Westchester County, New York, during the American Revolution, Part 15

Author: Dawson, Henry B. (Henry Barton), 1821-1889. 4n
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Morrisania, New York City : [s.n.]
Number of Pages: 592

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In the House of Commons, Mr. Jenkinson, in opposition to receiving the paper addressed to that ilouse, " urgell that the House had uever re- " ceived Petitions of this tinture : that, here, the name of a Petition was "stadionsly avoided, lest anything like an obedience to Parliament " should be acknowledged. The opposition of the Colonies was not so "much against the tax which gave rise to the present dispute, as to the " whole legislative authority of Parliament, and to any restrictions of

WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

"vi immediately pre eded it, that Resolution, also, sereived the affirmative vote of every member of the House who was then present. 1

Continuing the commendable work in which it had thu- commenced the proceedings of the day, and ap- parently without any dissent from any one, the House then ordered that James De Lancey, and Benjamin Kisam, of the City of New York, Colonel Philip Schuyler. of Albany-county. George Clinton, of Ul- ster-county, Dirk Brinkerhoof, of Duchess-county, Samuel Gale, of Orange-county, Isaac Wilkins, of the Borough of Westchester, Crean Brush, of Cumber- land-county [now a part of Vermont], Christopher Billop, of Richmond-county, John Rapelje, of Kings-county, and William Nicoll, of Queens- county, or the major part of them-all, except Philip Schuyler and George Clinton being of the majority of the House-be " a Committee to prepare a State of the " Grievances of this Colony, and report same to this 4. House, with all convenient speed, after the Call "thereof, to be had on the seventh of February "next." 3 Having thus indicated what the House proposed to do, in the common cause in which the hody. of the Colonists was so earnestly engaged, the House was then adjourned.

Time, very often, produces marvellous changes in the tempers and purposes of politicians, especially in those of politicians who are not of the controlling majority, in their own party or in the State; and, very often, the actions of those politicians, when the latter are engaged in a personal, or factional, or par- fisan struggle, cannot be brought within the provisions of any known rule of action, of any class. No reas- onable reason which would be honorable to the minority of the Assembly, therefore, can be given for the eagerness which it displayed, on the sixteenth of February, to disturb the harmony of that body, in which all of both factions appeared to have been united in both purpose and action ; but, on that day, Colonel Philip Schuyler, of Albany-county, in behalf of that minority, renewed the conflict of factions which had been opened, unsuccessfully, by Colonel Abraham Ten Broeck, of the Manor of Rensselaers- wyck, on the preceding twenty-sixth of January. For that unseemly purpose, that distinguished mem-

"their trade." -(Speech of Mr. Jenkinson, in the House of Commons, May 15, 1775 .-- Almon's Parliamentary Register, i., 470.)

Besides the peculiarity of the titles of those several papers, to which reference has been made there was a grave significance in the fact that they were moved for, with those titles, by the head of the leading fam- ny in the Colony ; and that they were ordered by an unanimous vote of the Annualy. It has suited those who have preferred to traduce New York and her General Assembly, however, to regard both the General Assembly and its papers as only favorable to the Home Government and allasomistic to the counnon canse.

i Jed of the House, " Die Martis, to ho., A.M , the 31st January,

: In the language of that period, the wont " State," as it was used in that and similar connections, was the equivalent of the word "State. " richt," which, in such connections, is now employed.

" Javad of the Home, " Die Martis, 10 ho., A.M., the Ast January,

ber of the minority, of the day referred to, moved that certain specified beters, written by the Assem- bly's Committee of Correspondence, during the recess of the House, and urging the convention of a Con- gress of the Continent for the consideration of the grievances of the Colonies,' should be entered on the Journal of the House, and copies of them be sent to the newspapers, for publication; and, of course, "debates arose upon the said Motion," which was followed by the emphatic rejection of it, by a vote of nine, in the affirmative, against sixteen, in the negative-Judge Thomas and Pierre Van Cort- landt, of course, being among the former, and Colonel Philipse and Isaac Wilkins, of course, among the lat- ter.5

On the following day, [February 17], Colonel Nathaniel Woodhull, of Suffolk-county, also a prom- inent member of the minority, continued the faction- al strife, by offering a Resolution of Thanks to those gentlemen who had represented this Colony in the recent Congress, "for their faithful and judicious dis- " charge of the trust reposed in them, by the good "people of this Colony ; " aud, of course, "debates "arose upon the said Motion; " after which, by a vote of nine, in the affirmative, against fifteen, in the negative, it was rejected-Judge Thomas being among the former, and Colonel Philipse and Isaac Wilkins being among the latter.6

On the twenty - first of February, Peter R. Living- ston, of the Manor of Livingston, continued the struggle of the minority, by offering a Resolution giving "the Thanks of this House to the Merchants " and Inhabitants of this City and Colony, for their " repeated, disinterested, publick-spirited, aud patri- "otic Conduct, in declining the Importation or Re- " ceiving of Goods from Great Britain, and for their " firm Adherence to the Association entered into and "recommended by the Grand Continental Congress, " held at Philadelphia, in the Months of September "and October last, and that Mr. Speaker signify the "same to the President of the Chamber of Commerce "in this City, at their next Meeting, and order a copy "of the same to be published in the public Prints." Like the other Resolutions of the series, which had preceded it, this peculiarly inappropriate Resolution, before such a deliberative body, after it had been amply discussed, was promptly rejected by a vote of teu, in the affirmative, among whom were Judge Thomas and Pierre Van Cortlandt, against fifteen,

4 One of those Letters, if not more of them, was noticed in our statement of the measures of the Committee of Correspondence in New York. relative to its proposition for the convention of a Congress of the Colo- nies, page 23, ante.

& Journal of the House, "Die Jovis, 10 ho., A.M., the 16th February, "1775."

B Jorend of the House, " Die Veneris, 10 ho., A. M., the 17th February. "1775 ;" Lieutenant governor Coldon to General Change, "NEW YORK 20th " Febry, 1775."

See, also, Dunlap's History of New - York, i., 154, 455.

WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

in the negative, among whom were Colonel Philipse other line of action, in New York or elsewhere, and Isaac Wilkins.1

On the twenty third of February, Crean Brush, of

Cumberland-county, from the Committee which had Ferment which the opposition of those who were in

been appointed to prepare a State of the Grievances of this Colony, presented a Report from that Committee; known to the minority of that General Assembly, which was " referred to the consideration of a Com- " mittee of the Whole House, and be proceeded on, " by the said Committee, on Wednesday next." -

Immediately after the Report on the Grievances of the Colony had been thus referred, Judge John Thomas, one of the Representatives of Westchester- " county, and a leading member of the minority, offered : great end which all professed to regard as greater a Resolution providing that " the sense of this House

than all others, if that profession had been honestly " be taken on the necessity of appointing Delegates : made, would, unquestionably, have induced every "for this Colony, to meet the Delegates for the other ; member of each of the factions to have labored. earn- " Colonies on this Continent, in General Congre -- , " on the tenth day of May next." The introduction of that resolution led to a spirited Debate in which the motives of the rival factions composing the eon- federated party of the Opposition and the undue assumption of authority which had not been dele- gated to it, by the recently held Congress of the Con- tinent, were freely and ably discussed by Colonel Philip Schuyler and George Clinton, in support of the Resolution, and by Crean Brush and Isaac Wil- kins,3 in opposition to it ; and the consideration of the subject was closed by the rejection of the Resolution, by a vote of nine in the affirmative and seventeen in the negative, the four Representatives from the County of Westchester being divided between the two factions, as they had been in the previous divi- sions of the House.+

The well-considered and, under the circumstances, the judicious determination of the majority of the General Assembly, to unite in the general opposition to the Colonial poliey of the Home Government, in the general demand for a redress of the assumed griev- ances of the Colonies, and in the generally expressed desire to restore the harmony between the Colonies and the Mother Country, which the infliction of those grievances had disturbed, without, however, recogniz- ing the existence of any other opposition thereto, in any other person, in any other organization, or in any

1 Journal of the House, "Die Martis, 19 ho., A.M., the 21st February, "1775%" Livetenant-Governor foden to Gerend Gage, "NEW YORK 20th " Febry, 1,75."

2 Journal of the House, "Die Jovis, 19 ho., A. M., the 23d February, " 1175." Lieutenant governor Colder to General Gage, " NEW YORK, 20th " Febry 1775 ;" the same to the Earl of Dartmouth, " NEW YORK, Ist March, " 1775."

3 Speeches, made by Brush und Wilkins, on that occasion, may be seen in Force's American Archives, Fourth Series, i., 1290-1297, the former re-printed from Beingtod's New-York Gazetteer, No. 98, NEW-YORK, Thursday, March 2, 1775 ; the latter from the sune paper, No. 1+3, NEW- YORK, Thurslay, April 6, 1775. Students of the history of the Revolu- tion in the Colonies will be well paid for the tune occupied in a careful perusal of those speeches, in connection with the other literature of that subject, published during that period.

4 Journal of the House, "Die Jovis, Io ho., A.M., the 23d of February, " 1775 ; " Leutewant-governor Collen to the Earl of Dartmouth, " NEW YORK, " 1st March, 1775."

in order that its partienlar opposition might not en- counter that reasonable disregard of the Home Gov- open insurrection would surely encounter, was as well

especially after the rejection of the Resolution offered by Colonel Ten Broeck and the subsequent adoption of those offered, respectively, by Peter R. Livingston "and James De Lancey, as it was to the greater number of the members of that body, who sustained it; and a dreent respect for the welfare of the Colony, that

estly and harmoniously, in the sincere promotion of the common can-e. But it was clearly shown that " the common cause," which was so loudly talked of, was only a secondary matter ; that personal and factional interests were, in fact, regarded as superior to the interests of the country ; that it was the pur- pose of the minority and of those with whom it afhil- iated, for the especial advancement of their individual and factional interests, to obtain the entire control of the political affairs of the Colony, even at the expense of a revolutionary overthrow of the entire structure of the Colonial Government; that, for the pro- motion of that purpose, the series of Resolutions submitted by the minority, from that submitted by Colonel Schuyler to that submitted by Judge Thomas, was prepared and submitted with an entire knowledge that it would be promptly rejected by the House, as inconsistent with the line of action which the majority had adopted, for its guidance; and that the successive votes of the General Assembly, by which those Resolutions were successively re- jected, divested of all that was so well known of the purposes of that body and surrounded with all of insinuation and falsehood which individual animosity and factional zeal could contrive, were industriously presented. one after another, in their naked form, to the populace in New York City and elsewhere, as evi- denees, as false as they were mischievous, of what was unduly assumed to have been the antagonism of the General Assembly to the common cause, and, at the same time, for the purpose of gradually under- mining the affection for the Mother Country, which generally prevailed, throughout the Colony, and of preparing the populace for a revolutionary transfer of the legislative, as well as for that of the executive and judicial, authority of the Colonial Government, into other channels, in the interest of Rebellion. wherein the control would be assumed by other, if not by better, men.

Having fully accomplished its preliminary purpose, in securing from the legally constituted Legislature of the Colony a rejection of the several revolutionary Resolutions which it had submitted, and in, thereby,

WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

of anthority, noudnally in the name of the body of Elle Colonists but really in known opposition to the inclinations of by far the greater number, to call a Convention of the Colony, in the interests of Rebel- hon, in which should be reposed the uncontrolled power of exercising the various functions of an inde- pendent, despotie Goverment, without any limitation, and in open disregard of the existing, legally-consti- tuted Government of the Colony-having accom- plished that preliminary purpose, the minority of the Assembly discontinued the submission of Resolutions of any character ; and, as will be seen, all its labors were subsequently devoted to the promotion of its factional purposes, only, in the consideration of the papers which the House had ordered to be prepared and laid before it, in which, however, the majority afforded very slight reasons for complaint.

adding a pretext to those of its confederates, not of The State of Grievances which was thus adopted by thay General Assembly, for the assumption, by them, ! the General Assembly of New York included not only all those Acts of the Parliament of Great Britain, relating to or affecting the Colony of New York, for which Colony only the Assembly presumed to legis- late, which the Congress of the Continent had in- cluded in the Bill of Rights and Grievances which that body had adopted and published, but it included the additional Grievance inflicted in the Act of 6th George III., Chapter XII., "declaring the Right of "Parliament to bind the Colonies in all cases what- " soever," and that inflicted in the Act of 35th Henry VIII., Chapter II., authorizing the removal of pris- oners accused of Crimes committed in America, to England, for Trial, neither of which was included in that Bill of Rights and Grievances which the Congress had published. It included, also, the Act of 7th George III., Chapter LIX., "requiring the Legisla- "ture of this Colony to provide for the Services there- "in mentioned, without application made to the "Representatives of the People of this Colony, in "General Assembly, and holding up, by any other " Acts, a Suspension of the legislative powers of this "Colony, until such Requisitions be complied with ;" the Act of 14th George III. Chapter LXXXIII., "so " far as it may be construed to establish the Roman "Catholic Religion in the Province of Quebec," and "so far as it imposes Duties upon certain Ar- "ticles of Merchandise imported into that Province," " which by another Statute of the same year, Chapter " LXXXVIII., is so extended as to comprehend all the " Indian Country, from Hudson's Bay to the Mouth "of the Ohio-river ;" and the four Acts especially re- lating to Boston and the Colony of Massachusetts- Bay, all of which it declared to be Grievances of this Colony ;5 and, as has been said, it concurred in that

On the appointed day, [ March 1, 1775] the Assem- bly, in Committee of the Whole House, Colonel Ben- jamin Seaman, of Richmond-county, occupying the Chair, commenced the consideration of the State of the Colony's Grievances, which had been reported by the Special Committee which had prepared it ; 1 and after having spent the entire day thereon, as well as the whole of the following day? and the greater por- tion of the succeeding day,' also, in Committee of the Whole House, the latter day's session was closed by the adoption of the Report, by the Assembly, with a single Amendment, which was submitted by Colonel Philip Schuyler, and supported by nine of the minor- ity, and five of the majority -- the only Amendment which was submitted by any one-a marked feature of the proceedings having been that the amended State of the Grievances of this Colony was adopted by the House, without a division.'

1 Journal of the House, "Die Mercurij, 10 ho., A.M., the 1st March, 1775."

" Journal of the House, "Die Jovis, lo ho., A.M., the 21 March, 1775." " Journal of the House, " Die Veneris, 10 ho., A.M., the 34 March, :

4 With that lack of modesty and truthfulness which characterized all, co' erning his own family, which John C. Hamilton wrote, that geutle- man (History of the Republic, i., 81, 82) has undertaken to glorify Colonel Schuyler, his grandfather, by falsifying the recorl, concerning this

In the Committee which bal been appointed for the preparation of the Nie, in which every member brought forward whatever he regarded as n Grievance, and not in the body of the Assembly, as is meanly insinu- ates, Polonel Schuyler introduced the Act of 4th George IFi., Chapter XV, ax such a Grievance, which was approved and accepted by the Committee, with only two dissenting votes, notwithstanding the over- whatming nugority, in that Committee, who was opposed to Colonel S hanyler. When the Report was considered in Committee of the Whole Il pro, there was not the slightest opposition to it ; and when the Com- Falls of the House repeated the completed paper to the House, John C. IIst.dton to the contrary notwithstanding, the entire State was adopted watson . division.'

Ho wo whiled to the third of the Grievances, offered in the original " . Butter, by Jaunes De Lancey, recognizing the Right of the Govern- rest of Great Britain to regulate the Trade of the Colonies and to 1. .- Paties on such articles, the products of foreign Nations, By > .. . il Im imported, directly, into the Colonies-the same, in substance

if not in words, as that, on the same subject, which the Congress of the Continent had recently adopted-and he glorified his grandfather, because of that gentleman's labors in opposing it, and in endeavoring to qualify the Assembly's recognition of that Right, through an Amend- ment, which the Committee had rejected ; without, however, alluding to that other fact that, in all that his grandfather did, on that occa- sion, he did in open antagonism to the action of the Continental Cou- gres«, on the same subject -- he does not say, also, that all that which has been described was done in the original Committee ; that when the Jeport of the Committee was submitted to the Committee of the Whole House, that larger body reversed the action of the original Committee, and united with Colonel Schuyler and his associates in the minority, in their qualification of that portion of the proceedings of the Continental Congress; nor that the House itself, when it accepted the completed Sat , endorsed and approved that emphatic repudiation of Jamies Duane, and of John Adams, and of their unqualified recognition of the Right of the Mother Country to regulate the Trade of the Colonies and to receive the benefits of that Commerce.

Philip Schuyler needed no such fictitious praise, even from bis grandson ; and, although he was willing to promote the interests of his faction, he does not appear to have been thus employed, in what he did ns a member of that Committee for preparing a state of the trierances of this Colony, nor in any proceedings thereon, either in Committee of the Whole House or in the Assembly.

5 . I was informi'd that the Boston aud Quebee Bills were at first re- "jected in the Committee as not being Part of the Grievances of this " Colony ; it seems however they were at last brought into the Report. " and I am afraid may not now be got rid of in the House."-(Lieuten.

WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

action of the Continental Congress, moved by James Duane and supported by John Adams, and nearly in its words,' recognizing the Right of the Parliament "to regulate the Trade of the Colonies, and to lay " Duties on articles that are imported, directly, into " this Colony, from any foreign Country or Planta- " tation, which may interfere with the Products or " Manufactures of Great Britain or any other parts of " His Majesty's Dominions," qualified however, by "excluding every idea of Taxation, internal or exter- " nal, for the purpose of rai-ing a Revenue on the "Subjects in America, without their Consent." Ht. will be seen, therefore, that the State of the Grievances of this Colony, adopted and published by the General Assembly, was more extended than the Bill of Rights and Grievances which the Congress of the Colonies had adopted and published ; and it will be seen, also, by any one who will compare the two papers, that the former, both in its tone and in its terms, was quite as firm and quite as plain spoken, on the several sub- jects to which it was devoted, as was the latter ; and that, in the adoption and promulgation of that State, the majority of the Assembly openly maintained its character and standing, as intelligent and fearless op- ponents of the Colonial. policy of the Home Govern- ment, without impairing its consistency as Members of the Legislature of a Colony -- even the factional confederates of the minority, out in the populaee, beeanse of that et, was compelled to acknowledge the fidelity of the majority, and to admit, in their correspondenee with each other, that the State of the Griccances in this Colony which it had prepared and promulgated, was an accurate exposition of the feel- ings and opinions of the great body of the Colonists, in New York, wherever any feelings or opinions, on those subjects, really existed, concerning their griev- anees, and altogether favorable to the common cause.3

---

On the seventh of March, James De Lancey, and Benjamin Kissain, of New York City, and George Clinton, of Ulster-county, were appointed a Com- mittee to prepare the series of Resolutions re- quired as a basis for the Petition to the King, which had been ordered by the House, ou the thirty-first of January preceding ;" and, on the following day, Benja- ; min Kissam reported, from that Committee, a series of Resolutions, agrecably to that Order. The Assembly promptly went into a Committee of the Whole House, with Colonel Benjamin Seaman, of Richmond-county,

in the Chair; and proceeded to consider the Report which had thus been presented ; and, after having made some amendments in the proposed Resolutions," the Chairman reported the result of the Committee's deliberations to the House: and, after some discus- sion, the House agreed with the Committee, in its Report and Resolutions,3

The first of these Resolutions, following the general sentiment of the Colonists, acknowledged the Faith and Allegiance to the King which were due to him from " the people of this Colony." The second ae- knowledged that the Colonists " owe obedience to all " Acts of Parliaments calenlated for the general weal "of the whole Empire and the due regulation of the " Trade and Commerce thereof, and not inconsistent "with the essential Rights and Liberties of English- "men, to which they are equally entitled with their " fellow-subjects in Great Britain." The third de- clared " that it is essential to Freedom and the un- " doubted Right of Englishmen, that no Taxes be " imposed on them but with their consent, given per- " sonally or by their Representatives in General As- "sembly." The fourth maintained " that the Acts of "Parliament, raising a Revenue in America especially "to provide for the support of the Civil Government " and administration of Justice in the Colonies, ex- " tending the Jurisdiction of the Courts of Admiralty "beyond their ancient limits, authorizing the Judge's " Certifieate to indemnify the Prosecutor from Dam- " ages lie would otherwise be liable to, giving them a "eoucurrent Jurisdiction of Causes heretofore cog- "nizable only in the Courts of Common Law, and by "that means depriving the American Subject of his "Trial by a Jury, are destructive to Freedom, and " subversive of the Rights and Liberties of the Colo- "nies." The fifth and last of these Resolutions de- clared " that a Trial by a Jury of the Vicinage, in all "Capital Cases, is the grand Security of Freedom and " the Birthright of Englishmen ; and, therefore, that " the seizing any Person or Persons, residing in this "Colony, suspected of Treasons, Misprisions of " Treason, or any other Offences, and sending such "Person or Persons out of the same, to betried, is dan- "gerous to the Lives aud Liberties of His Majesty's " American Subject -. "6

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Westchester County, New York, during the American Revolution, Part 15

Author: Dawson, Henry B. (Henry Barton), 1821-1889. 4n Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Morrisania, New York City : [s.n.] Number of Pages: 592

Author: Dawson, Henry B. (Henry Barton), 1821-1889. 4n
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Morrisania, New York City : [s.n.]
Number of Pages: 592