History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 89

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, ed
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co.
Number of Pages: 1354

USA > New York > Westchester County > History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I > Part 89

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been of a different tenor ; but John Morin Seott, who was present on both occasions, and whose master mind probably controlled, wisely halted, and evidently induced the Congress to halt, in the work of pro- posed persecution and devastation and ruin. The Committee of Salem was coldly dismissed, without even a word of sympathy ; and the Provincial Con- gress paid no further attention to the subject.

With a persisteney which was worthy of a better purpose, notwithstanding the rebuke which the Pro- vincial Congress had thus administered, the Commit- tee at Salem was not disposed to be thus relegated to the obseurity of a rural Town; and, subsequently, two other letters, relating to the same general subject of " the disaffected persons who were under bonds to " that Committee," were addressed by it, to the Con- gress. The first of these letters is in these words :

" GENTLEMEN :

" As our civil and religious privileges all lie at "stake, we that are friends thereto desire to lend a " lifting hand in trying to preserve them ; and as the " tories grow more and more disaffected, and are daily "going off on to Long island-four men last week " from my neighborhood, several more from other "parts, Capt. Theal and his son John Lobdiu, and "Stephen Delanee" [De Lancey ?] " some of them " laid under £500. bonds and also the solemnity of an " oath-but they regard not any thing the Connnit- " tee does witli them, so long as they have their lib- "erty. It is supposed numbers are concealed on " Long island. Please to take it into your wise con- " sideration, whether or no it will not be best to send "and purge Long island; and as I wrote to you a "little baek by Mr. Chapman, one of the members of " Salem Committee, to know what we should do with " those that forfeit their bonds, and how we should " get pay for the last, as there is since many more, we . " should be glad of an answer.

" By order of the Committee, " EZEKIEL HAWLEY, Chairman. "SALEM, June 22d, 1776.

' TO THE HONOURABLE TIIE PROVINCIAL CONGRESS "OF NEW-YORK." +

Two days after that letter was written, [June 24, 1776,] the Sub-committees of Cortlandt and Salem united in the following letter, also addressed to the Provincial Congress ; and in order to expedite the consideration of the subject to which it was devoted, by that body, Ezekiel Hawley was formally directed to forward it, " with all convenient speed."

"SALEM, 24th of June, 1776.

" GENTLEMEN :

" Whereas sundry persons of uote have lately ab- "sconded from our part of the country, and we have " reason to think, from several circumstances, are " (with numbers of others) assembling together on

+ Journal of the Provincial Congress : Correspondence, ii., 196, 197.

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THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, 1774-1783.

" Long island, with a view to join the Ministerial " Army, we beg the Congress would take the matter " under consideration, and adopt such measures as to " youshall appear most proper for the removal of such " dangerous assemblages, who we fear are forming " a combination to aid and assist the Ministerial Army "when an opportunity shall permit.

"ORDERED, That the same be forwarded with all " convenient spced by Mr. Ezckiel Halley.

" By the joint order of the Sub-committees of the " manor of Cortlandt and Salem.

" EZEKIEL HALLEY,

" JOSEPH BENEDICT,

" Chairmen.

" TO THE HONOURABLE THE PROVINCIAL CON- GRESS." 1

Thesc two letters were presented to the Provincial Congress, on the afternoon of the twenty-fourth of June; read before that body ; and ordered " to remain "for further consideration ; " 2 and there, as far as we have knowledge, they have remained, from that day until this-the Provincial Congress certainly paid no further attention to them.

Closely connected with it, if it was not really the basis of that policy of proscription and persecution and devastation which peculiarly distinguished the entire series of Provincial Congresses and Committees of Safety of the Colony of New York, as well as the early Conventions and Legislatures of the State, after the Colony had ceased to exist, was the series of Tests, known as Associations, which were enaeted, first, by the Continental Congress of 1774 and, subsequently, in various forms, by the Provincial Congresses of New York, by the latter of whom and by their several Committees of Safety they were, also, rigidly en- forced, as we have seen, in other portions of this narrative.

One of these Tests, or Associations, adopted by a Provincial Committee of Safety, was proved to have been so entirely subversive of the personal Rights of those to whom it was offered, that numbers who had previously favored or acquieseed in the Rebellion, peremptorily declined to sign it, preferring rather to be considered as disaffected and to be disarmed, as such,3 and to suffer all the other pains and penalties and insults to which those who were known as " dis- " affected" were continually subjected.

The disaffection referred to must have been quite extended, seriously impairing the prospects of a polit- ical uniformity throughout the Colony, to which the leaders of the Rebellion had constantly aspired, or the Provincial Congress would not have turned aside from its daily routine to have noticed it. As it had reached

those proportions which entitled it to respect, how- ever, on the eighteenthi of June, thirce days after the organization of "the Committee to detect Conspir- "acies," the Provincial Congress adopted the following Resolution, on the subject :

" WHEREAS doubts have arisen respecting the true " construction of a certain Association ordered by the " late Committee of Safety of this Colony, to be pre- " sented for subseription to the inhabitants thereof :

" RESOLVED, That all doubts respecting the true " construction of the said Association ought to be re- " moved; and that a Committee be appointed to " prepare and report a Resolution for that purpose." +

On the twentieth of June, the Committee which had been appointed to consider the subjeet-a Com- mittee composed of Thomas Tredwell and John Sloss Hobart, of Suffolk, and John Jay, of the City of New York, all of whom were distinguished for their rigid and intense partisan feelings-submitted its Report, evidently the work of John Jay, by whom it was pre- sented. As it was intended to be submitted to the inhabitants of Westchester-county, and to be em- ployed as the basis of fresh outrages against their persons and properties, it may properly find a place in this narrative:

" IN PROVINCIAL CONGRESS, " NEW-YORK, June 20, 1776.

" WHEREAS, the Continental Congress, on the " fourteenth day of March last, did recommend to the " several Assemblies, Conventions, and Councils or " Committees of Safety of the United Colonies, im- " mediately to cause all persons to be disarmed within " their respective Colonies, who were notoriously dis- " affeeted to the cause of America, or had not associ- " ated, and refused to associate to defend, by arms, " these United Colonies, against the hostile attempts " of the British Fleets and Armies :

" AND, WHEREAS, the late Committee of Safety of " this Colony did, thercupon, on the twenty-seventh " day of March aforesaid, recommend it to the Com- " mittees of the several Cities, Counties, Manors, " Townships, Precincts, and Distriets in this Colony, " forthwith, to cause to be disarmed, all persons " within their respective districts, who were known " to be disaffected to the cause of America, and also " all such persons as should refuse to sign the follow- " ing Association, viz. :

"' We, the subscribers, inhabitants of

" ' in the County of , and Colony " ' of New York, do voluntarily and solemnly engage, " ' under all the ties held sacred among mankind, at " ' the risk of our lives and fortunes, to defend, by " 'arms, the United American Colonics, against the " ' hostile attempts of the British Fleets and Armies, "' until the present unhappy controversy between " ' the two Countries shall be settled.'

4 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Tuesday morning, June 18, 1776."

1 Journal of the Provincial Congress : Correspondence, ii., 197.

2 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Monday afternoon, June 24, "1776."

3 Recital in the Preamble of the new Association, adopted by the Pro- vincial Congress, on the twentieth of June, 1776.

354

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

" AND WHEREAS it hath been objected to the said " form of an Association, that, by obliging the sub- "scribers or associators, in such general and express " terms, to defend the United Colonies, by arms, "against the hostile attempts of the British Fleets "and Armies, it deprived them of the Rights reserved "by the Militia Regulations, and imposed on them the " necessity of marching to the most distant of the " Colonies, whenever called upon, which construction " of the said Association, however nice and casuistical, "is inconsistent and fallacious, it being manifest that " the Militia Regulations could, by no rules of construc- "tion, be supposed to be repealed and abrogated by " any subtle implications drawn from the said Associ- "tion. But, as some of the friends to the American " cause have been influenced, by this objection, to "refuse signing the said Association, and, in conse- " quence thereof, been disarmed, it hath become ex- "pedieut that the said Association should be so ex- " plained as to render it free from specious as well as "solid objections; and, therefore,

"RESOLVED, UNANIMOUSLY, That nothing in the "said Association contained, shall extend or be con- "strued to extend to deprive those who have sub- " scribed it of any Rights reserved to them, iu and by " the said Militia Regulations ; and to the end that all " the Freemen of this Colony may associate for the "preservation of American liberty, in a form entirely "unexceptionable ;

"RESOLVED, UNANIMOUSLY, That the following " form of an Association be and it is hereby recom- " mended to them, viz. :

"'We, the subscribers, inhabitants of

""'in the County of . , and Colony of New "' York, do most solemnly declare that the claims of " ' the British Parliament to bind, at their discretion, "' the people of the United Colonies in America, in " ' all cases whatsoever, are, in our opinions, absurd, "'unjust, and tyrannical; and that the hostile at- ""' tempts of their Fleets and Armies to enforce sub- "'mission to those wicked and ridiculous claims " 'ought to be resisted by arms.

"' And, therefore, we do engage aud associate, ""' under all the ties which we respectively hold "' sacred, to defend, by arms, these United Colonies, "'against the said hostile attempts, agreeable to such " ' Laws and Regulations as our Representatives in "' the Congresses or future General Assemblies of " ' this Colony have or shall, for that purpose, make " 'and establish.'

" And that all persons who have been disarmed for "refusing to associate with their countrymen, for the " defense of the United Colonies, in the form pre- " scribed by the late Committee of Safety, as afore- " said, may have no preteuce to complain of injus- " tice, and that they may have a fair opportunity of " convincing the public that their refusal to sign the " said Association did not arise from a disinclinatiou " to defend the Rights of America, but merely from

" objections to sign to the form of the said Association, " and thereby be restored to the privilege of bearing "arms in support of a cause so important and so "glorious;

" RESOLVED, UNANIMOUSLY, That all persons, " other than those whom the Committees of the sey- " eral Counties shall adjudge to be uotoriously disaf- " fected to the American cause, who have not asso- " ciated iu the form prescribed by the late Committee " of Safety, as aforesaid, be called upon, by persons " to be appointed by the said Committees of the sev- " eral Couuties, and requested to subscribe the Asso- " ciation contained and recommended in and by these " Resolutions. And

" RESOLVED, FURTHER, That all such of the said "persons as shall subscribe the same, other than " notoriously disaffected persons, as aforesaid, ought " to be considered and treated as friends to their " couutry ; and that all arms taken from them and " not disposed of to the Continental troops, be re- "stored to them; and that care be taken that they " respectively be paid the full price allowed, for such " of their arms as may have been delivered to the " Continental troops, as aforesaid.

" AND FURTHER, that all such of the said persons " as shall refuse to subscribe to the same, together " with all notorious disaffected persons, be forthwith, " if not already done, disarmed, and required on oatlı " to declare and discover whether the arms so to be " taken from them be all the arms they respectively " have or had, and if not, where the residue thereof, " to the best of their knowledge and belief, are depos- "ited aud may be found; and that such of them as " shall refuse to take such oath, be committed to safe " custody till they will consent to take it. .

" RESOLVED, UNANIMOUSLY, That it be and it is " hercby recommended to the Committees of the sev- " eral Counties in this Colony, to carry the aforesaid " Resolutions into execution, with diligence and " punctuality."1

It is said that the Report and Resolutions were unanimously adopted by the Provincial Congress, evidently without the slightest consideration of their characters and probable result, and certainly during the latter portion of an afternoou session of the Con- gress, in which, both before and after the presenta- tion of them, that body was crowded with other and very important matters of business ; and it is said to have ordered, at that time, that the Resolutions should be printed in all the newspapers which were then published in the City of New York and in hand- bills; and "that the Resolutions be read to every " person to whom the Association thereby recom- " mended shall be offered for subscription." 2

Whatever the real motives of those who had de-

1 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Thursday Afternoon, June 20, "1776."

2 Ibid.

355

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, 1774-1783.

clined to sign the Association which the Committee of Safety had prescribed, had been, they were such as had led the Provincial Congress to notice them, respectfully, and to lead that body to move for the re- moval of the objectious which had been thus reasona- bly raised against that Association, by those whom the Provincial Congress's Committee was constrained to recognize as " friends to the American cause; " and it ill became John Jay, therefore, to display so many of the idiosyncrasies of his generally unamiable character, in the contemptuous and singularly insult- ing words which he applied to those of his fellow " friends of the American cause" who had presumed to take their knowledge of the legal obligations con- tained in that objectiouable Association from some oue else thau from himself aud his Congressional con- frcrie ; and an impartial examination of the two forms of Association, and a careful comparison of that revised form, which he induced the Provincial Con- gress to substitute for that against which the objec- tions had been raised, with the latter, will clearly indicate to the reader that the writer of that revised form had permitted his evil passions to get the better of his personal integrity, when he belittled himself by reporting au Association which was even more objectionable in its provisions than that which had becn objected to, dressed and decorated with a meaningless Preamble, evidently intended for the beguilement of the uuwary, but without containing a single word of provision, either in the Preamble or in the Association itself, that the signers of that revised instrument, by that act, would not deprive themselves of their Rights as Militia, and subjeet themselves to be taken beyond the limits of the Colony, even to the extent of the most distant of the confederated Colonies, whenever some body, over whom they eould exercise no control, should incline to order them thither. Indeed, instead of relieving the Asso- ciation which the Committee of Safety had recom- mended, from the uncertainties of its provisions, the only duty which had been assigned to John Jay and his two rustic associates, these astute partisans, in the bitterness of their animosities, did nothing else, in the way of the duty which had devolved on them, than to indulge in contemptuous sneers and inuen- does against those who had objected to the terms of the Committee of Safety's Association, without includ- ing, in their revised form, the provisions of safety which the Provincial Congress had evidently intended to haveinserted; and, by the addition of words which were not in the former, they actually made the signers of the revised Association, more than before, the helpless subjects of two absolutely despotic bodies, over neither of whom could they bring any, even the slightest, restraining influenee, no matter how objectionable and oppressive the Orders and enactments of either or both of those bodies might be.

As a man thinketh in his heart, so he is; and it will be difficult, in the light of such actions as this,

to convince any honest man that, whatever he may have been after he had reached that place in the office-bearing ranks of his countrymen which he so greatly coveted and of which he was so exeeeding fond, while John Jay was still struggling for place, it mattered little under what master, he was neither more nor less upright, in what he said and did for the advancement of his individual or his party's purposes, than are office-seekers of our own day, with whom the end in view is generally made to justify the means.

On the twenty-sixth of June, the Provincial Con- gress received a letter from the President of the Continental Congress, dated on the preceding day, and enclosing a Resolution of that body,1 the latter of which, because of its remarkable character, is entitled to a passing notice, in this placc. The Reso- lution referred to was in these words :

" IN CONGRESS, June 24, 1776.

" RESOLVED, That all persons abiding within any " of the United Colouies and deriving protection from "the Laws of the same, owe allegiance to the said " Laws and are members of such Colony ; and that all " persons passing through, visiting, or making a tem- " porary stay in auy of the said Colouies, being en- "titled to the protection of the Laws during the time "of such passage, visitation, or temporary stay, owe, "during the same time, allegiance thereto.

" That all persons, members of or owing allegiance "to any of the United Colonies, as before described, " who shall levy war against any of the said Colonies, " within the same, or be adherent to the King of Great " Britain or others, the enemies of the said Colonies, or "any of them, within the same, giving to him or them "aid or comfort, are guilty of treason against such " Colony.

"That it be recommended to the Legislatures of " the several United Colonies to pass Laws for punish- " ing, in such manner as to them shall seem fit, such "persons, as before described, as shall be proveably " attainted of open deed, by people of their condi- "tions, of any of the treasons before described.

"That it be recommended to the Legislatures of "the several United Colonies, to pass Laws for pun- "ishing, in such manuer as they shall think fit, per- " sons who shall counterfeit, or aid or abet iu coun- " terfeiting, the Continental Bills of Credit, or who "shall pass auy such Bill, in payment, knowing the " same to be counterfeit.

" By order of Congress, " JOHN HANCOCK, President." ?

The Journal of the Continental Congress tells us that this remarkable paper formed a part of the Report of the Committec ou Spies, to that body ; and that Com-

1 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Wednesday morning, June 26, " 1776."

2 Journal of the Provincial Congress : Correspondence, ii., 196. See, also, Journal of the Continental Congress, "Monday, June 24, " 1776."

356

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

mittee appears to have been composed of John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Edward Rutledge, James Wilson, and Robert R. Livingston ;1 but the character of those who framed the Resolution only increases our surprise, and, more clearly than before, indicates the desperate straits into which, even at that early date, the Continental Congress had been crowded, unless the "spies " against whom the Committee ful- minated its Report were those Commissioners whom the Ministry had authorized to treat for Reconcilation and Peace,2 and who were, at that time, nearing and not distant from New York ; and unless, also, the Con- tinental Congress, by these Resolutions, proposed to naturalize Admiral Howe, and General Howe, and the forces which were respectively under their com- mand; and to transform all these, on their arrival within the harbor of New York, into "members of "the Colony " of New York, "owing allegiance to " the Laws of the United Colonies," and subject to be tried on a charge of "Treason against such Colony " of New York, should they become prisoners of war.

Whatever the purposes of the Continental Congress may have been, in the adoption and promulgation of these Resolutions, no one can attribute to the learned lawyers who reported them the slightest sincerity, since none knew better than they, that "allegiance," under any possible circumstances, was not and could not become due to what was nothing else than a mere "Law," and that the "Law " of a mere "Colony," which might be enacted on one day and be repealed on the next; that "allegiance " was, tlien, and would always be, due to nothing else than to the Sovereign of whom the person was or should becomc, legiti- mately, a subject ; that an avowed sojourner, “ pass- "ing through " a Colony or merely "visiting" it or "making a temporary stay" within it, at the same time owing " allegiance " to the Sovereign of another country, while he would certainly owe obedience to the local Law, during the entire period of his journey through or of his visit to or of his temporary stay within that Colony, by no Law nor by any possible interpretation of a Law which would have been en- titled to the slightest respect, only by reason of that journey or visit or temporary stay, could have been said to have surrendered his " allegiance" due only to his own Sovereign, and, instead, only for the same reason, to have become a subject of, owing "alle- "giance " to, the authority which controlled the place of his journey or visit or temporary stay, and espe- cially so while that place was or should continue to be only an acknowledged dependency of a foreign Prince, to whom it was or should be, itself, avowedly subject, and by whom no such enactment or order had

been made; that no mere Colony, dependent on another and superior political power, could possibly have been said, sincerely, by such a Committee, to have possessed a political Sovereignty, nor that, in the absence of such a Sovereignty, there could possibly have been a respectable and competent charge of Treason against it, in any instance whatever; and, more than all, that such a pretense and threat of charges of Treason against a Colony, made by the Committee, in its Resolutions, was simply a harmless thunderbolt, before the Law, since the King of Great Britain, against whom and against whose authority the Resolutions were specifically directed, was, at the time of the adoption and promulgation of those Res- olutions, actually the Sovereign of all those Colonies and of all those who were thus denouncing him, openly and generally recognized, throughout the for- mer, as the source of all their legitimate political authority and as their King; and, by the members of that Committee and the authors of those Resolutions, themselves, specifically recognized as the Sovereign to whom each and every of them was himself proud to owe allegiance.3

" Allegiance " and " Treason " presupposed Sov- ereignty existing in the Colonies, without which Sov- ereignty there could not have possibly been any " Allegiance " due to either of them nor "Treason " committed against them or either of them; but it would require a bold man, possessed of a very vivid imagination, to maintain, seriously and honestly, that any such Sovereignty existed in the Colonies, or in any or either of them, on the twenty-fourth of June, 1776, when the Continental Congress adopted these Resolutions, whatever there might have been or not have been, in the several States, a fortnight after- wards.

What the result of this action of the Continental Congress was, will be seen, hereafter.

Another very important subject which was intro- duced to the notice of the third Provincial Congress, during its very brief existence, was that of supplant- ing the existing Colonial Government by the estab- lisliment of a new form of Government which would more nearly represent the current spirit of those who were leaders in the Rebellion, and which, more than anything else, would indicate a determination to sever the political connection of the Colony with the Mother Country.

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History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 89

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, ed Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co. Number of Pages: 1354

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, ed
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co.
Number of Pages: 1354