Authors: Alfred W. Blumrosen
Slave Nation (32 page)
19
. “Virginia Instructions to the Delegates to the Continental Congress, August 1, 1774,” Commager,
Documents of American History
, 78
20
. Arendt,
On Revolution
, 119. Hannah Arendt understood that the objection to taxation without representation was not revolutionary until the southerners demanded independence from Parliament.
21
. British politician Edmund Burke, in 1775, and American historian Edmund Morgan, in 1975, drew this same conclusion. Burke emphasized the attachment to liberty by whites in the South arising from the presence of slavery. “In Virginia and the Carolinas, they have a vast multitude of slaves.…Those who are free are by far the most proud and jealous of their freedom. Freedom to them is not only an enjoyment, but a kind of rank and privilege.…Those people…are much more strongly…attached to liberty, than those to the northward.” Edmund Burke to Parliament, March 22, 1775. Cook, Albert S., ed. Vol. II, Speech on Conciliation with America (New York: Longman’s, Greenard Co., 1913) 123-24. Morgan concluded that: “Virginians may have had a special appreciation of the freedom dear to republicans, because they saw every day what life without it could be like.” Morgan,
American Slavery, American Freedom
, 376
C
HAPTER
5
J
OHN
A
DAMS
S
UPPORTS THE
S
OUTH ON
S
LAVERY
1
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, 96n1. The delegates had been appointed by the General Court sitting in Salem.
2
. Rakove,
National Politics
, 108. Maier,
Old Revolutionaries
, 3-50
3
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, 104
4
. Ibid.106
5
. Ibid.109
6
. Ibid.112
7
. Brodsky,
Benjamin Rush
8
. Ferling,
Leap in the Dark
, 48–50
9
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, 114, 115n2. See David Freeman Hawke,
Benjamin Rush: Revolutionary Gadfly
, (City: Bobbs-Merrill, 1971) 116–17
10
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, 114
11
. Ibid. 116
12
. Ibid. 136
13
. Ibid. 126
14
. Phyllis Lee Levin,
Abigail Adams: A Biography
(New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2001) 36
15
. Morgan,
Birth of the Republic
, 63–64
16
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, 119. (discussed in
Chapter 3
)
17
. “John Adams to William Tudor, Sept. 19, 1774,” in Smith,
Letters of Delegates to Congress
, 129–30
18
. Joseph Ellis.
Passionate Sage: The Character and Legacy of John Adams
(New York: N. W. Norton & Co., 1993) 39.
19
. Smith,
Letters of Delegates to Congress
, 178
20
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, 120
21
. Ferling,
Leap in the Dark
, 114n5
22
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, 120
23
. See
Chapter 10
24
. See Higginbotham,
In the Matter of Color
, 19–150
25
. Foner,
History of Black Americans
, 295. Writs of assistance were general warrants enabling customs officers to search on suspicion alone. 26. Ibid.
27
. Grigsby,
Virginia Convention
, 66–67
28
. Ferling,
Leap in the Dark
, 41. In 1780, while lieutenant governor of South Carolina, Gadsden successfully recommended that Charleston be surrendered to the British. Buchanan,
The Road to Guilford Court House: The American Revolution in South Carolina
(New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1997) 66, 69
29
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, v1, 133. Sept. 14, 1774. The words following the quotation, “This I deny,” were Adams’s views of Gadsden’s analysis.
30
. Adams, “Letter to William Tudor, June 1, 1818.”
The Works of John Adams
, 315.
31
. Adams, “Letter to Robert Evans, June 8, 1819.”
The Works of John Adams
, 380. Frederick M. Binder,
The Color Problem in Early National America as Viewed by John Adams, Jefferson, and Jackson
, (The Hague: Mouton Press, 1968) 11–31, discusses Adams’s views in considerable detail, but does not mention the quotations in the text.
32
. See Benjamin Quarles,
The Negro in the American Revolution
, (Chapel Hill: University of NC Press, 1961) esp. 47n53.
33
. Henry Wiencek,
An Imperfect God: George Washington, His Slaves, and the Creation of America
(New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2003) 215.
34
. Smith,
Letters of Delegates to Congress
, 217
35
. Robinson,
Structure of American Politics
, 114–115
37
. Brodsky,
Benjamin Rush
, 352-356
38
. Discussed in
Chapters 10
and
11
39
. Cappon,
Adams–Jefferson Letters
, 548
40
. Ibid. 549
41
. Ibid. 551
42
. Ibid. 569–70
43
. Ibid. 571. This attitude explains his compiler’s comment that Adams seemed disinterested in the slavery issue. Robert J. Taylor, Ed.,
Papers of John Adams
, Vol. III, May 1775–January 1776 (Cambridge: Belknap Press, 1979) xvi–xvii. Historian Theodore Draper’s view was that the American elite “wanted freedom from British subjugation without social travail and transformation,” Draper,
Struggle for Power
, 516
44
. See Nash,
Race and Revolution
, 25–50
45
. Lester H. Cohen, “Creating a Usable Future: The Revolutionary Historians and the National Past,” in Jack P. Greene, Ed.,
The American Revolution: Its Character and Limits
( New York: NYU Press, 1989) 309–330
46
. Ellis,
American Sphinx
, 267, suggests that Adams’s position presupposed a reciprocal obligation on the “southern gentlemen” to effect a policy of gradual emancipation. The existence of such an understanding seems unlikely in the Revolutionary years, and was explicitly denied by General Pinckney of South Carolina at the Constitutional convention. “General Pinckney thought himself bound to declare candidly that he did not think S. Carolina would stop her importations of slaves in any short time, but only stop them occasionally as she does now.” Rutledge of South Carolina agreed. “If the convention thinks that N.C., S.C., and Georgia will ever agree to the plan, unless their right to import slaves be untouched, the expectation is vain. The people of those states will never be such fools as to give up so important an interest.” Farrand,
Records
, Vol. 2, 373, Aug. 22, 1787.
47
. Richard Brookheiser,
America’s First Dynasty
, (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2002)198
48
. McCullough,
John Adams
, 545, describes Adams as “the farmer’s son who despised slavery,” in contrasting him to Jefferson, and also quotes Adams’s “confession” that he had deferred to the South on the issues of slavery, at 633, but does not draw any conclusions from that “confession” about Adams’s role concerning slavery during his active years.
49
. Burnett,
The Continental Congress
, 225-227
50
. “Letter to John Holmes, April 22, 1820,” in Ford,
Works of Thomas Jefferson
, 158
51
. Jensen,
Articles of Confederation,
146–47
52
. Morgan,
Birth of the Republic
, 96–97
53
. Rakove,
National Politics
, 3–20
54
. John Adams, to Benjamin Rush, July 23, 1806. John A. Schultz and Douglas Adair, Eds.,
The Spur of Fame: Dialogues of John Adams and Benjamin Rush, 1805–1813
(San Marino, CA: The Huntington Library, 1966) 61
55
. Cappon,
Adams–Jefferson Letters
, 451, July 15, 1815.
56
. Ibid. 452
57
. Ibid. 455.
58
. Quoted in Fritz Hirschfeld,
George Washington and Slavery: A Documentary Portrayal
(Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 1997) 121
C
HAPTER
6
T
HE
C
OLONIES
C
LAIM
I
NDEPENDENCE FROM
P
ARLIAMENT
1
Rakove,
National Politics
, 27–35
2
. “Instructions for the Deputies appointed to meet in General Congress on the Part of this Colony, 6 August 1774,” Commager,
Documents of American History
.
http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/related/instr.htm
3
. Rakove,
National Politics
, 33
4
. The Suffolk Resolves were prepared by Joseph Warren in a convention in Suffolk County condemning Parliament and a “licentious minister,” declaring all British appointed officers who did not resign enemies of the people, calling for armed militias, and stoppage of all commerce with Britain. They were approved by the Congress around September 16, as an expression of “wisdom and fortitude.” See Draper,
Struggle for Power
, 429
5
. Draper,
Struggle for Power
, 426–440. Ferling,
Leap in the Dark
, 109–122 describes in more detail the action at the Congress. The Declaration adopted on October 14 is available on the web at the Avalon Project of Yale Law School,
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/resolves.htm
6
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, Vol. 3, 310
7
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, Vol. 3, 308-310.
8
. See Ch.4
9
. Smith,
Letters of Delegates to Congress
, 44. The editorial note establishes that the document is either John Rutledge’s proposed resolution to the committee, or James Duane’s notes on a Rutledge proposal. This suggests that the linkage of the two concepts originated with Rutledge, and was taken up by Duane. It had earlier been believed the draft was by Duane. See Morgan,
Birth of the Republic
,65
10
. Draper,
Struggle for Power
, 265. The initial combination of “internal polity and taxation” appeared in the Virginia House of Burgesses’ petition of 1764, repeated in the Virginia resolves of May 29, 1765. Edmund S. Morgan and Helen M. Morgan, Eds.,
The Stamp Act Crisis: Prologue to Revolution
(Chapel Hill: University of NC Press, 1962)
11
. See Richard Barry,
Mr. Rutledge of South Carolina
(New York: Duell, Sloan and Pieve, 1942) for an account that identifies qualities of political sagacity in Rutledge’s actions.
12
. Smith,
Letters of Delegates to Congress
, 39,40, 42. See Morgan,
Birth of the Republic
, 65
13
. Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, 308–310
14
. The committee to state the rights of the colonies was established by the Congress on Tuesday, Sept. 6, 1774. JCC, 26. On Wednesday, Sept. 7, the Congress appointed two from each colony for the committee. On Friday, Sept. 9, the committee, “met, agreed to found our rights upon the laws of nature, the principles of the English Constitution & charters & compacts; ordered a sub. comee. to draw up a state of rights.” Smith,
Letters of Delegates to Congress
, 56. On Sept. 14, the subcommittee met, and reported to the Great Committee which appointed the next morning, the Sept. 15 for a consideration of the report.
15
. It appears that the Great Committee considered the report on rights on Sept. 15, 16, 19, 20, and 21, and reported to the Congress on Sept. 22. Sept. 24, 26, and 27 were devoted by Congress to developing the nonimportation principle. Thus, as of Sept. 28, when Galloway’s plan was presented, Congress had before it the report of the Great Committee which included the language which Adams had drafted.
16
. Adams may have intended to include the presentation of Galloway’s Plan of Union, proposed on Sept. 28, as an attack on his draft.
17
. This provision is essentially in accord with the Virginia instructions to its delegates to the Continental Congress. See
Chapter 4
18
Adams suggested that the italicized language was the critical issue, by indicating that it was the point of Rutledge’s interest. This language would not have been disputed by New York commercial interests who wished to continue British control of shipping, or by those like Galloway who preferred to retain British dominated legislative jurisdiction over the colonies, as much as the boldfaced language declaring independence from Parliament.
21
. There is evidence that Adams was aware of Rutledge’s proposal at the time he prepared Article IV. Rutledge’s proposal consisted of three paragraphs. The short middle paragraph contained one sentence: “We do not however admit into this collection [of English statutes and common law] but absolutely reject the statutes of Henry the VIII and Edward VI respecting treasons and misprisions of treason.” Adams’s diary for Sept. 13, 1774, the day before the subcommittee report was submitted to the great committee, notes, “ 1 & 2. Phil. & Mary. C. 10. ss. 7.” The editors note: “The British statute cited is ‘An acte whereby certayne offenses bee made tresons,’” Butterfield,
Diary and Autobiography
, 1554–55. The references of both Rutledge and Adams to treason in connection with what became Article IV suggest that they understood the risks that the adoption of the Article entailed. “Direct evidence,” in the form of writings by the delegates concerning their desire for independence in 1774, does not exist, and for a good reason. The delegates were concerned about being prosecuted for treason. John Adams’s diary, on Tuesday, Sept. 13, the day this deal was struck with Rutledge and the sub-committee, contains a citation to the British treason statute, as does Rutledge’s own proposal.
