CHAP. II. THE STAMP ACT CONGRESS. 623 thy Ruggles of Massachusetts, a rank tory at heart, was chosen to preside, and John Cotton was appointed secretary. Communications were received from the assemblies of New Hampshire, Virginia, North Carolina and Georgia, saying they would agree to whatever might be done by the Congress. That body continued in session fourteen days, and the whole subject of the rights and grievances of the colonies was fully discussed. John Cruger of New York, was deputed to write a Declaration of Rights; Robert R. Livingston of New York, prepared a Petition to the King; and James Otis of Massachusetts, wrote a Memorial to both Houses of Parliament. These were adopted, and have ever been regarded as able state papers. They embodied the prin ciples that governed the men of the Revolution that broke out ten years afterward. The proceedings were signed by all but the President and Robert Ogden of New Jersey, both of whom thus early manifested their defection from a cause which they afterward openly opposed. Ruggles was censured for his conduct by a vote of the Massachusetts Assembly, and was reprimanded, in his place, by the Speaker. He afterward became a bitter Tory, and took up arms for the king. In Mrs. Mercy Warren's drama called The Group, Ruggles figures as Brigadier Hate-all. Ogden was also publicly censured for his conduct; was burned in effigy, and at the next meeting of the New Jersey Assembly was dismissed from the Speaker's chair, which honorable post he held at the time of the Congress. These men had insisted in that body that resistance to the act was treason, and they, in turn, were denounced as traitors to the rights of man. On the first of November, 1765, the stamp act became a law in America. It had been ably discussed by the brightest intellects in the land, and generally denounced, sometimes with calmness, sometimes with turbulence. It was manifest to all that its enforcement was an impossibility; yet its existence was a perplexity. No legal instrument of writing was thereafter valid without a stamp, by a law of the British realm. But on that day there remained not one person commissioned to sell a stamp, for they had all resigned. The royal governors had taken an oath that they would see that the law was executed, but they were powerless. The people were their masters, and were simply holding their own power in abeyance. The first of November was Friday. It was a "black Friday" in America. The morning was ushered by the tolling of bells. A funeral solemnity overspread the land. Minute-guns were fired as if a funeral procession was passing. Flags were hoisted at half-mast as if there had been a national bereavement. There were orations and sermons appropriate to the occasion. The press spoke out boldly. "The press is the test of truth; the bulwark of public safety; the guardian of freedom, and the people ought not to sacrifice it," said Benjamin Mecom, of New Haven, in his Connecticut Gazette, printed that morning, and filled with patriotic appeals. This was the spirit of most of the newspapers. Such, also, was the spirit of most of the Congregational pulpits. Patriots everywhere encouraged each other; and a yearning for union was universally felt. Nothing will now save us but acting together," wrote the sturdy Gadsden of South Carolina. "The province that endeavors to act separately must fall with the rest, and be branded besides with everlasting infamy." As none but stamped paper was legal, and as the people had determined not to use it, all business was suspended. The courts were closed; marriages ceased; vessels lay idle in the harbors, and the social and commercial operations in America were paralyzed. Few dared to think of positive rebellion. The sword of British power was ready to leap from its scabbard in wrath; and a general gloom overspread society. Yet the Americans did not despair nor even despond. They held in their hands a power which might compel the British Parliament to repeal the obnoxious act. The commerce between Great Britain and the colonies had become very important, and any measure that might interrupt its course would be keenly felt by a large and powerful class in England, whose influence was felt in Parliament. The expediency of striking a deadly blow at that trade occurred to some New York merchants, and on the 31st of October-the day before the obnoxious act went into operation-a meeting was held in that city, and an agreement entered into not to import from England certain enumerated CHAP. II. DOMESTIC MANUFACTURES. 625 articles after the first of January next ensuing. The merchants of Philadelphia and Boston readily entered into a similar agreement. So also did retail merchants agree not to buy or sell goods shipped from England after the first of January. In this way was begun that system of non-importation agreements which hurled back upon England, with great force, the commercial miseries she had inflicted upon the colonies. The patriotic people co-operated with the merchants. Domestic manufactures were commenced in almost every family. Forty or fifty young ladies, calling themselves "Daughters of Liberty," met at the house of Rev. Dr. Morehead, in Boston, with their spinning-wheels, and spun two hundred and thirty-two skeins of yarn during a day and presented them to the pastor. There were upwards of one hundred spinners in Mr. Morehead's society. "Within a month," wrote a gentleman from Newport, Rhode Island, some time afterward, “four hundred and eighty-seven yards of cloth and thirty-six pairs of stockings have been spun and knit in the family of James Nixon, of this town." Other families were mentioned in which several hundred yards of cloth were made. Another from Newport said: "A lady of this town, though in the bloom of youth, and possessed of virtues and accomplishments, engaging, and sufficient to excite the most pleasing expectations of happiness in the married state, has declared that she should rather be an old maid than that the operations of the stamp act should commence in these colonies." The wealthiest vied with the middling classes in economy, and wore clothing of their own manufacture. That wool might not be scarce, the use of sheep flesh for food was discouraged. One source of British prosperity was thus dried up. When firm but respectful appeals went to the ears of the British ministry from America, the merchants and manufacturers of England seconded them, and their potential voices were heeded. C PITT ATTEMPTS CHAPTER III. ΤΟ FORM A NEW CABINET—DUKE OF CUMBERLAND'S MINISTRY-AMERICAN AFFAIRS IN PARLIAMENT-PITT'S GREAT SPEECH-REPEAL OF THE STAMP ACT-THE DECLARATORY ACT-PITT CARICATURED-JOYFUL PROCEEDINGS IN ENGLAND AND AMERICAPITT MADE A PEER AND BECOMES UNPOPULAR-PITT'S CABINET-BRITISH TROOPS IN NEW YORK THE LIBERTY-POLE-TAXATION MEASURES ADOPTED BY PARLIAMENT INDIGNATION OF THE AMERICANS HOPES OF THE FRENCH THEY SEND AN EMISSARY TO AMERICAPREPARATIONS FOR RESISTANCE. I N the early summer of 1765, Grenville found his administration embarrassed by conflicting political interests, and the king was dissatisfied with what his minister failed to accomplish. The monarch, influenced by men of greater minds than his own, had resolved on a change. The public were loudly clamoring for the restoration of Pitt to the premiership. The king was not unwilling, and in June he summoned that statesman to an audience. Pitt was shy; he would not commit himself until he knew what lines of policy were to be pursued. The king yielded much. Among other things he agreed to a repeal of the English cider tax and a change in the American stamp tax, and then Pitt consented to form a new ministry. He sent for his brother-in-law, Lord Temple, to whom he offered the seals of the treasury. Temple declined. He was influenced by Grenville, and Pitt was thwarted. Then the Duke of Cumberland attempted to form a ministry. He well knew the value of Pitt, and the importance of having him a leading spirit in the cabinet. To accomplish this end, he visited the great commoner in person, at Hayes, where Pitt was laid up with the gout, but he failed in his mission, and made up an incongruous cabinet. This visit to Hayes drew forth a caricature that was inspired by the ministers out of office. The Duke of Cumberland is seen as a courier riding in hot haste to consult the gouty foot of the statesman, which is seen projecting from the door of a country inn, and swathed in flannels. On a sign-board over the door is an inflated bladder inscribed "Popularity," and under it the initials of Pitt-W. P. In the new cabinet, the Marquis of Rockingham, a friend of the Americans, took the place of Grenville; General Conway, another friend, was appointed Secretary of State with the management of the House of Com CHAP. III. NEWS FROM AMERICA IN PARLIAMENT. 627 mons, assisted by the Duke of Grafton. This office concerned the Americans more than any other, for its incumbent dealt directly with them. These, with other members of the cabinet, formed such a motley group of men of conflicting political views, that its early dissolution seemed inevitable. Lord Chesterfield wrote to his son: "It will either require repairs or a keystone next winter; and that keystone will and must necessarily be Mr. Pitt." Such was the tendency and such was the expectation all the autumn—that memorable autumn when the tempest of opposition to the stamp tax raged in America. At the same time Mr. Pitt's health gradually improved. At the close of November, he wrote to I his wife from Bath: "I have been Meanwhile public sentiment had been deeply stirred in England by events in America, while strange apathy marked the conduct of the king and Parliament. In his speech, when the latter assembled at the middle of December, and when the conduct of the Americans and their petitions and remonstrances were made known, the monarch barely alluded to unpleasant occurrences in the colonies that might demand the attention of the legislature. That body seemed quite as indifferent to the news from beyond the sea as the king, and almost immediately adjourned. But when they reassembled in January, 1766, the ministry were fully alive to the necessity of prompt and vigorous action. The king, after alluding to the disturbances in the colonies, assured the |