From September 5 to October 26, 1774, delegates from twelve colonies (New Hampshire to South Carolina) convened in Philadelphia to prepare a united response to the Coercive Acts, a series of laws that Parliament had passed between March and June 1774 to punish Boston and Massachusetts for the Boston Tea Party. Shocked at the destruction of property and the rebelliousness of Boston, Parliament passed the Boston Port Act, Massachusetts Government Act, Act for the Impartial Administration of Justice, and the Quartering Act. These laws closed the port of Boston until the citizens paid for the lost tea, altered the government of Massachusetts (essentially annulling its charter), removed royal officials in Massachusetts from the jurisdiction of provincial courts, and allowed for the quartering of troops not only in taverns and unoccupied buildings, but in occupied dwellings if a colony failed to provide accommodations for the soldiery. The Coercive Acts, with the Quebec Act that among other things extended the boundary of Quebec to the Ohio River, seemed part of a tyrannical system designed to subvert the colonists' rights and subjugate them "that are not, and, from local circumstances, cannot be represented in the house of commons, to the uncontroulable and unlimited power of parliament, in violation of their undoubted rights and liberties." Rather than isolate Boston and Massachusetts from the other colonies and bring the New Englanders to heel as intended, the Intolerable Acts, as they were known in the colonies, inflamed passions against Parliament and the British ministry. Massachusetts sent out an appeal for a general congress to be held in Philadelphia in September to seek redress of American grievances.
Carpenters' Hall from Annals of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, 1856.
On the morning of Monday, September 5, the delegates gathered at City Tavern on the corner of Second and Walnut Streets and at 10 a.m. walked as a body the few blocks to the newly completed Carpenters' Hall, where they would meet for the next seven weeks. On that first day, they unanimously elected Peyton Randolph of Virginia as president of the Congress and Charles Thomson as secretary and those in attendance presented their credentials. On Tuesday, the members determined that each colony would have one vote and "that the door shall be kept shut during the time of business, and that the members consider themselves under the strongest obligations of honour, to keep the proceedings secret, until the majority shall direct them to be made public." They agreed to appoint a committee to state the rights of the colonies, how they had been violated, and how to restore them and a committee to report on the statutes affecting the "trade and manufactures" of the colonies.
Title page of volume 1 of the 1800-1801 edition of the journals of the Continental Congress.
Anglican clergyman Jacob Duché, assistant rector of Christ Church and St. Peter's, opened Congress with prayers at 9 a.m. on Wednesday. The Psalter for the seventh day was the 35th Psalm--"Plead thou my cause, O Lord, with them that strive with me, and fight thou against them that fight against me." As John Adams recorded in his diary, "it was most admirably adapted, though this was accidental, or rather providential." Committee members were chosen, and Congress then adjourned until Monday, September 12. The first public act of the body was to unanimously endorse the Suffolk Resolves, a declaration of resistance to the Coercive Acts passed in Suffolk County, Massachusetts. On September 17, Congress "Resolved unanimously, That this assembly deeply feels the suffering of their countrymen in the Massachusetts-Bay, under the operation of the late unjust, cruel, and oppressive acts of the British parliament--that they most thoroughly approve the wisdom and fortitude, with which opposition to these wicked ministerial measures has hitherto been conducted, and they earnestly recommend to their brethren, a perseverance in the same firm and temperate conduct as expressed in the resolutions determined upon, at a meeting of the delegates for the county of Suffolk, on Tuesday the 6th instant, trusting that the effect of the united efforts of North-America in their behalf, will carry such conviction to the British nation, of the unwise, unjust, and ruinous policy of the present administration, as quickly to introduce better men and wiser measures." Congress then ordered that its resolutions, along with the Suffolk Resolves, be published in the newspapers.
Forty-four delegates were in attendance on September 5, 1774. Twelve more representatives would arrive in the following weeks, including three from North Carolina.
On Friday, October 14, Congress declared "That the inhabitants of the English colonies in North-America, by the immutable laws of nature, the principles of the English constitution, and the several charters or compacts, have the following RIGHTS." They enumerated those rights in ten resolutions, the first stating, "That they are entitled to life, liberty, and property: and they have never ceded to any sovereign power whatever, a right to dispose of either without their consent." The declaration and resolves laid out the Parliamentary acts that violated the colonists' rights and announced the peaceable measures Congress had determined to pursue to restore harmony between Great Britian and the colonies. These measures were a non-importation, non-consumption, non-exportation agreement (the word boycott did not yet exist); an address to the people of Great Britain and an address to the inhabitants of British America; and an address to the king.
After several days of debate on the first measure, Congress adopted the Continental Association on October 18 and the delegates signed the document on October 20. It states that to obtain redress of their grievances, "which threaten destruction to the lives, liberty, and property of his majesty's subjects, in North-America, we are of opinion, that a non-importation, non-consumption, non-exportation agreement, faithfully adhered to, will prove the most speedy, effectual, and peaceable measure." The following day, Congress approved both the address to the people of Great Britain and the address to the inhabitants of the colonies. While disavowing any desire for independence, the address to the people of Great Britain warns, "if you are determined that your ministers shall wantonly sport with the rights of mankind--if neither the voice of justice, the dictates of the law, the principles of the constitution, or the suggestions of humanity, can restrain your hands from shedding human blood, in such an impious cause, we must then tell you, that we will never submit to be hewers of wood, or drawers of water, for any ministry or nation in the world." To the colonists, Congress boldly states, "From the detail of facts, herein before recited, as well as from authentic intelligence received, it is clear beyond a doubt, that a resolution is formed, and now carrying into execution, to extinguish the freedom of these colonies, by subjecting them to a despotic government."
The signers of the Continental Association.
On Wednesday, October 26, the delegates signed the address to the king, "filled with the sentiments of duty to your majesty, and of affection to our parent state...anxious to evince the sincerity of these dispositions, we present this petition only to obtain redress of grievances, and relief from fears and jealousies, occasioned by the system of statutes and regulations adopted since the close of the late war [the Seven Years' War]." Congress then "dissolved itself," having already resolved on October 22 that another Congress be held on May 10, 1775 in Philadelphia, unless redress of their grievances had been attained.
Special Collections & Archives has two editions of the journals of the Continental Congress, one published between 1800 and 1801 in 13 volumes, and a four-volume set published in 1823.
Title page of volume 1 of the 1823 edition of the journals of the Continental Congress.
Sources:
Adams, John. The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States. Edited by Charles Francis Adams. 10 vols. Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1850-1856. E302.A26 1850-1856. Quote from vol. 2, p. 368. E302.A26 1850-1856
Journals of the American Congress from 1774 to 1788. 4 vols. Washington: Way and Gideon, 1823. J10.A3 1823
Journals of Congress: Containing Their Proceedings from September 5, 1774, to [November 3, 1788]. 13 vols. Philadelphia: Richard Folwell, 1800-1801. All quotes from vol. 1. J10.A2 1800-1801
Watson, John Fanning. Annals of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, in the Olden Time. 2 vols. Philadelphia: Whiting and Thomas, 1856-1857. F158.3.W5 1857
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