USA > South Carolina > The history of South Carolina in the Revolution, 1775-1780 > Part 12
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On Tuesday, the 26th of March, the new Constitution was adopted, and it was ordered "that the President of this Congress do sign the same and also the Secretary " : which having been done, the members made choice of
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William Henry Drayton to be their chairman, by whom they were adjourned as a General Assembly to meet at four o'clock in the afternoon. At this hour having re- assembled, the Congress, now called a General Assembly, first proceeded to the choice of a Legislative Council, and elected Charles Pinckney, Henry Middleton, Richard Richardson, Rawlins Lowndes, Le Roy Hammond, Henry Laurens, David Oliphant, Thomas Ferguson, Stephen Bull, George Gabriel Powell, Thomas Bee, Joseph Ker- shaw, and Thomas Shubrick.
The General Assembly and Legislative Council then proceeded under the provisions of the Constitution to choose by ballot a President and Commander-in-chief and a Vice President. And no better selections could have been made than John Rutledge, who was chosen Presi- dent, and Henry Laurens Vice President. Both of these gentlemen were earnest in the maintenance of what they conceived to be their rights as English-born freemen ; but neither was prepared for separation from the mother country. They both represented the real sentiment of at least the most substantial people in the colony.
They were English Whigs, seeking the redress of their grievances by constitutional means, and in maintaining which they were prepared to shed their blood if necessary, as many Englishmen had done before; but neither was in favor of the New England idea of independence. Had Christopher Gadsden been elected after his declaration in favor of a complete separation from England, there can be little doubt that the revolutionary movement would have ended then in the disruption of the party. But John Rutledge was known to be opposed to a separation from the mother country. Henry Middleton and himself had been acceptable to all parties at the first election for delegates to the Continental Congress in July in 1774,
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because on the one hand they had been known to be firm in the maintenance of the rights of the colonies, but on the other opposed to any radical changes in their relation to the Crown. This position John Rutledge had consist- ently maintained, and in the draft of the preamble to the Constitution first adopted he had been careful to assert that it was adopted during " the present situation of Ameri- can affairs and until an accommodation of the unhappy differences between Great Britain and America can be ob- tained," an event which that instrument declared, though traduced and treated as rebel, the people yet earnestly desired. Again in replying to the congratulatory address of the Assembly upon his election he declared that no man would embrace a just and equitable accommodation with Great Britain more gladly than himself. But he was not content even with these declarations ; in his address upon the adjournment of the Assembly he took occasion to be still more explicit.
"Show your constituents then," he said, "the indispensable neces- sity which there was for establishing some mode of government in this colony; the benefits of that which a full and free representation has established, and that the consent of the people is the origin and the happiness the end of government. Remove the apprehension with which honest and well-meaning but weak and credulous minds may be alarmed and prevent ill impressions by artful and designing enemies. Let it be known that this Constitution is but temporary, till an accommodation of the unhappy differences between Great Britain and America can be obtained; and that such an event is still desired by men who yet remember former friendships and intimate connections, though for defending their persons and properties they are stigmatized and treated as rebels."
This position he steadily maintained with but a tem- porary exception, and when two years later another Con- stitution was adopted by the General Assembly, he vetoed it under the power now conferred upon him because it, as
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he construed it, closed the door to a reconciliation with the mother country.
On the other hand, William Henry Drayton, who had been elected Chief Justice, seized upon the opportunity of his charge to the grand jury at the first term of the court of sessions held at Charlestown to declare for absolute inde- pendence, as Gadsden had done in the Assembly. After explaining to the grand jury some of their common and general duties, he proceeded to expound to them the new Constitution.
"The House of Brunswick," he said, " was yet scarcely settled in the British throne to which it had been called by a free people, when, in the year 1719, our ancestors in this country, finding that the gov- ernment of the Lords Proprietors operated to their ruin, exercised the rights transmitted to them by their forefathers of England, and cast- ing off the Proprietary authority called upon the House of Brunswick to rule over them - a House elevated to the royal dominion for no other purpose than to preserve to a people their unalienable rights. The King accepted the invitation and thereby indisputably admitted the legality of that revolution. And in so doing, by his own act, he vested in our forefathers and in us, their posterity, a clear right to effect another revolution if ever the government of this House of Brunswick should operate to the ruin of the people. So the excel- lent Roman Emperor Trajan delivered a sword to Saburanus, his captain of the Prætorian Guard, with this admirable sentence, ' Re- ceive this sword and use it to defend me if I govern well, but against me if I behave ill.'"
The Chief Justice was perhaps not aware how completely he was fulfilling the prophecy of Colonel Rhett when he wrote in 1719, " If the revolt is not crop't in the bud, they will set up for themselves against his Majesty."1 His honor proceeded : -
" With joyful acclamations our ancestors by act of assembly passed on the 18th day of August, 1721, recognized the British Monarch, the
1 Hist. of So. Ca. under Roy. Gov. (McCrady), 3.
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virtues of the Second George are still revered among us - he was the father of his people, and it was with extacy we saw his grandson, George III, mount the throne, possessed of the hearts of his subjects.
"But alas! almost with the commencement of his reign, his sub- jects felt causes to complain of government. The reign advanced - the grievances became more numerous and intolerable, the complaints more general and loud - the whole empire resounded with the cries of injured subjects ! At length grievances being unredressed and ever increasing, all patience being borne down, all hope destroyed, all confidence in Royal government blasted! Behold the empire is rent from pole to pole ! perhaps to continue asunder forever !
" The catalogue of our oppressions, continental and local, is enor- mous. Of such oppressions I will mention only some of the most weighty.
" Under color of law the King and Parliament of Great Britain have made the most arbitrary attempts to enslave America ;
" By claiming the right to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever ;
" By laying duties at their mere will and pleasure upon all the colonies ;
" By suspending the Legislature of New York ;
"By rendering the American charters of no validity, having annulled the most material parts of the charter of the Massachusetts Bay ;
" By divesting multitudes of the colonists of their property without legal accusation or trial ;
" By depriving whole colonies of the bounty of Providence on their own proper coasts, in order to coerce them by famine ;
" By restricting the trade and commerce of America ;
" By sending to and continuing in America in time of peace an armed force, without, and against the consent of the people ;
"By granting impunity to a soldiery instigated to murder the Americans ;
" By declaring that the people of Massachusetts Bay are liable for offences or pretended offences done in that colony, to be sent to and tried for the same in England or in any colony where they cannot have the benefit of a jury of the vicinage ;
" By establishing in Quebec the Roman Catholic Religion and an arbitrary government, instead of the Protestant Religion and a free government."
Then after elaborating these charges and comparing with great detail the causes of this with the famous Revolu-
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tion in England in the year 1688, his honor thus con- cluded his charge : -
" The Almighty created America to be independent of Britain ; let us beware of the impiety of being backward to act as instruments in the Almighty hand now extended to accomplish his purpose ; and by the completion of which alone America in the nature of human affairs can be secure against the craft and insidious designs of her enemies who think her prosperity already by far too great. In a word, our piety and political safety are so blended that to refuse our labours in this divine work is to refuse to be a great, a free, a pious, and a happy people !"
The Almighty had indeed created America to be inde- pendent of Great Britain, and to be the land of a free, a pious, and a happy people. To this end under His provi- dence all things were working. In the very nature of things it was impossible for Parliament in England to legislate for this great country three thousand miles away - miles which had not yet been shortened by steam and electricity. But what argument in the charge had Mr. Chief Justice Drayton advanced to influence those of his fellow-citizens on the coast who still clung to the love of old England beyond their ambition for the future of the new country, or to those in the interior who had felt and recognized no oppression ?
In this bill of grievances against England which the Chief Justice laid before the Grand Jury there was nothing which particularly affected their colony but the general charge that Parliament claimed the right to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever. And in regard to this no one in South Carolina, not even Gadsden, had ever denied its right to bind them except in the matter of taxation. When it was supposed that the Northern colonies were inclined to so general a denial of the powers of Parliament, Mr. Lowndes had declared that no one in
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South Carolina admitted the doctrine, and his assertion was not challenged. Then in the matter of taxation it was open to the friends of the Royal government to refer the Chief Justice to his own Letters of Freeman in 1769, in which he had strenuously maintained this right of Parliament in that particular, letters which he had republished in London in 1771 with a preface that he did so " that in thus creating to them a longer existence than what usually falls to the lot of fugitive pieces delivered to the channel of a newspaper; he may thereby preserve them as vouchers of the propriety of that political conduct which drew on him the censures of those men from whose ideas of patriotism unconstitutional schemes started into action." Might not they who had then agreed with Mr. Drayton refer him to this little book of his as their voucher of the propriety of that conduct from which they had not been able to change as he had ? He had not only left them who still thought as he had done for three years, at least, after he had written those letters ; but he was now inveighing against his former friends, as he had once done against those with whom he was now acting. Nay, more, he had outstripped Lowndes and Laurens and Pinckney and Rutledge, and was now with Gadsden, his former ad- versary, advocating a separation from the mother country.
It is singular, too, that in justifying the great step the Chief Justice does not allude to the real grievances of this colony. He does not point out how the native colonists had been superseded and set aside by the officials of the Board of Trade for the placemen who hung around the throne for recognition and reward for questionable service rendered. He does not point out to the people of the Up Country that it was the wilful neglect and corrupt con- duct of that Board in England which had deprived them of courts for the punishment of crime and the mainte
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nance of justice. He does not remind them that the Colonial Assembly on the coast had passed act after act for the purpose of providing courts, and that these acts had been disallowed in England until the Assembly had agreed to buy off Mr. Cumberland, a clerk of the Board who held in England the sinecure of the office of High Sheriff of the province. In the stead of all this he appeals to them to declare themselves independent of England because New England's fishing trade had been interfered with and because the legislature of New York had been suspended, the charter of Massachusetts altered, and the Roman Catholic religion recognized in Quebec. But what had the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, who with the Bible containing their own version of the Psalms were enjoying the liberty of conscience in the country they were wresting from the Indians, to do with all that? Were they for the sake of the New England fishermen and the Canadian Protestants to go into a war and expose themselves to the inroads of the Indians, and to set up a government on the coast which was not yet prepared to abandon the Church of England as a church of State ? Then, on the other hand, this very matter of church was a most delicate one, even in the Low Country. There the planters were almost all churchmen. Whether from senti- ment or piety the whole social and civil fabric was based upon the church. It was interwoven with the very system of government. And while the Chief Justice was appealing to these people from the Bench to go into the Revolution, the Rev. Mr. Tennent, the Congregational minister who had come from Connecticut, and had been so closely associated with him in the mission to the interior the year before, was urging the abandonment of all con- nection between the government and the church. The Chief Justice had nothing to say to the people of the Up
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Country, explaining why they should fight for represen- tation in the Parliament in England at the bidding of a body in which they had had no representation at home.
It was indeed a great political mistake which the small number of the Provincial Congress assembled in Charlestown had made when disregarding Mr. Lowndes's protest that they did not constitute a full and free repre- sentation of the people, as the Continental Congress had recommended, they assumed to form a government. It may have been that had they waited for such a represen- tation, no government would have been founded at all, and the revolutionary movement would have been checked. But, on the other hand, the action of the few who attended that Congress in setting up a government without further reference to the people, especially to those of the upper part of the province, added to the opposition throughout that most populous section.
An independent government had existed in South Caro- lina since the 8th of July, 1774, when the Congress which met under the Exchange in Charlestown appointed an executive committee upon whom it conferred executive powers until it met again.1 In the measure now adopted South Carolina was the first to set up a formal govern- ment in opposition to the King's, and to provide for it a constitution. The plan of government now adopted was styled A Constitution or Form of Government, but it was really in no sense a constitution as we in America now understand that term, to wit : an instrument emanating from the people, -the original source of all power, enacted by their immediate representatives chosen for that specific purpose, organizing a government, regulating its adminis- tration, and defining and limiting its powers, - an instru- ment unalterable except by the people who ordained it in
1 Hist. of So. Ca. under Roy. Gov. (McCrady), 741.
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convention assembled, or in pursuance of specific provi- sions indicating and prescribing the form and manner in which changes may be made.1 This scheme or plan of government did not emanate directly from the people, if indeed it can be said to have done so at all. It did not purpose to be permanent. It imposed no restriction or limitation upon the legislature which adopted it, nor upon any succeeding one; and so we shall see the first General Assembly elected under its provisions abrogating it and by a simple act substituting another. These so- called constitutions of 1776 and 1778 should not be re- garded as constitutions at all. It is unfortunate that they were so styled, thus to give occasion to classing South Carolina as a State of many constitutions.2 These instruments were but plans of provisional government adopted for the occasion with certainly no more force than an ordinary act of the legislature. That of 1776, which we are now considering, was avowedly of but a temporary or provisional nature - to be in force only "until an accommodation of the unhappy differences between Great Britain and America can be obtained." 3
1 Cooley on Constitutional Limitations, 3, 87 ; Potter's Dwarris on Statutes and Constitutions, 45, 46.
2 Professor Bryce in his work on The American Commonwealth, vol. I, 440, speaking of the conservative tendency of some States and the fre- quent changes in the constitution of others, observes that Virginia and South Carolina (both original States) have had five constitutions each. The truth is South Carolina has had but two constitutions of her own voluntary adoption. As stated in the text, the constitutions, so called, of 1776 and 1778 were in no sense constitutions as we now understand the term. That of 1790 continued for seventy-five years ; though three con- ventions of the people were held in that time, it was not changed by them. The so-called constitutions of 1865 and 1868 were imposed by the Federal government, and enforced through its military authority at the end of the war. The constitution of 1790 and that of 1895 are the only two constitutions proper voluntarily adopted by the people.
3 Statutes of So. Ca., vol. I, 128, 137 ; Memoirs of the Revolution (Drayton), vol. II, 186.
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As we have seen, John Rutledge, Henry Middleton, and Christopher Gadsden had returned from Philadelphia and had given an account of the proceedings of the Continental Congress. Henry Middleton, pleading his advancing years, declined to return to Congress, and Christopher Gadsden's military duties forbade his doing so. The Provincial Con- gress had indeed on the 8th of February adopted a resolu- tion hastening his return from Philadelphia and desiring him to assume the command of the troops to which he had been appointed. On the 24th the Congress had gone therefore into another election, and reelected John Rut- ledge, Thomas Lynch, and Edward Rutledge, and elected Arthur Middleton and Thomas Heyward, Jr., in the place of Henry Middleton and Christopher Gadsden. This election again balanced the two parties ; for Arthur Mid- dleton was one of the progressive party while Thomas Heyward was a conservative. Another delegate was added. Thomas Lynch had been seized with a paralytic affection while in Philadelphia, and his son Thomas Lynch, Jr., who was then an officer in Colonel Gadsden's regiment, applied for leave of absence to join his father, that he might be with him in his illness. But this Colo- nel Gadsden, who with the spirit of the Roman would have devoted his own son to the cause of his country, refused. The matter was speedily arranged by the elec- tion of Mr. Thomas Lynch, Jr., as sixth delegate by the unanimous vote of the Assembly. He immediately pro- ceeded to Philadelphia, where he was able to attend his father, and to take his place in the Continental Congress.
On the 23d of March the Provincial Congress resolved -
" That the delegates of this colony in the Continental Congress, or a majority of them as shall at any time be present in the said Congress, or any one of the said delegates if no more than one shall be present, be, and
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they and he are and is hereby authorized and empowered for and in behalf of this colony to concert, agree to, and execute every measure which they or he, together with a majority of the Continental Congress, shall judge nec- essary for the defence, security, interest, or welfare of this colony in par- ticular and of America in general."
Did this resolution authorize and empower our delegates to join in a declaration of independence of Great Britain ?
Gadsden's avowal - in favor of a declaration of the abso- lute independence of America -had been made on the 10th of February, when, as we are informed by Drayton, it came like an explosion, and was regretted as unwise and impru- dent by even the few who wished for independence. Nothing more had been said upon the subject; but on the 24th, after the resolution for a form of government had been agreed to, John Rutledge had reported the new con- stitution with a preamble which certainly negatived the idea of independence, and in accepting the Presidency under it, as we have seen, had again taken the occasion to repeat that this was but a temporary measure, intended only to continue until a reconciliation could be effected. The resolution of instruction to the delegates while there- fore extremely broad in its terms, could not be construed in the light of this contemporary action as authorizing them to commit the colony to a declaration of indepen- dence. There can be little doubt that the sense of the province was opposed to any such action.
Mr. Thomas Lynch, Jr., at this time was but twenty- seven years of age. He had been sent at the early age of fourteen to England for his education. He had passed through the school at Eton, had taken his degree at Cam- bridge, and had commenced his term at the Temple, but had returned in 1772, impatient to take part in the momentous questions arising between the colonies and the mother country. His first appearance as a public
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speaker had taken place at a town-meeting at Charles- town shortly after his return, and the interest of the occa- sion had been much enhanced by his having followed his venerable father in the debate. On the organization of the provincial regiments in 1775, he had been appointed a captain and had, with Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, gone at once into North Carolina on a recruiting tour. Upon his march back with his company which he had completed, he had fallen ill, from the effects of which ill- ness he did not recover, and was compelled soon after joining in the Declaration of Independence to retire from public life. He perished at sea in 1779.
Soon after the announcement by Christopher Gadsden of his readiness for the complete independence of the colonies, he assumed the command of the troops in the harbor with his headquarters at Fort Johnson - the posi- tion which throughout the history of the province had been regarded as the key to the defence of the town. Now that a formal government had been set up, and a distinct defiance of the Crown had been made, it behooved the Congress to look well to the defence of the town. On the 19th of February it ordered that 1050 militia should be drafted and immediately marched to the defence of the place. And three days after two more regiments were added to the four already organized. Two regiments of riflemen were ordered to be raised : one to consist of seven companies, and the other of five. Of the first Isaac Huger was made colonel, and of the second Thomas Sumter, who, we must presume, had stood the test of the "sharp eye " Colonel Richardson had promised Mr. Drayton to keep upon his conduct, was made Lieutenant Colonel Commandant.1
1 The regular regiments were now thus officered : -
First Regiment of Foot. Colonel : Christopher Gadsden ; Lieutenant Colonel : Charles Cotesworth Pinckney ; Major : William Cattell.
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Second Regiment of Foot. Colonel : William Moultrie ; Lieutenant Colonel : Isaac Motte ; Major : Francis Marion.
Third Regiment Rangers. Lieutenant Colonel Commandant : Will- iam Thomson ; Major : James Mayson.
Regiment of Artillery. Lieutenant Colonel Commandant : Owen Rob- erts ; Major : Barnard Elliott.
First Rifle Regiment. Colonel : Isaac Huger ; Lieutenant Colonel : Alexander McIntosh ; Major : Benjamin Huger.
Second Rifle Regiment. Lieutenant Colonel Commandant : Thomas Sumter ; Major : William Henderson.
Artillery Company at Beaufort. Captain : William Har- ) den.
Artillery Company at Georgetown. Captain : Paul Tra- pier.
Artillery Company at Charlestown. Captain : Thomas Grimball. -
Volunteers.
CHAPTER VII
1776
WHEN the Parliament of England met in September, 1775, it was proposed that the naval establishment should be increased to 28,000 men, and the number of ships in the American waters to 80. The land forces were to con- sist of 25,000 of the best troops in the service. These formidable preparations aroused great opposition, and in defending the estimates Lord Barrington stated the num- ber of effective men in the army at Boston to be 7415 ; but that the forces in America were increased to 34 bat- talions, amounting in the whole to 25,000 men. In the course of his statement he thought it necessary to explain that the idea of taxation was entirely given up, but that this force was necessary to secure the constitutional de- pendence of the colonies. He stated that the purpose of the administration was first to arm so as to be in a posi- tion to enforce obedience, and then to send out commis- sioners to endeavor to conciliate the people in America.1
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