FROM COLONIES TO COMMONWEALTHS

209

out), and themselves assuming even the forms of legislative bodies.

The members of the Second Continental Congress, like those of the First, had been elected, not as a legislature, but to formulate opinion, and to report their recommendations back to their colonies for approval. The war changed all that. A central government was imperative; and the patriot party everywhere recognized the Congress as the only agent to fill that place.

For the first five weeks, that body continued to pass recommendations only. But June 15 it adopted the irregular forces about Boston as a continental army, and appointed George Washington commander in chief. A year later it proclaimed the Declaration of Independence. Between these two events it created a navy, opened negotiations with foreign states, issued bills of credit on the faith of the colonies, and took

over (from the old English control) the management of Indian affairs and of the crude post office.

Thirteen "revolu

tions'

But the Revolution in government was not one movement. It was a whirl of thirteen State revolutions within this Continental revolution. The de

velopment of the State government of Virginia is fairly typical.

Virginia

passes from colony to

commonwealth:

a typical

County gatherings in that Province in December and January (1774-1775) approved the Continental Congress and set up the Association, so that a second convention was not necessary until it came time to appoint delegates to the Second Continental Congress. Meantime, many counties, on their own initiative, organized and armed a revolutionary miinstance litia, raising the necessary "taxes" by "recommendations" of county committees; and Cumberland County formally instructed its delegates to the Second Provincial Convention to declare to that body that any general tax imposed by it for such purposes would be 'cheerfully submitted to by the inhabitants of this county." The First Convention (August, 1774) had authorized its chairman to call a second when desirable. The Second Convention met March 20, 1775. It passed only "recommendations" in form; but it did organize the revolutionary militia into a state system. It sat only eight days; but it recommended the counties at once to choose delegates to a Third Convention to represent the colony for one year.

66

Governor Dunmore forbade the elections to this Third Convention as "acts of sedition"; but they passed off with regularity. Meantime, the governor called an Assembly, to consider a proposal from Lord North, intended to draw Virginia away from the common cause. Instead of this, the Assembly gave formal sanction to all the acts of the Continental congresses and of the Virginia conventions. In the squabbles that followed, Dunmore took refuge on board a British man-of-war. The Assembly strenuously "deplored" that their governor should so "desert" the "loyal and suffering colony," and adjourned, June royal gov- 24. This ended the last vestige of royal governernment ment in Virginia. Three weeks later, the Third Convention gathered at Richmond (out of range of guns from warships), and promptly assumed all powers and forms of government. It gave all bills three readings, and

The end of

FROM COLONIES TO COMMONWEALTHS

211

enacted them as ordinances; and it elected an executive (a "committee of safety"), and appointed a colonial Treasurer and other needful officials. In the winter of 1776 it dissolved, that a new body, fresher from the people, might act on the pressing questions of independence and of a permanent government.

ence

The Loyalists early began to accuse the Patriots of aiming at independence. But, until some months after Lexington, the Patriots vehemently disavowed such "vil- Growth of lainy," protesting enthusiastic loyalty to King the idea of George. They were ready to fight, but only as independEnglishmen had often fought, to compel a change in "ministerial policy." Otis, Dickinson, Hamilton, in their printed pamphlets, all denounced any thought of independence as a crime. Continental congresses and provincial conventions solemnly repeated such disclaimers. In March, 1775, Franklin declared that he had never heard a word in favor of independence "from any person drunk or sober." Two months later still, after Lexington, Washington soothed a Loyalist friend with the assurance that if the friend ever heard of his [Washington's] joining in any such measure, he had leave to set him down for everything wicked; and June 26, after becoming commander of the American armies, Washington assured the New Yorkers that he would exert himself to establish "peace and harmony between the mother country and the colonies." In September, 1775, Jefferson was still "looking with fondness towards a reconciliation," and John Jay asserts that not until after that month did he ever hear a desire for independence from "an American of any description." For months after Bunker Hill, American chaplains, in public services before the troops, prayed for King George; and, for long, Washington continued to refer to the British army merely as the "ministerial troops." Even in February, 1776, when Gadsden in the South Carolina convention expressed himself in favor of independence, he roused merely a storm of dismay, and found no support. And a month later

still, Maryland instructed her delegates to the Continental Congress not to consent to any proposal for independence.

All this was honestly meant; but the years of agitation had sapped the ties of loyalty more than men really knew, and a few months of war broke them wholly. In the fall of 1775 the King refused contemptuously even to receive a petition for reconciliation from Congress; and soon afterward, he sent to America an army of "Hessians" hired out, for slaughter, by petty German princelings. Moreover, it became plain that, in order to resist England, the colonies must have foreign aid; and no foreign power could be expected to give us open aid while we professed ourselves English colonies.

Thus, unconsciously, American patriots were ready to change front. Then, in January, 1776, came Thomas

Thomas Paine's Common Sense

Paine's daring and trenchant argument for independence in Common Sense. This fifty-page publication, in clarion tone, spoke out what the community hailed at once as its own unspoken thought. One hundred and twenty thousand copies sold in three months, one for every three families in America. At first the author's name was not given, and the booklet was commonly attributed to one of the Adamses or to Franklin. Paine was a poor English emigrant, of thirteen months before, whom Franklin had befriended for the “genius in his eyes." A few lines may represent his terse style.

"The period of debate is closed. Arms . . . must decide. . . By referring the matter from argument to arms, a new era in politics is struck. . . . All plans .. prior to the nineteenth of April are like the almanacs of last year.

"Where, say some, is the king of America? I'll tell you, friend. He reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind, like the royal brute of Britain. . . . A government of our own is our natural right. . . . Freedom has been hunted round the globe. Asia and Africa have long expelled her. Europe regards her like a stranger; and England has given her warning to depart. O, receive the fugitive and prepare in time an asylum for mankind.”

Meantime, the growth of independent State governments was going on. Several colonies had applied to Congress

INDEPENDENCE AND STATE GOVERNMENTS

ments

213

for counsel, in the disorders of the fall of 1775. In reply, Congress "recommended" the provincial convention of New Hampshire "to call a full and free representation Other State of the people . . [to] establish such a form of governgovernment as in their judgment will best produce the happiness of the people and most effectually secure peace and good order in that province, during the continuance of the present dispute between Great Britain and the colonies." Under such advice, early in 1776, New Hampshire and South Carolina set up provisional constitutions. These documents, however, did not imply independence. They declared themselves temporary, and referred always to the commonwealths not as States, but as "colonies."

mends State

But May 15, 1776, Congress took more advanced action. It recommended the "assemblies and conventions" of all colonies, "where no government sufficient to the Congress exigencies of their affairs hath been hitherto es- recomtablished, to adopt such a government as shall, in the opinion of the representatives of the people, ments best conduce to the happiness and safety of their constituents in particular, and of America in general." Two days later, in a letter to his wife, John Adams hailed this action (for which he had been the foremost champion) as “a total, absolute independence . . . for such is the amount of the resolve of the 15th."

leads for

independence and a

stitution

Virginia had not waited for this counsel. The Fourth Virginia convention (page 211) met May 6, 1776, and turned at once to the questions of independence Virginia and of a constitution. The only difference of opinion was: Should Virginia, standing alone, declare herself an independent State and frame a State conconstitution for herself? Or should she try to get the Continental Congress to make a declaration and to suggest a general model of government for all the new States? Plans were presented, representing each of these views. On May 15, after much debate, the convention determined upon a middle plan. Unanimously it instructed its representatives in Congress to move immediately for a gen