USA > Connecticut > The Connecticut River and the valley of the Connecticut, three hundred and fifty miles from mountain to sea; historical and descriptive > Part 21
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These exciting matters disposed of, the regular business was resumed by the members with fine composure. The draft of the constitution was taken up and considered para- graph by paragraph through nearly four days' sittings, or till the eighth of July. Then came another and more
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startling interruption which threw the body into confusion. An express direct from the field clattered up to the tavern, bringing a message from General St. Clair which announced the fateful events of the evacuation of Ticonderoga on the morning of the sixth, the British pursuit of the retreating Americans, and the attack on the morning of the seventh upon Warner at Hubbardton, the disastrous result of which was not known at the time of writing.
In the line of the triumphant enemy's march were the homes of many of the members, and the first impulse, strong especially in the delegates from the western towns, was immediately to adjourn and fly to the common defence. As they were debating, suddenly there broke upon the town a furious thunderstorm which compelled all to keep the tavern's shelter for a time. While they waited they con- tinued their work, and the interval was sufficient to enable them properly and fully to complete it. The constitution as finally fixed was rapidly read and adopted unanimously ; an election was ordered for December when representatives should be chosen to the first General Assembly, which was appointed to meet at Bennington in January; a committee was named to procure a supply of arms for the new state ; and a Council of Safety was instituted to administer its affairs till the state should be duly organized. Then in the clearing of the storm the delegates, their civic work done, immediately scattered for the work of war.
The constitution was modelled after that of Pennsyl- vania, Benjamin Franklin's work, and was a pretty close copy. But the delegates added to the first section of the declaration of rights that clause, all their own, which gave Vermont the distinction of being the first of the American states to abolish slavery by constitutional act. Thus to the Connecticut Valley is to be credited another great step in democracy.
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The College party, after the issue of their " ultimatum " in June, remained inactive during the rest of this troublous summer of 1777. But in October, at a meeting in John Payne's tavern at Hanover, they appointed a new committee to lay that document before the Assembly then in session at Exeter. In November the Assembly made reply. The existing government and representation, it was agreed, were "far from perfect," but would answer for "the present purposes of our grand concern " - the war; the Assembly were in " full sentiment " that so soon as the circumstances of the war would admit, a free and equal representation of the people should convene and form a permanent system. Though conciliatory, this failed to satisfy. At the next session, which began in December, the Assembly took an- other tack. It was now proposed that the towns should, if they saw fit, at the next ensuing election instruct their representatives to call a constitutional convention, to be chosen by a full and free vote, at once to frame a permanent form of government.
These concessions were more effective, and perceptibly weakened the College statesmen's hold on their constituents. In this emergency they again resorted to the printing press. Their issue at this time, bearing date of January 6, 1778, was the now rare pamphlet entitled, " Observations on the Right of Jurisdiction claimed by the States of New York and New Hampshire over the New Hampshire Grants (so called) lying on both sides of Connecticut-River: In a Letter addressed to the Inhabitants of said Grants." The essay presented a concise historical statement of the origin of the jurisdiction, with a masterly argument in support of the right and the "expediency " of the grants on both sides of the River to unite under one government. It was so skill- fully framed as to apply either to a union of the east side
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towns with the new Vermont, or to an independent con- federation of east and west side towns whose centre and capital should be " Dresden." So the way was cleared for action.
Now followed a series of bold moves and counter-moves which kept the community on both sides of the River in a lively state of commotion for a considerable time.
The Vermont constitutional convention reassembled again at Windsor in a brief session on December 24, and on account of the war troubles postponed the election called for that date to the first of March, 1778, and advanced the day of meeting of the first Assembly to the twelfth of March. The place of meeting was also changed from Bennington to Windsor, perhaps through the influence of the College men. A month before the day appointed for the coming in of this Assembly the United-Committees met in Cornish, at Moses Chase's house, and evidently considered the de- tails of a scheme of union with the new state of all the New Hampshire towns between the River and the line of the Mason Grant, twenty miles east of it. To the eleven towns originally constituting the United-Committees' con- stituency five had been added, three of them River towns - Cornish, Piermont, and Lyman.
When on March 12 the new Assembly convened the United-Committees were in session conveniently across the River at Cornish, primed for action. Promptly upon the organization of the state in Windsor's "Constitution Hall" with the election of officers, they sent over a delegation bearing a petition for the admission of their sixteen east side towns, and all others on the grants east of the River that might be desirous of such union ; with the allegation that the sixteen were "not connected with any state with respect to their internal police." The proposition was
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received with marked disfavor by the Bennington party, and they brought about its rejection a day or two after by a decisive vote. But at this the representatives from most of the west side River towns threatened to withdraw and unite with the east-siders in forming a new state. There- upon the adverse vote was rescinded, and the Assembly finally referred the decision of the question to the people.
The popular vote was taken by towns after the adjourn- ment of the Assembly, and reported at the next session, which met at Bennington the following June. Forty-seven towns made returns. Thirty-five favored the union, twelve opposed it. The Bennington party protested that the towns had voted under a misapprehension, and charged the Col- lege party with having wilfully spread the impression that New Hampshire was indifferent to the movement. The Benningtonians were also at a disadvantage, since the larger part of the towns west of the mountains had been abandoned at the time of Burgoyne's advance and were not yet in condition to vote. The opposition, however, accepted the situation, and on June 11 the sixteen east side towns were formally admitted into the Vermont fold. Notifica- tion was also made to the contiguous towns that they would be similarly received upon a vote of the major part of their inhabitants in favor of union.
The College party now began to exercise a directing hand in the further shaping of the state. On June 15 Dartmouth College was taken under the patronage of Ver- mont. President Eleazer Wheelock was commissioned a justice of the peace, and Bezaleel Woodward was appointed one of the judges of the superior court " for the banishment of tories &c." With the College statesmen's plans at last apparently prospering, this session adjourned, the next Assembly to meet again at Windsor, in October.
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During the interval between these sittings, however, moves were made by the opposition which were to turn the game.
Shortly after the adjournment of the Bennington ses- sion the United-Committees met in Orford, at the house of Colonel Morey, and prepared a series of instructions for the conduct of the east side towns that had accepted the union with Vermont. They were to obey all military orders emanating from Vermont, but were to cooperate with the New Hampshire militia in all matters pertaining to the common defence. A letter was also despatched to Presi- dent Weare announcing the separation of these towns from New Hampshire; and, with a suavity under the circum- stances sublime, expressing the hope that an " amicable settlement may be come into at a proper time between the State of New Hampshire and those towns on the grants that unite with the State of Vermont relative to all civil and military affairs transacted in connection with the State of New Hampshire since the commencement of the present war to the time of the union, so that amity and friendship may subsist and continue between the two states." But the studied courtesy of this communication instead of soft- ening incensed the Exeter party, and their batteries were turned hotly beyond the College party against the new state.
The hostilities warmed up with the sending in August of two stirring letters from President Weare, one to the New Hampshire delegates in the Continental Congress, the other to Governor Chittenden. In the letter to the delegates he told caustically of the action of the " pretended State of Vermont " in extending " their pretended jurisdic- tion " over the Connecticut and "taking into union, as they phrase it," the towns belonging to New Hampshire;
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and he urged the delegates to endeavor to induce Congress to interfere, otherwise the sword might have to decide the matter. To Governor Chittenden, whom he addressed not in that gentleman's "magistratical style," since Vermont had not been admitted into the confederacy of the United States, he represented the assumption that the sixteen towns were not connected with any state in respect to their in- ternal police, to be "an idle phantom, a mere chimera." The "town of Boston in Massachusetts, or Hartford in Connecticut," he indignantly declared, "might as naturally evince their being unconnected with their respective states as these sixteen towns their not being connected with New Hampshire." He besought Mr. Chittenden to exert his influence to undo the work.
Upon the receipt of this letter the Vermont governor convoked the council, and at the instance of the Bennington party, Ethan Allen was despatched upon a semi-official mission to Philadelphia to "ascertain in what light the proceedings of Vermont were viewed by Congress." Allen arriving in Philadelphia in September, found the delegates from New Hampshire and New York combined in a common effort to crush the new state. He succeeded in winning over the New Hampshire delegates by entering into a compact with them, under which he stipulated to use his influence to dissolve the union with the towns east of the Connecticut, they agreeing, if this were done, to break with New York and assist Vermont in procuring the recognition of Con- gress. Then he hastened back to plan for carrying out his part of the bargain as speedily as possible.
When the Assembly convened in Windsor for the Oc- tober session, representatives from ten of the sixteen east side towns appeared and took their seats. The College party were sufficiently strong to elect Bezaleel Woodward,
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who sat for Dresden, as clerk of the House. On the se- cond day Ethan Allen's report was put in. It was em- phatic in the expression of his conviction, from what he had heard of the disapprobation of the union with "sundry towns east of the River Connecticut," that unless the state immediately receded from such union, "the whole power of the confederacy of the United States of America " would join to annihilate Vermont. Congress, he confidently as- serted, was ready to concede her independence provided no claim was made to jurisdiction east of the River.
With this report President Weare's August letter to Governor Chittenden was taken up and the union was under consideration in committee of the whole, joined by the governor and council, for nearly a fortnight. The Bennington party bent their energies to break it, while the College party ably sustained it. Of a committee appointed to outline a plan to " lay the foundation " for an answer to President Weare, the College party had the majority. They carried through a report announcing the Assembly's determination "in every prudent and lawful way to main- tain and support entire the state as it now stands "; and coolly proposing to the Exeter government a plan for estab- lishing the Mason line as the boundary line between New Hampshire and Vermont. The report made provision for the drafting by a sub-committee, which they named, of a "Declaration," setting forth the political state of the grants on both sides of the River from the time of their original issue.
To this point the Bennington party had been outma- nœuvred by the College statesmen. But the day after the adoption of the report (October 21) the Benningtonians succeeded in executing a flank movement which brought affairs to a crisis with the advantage on their side. This
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movement was the defeat of the College party's measure for erecting the east side towns into a county by them- selves, or annexing them to one of the west side counties. Thus these towns were summarily deprived of the exercise of any jurisdictional power, and denied the same "privileges and immunities " enjoyed by the other towns of the state, as guaranteed them by the act of union. Thereupon their representatives bolted. Entering a formal protest against the proceeding on the ground that it violated the Vermont constitution and "totally destroyed the confederation of the state," they all walked out from the Assembly. And with them went the representatives of ten border towns on the west side, two members of the council, and the deputy or lieutenant governor, Colonel Joseph Marsh of the Ver- mont Hartford. So the Assembly was left with barely a quorum, but the Bennington party in full control.
The Bennington party artfully interpreted the protest and withdrawal as virtually a dissolution of the union, thus accomplishing their object. The next day, October 23, was devoted to much writing of messages to outside author- ities. Governor Chittenden and Ethan Allen prepared let- ters to President Weare, while the " Protesting Members," as the bolters designated themselves, drew up a presenta- tion of their side to the president of Congress. Governor Chittenden's letter represented the Assembly's vote on the county matter as actually a resolve that "no additional exercise of jurisdictional authority be had by the state east of Connecticut River for the time being." Colonel Allen wrote more spiritedly. The union, brought about " inad- vertently by influence of designing men," was in his opinion now entirely dissolved, and he hoped the New Hampshire government would excuse the "imbecility" of Vermont in entering into it. He had punctually discharged his
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obligation with the delegates in Congress for its demolition. Now he looked to New Hampshire to complete the bargain by acceding to the independence of Vermont, " as the late obstacles are honorably removed." Both of these letters were despatched to Exeter by Ira Allen, Ethan's able and more diplomatic younger brother, well up to the measure of a great statesman. The letter of the " Protesting Mem- bers " to President Laurens was intended mainly to fore- stall possible acknowledgment of Vermont with her eastern boundary at the River. It was forwarded by John Whee- lock, now made Colonel, for service in the war, and virtually accredited by the protestants as their agent to Congress.
On the twenty-fourth the few representatives left in the Assembly finished up the remaining business, and after making provision for ascertaining the sense of the people upon the subject of the union, adjourned to meet next at Bennington in February (1779). On the same day the Protesting Members, now organized after the manner of the United-Committees, were planning to assemble a con- vention at Cornish on the ninth of December (1778) of delegates from all the towns on the Grants.
A brave move was now to be made by the scholars in politics. The purpose of this convention was practically to take measures for the formation of a new state of the towns on both sides of the River, and to supplant Vermont.
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The Play for a State
The College Party's Strategic Moves -New Hampshire extending Jurisdiction over Vermont's Territory - Clashes in West Side River Towns between Vermont Officers and " Yorkers" - Ethan Allen and his " Green Moun- tain Boys " on the Scene - A Trial in Westminster Court-House - Con- gress and the Contesting Interests - New Combinations in the Valley - Ira Allen's clever Capture of a Convention - East-side Towns again united with Vermont - Disturbances in River border Towns - Final Move of the Benningtonians - Passing of the College Party.
TO prepare the way for their Cornish convention of December, 1778, and the supplanting of Vermont by a new state in the Valley, the College statesmen issued a new address, the most elaborate of all their essays. This was the famous state paper, " A Public Defence of the Rights of the New Hampshire Grants (so called) on Both Sides of Connecticut-River to Associate Together and form themselves into an Independent State." It was deliber- ately put forth as the "Declaration " called for in the re- port adopted by the October Vermont Assembly before the bolt of the " Protesting Members," and purported to be the work of the " major part of the committee appointed for that purpose." The "major part " comprised the bolting College party leaders.
Questionable as the manner of putting it forth may have been, it was a document ranking with the ablest state papers of the period, and it has become of distinct historical value.
It discussed with lucidness the fundamental principles
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of free government which the republican statesmen of that day were advancing in the colonies. It marked sharply the distinction between the charter governments of Massa- chusetts and Connecticut and the government of New Hampshire by royal commission, upon which distinction from the beginning the College men had grounded the right of the grants to stand out from New Hampshire when the king's authority was thrown off. Unlike Massachusetts and Connecticut, whose people were "held together and united by Grants and Charters from the king conferring both landed property and jurisdiction, which the king could not constitutionally alter," New Hampshire, outside the Mason Grant, " never owned an inch of land or farth- ing of property. Neither could they even as much as grant a town incorporation ; nor had they right or voice in the matter. In short, they never were a body politic in any legal sense whatever ; nor anything more than a number of people subjected to the obedience of the king's servant (the governor) in such way as his commission prescribed." With the Declaration of Independence the royal commis- sion became "a mere nullity." When the power of the king was rejected and ceased to operate, -
" the people made a stand at their first legal stage, viz., their town incorporations, which they received from the king as little Grants or Charters of privileges by which they were united in little incorpor- ated bodies with certain powers and privileges which were not held at the pleasure of the king (as those commissions were) but were perpetual. These the people by universal consent held sacred ; and so long as they hold these grants so long do they hold themselves subjects of government according to them; and as such must and do they act, and transact all heir political affairs. Hence it is that the major part of one of those towns have a right to control the minor part. . .. Consequently they will remain so many distinct corporations until they agree to unite in one aggregate body .. . as
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much as the thirteen United States were before they entered into a confederacy."
Thus President Weare's assertion that the seceding sixteen towns could no more claim to be unconnected with any state than could Boston in Massachusetts or Hartford in Connecticut, was met and answered. Other arguments of the Exeter government were as successfully controverted, and the Defence concluded with these alternative proposi- tions to New Hampshire : to unite all the New Hampshire Grants in one state by themselves, or to annex the whole to New Hampshire. The adoption of either would be likely to bring the seat of government to the Valley and the College neighborhood and thus realize the desires of the College party.
When the Cornish convention assembled at Samuel Chase's house on the appointed day, it appeared that twen- ty-two towns were represented. Eight of these were towns west of the River. All were the most populous and influ- ential in their respective counties. The only record of the proceedings is a series of resolves as adopted, printed at the back of the pamphlet containing the "Public Defence." These resolves, however, sufficiently indicate the radical nature of the action taken. They approved the "Public Defence " and adopted its principles. They rejected the line of the River, arbitrarily fixed by the king in 1764, as a boundary between separate jurisdictions. They assumed that the Vermont Assembly's act of October 21 on the county matter effectually destroyed the Windsor consti- tution, and involved the dissolution of the Vermont con- federation of towns .. They provided that the towns not represented in the convention be requested to join the body in proposals to New Hampshire for the settlement of the
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boundary line between that state and the grants at or near the Mason line. Should the Vermont towns not agree to this, then efforts would be made to induce New Hampshire to claim jurisdiction over the entire grants provided a plan of government was adopted agreeable to the views of the people on them. Meanwhile, the resolves significantly closed, till one or the other of these proposals should be accepted, the "United Towns," as the combination was now styled, would " trust in Providence and defend them- selves."
The Bennington party moved energetically to thwart these schemes. Ira Allen, who, as he wrote, “ providen- tially happened " at the Cornish convention, immediately sent an account of it to President Weare in a letter from Windsor, with his assurance that the incoming Assembly of Vermont would not countenance an encroachment on the State of New Hampshire, and the intimation that any at- tempt on New Hampshire's part to extend her "ancient jurisdiction " west of the River would be resisted. He had already issued from Dresden, the heart of the College party, an address to the west side people recounting the reasons which should determine them to adhere to the Vermont government as then constituted. The Dresden leaders of the " United Towns" as sedulously pursued their cause, exerting their best endeavors to bring the same west side towns to their propositions.
The Benningtonians, however, easily won, and when the General Assembly came in at Bennington, February 11, 1779, a clear majority of the representatives were found to be instructed to vote for recession from the union with the sixteen east side towns. Accordingly the matter was taken up with the first business, and on the second day a committee had reported and the Assembly had voted
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formally to dissolve "said union " and make it "totally void, null and extinct."
With this action the committee of the Cornish conven- tion were driven to the alternative of inducing New Hamp- shire to assert her old jurisdiction over all the grants as before the royal decree of 1764, and so wipe out Vermont. This proposition was immediately pushed, notwithstanding its conflict with the theory, all along so stoutly maintained, in justification of the secession of the sixteen towns. In March General Bailey and Captain Davenport Phelps at Newbury, asa sub-committee, or agents, embodied the pro- posal in a skilfully drawn petition to the Exeter govern- ment. Later, in March, Ira Allen, appearing at Exeter with Governor Chittenden's report of the dissolution of the union, found the project making dangerous progress there. Strong efforts were exerted to head it off, but without suc- cess. It however entered the House in a mutilated form. The committee to whom it had been referred reported that the state should lay claim to the jurisdiction of the whole of the grants lying westward of the River, but "allowing and conceding, nevertheless, that if the honorable Conti- nental Congress " should permit them to be a separate state, "as now claimed by some of the inhabitants thereof by the name of Vermont," New Hampshire would acquiesce therein. Meanwhile, until the dispute were settled by Congress, New Hampshire should exercise jurisdiction only so far as the western bank of the River. Action on this report was prudently reserved till the following session in June, and the Cornish committee were requested to col- lect in the interim the sentiments of the people west of the River in town-votes on their proposition. Accordingly the Cornish committee proceeded industriously to canvass the Vermont towns through handbills and circular letters sent out from Dresden.
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