out of an army of 9,000
men, who were in their lines at night-fall, within
six hundred yards of an enemy more than double
their number, not a soldier remained, to the great
surprize and mortification of the enemy, when the
morning disclosed the place of their encampment.
After all the troops had been transported, a party
of Americans, not in any wise attached to the
army, and unarmed, volunteered to bring over some
stores and property of inconsiderable value which
had remained. It happened that while the last

48
boat's company which had ventured on this enter-
prize were employed in completing their lading,
the dense fog, which till that moment had rested
on the East river, was suddenly lifted up like a cur
tain, by which they were exposed to a party of the
disappointed and enraged enemy. They met the
fate of the men who had been surprised at the
American out-posts. Every man was put to death
with the bayonet — all were murdered, though on
their knees, and begging for quarter with cries
which rent the air, and could not be heard without
a thrill of horror.
And what gives to this war its most awful cha
racter is that nearly all its cruelties were delibe
rately and systematically practised. Such was the
refusal to give quarter wherever it was deemed
safe to refuse, and the consequent murders com
mitted in cold blood ; such was the treatment of
our prisoners — too horrible even for belief if the
facts were not so well authenticated ; and such
was the destruction of towns and settlements by
fire, especially in the memorable campaign of 1777.
The Americans were informed by public proclama
tion from the highest authority, that " the existence
of a single habitation on their defenceless coasts
ought to be a constant reproof to their ingrati
tude." And truly this generous enemy took care
not to leave to the inhabitants of Esopus, and Fair
field, and Greenfield, and Norwalk, a single stand
ing monument of that ingratitude which he so
much deprecated !

49
But it were useless, even if our time was not al
ready too far spent, to dwell on those scenes, so
familiar to every American ear and heart. They
stand as everlasting monuments between England
and America ; to cover the one with shame, and
to crown the other with glory. The light which
beams on our beloved country from Trenton and
Saratoga, and Yorktown, and many an other well-
fought field, can never fade. The brightness of
the names of Warren, and Washington, and Green,
and a host of others, which are hung up as partic
ular stars in her firmament, can never grow dim.
But her chief glory, that which shines the bright
est, and will endure the longest, was the achieve
ment of the Fourth of July, 1776. Then it was
that she effected the memorable transition from a
state of colonial dependence to the condition of a
free and independent sovereignty. Taking her
station in the family of nations, she threw down
the gauntlet, and bid the world defiance. She
stood alone in the strength of her new and distinc
tive principles and of her cause, and presented her
rocky breast to the impotent rage of the billow
and the storm. From that moment, having stept
without the circle of parental authority, she stood
on firm ground of her own, holding England and
her people, as the rest of the world, " enemies in
war, in peace friends." The wand of the enchant
ress was broken ; the spell of her constitutional
witcheries was dissolved ; America was free !
7

50
It remains only, my friends and fellow-citizens,
that we should remember that we are the children
of the men who set up a new standard of freedom
and civil government in the earth ; that this was
done at the cost of sacrifices too vast for computa
tion ; and that to us has been committed the re
sponsible charge of carrying forward the experi
ment which they began. As the new system
has stood for half a century and more, so, for
aught that is vicious or defective in itself, it may
stand for centuries on centuries, and as long as
time and the earth shall endure. It has its foun
dations in the eternal principles of truth and of
right ; yet it may fail ; it may even break down in
our keeping ; and it will if we ourselves shall be
come recreant to those principles — wanting the
Virtue and the purity, and the intelligence, and the
faithfulness, and the integrity of our fathers. Let
Us hope at least that no such calamity shall befal
in our day. Let us make this day the occasion
for renewing in our own names, in behalf of our
common country, that same solemn pledge which
Our fathers gave in support of the same glorious
cause — the pledge of " our lives, our fortunes and
our sacred honor." Here, as on a common altar
and before our common God, let us unitedly swear,
that the Republic shall receive no detriment at our
hands : that it shall live, by His blessing, while we
live ; and that our children shall receive it from us
as we received it from our Sires, undimmed in pu
rity, undiminished in lustre, great, happy, glorious
and free !

51

N O T E S.

NOTE A.
It is true that in England it is usual to regard the liberties of the people
as resting in co/itract between the king and them. " Breaking the onyal
ai contract" was deemed good cause for expelling James II. ; that it), it
was deemed good cause of war. Admitting the contract, what equality
is there between the contracting parties, and what are its sanctions, and
the remedies for its violations 1 The king promises to abate so much of Ins
prerogatire, and to ultotc so much freedom ; and on these conditious tho
people agree to be his obedient subjects — such is the equality between the
contractors. The agreement has no sanction but the honor and intcrni of
the promiser ; and if violated, the remedy is not in llie constitution, but
beyond it — in war.

NOTE B.
Major Rogers, an American parlizan officer in tliis war, states in his
" Journal," published in 1765, that his brother had died of small-pox at
Fort William Henry a few days before the surrender ; and that after the
conquest, the body was dug up and the scalp taken by the Indians. This
could not have been done from the mere lust of blood. The scalps were
doubtless paid for. Maj. Rogers learned, through a prisoner, that the In
dians themselves, in a state of alarm, " greatly blamed the French for en
couraging them" in their barbarous practices.

ERRATUM.
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