"American
Independence" -
Samuel Adams Speech -
August 1, 1776
"American Independence" is a famous speech delivered by Samuel
Adams from the steps of the
State House in Philadelphia, the meeting place of the Continental
Congress. In the speech, Adams' declares that by voting for the
Declaration of Independence, Americans have restored "the Sovereign to
Whom alone all men ought to be obedient" (meaning God) to the "throne"
of America.
This speech was delivered the day before the familiar
parchment copy of the Declaration of Independence was signed by the
Continental Congress. The vote for independence was on July 2nd. The
decision to use the Declaration written by Thomas Jefferson as the tool
to announce the decision publicly was made on July 4th. The document
was signed by the members on August 2nd.
COUNTRYMEN AND BRETHREN: I would gladly have declined an honor, to
which I find myself unequal. I have not the calmness and impartiality
which the infinite importance of this occasion demands. I will not deny
the charge of my enemies, that resentment for the accumulated injuries
of our country, and an ardor for her glory, rising to enthusiasm, may
deprive me of that accuracy of judgment and expression which men of
cooler passions may Possess. Let me beseech you, then, to hear me with
caution, to examine without prejudice, and to correct the mistakes into
which I may be hurried by my zeal.
Truth loves an appeal to the common-sense of mankind. Your unperverted
understandings can best determine on subjects of a practical nature.
The positions and plans which are said to be above the comprehension of
the multitude may be always suspected to be visionary and fruitless. He
who made all men hath made the truths necessary to human happiness
obvious to all.
Our forefathers threw off the yoke of popery in religion: for you is
reserved the honor of levelling the popery of politics. They opened the
Bible to all, and maintained the capacity of every man to judge for
himself in religion. Are we sufficient for the comprehension of the
sublimest spiritual truths, and unequal to material and temporal ones?
Heaven hath trusted us with the management of things for eternity, and
man denies us ability to judge of the present, or to know from our
feelings the experience that will make us happy. “You can discern,” say
they, “objects distant and remote, but cannot perceive those within
your grasp. Let us have the distribution of present goods, and cut out
and manage as you please the interests of futurity.” This day, I trust
the reign of political protestantism will commence. We have explored
the temple of royalty, and found that the idol we have bowed down to,
has eyes which see not, ears that hear not our prayers, and a heart
like the nether millstone. We have this day restored the Sovereign, to
whom alone men ought to be obedient. He reigns in Heaven, and with a
propitious eye beholds his subjects assuming that freedom of thought,
and dignity of self-direction which He bestowed on them. From the
rising to the setting sun, may His kingdom come.
Having been a slave to the influence of opinions early acquired, and
distinctions generally received, I am ever inclined not to despise but
pity those who are yet in darkness. But to the eye of reason what can
be more clear, than that all men have an equal right to happiness?
Nature made no other distinction than that of higher or lower degrees
of power of mind and body. But what mysterious distribution of
character has the craft of statesmen, more fatal than priestcraft,
introduced?
According to their doctrine, the offspring of perhaps the lewd embraces
of a successful invader, shall, from generation to generation, arrogate
the right of lavishing on their pleasures a proportion of the fruits of
the earth, more than sufficient to supply the wants of thousands of
their fellow-creatures: claim authority to manage them like beasts of
burden, and without superior industry, capacity, or virtue, nay, though
disgraceful to humanity by their ignorance, intemperance, and
brutality, shall be deemed best calculated to frame laws, and to
consult for the welfare of society.
Were the talents and virtues, which Heaven has bestowed on men, given
merely to make then more obedient drudges, to be sacrificed to the
follies and ambition of a few? or, were not the noble gifts so equally
dispensed with a divine purpose and law, that they should as nearly as
possible be equally exerted, and the blessings of Providence be equally
enjoyed by all? Away then, with those absurd systems, which, to gratify
the pride of a few, debase the greatest part of our species below the
order of men. What an affront to the King of the universe, to maintain
that the happiness of a monster, sunk in debauchery and spreading
desolation and murder among men, of a Caligula, a Nero, or a Charles,
is more precious in his sight than that of millions of his suppliant
creatures, who do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with their God!
No! in the judgment of Heaven there is no other superiority among men,
than a superiority in wisdom and virtue. And can we have a safer model
in forming ours? The Deity then has not given any order or family of
men authority over others, and if any men have given it, they only
could give it for themselves. Our forefathers, 'tis said, consented to
be subject to the laws of Great Britain. I will not, at present,
dispute it, nor mark out the limits and conditions of their submission:
but will it be denied that they contracted to pay obedience, and to be
under the control of Great Britain, because it appeared to them most
beneficial in their then present circumstances and situations? We, my
countrymen, have the same right to consult and provide for our
happiness, which they had to promote theirs. If they had a view to
posterity in their contracts, it must have been to advance the felicity
of their descendants. If they erred in their expectations and
prospects, we can never be condemned for a conduct which they would
have recommended had they foreseen our present condition.
Ye darkeners of counsel, who would make the property, lives, and
religion of millions, depend on the evasive interpretations of musty
parchments: who would send us to antiquated charters, of uncertain and
contradictory meaning, to prove that the present generation are not
bound to be victims to cruel and unforgiving despotism, tell us whether
our pious and generous ancestors bequeathed to us the miserable
privilege of having the rewards of our honest industry, the fruits of
those fields which they purchased and bled for, wrested from us at the
will of men over whom we have no check? Did they contract for us that,
with folded arms, we should expect that justice and mercy from brutal
and inflamed invaders which have been denied to our supplications at
the foot of the throne? Were we to hear our character as a people
ridiculed with indifference? Did they promise for us that our meekness
and patience should be insulted: our coasts harassed: our towns
demolished and plundered, and our wives and offspring exposed to
nakedness, hunger and death, without our feeling the resentment of men,
and exerting those powers of self-preservation which God has given us?
No man had once a greater veneration for Englishmen than I entertained.
They were dear to me as branches of the same parental trunk, and
partakers of the same religion and laws; I still view with respect the
remains of the constitution as I would a lifeless body which had once
been animated by a great and heroic soul. But when I am roused by the
din of arms: when I behold legions of foreign assassins, paid by
Englishmen to imbrue their hands in our blood: when I tread over the
uncoffined bones of my countrymen, neighbors and friends: when I see
the locks of a venerable father torn by savage hands, and a feeble
mother, clasping her infants to her bosom, and on her knees imploring
their lives from her own slaves, whom Englishmen have allured to
treachery and murder: when I behold my country, once the seat of
industry, peace, and plenty, changed by Englishmen to a theatre of
blood and misery, Heaven forgive me, if I cannot root out those
passions which it has implanted in my bosom, and detest submission to a
people who have either ceased to be human, or have not virtue enough to
feel their own wretchedness and servitude.
Men who content themselves with the semblance of truth, and a display
of words, talk much of our obligations to Great Britain for protection!
Had she a single eye to our advantage? A nation of shopkeepers are very
seldom so disinterested. Let us not be so amused with words: the
extension of her commerce was her object. When she defended our coasts,
she fought for her customers, and convoyed our ships loaded with
wealth, which we had acquired for her by our industry. She has treated
us as beasts of burden, whom the lordly masters cherish that they may
carry a greater load. Let us inquire also against whom she has
protected us? Against her own enemies with whom we had no quarrel, or
only on her account, and against whom we always readily exerted our
wealth and strength when they were required. Were these colonies
backward in giving assistance to Great Britain, when they were called
upon in 1739, to aid the expedition against Carthagena? They at that
time sent three thousand men to join the British army, although the war
commenced without their consent. But the last war, 'tis said, was
purely American. This is a vulgar error, which, like many others, has
gained credit by being confidently repeated. The dispute between the
Courts of Great Britain and France related to the limits of Canada and
Nova Scotia. The controverted territory was not claimed by any in the
colonies, but by the Crown of Great Britain. It was therefore their own
quarrel. The infringement of a right which England had, by the treaty
of Utrecht, of trading in the Indian country of Ohio, was another cause
of the war. The French seized large quantities of British manufactures,
and took possession of a fort which a company of British merchants and
factors had erected for the security of their commerce. The war was
therefore waged in defence of lands claimed by the Crown, and for the
protection of British property. The French at that time had no quarrel
with America: and, as appears by letters sent from their
commander-in-chief, to some of the colonies, wished to remain in peace
with us. The part therefore which we then took, and the miseries to
which we exposed ourselves, ought to be charged to our affection for
Britain. These colonies granted more than their proportion to the
support of the war. They raised, clothed, and maintained, nearly
twenty-five thousand men, and so sensible were the people of England of
our great exertions, that a message was annually sent to the House of
Commons purporting: “That His Majesty, being highly satisfied of the
zeal and vigor with which his faithful subjects in North America had
exerted themselves in defence of His Majesty's just rights and
possessions, recommended it to the House, to take the same into
consideration, and enable him to give them a proper compensation.”
But what purpose can arguments of this kind answer? Did the protection
we received annul our rights as men, and lay us under an obligation of
being miserable?
Who among you, my countrymen, that is a father, would claim authority
to make your child a slave because you had nourished him in his
infancy?
It is a strange species of generosity which requires a return
infinitely more valuable than anything it could have bestowed: that
demands as a reward for a defence of our property, a surrender of those
inestimable privileges, to the arbitrary will of vindictive tyrants,
which alone give value to that very property.
Political right and public happiness are different words for the same
idea. They who wander into metaphysical labyrinths, or have recourse to
original contracts, to determine the rights of men, either impose on
themselves or mean to delude others.
Public utility is the only certain criterion. It is a test which brings
disputes to a speedy decision, and makes it appeal to the feelings of
mankind. The force of truth has obliged men to use arguments drawn from
this principle who were combating it, in practice and speculation. The
advocates for a despotic government, and non-resistance to the
magistrate, employ reasons in favor of their systems drawn from a
consideration of their tendency to promote public happiness.
The Author of Nature directs all his operations to the production of
the greatest good, and has made human virtue to consist in a
disposition and conduct which tend to the common felicity of his
creatures. An abridgement of the natural freedom of man, by the
institution of political societies, is vindicable only on this foot.
How absurd, then, is it to draw argument from the nature of civil
society for the annihilation of those very ends which society was
intended to procure. Men associate for their mutual advantage. Hence
the good and happiness of the members, that is, the majority of the
members of any state, is the great standard by which everything
relating to that state must finally be determined; and though it may be
supposed that a body of people may be bound by a voluntary resignation
(which they have been so infatuated as to make) of all their interests
to a single person, or to a few, it can never be conceived that the
resignation is obligatory to their posterity: because it is manifestly
contrary to the good of the whole that it should be so.
These are the sentiments of the wisest and most virtuous champions of
freedom. Attend to a portion on this subject from a book in our
defence, written, I had almost said by the pen of inspiration. “I lay
no stress,” says he, “on charters— they derive their rights from a
higher source. It is inconsistent with common-sense to imagine that any
people would ever think of settling in a distant country, on any such
condition, or that the people from whom they withdrew should forever be
masters of their property, and have power to subject them to any modes
of government they pleased. And had there been express stipulations to
this purpose in all the charters of the colonies, they would, in my
opinion, be no more bound by them than if it had been stipulated with
them that they should go naked, or expose themselves to the incursions
of wolves and tigers.”
Such are the opinions of every virtuous and enlightened patriot in
Great Britain. Their petition to Heaven is— "That there may be one free
country left upon earth, to which they may fly, when venality, luxury,
and vice, shall have completed the ruin of liberty there."
Courage, then, my countrymen! Our contest is not only whether we
ourselves shall be free, but whether there shall be left to mankind an
asylum on earth, for civil and religious liberty? Dismissing therefore
the justice of our cause, as incontestable, the only question is, What
is best for us to pursue in our present circumstances?
The doctrine of dependence on Great Britain is, I believe, generally
exploded: but as I would attend to the honest weakness of the simplest
of men, you will pardon me if I offer a few words on that subject.
We are now on this continent, to the astonishment of the world, three
millions of souls united in one common cause. We have large armies,
well disciplined and appointed, with commanders inferior to none in
military skill, and superior in activity and zeal. We are furnished
with arsenals and stores beyond our most sanguine expectations, and
foreign nations are waiting to crown our success by their alliances.
There are instances of, I would say, an almost astonishing Providence
in our favor: our success has staggered our enemies, and almost given
faith to infidels: so that we may truly say it is not our own arm which
has saved us.
The hand of heaven appears to have led us on to be, perhaps, humble
instruments and means in the great providential dispensation which is
completing. We have fled from the political Sodom; let us not look
back, lest we perish and become a monument of infamy and derision to
the world! For can we ever expect more unanimity and a better
preparation for defence: more infatuation of counsel among our enemies,
and more valor and zeal among ourselves? The same force and resistance
which are sufficient to procure us our liberties will secure us a
glorious independence and support us in the dignity of free, imperial
States. We cannot suppose that our opposition has made a corrupt and
dissipated nation more friendly to America, or created in them a
greater respect for the rights of mankind. we can therefore expect a
restoration and establishment of our privileges, and a compensation for
the injuries we have received from their want of power, from their
fears, and not from their virtues. The unanimity and valor, which will
effect an honorable peace, can render a future contest for our
liberties unnecessary. He who has strength to chain down the wolf is a
madman if he lets him loose without drawing his teeth and paring his
nails.
From the day on which an accommodation takes place between England and
America, on any other terms than as independent States, I shall date
the ruin of this country. A politic minister will study to lull us into
security, by granting us the full extent of our petitions. The warm
sunshine of influence would melt down the virtue, which the violence of
the storm rendered more firm and unyielding. In a state of
tranquillity, wealth and luxury, our descendants would forget the arts
of war, and the noble activity and zeal which made their ancestors
invincible. Every art of corruption would be employed to loosen the
bond of union which renders our assistance formidable. When the spirit
of liberty which now animates our hearts and gives success to our arms
is extinct, our numbers will accelerate our ruin, and render us easier
victims to tyranny. Ye abandoned minions of an infatuated ministry, if
peradventure any should yet remain among us! —remember that a Warren
and Montgomery are numbered among the dead. Contemplate the mangled
bodies of our countrymen, and then say, What should be the reward of
such sacrifices? Bid us and our posterity bow the knee, supplicate the
friendship, and plough, and sow, and reap, to glut the avarice of the
men who have let loose on us the dogs of war to riot in our blood, and
hunt us from the face of the earth? If we 1ove wealth better than
liberty, the tranquillity of servitude, than the animating contest of
freedom—go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch
down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly
upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.
To unite the supremacy of Great Britain and the liberty of America, is
utterly impossible. So vast a continent and of such a distance from the
seat of empire will every day grow more unmanageable. The motion of so
unwieldy a body cannot be directed with any despatch and uniformity,
without committing to the Parliament of Great Britain powers
inconsistent with our freedom. The authority and force which would be
absolutely necessary for the preservation of the peace and good order
of this continent, would put all our valuable rights within the reach
of that nation.
As the administration of government requires firmer and more numerous
supports in proportion to its extent, the burdens imposed on us would
be excessive, and we should have the melancholy prospect of their
increasing on our posterity. The scale of officers, from the rapacious
and needy commissioner, to the haughty govenor, and from the governor
with his hungry train, to perhaps a licentious and prodigal viceroy,
must be upheld by you and your children. The fleets and armies which
will be employed to silence your murmurs and complaints must be
supported by the fruits of your industry.
And yet, with all this enlargement of the expense and powers of
government, the administration of it at such a distance, and over so
extensive a territory, must necessarily fail of putting the laws into
vigorous execution, removing private oppressions, and forming plans for
the advancement of agriculture and commerce, and preserving the vast
empire in any tolerable peace and security. If our posterity retain any
spark of patriotism, they can never tamely submit to such burdens. This
country will be made the field of bloody contention till it gains that
independence for which nature formed it. It is therefore injustice and
cruelty to our offspring, and would stamp us with the character of
baseness and cowardice, to leave the salvation of this country to be
worked out by them with accumulated difficulty and danger.
Prejudice, I confess, may warp our judgments. Let us hear the decision
of Englishmen on this subject, who cannot be suspected of partiality:
“The Americans,” say they, “are but little short of half our number. To
this number they have grown from a small body of original settlers by a
very rapid increase. The probability is that they will go on to
increase, and that in fifty or sixty years they will be double our
number: and form a mighty empire, consisting of a variety of States,
all equal or superior to ourselves in all the arts and accomplishments
which give dignity and happiness to human life. In that period will
they be still bound to acknowledge that supremacy over them which we
now claim? Can there be any person who will assert this, or whose mind
does not revolt at the idea of a vast continent, holding all that is
valuable to it, at the discretion of a handful of people on the other
side the Atlantic? But if at that period this would be unreasonable,
what makes it otherwise now? Draw the line if you can. But there is
still a greater difficulty. Britain is now, I will suppose, the seat of
liberty and virtue, and its legislature consists of a body of able and
independent men, who govern with wisdom and justice. The time may come
when all will be reversed: when its excellent constitution of
government will be subverted: when pressed by debts and taxes, it will
be greedy to draw to itself an increase of revenue from every distant
province, in order to ease its own burdens: when the influence of the
Crown, strengthened by luxury and an universal profligacy of manners,
will have tainted every heart, broken down every fence of liberty, and
rendered us a nation of tame and contented vassals: when a general
election will be nothing but a general auction of boroughs, and when
the Parliament, the grand council of the nation, and once the faithful
guardian of the state, and a terror to evil ministers, will be
degenerated into a body of sycophants, dependent and venal, always
ready to confirm any measures, and little more than a public court for
registering royal edicts. Such, it is possible, may, some time or
other, be the state of Great Britain. What will at that period be the
duty of the colonies? Will they be still bound to unconditional
submission? Must they always continue an appendage to our Government,
and follow it implicitly through every change that can happen to it?
Wretched condition indeed, of millions of freemen as good as ourselves!
Will you say that we now govern equitably, and that there is no danger
of such revolution? Would to God that this were true. But will you not
always say the same? Who shall judge whether we govern equitably or
not? Can you give the colonies any security that such a period will
never come?” No! The period, countrymen, is already come. The
calamities were at our door. The rod of oppression was raised over us.
We were roused from our slumbers, and may we never sink into repose
until we can convey a clear and undisputed inheritance to our
posterity. This day we are called upon to give a glorious example of
what the wisest and best of men were rejoiced to view, only in
speculation. This day presents the world with the most august spectacle
that its annals ever unfolded. Millions of freemen, deliberately and
voluntarily forming themselves into a society for their common defence
and common happiness. Immortal spirits of Hampden, Locke, and Sidney!
will it not add to your benevolent joys to behold your posterity rising
to the dignity of men, and evincing to the world the reality and
expediency of your systems, and in the actual enjoyments of that equal
liberty, which you were happy, when on earth, in delineating and
recommending to mankind!
Other nations have received their laws from conquerors: some are
indebted for a constitution to the sufferings of their ancestors
through revolving centuries. The people of this country, alone, have
formally and deliberately chosen a Government for themselves, and with
open and uninfluenced consent, bound themselves into a social compact.
Here, no man proclaims his birth or wealth as a title to honorable
distinction, or to sanctify ignorance and vice with the name of
hereditary authority. He who has most zeal and ability to promote
public felicity, let him be the servant of the public. This is the only
line of distinction drawn by nature. Leave the bird of night to the
obscurity for which nature intended him, and expect only from the eagle
to brush the clouds with his wings, and look boldly in the face of the
sun.
Some who would persuade us that they have tender feelings for future
generations, while they are insensible to the happinness of the
present, are perpetually foreboding a train of dissensions under our
popular system. Such men's reasoning amounts to this—give up all that
is valuable to Great Britain, and then you will have no inducements to
quarrel among yourselves; or suffer yourselves to be chained down by
your enemies, that you may not be able to fight with your friends.
This is an insult on your virtue as well as your common sense. Your
unanimity this day and through the course of the war, is a decisive
refutation of such invidious predictions. Our enemies have already had
evidence that our present constitution contains in it the justice and
ardor of freedom, and the wisdom and vigor of the most absolute system.
When the law is the will of the people, it will be uniform and
coherent: but fluctuation, contradiction, and inconsistency of councils
must be expected under those governments where every revolution in the
ministry of a court produces one in the state. Such being the folly and
pride of all ministers, that they ever pursue measures directly
opposite to those of their predecessors.
We shall neither be exposed to the necessary convulsions of elective
monarchies, nor to the want of wisdom, fortitude, and virtue, to which
hereditary succession is liable. In your hands it will be to perpetuate
a prudent, active and just legislature, and which will never expire
until you yourselves lose the virtues which give it existence.
And, brethren and fellow-countrymen, if it was ever granted to mortals
to trace the designs of Providence, and interpret its manifestations in
favor of their cause, we may, with humility of soul, cry out, Not unto
us, not unto us, but to thy name be the praise. The confusion of the
devices among our enemies, and the rage of the elements against them,
have done almost as much towards our success as either our councils or
our arms.
The time at which this attempt on our liberties was made, when we were
ripened into maturity, had acquired a knowledge of war, and were free
from the incursions of enemies in this country, the gradual advances of
our oppressors enabling us to prepare for our defence, the unusual
fertility of our lands and clemency of the seasons, the success which
at first attended our feeble arms, producing unanimity among our
friends and reducing our internal foes to acquiescence—these are all
strong and palpable marks and assurances, that Providence is yet
gracious unto Zion, that it will turn away the captivity of Jacob.
Our glorious reformers when they broke through the fetters of
superstition, effected more than could be expected from an age so
darkened. But they left much to be done by their posterity. They lopped
off, indeed, some of the branches of popery, but they left the root and
stock when they left us under the domination of human systems and
decisions, usurping the infallibility which can be attributed to
Revelation alone. They dethroned one usurper only to raise up another:
they refused allegiance to the Pope, only to place the civil magistrate
in the throne of Christ, vested with authority to enact laws, and
inflict penalties in his kingdom. And if we now cast our eyes over the
nations of the earth we shall find, that instead of possessing the pure
religion of the gospel, they may be divided either into infidels who
deny the truth, or politicians who make religion a stalking horse for
their ambition, or professors, who walk in the trammels of orthodoxy,
and are more attentive to traditions and ordinances of men than to the
oracles of truth.
The civil magistrate has everywhere contaminated religion by making it
an engine of policy: and freedom of thought and the right of private
judgment, in matters of conscience, driven from every other corner of
the earth, direct their course to this happy country as their last
asylum. Let us cherish the noble guests, and shelter them under the
wings of an universal toleration. Be this the seat of unbounded
religious freedom. She will bring with her in her train, industry,
wisdom, and commerce. She thrives most when left to shoot forth in her
natural luxuriance, and asks from human policy, only not to be checked
in her growth by artificial encouragements.
Thus by the beneficence of Providence, we shall behold our empire
arising, founded on justice and the voluntary consent of the people,
and giving full scope to the exercise of those faculties and rights
which most ennoble our species. Besides the advantages of liberty and
the most equal constitution, heaven has given us a country with every
variety of climate and soil, pouring forth in abundance whatever is
necessary for the support, comfort, and strength of a nation. Within
our own borders we possess all the means of sustenance, defence, and
commerce; at the same time, these advantages are so distributed among
the different States of this continent, as if nature had in view to
proclaim to us—Be united among yourselves, and you will want nothing
from the rest of the world.
The more northern States most amply supply us with every necessary, and
many of the luxuries of life—with iron, timber, and masts for ships of
commerce or of war: with flax for the manufacture of linen, and seed
either for oil or exportation.
So abundant are our harvests, that almost every part raises more than
double the quantity of grain requisite for the support of the
inhabitants. From Georgia and the Carolinas, we have, as well for our
own wants as for the purpose of supplying the wants of other powers,
indigo, rice, hemp, naval stores, and lumber.
Virginia and Maryland teem with wheat, Indian corn, and tobacco. Every
nation whose harvest is precarious, or whose lands yield not those
commodities, which we cultivate, will gladly exchange their
superfluities and manufactures for ours.
We have already received many and large cargoes of clothing, military
stores, etc., from our commerce with foreign powers, and in spite of
the efforts of the boasted navy of England, we shall continue to profit
by this connection.
The want of our naval stores has already increased the price of these
articles to a great height, especially in Britain. Without our lumber,
it will be impossible for those haughty islanders to convey the
products of the West Indies to their own ports— for a while they may
with difficulty effect it, but without our assistance, their resources
soon must fail. Indeed, the West India Islands appear as the necessary
appendages to this our empire. They must owe their support to it, and
ere long, I doubt not, some of them will from necessity wish to enjoy
the benefit of our protection.
These natural advantages will enable us to remain independent of the
world, or make it the interest of European powers to court our
alliance, and aid in protecting us against the invasions of others.
What argument therefore do we want, to show the equity of our conduct:
or motive of interest to recommend it to our prudence? Nature points
out the path, and our enemies have obliged us to pursue it.
If there is any man so base or so weak as to prefer a dependence on
Great Britain to the dignity and happiness of living a member of a free
and independent nation—let me tell him that necessity now demands what
the generous principle of patriotism should have dictated.
We have now no other alternative than independence, or the most
ignominious and galling servitude. The legions of our enemies thicken
on our plains; desolation and death mark their bloody career; whilst
the mangled corpses of our countrymen seem to cry out to us as a voice
from heaven— ”Will you permit our posterity to groan under the galling
chains of our murderers? Has our blood been expended in vain? Is the
only reward which our constancy, till death, has obtained for our
country, that it should be sunk into a deeper and more ignominious
vassalage? Recollect who are the men that demand your submission; to
whose decrees you are invited to pay obedience! Men who, unmindful of
their relation to you as brethren, of your long implicit submission to
their laws; of the sacrifice which you and your forefathers made of
your natural advantages for commerce to their avarice—formed a
deliberate plan to wrest from you the small pittance of property which
they had permitted you to acquire. Remember that the men who wish to
rule over you, are they who, in pursuit of this plan of despotism,
annulled the sacred contracts which had been made with your ancestors:
conveyed into your cities a mercenary soldiery to compel you to
submission by insult and murder - who called your patience, cowardice;
your piety, hypocrisy.”
Countrymen! the men who now invite you to surrender your rights into
their hands, are the men who have let loose the merciless savages to
riot in the blood of their brethren—who have dared to establish popery
triumphant in our land—who have taught treachery to your slaves, and
courted them to assassinate your wives and children.
These are the men to whom we are exhorted to sacrifice the blessings
which Providence holds out to us—the happiness, the dignity of
uncontrolled freedom and independence.
Let not your generous indignation be directed against any among us, who
may advise so absurd and maddening a measure. Their number is but few
and daily decreases; and the spirit which can render them patient of
slavery will render them contemptible enemies.
Our Union is now complete; our constitution composed, established, and
approved. You are now the guardians of your own liberties. We may
justly address you, as the Decemviri did the Romans, and say— ”Nothing
that we propose can pass into a law without your consent. Be
yourselves, O Americans, the authors of those laws on which your
happiness depends.”
You have now in the field armies sufficient to repel the whole force of
your enemies, and their base and mercenary auxiliaries. The hearts of
your soldiers beat high with the spirit of freedom — they are animated
with the justice of their cause, and while they grasp their swords, can
look up to heaven for assistance. Your adversaries are composed of
wretches who laugh at the rights of humanity, who turn religion into
derision, and would, for higher wages, direct their swords against
their leaders or their country. Go on, then, in your generous
enterprise, with gratitude to heaven, for past success, and confidence
of it in the future. For my own part, I ask no greater blessing than to
share with you the common danger and common glory. If I have a wish
dearer to my soul, than that my ashes may be mingled with those of a
Warren and Montgomery—it is—that these American States may never cease
to be free and independent!
