Title: V. “A Dissertation on the Canon and the Feudal Law,” No. 3, 30 September 1765
From: Adams, John
To: Boston Gazette (newspaper)

        Monday, 30 September 1765

      TO have holden their lands, allodially, or for every man to have been the sovereign lord and proprietor of the ground he occupied, would have constituted a government, too nearly like a commonwealth. They were contented therefore to hold their lands of their King, as their sovereign Lord, and to him they were willing to render homage: but to no mesne and subordinate Lords, nor were they willing to submit to any of the baser services. In all this, they were so strenuous, that they have even transmitted to their posterity, a very general contempt and detestation of holdings by quit rents: As they have also an hereditary ardor for liberty and thirst for knowledge.
      They were convinced by their knowledge of human nature derived from history and their own experience, that nothing could preserve their posterity from the encroachments of the two systems of tyranny, in opposition to which, as has been observed already, they erected their government in church and state, but knowledge diffused generally thro’ the whole body of the people. Their civil and religious principles, therefore, conspired to prompt them to use every measure, and take every precaution in their power, to propagate and perpetuate knowledge. For this purpose they laid, very early the foundations of colleges, and invested them with ample priviledges and emoluments; and it is  remarkable, that they have left among their posterity, so universal an affection and veneration for those seminaries, and for liberal education, that the meanest of the people contribute chearfully to the support and maintenance of them every year, and that nothing is more generally popular than projections for the honour, reputation and advantage of those seats of learning. But the wisdom and benevolence of our fathers rested not here. They made an early provision by law, that every town consisting of so many families, should be always furnished with a grammar school. They made it a crime for such a town to be destitute of a grammar school master, for a few months, and subjected it to an heavy penalty. So that the education of all ranks of people was made the care and expence of the public in a manner, that I believe has been unknown to any other people ancient or modern.
      The consequences of these establishments we see and feel every day. A native of America who cannot read and write is as rare an appearance, as a Jacobite or a Roman Catholic, i. e. as rare as a Comet or an Earthquake. It has been observed, that we are all of us, lawyers, divines, politicians and philosophers. And I have good authorities to say that all candid foreigners who have passed thro’ this country, and conversed freely with all sorts of people here, will allow, that they have never seen so much knowledge and civility among the common people in any part of the world. It is true, there has been among us a party for some years, consisting chiefly not of the descendants of the first settlers of this country but of high churchmen and high statesmen, imported since, who affect to censure this provision for the education of our youth as a needless expence, and an imposition upon the rich in favour of the poor—and as an institution productive of idleness and vain speculation among the people, whose time and attention it is said ought to be devoted to labour, and not to public affairs or to examination into the conduct of their superiours. And certain officers of the crown, and certain other missionaries of ignorance, foppery, servility and slavery, have been most inclined to countenance and increase the same party. Be it remembred, however, that liberty must at all hazards be supported. We have a right to it, derived from our Maker. But if we had not, our fathers have earned, and bought it for us, at the expence of their ease, their estates, their pleasure, and their blood. And liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people, who have a right from the frame of their nature, to knowledge, as their great Creator who does nothing in vain, has given them understandings, and a desire to know—but besides this they have a right, an indisputable, unalienable, indefeasible divine right to that most dreaded, and envied kind of knowledge, I mean of the characters and conduct of their rulers. Rulers are no more than attorneys, agents and trustees for the people; and if the cause, the interest and trust is insidiously betray’d, or wantonly trifled away, the people have a right to revoke the authority, that they themselves have deputed, and to constitute abler and better agents, attorneys and trustees. And the preservation of the means of knowledge, among the lowest ranks, is of more importance to the public, than all the property of all the rich men in the country. It is even of more consequence to the rich themselves, and to their posterity. The only question is whether it is a public emolument? and if it is, the rich ought undoubtedly to contribute in the same proportion, as to all other public burdens, i. e. in proportion to their wealth which is secured by public expences. But none of the means of information are more sacred, or have been cherished with more tenderness and care by the settlers of America, than the Press. Care has been taken, that the art of printing should be encouraged, and that it should be easy and cheap and safe for any person to communicate his thoughts to the public. And you, Messieurs Printers, whatever the tyrants of the earth may say of your paper, have done important service to your country, by your readiness and freedom in publishing the speculations of the curious. The stale, impudent insinuations of slander and sedition, with which the gormandizers of power have endeavor’d to discredit your paper, are so much the more to your honour; for the jaws of power are always opened to devour, and her arm is always stretched out if possible to destroy, the freedom of thinking, speaking and writing. And if the public interest, liberty and happiness have been in danger, from the ambition or avarice of any great man or number of great men, whatever may be their politeness, address, learning, ingenuity and in other respects integrity and humanity, you have done yourselves honour and your country service, by publishing and pointing out that avarice and ambition. These views are so much the more dangerous and pernicious, for the virtues with which they may be accompanied in the same character, and with so much the more watchful jealousy to be guarded against.

       “Curse on such virtues, they’ve undone their country.”

      Be not intimidated therefore, by any terrors, from publishing with the utmost freedom, whatever can be warranted by the laws of your country; nor suffer yourselves to be wheedled out of your liberty, by any pretences of politeness, delicacy or decency. These as they are often used, are but three different names, for hypocrisy, chicanery and cowardice. Much less I presume will you be discouraged by any pretences, that malignant’s on this side the water will represent your paper as factious and seditious, or that the Great on the other side the water will take offence at them. This Dread of representation, has had for a long time in this province effects very similar to what the physicians call an hydropho, or dread of water. It has made us delirious. And we have rushed headlong into the water, till we are almost drowned, out of simple or phrensical fear of it. Believe me, the character of this country has suffered more in Britain, by the pusillanimity with which we have borne many insults and indignities from the creatures of power at home, and the creatures of those creatures here, than it ever did or ever will by the freedom and spirit that has been or will be discovered in writing, or action. Believe me my countrymen, they have imbibed an opinion on the other side the water, that we are an ignorant, a timid and a stupid people, nay their tools on this side have often the impudence to dispute your bravery. But I hope in God the time is near at hand, when they will be fully convinced of your understanding, integrity and courage. But can any thing be more ridiculous, were it not too provoking to be laughed at, than to pretend that offence should be taken at home for writings here? Pray let them look at home. Is not the human understanding exhausted there? Are not reason, imagination, wit, passion, senses and all, tortured to find out satyr and invective against the characters of the vile and futile fellows who sometimes get into place and power? The most exceptionable paper that ever I saw here, is perfect prudence and modesty, in comparison of multitudes of their applauded writings. Yet the high regard they have for the freedom of the Press, indulges all. I must and will repeat it, your Paper deserves the patronage of every friend to his country. And whether the defamers of it are arrayed in robes of scarlet or sable, whether they lurk and skulk in an insurance office, whether they assume the venerable character of a Priest, the sly one of a scrivener, or the dirty, infamous, abandoned one of an informer, they are all the creatures and tools of the lust of domination.
      The true source of our sufferings, has been our timidity.


Title: VI. “A Dissertation on the Canon and the Feudal Law,” No. 4, 21 October 1765
From: Adams, John
To: Boston Gazette (newspaper)

        Monday, 21 October 1765

      WE have been afraid to think. We have felt a reluctance to examining into the grounds of our privileges, and the extent in which we have an indisputable right to demand them against all the power and authority, on earth. And many who have not scrupled to examine for themselves, have yet for certain prudent reasons been cautious, and diffident of declaring the result of their enquiries.
      The cause of this timidity is perhaps hereditary and to be traced back in history, as far as the cruel treatment the first settlers of this country received, before their embarkation for America, from the government at Home. Every body knows how dangerous it was to speak or write in favour of any thing in those days, but the triumphant system of religion and politicks. And our fathers were particularly, the objects of the persecutions and proscriptions of the times. It is not unlikely therefore, that, although they were inflexibly steady in refusing their positive assent to any thing against their principles, they might have contracted habits of reserve, and a cautious diffidence of asserting their opinions publickly. These habits they probably brought with them to America, and have transmitted down to us. Or, we may possibly account for this appearance, by the great affection and veneration, Americans have always entertained for the country from whence they sprang—or by the quiet temper for which they have been remarkable, no country having been less disposed to discontent than this—or by a sense they have, that it is their duty to acquiesce, under the administration of government, even when in many smaller matters gravaminous to them, and until the essentials of the great compact are destroy’d or invaded. These peculiar causes might operate upon them; but without these we all know, that human nature itself, from indolence, modesty, humanity or fear, has always too much reluctance to a manly assertion of its rights. Hence perhaps it has happened that nine tenths of the species, are groaning and gasping in misery and servitude.

      But whatever the cause has been, the fact is certain, we have been excessively cautious of giving offence by complaining of grievances. And it is as certain that American governors, and their friends and all the crown officers have avail’d themselves of this disposition in the people. They have prevailed on us to consent to many things, which were grosly injurious to us, and to surrender many others with voluntary tameness, to which we had the clearest right. Have we not been treated formerly, with abominable insolence, by officers of the navy? I mean no insinuation against any gentleman now on this station, having heard no complaint of any one of them to his dishonor. Have not some generals, from England, treated us like servants, nay more like slaves than like Britons? Have we not been under the most ignominious contribution, the most abject submission, the most supercilious insults of some custom house officers? Have we not been trifled with, browbeaten, and trampled on, by former governors, in a manner which no king of England since James the second has dared to indulge towards his subjects? Have we not raised up one family, in them placed an unlimitted confidence, and been soothed and battered and intimidated by their influence, into a great part of this infamous tameness and submission? “These are serious and alarming questions, and deserve a dispassionate consideration.”
      This disposition has been the great wheel and the mainspring in the American machine of court politicks. We have been told that “the word ’Rights’ is an offensive expression.” That “the King his ministry and parliament will not endure to hear Americans talk of their Rights.” That “Britain is the mother and we the children, that a filial duty and submission is due from us to her,” and that “we ought to doubt our own judgment, and presume that she is right, even when she seems to us to shake the foundations of government.” That “Britain is immensely rich and great and powerful, has fleets and armies at her command, which have been the dread and terror of the universe, and that she will force her own judgment into execution, right or wrong.” But let me intreat you Sir to pause and consider. Do you consider your self as a missionary of loyalty or of rebellion? Are you not representing your King his ministry and parliament as tyrants, imperious, unrelenting tyrants by such reasoning as this? Is not this representing your most gracious sovereign, as endeavouring to destroy the foundations of his own throne? Are you not putting language into the royal mouth, which if fairly pursued will shew him to have no right to the crown on his own sacred head? Are you not representing every member of parliament as renouncing the transactions at Runningmede, and as repealing in effect the bill of rights, when the Lords and Commons asserted and vindicated the rights of the people and their own rights, and insisted on the King’s assent to that assertion and vindication? Do you not represent them as forgetting that the prince of Orange, was created King William by the People, on purpose that their rights might be eternal and inviolable? Is there not something extremely fallacious, in the common-place images of mother country and children colonies? Are we the children of Great-Britain, any more than the cities of London, Exeter and Bath? Are we not brethren and fellow subjects, with those in Britain, only under a somewhat different method of legislation, and a totally different method of taxation? But admitting we are children; have not children a right to complain when their parents are attempting to break their limbs, to administer poison, or to sell them to enemies for slaves? Let me intreat you to consider, will the mother, be pleased, when you represent her as deaf to the cries of her children? When you compare her to the infamous miscreant, who lately stood on the gallows for starving her child? When you resemble her to Lady Macbeth in Shakespear, (I cannot think of it without horror)

       Who “had given suck, and knew
       How tender ’twas to love the Babe that milk’d her.”
       But yet, who could
       “Even while ’twas smiling in her Face,
       Have pluck’d her Nipple from the boneless Gums,
       And dash’d the Brains out.”

      Let us banish forever from our minds, my countrymen, all such unworthy ideas of the King, his ministry and parliament. Let us not suppose, that all are become luxurious effeminate and unreasonable, on the other side the water, as many designing persons would insinuate. Let us presume, what is in fact true, that the spirit of liberty, is as ardent as ever among the body of the nation, though a few individuals may be corrupted. Let us take it for granted, that the same great spirit, which once gave Caesar so warm a reception; which denounced hostilities against John ’till Magna Charta was signed; which severed the head of Charles the first from his body, and drove James the second from his kingdom; the same great spirit (may heaven preserve it till the earth shall be no more) which first seated the great grand father of his present most gracious Majesty, on the throne of Britain, is still alive and active and warm in England; and that the same spirit in America, instead of provoking the inhabitants of that country, will endear us to them for ever and secure their good will.

      This spirit however without knowledge, would be little better than a brutal rage. Let us tenderly and kindly cherish, therefore the means of knowledge. Let us dare to read, think, speak and write. Let every order and degree among the people rouse their attention and animate their resolution. Let them all become attentive to the grounds and principles of government, ecclesiastical and civil. Let us study the law of nature; search into the spirit of the British constitution; read the histories of ancient ages; contemplate the great examples of Greece and Rome; set before us, the conduct of our own British ancestors, who have defended for us, the inherent rights of mankind, against foreign and domestic tyrants and usurpers, against arbitrary kings and cruel priests, in short against the gates of earth and hell. Let us read and recollect and impress upon our souls, the views and ends, of our own more immediate forefathers, in exchanging their native country for a dreary, inhospitable wilderness. Let us examine into the nature of that power and the cruelty of that oppression which drove them from their homes. Recollect their amazing fortitude, their bitter sufferings! The hunger, the nakedness, the cold, which they patiently endured! The severe labours of clearing their grounds, building their houses, raising their provisions amidst dangers from wild beasts and savage men, before they had time or money or materials for commerce! Recollect the civil and religious principles and hopes and expectations, which constantly supported and carried them through all hardships, and patience and resignation! Let us recollect it was liberty! The hope of liberty for themselves and us and ours, which conquered all discouragements, dangers and trials! In such researches as these let us all in our several departments chearfully engage! But especially the proper patrons and supporters of law, learning and religion.
      Let the pulpit resound with the doctrines and sentiments of religious liberty. Let us hear the danger of thraldom to our consciences, from ignorance, extream poverty and dependance, in short from civil and political slavery. Let us see delineated before us, the true map of man. Let us hear the dignity of his nature, and the noble rank he holds among the works of God! that consenting to slavery is a sacriligious breach of trust, as offensive in the sight of God, as it is derogatory from our own honor or interest or happiness; and that God almighty has promulgated from heaven, liberty, peace, and good-will to man!
      Let the Bar proclaim, “the laws, the rights, the generous plan of power,” delivered down from remote antiquity; inform the world of the mighty struggles, and numberless sacrifices, made by our ancestors, in defence of freedom. Let it be known, that British liberties are not the grants of princes or parliaments, but original rights, conditions of original contracts, coequal with prerogative and coeval with government.—That many of our rights are inherent and essential, agreed on as maxims and establish’d as preliminaries, even before a parliament existed. Let them search for the foundations of British laws and government in the frame of human nature, in the constitution of the intellectual and moral world. There let us see, that truth, liberty, justice and benevolence, are its everlasting basis; and if these could be removed, the superstructure is overthrown of course.
      Let the colleges join their harmony, in the same delightful concern. Let every declamation turn upon the beauty of liberty and virtue, and the deformity, turpitude and malignity of slavery and vice. Let the public disputations become researches into the grounds and nature and ends of government, and the means of preserving the good and demolishing the evil. Let the dialogues and all the exercises, become the instruments of impressing on the tender mind, and of spreading and distributing, far and wide, the ideas of right and the sensations of freedom.
      In a word, let every sluice of knowledge be open’d and set a flowing. The encroachments upon liberty, in the reigns of the first James and the first Charles, by turning the general attention of learned men to government, are said to have produced the greatest number of consummate statesmen, which has ever been seen in any age, or nation. Your Clarendons, Southamptons, Seldens, Hampdens, Faulklands, Sidneys, Locks, Harringtons, are all said to have owed their eminence in political knowledge, to the tyrannies of those reigns. The prospect, now before us, in America, ought in the same manner to engage the attention of every man of learning to matters of power and of right, that we may be neither led nor driven blindfolded to irretrievable destruction. Nothing less than this seems to have been meditated for us, by somebody or other in Great-Britain. There seems to be a direct and formal design on foot, to enslave all America. This however must be done by degrees. The first step that is intended seems to be an entire subversion of the whole system of our Fathers, by an introduction of the cannon and feudal law, into America. The cannon and feudal systems tho’ greatly mutilated in England, are not yet destroy’d. Like the temples and palaces, in which the great contrivers of them, once worship’d and inhabited, they exist in ruins; and much of the domineering spirit of them still remains. The designs and labours of a certain society, to introduce the former of them into America, have been well exposed to the public by a writer of great abilities, and the further attempts to the same purpose that may be made by that society, or by the ministry or parliament, I leave to the conjectures of the thoughtful. But it seems very manifest from the S—p A-t itself, that a design is form’d to strip us in a great measure of the means of knowledge, by loading the Press, the Colleges, and even an Almanack and a News-Paper, with restraints and duties; and to introduce the inequalities and dependances of the feudal system, by taking from the poorer sort of people all their little subsistance, and conferring it on a set of stamp officers, distributors and their deputies. But I must proceed no further at present. The sequel, whenever I shall find health and leisure to pursue it, will be a “disquisition of the policy of the stamp act.” In the mean time however let me add, These are not the vapours of a melancholly mind, nor the effusions of envy, disappointed ambition, nor of a spirit of opposition to government: but the emanations of an heart that burns, for its country’s welfare. No one of any feeling, born and educated in this once happy country, can consider the numerous distresses, the gross indignities, the barbarous ignorance, the haughty usurpations, that we have reason to fear are meditating for ourselves, our children, our neighbours, in short for all our countrymen and all their posterity, without the utmost agonies of heart, and many tears.


Title: On the Pillaging of Andrew Oliver’s Home, 15 August 1765
From: Adams, John
To:

     15 Aug. 1765. Printed: JA, Diary and AutobiographyDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 1:259–261. Probably designed as a newspaper contribution.


Title: Editorial Note
From:
To:

      Although “A Dissertation on the Canon and the Feudal Law” was John Adams’ first contribution to the literature of the American Revolution, the Braintree Instructions about the Stamp Act were the first defense of American rights publicly recognized as having come from his pen. These Instructions, drafted in the first instance by Adams, then approved with modifications by a Braintree town meeting, and finally broadcast through Massachusetts in the Massachusetts GazetteMassachusetts Gazette: and the Boston Weekly News-Letter. and the Boston Gazette with additional variations, vigorously denounced the Stamp Act for depriving Americans of their rights as Englishmen to be taxed only with their consent and to be tried by juries of their peers. Adams advanced no novel principles and recommended no particularly radical mode of opposition to parliamentary authority. Nevertheless, his instructions deserve more than passing commentary because of the opportunity they offer both for textual analysis of one of the more significant documents of the early Revolutionary period and for a critical appraisal of the author’s own subsequent account of their history.
      Writing in his Autobiography almost forty years after the events in question, Adams composed the only extended description of the provenance of the Braintree Instructions known to exist (Diary and AutobiographyDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 3:282–283). According to this account, Adams became alarmed by the Stamp Act sometime in 1765 and thereupon secured the approval of his fellow townsmen in Braintree for a petition he had drawn up, calling for a town meeting in order “to instruct their Representatives in Relation to the Stamps.” When this meeting convened, on 24 September, the towns people chose Adams and four others to be a committee to prepare a set of instructions for the town’s representative. This committee immediately repaired to the home of Samuel Niles, one of its members. There Adams presented his colleagues with a draft set of instructions about the Stamp Act, which he had written some time prior to the town meeting and which that same day were “unanimously adopted by the committee without Amendment, reported to the Town and Accepted without a dissenting Voice.” Several days later, Richard Draper, printer of the Massachusetts GazetteMassachusetts Gazette: and the Boston Weekly News-Letter., asked Adams to furnish him with a copy of the Braintree Instructions—an indication, perhaps, of the extent to which Adams’ authorship was already known. Adams readily complied with Draper’s request, and the Instructions appeared in the 10 October 1765 issue of the Massachusetts GazetteMassachusetts Gazette: and the Boston Weekly News-Letter.—from which they were taken and reprinted four days later in the Boston Gazette. Once in print, Adams went on to recall, the Braintree Instructions made a profound impression upon the freemen of the province. Forty other towns adopted them, “in so many Words,” to guide their representatives during the session of the General Court which began in the fall of 1765; even Samuel Adams, that master of propaganda, saw fit to incorporate “some paragraphs” from the Braintree Instructions into those which he wrote at this time for the town of Boston.
      Although Adams’ memory served him well in the reconstruction of some features of this episode, it was either deficient or misleading in regard to at least three others. He only partially explained the fundamental question of motivation, or what exactly prompted him to write these particular Instructions at this particular time. That he acted out of opposition to the Stamp Act, as the Autobiography implies, is indisputable. But the question remains of why he waited till the fall of 1765 to call for a town meeting to protest an act of Parliament that he had known about since the preceding spring. This delay between awareness and action becomes comprehensible, when two events that Adams forgot to mention in his Autobiography are taken into account. The first was Governor Bernard’s issuance of a proclamation, on 6 September, ordering a meeting of the General Court for the 25th of the month, and the second, the arrival in Boston, on 21 September, of the first consignment of stamp paper (Boston Post-Boy, 9, 23 Sept. 1765). While the one gave the voters their first opportunity after the riots and tumults of the preceding August to reaffirm their opposition to the Stamp Act through their regularly elected representatives, the other made it technically possible to implement this measure on 1 November 1765, the date it was scheduled to go into effect. The forthcoming session of the General Court provided Adams with the occasion for writing the Braintree Instructions, and the arrival of the stamps almost certainly lent a note of urgency to this work. The conjuncture of these two events, combined with Adams’ prior opposition to the Stamp Act, elicited these Instructions.
      If Adams said too little in the Autobiography about specifically why he wrote the Braintree Instructions, he claimed too much for their impact upon Massachusetts. His assertion that they were adopted, “in so many Words,” by forty other towns in the fall of 1765 does not stand up. A scrupulous examination of the town instructions printed in the Boston newspapers (Boston Gazette, Boston Evening-Post, Boston Post-Boy, Massachusetts GazetteMassachusetts Gazette: and the Boston Weekly News-Letter.) for the period October–December 1765 reveals that a few towns voted instructions that might have been inspired by those of Braintree, but that many more did not. Thus, it is highly unlikely that Adams’ Instructions were nearly so effective in 1765 as he claimed in 1804.
      Caution must also be observed with respect to Adams’ version of the influence he exercised over the writing of cousin Samuel’s Boston Instructions. These received the approval of the Boston town meeting, 18 September 1765, and were printed in the Boston Gazette five days later, thereby raising the possibility that it was Samuel who influenced John, and not vice versa (Boston Record Commissioners, 16th ReportCity of Boston, Record Commissioners, Reports, Boston, 1876–1909; 39 vols., p. 155–156; Boston Gazette, 23 Sept. 1765). Besides preceding the Braintree Instructions in time, the Boston Instructions show no evidence of the specific sort of influence which Adams described in his Autobiography and during his controversy with Mercy Warren in 1807. In the first he asserted that Samuel Adams had incorporated into the Boston Instructions “some paragraphs” from a “Copy” of the Braintree Instructions furnished him by cousin John; and in the second, that “Boston, whose instructions were drawn by Mr. Samuel Adams, had, in the main essential point of all, adopted the sentiment and the very expressions of my instructions” (JA, Diary and AutobiographyDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 3:283; same to Mercy Warren, 20 July 1807, MHS, Colls.Massachusetts Historical Society, Collections and Proceedings., 5th ser., 4 [1878]:341). But a close comparison of the two sets of instructions shows that Boston’s have absolutely none of the “paragraphs” and only several of the “expressions” of Braintree’s. The best one can say, therefore, is that although Adams might have had some influence on the drafting of the Boston Instructions, it was neither of the magnitude nor of the type that he claimed in his Autobiography.
      In contrast, the textual history of the Braintree Instructions is considerably more involved than one would gather from Adams’ autobiographical account of it. There are three distinct texts of the Instructions—Adams’ own undated draft (No. I, below); the instructions approved by the town meeting of Braintree on 24 September 1765 (No. II, below); and the two identical newspaper printings of them (No. III, below). All express substantially the same general arguments—that the Stamp Act was unconstitutional because it deprived Americans of their rights to taxation by consent and trial by jury, and inexpedient because of the economic problems it would produce in Massachusetts—but in several significant respects each one differs from the others in content, tone, or phraseology. Consequently, one cannot accept Adams’ statement that Braintree approved his draft Instructions without any amendments, or his insinuation that the newspapers printed them without any changes (JA, Diary and AutobiographyDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 3:282).
      Adams’ draft instructions breathed defiance. In addition to stating constitutional and economic objections to the Stamp Act, they indirectly but unmistakably criticized recent parliamentary acts affecting trade; reminded one and all that the august Parliament was made up of mere men; questioned the learning and probity of some of the admiralty judges; and, most of all, descried a conspiracy of Parliament to enslave Americans.
      Adams’ draft was evidently too radical for his committee colleagues, or the members of the town meeting, or both. In any case, the Instructions the town approved retained the principal arguments against the Stamp Act that Adams had formulated, but omitted his pointed allusion to recent parliamentary economic regulation as well as his sharp comments about M.P.’s, admiralty judges, and enslavement. These changes made the officially adopted Instructions less radical than Adams’ draft in content and in tone; yet the net effect was still a forthright defense of colonial rights against an allegedly unconstitutional exercise of parliamentary authority. Whether these modifications were made with or without Adams’ consent is impossible to determine. Nor are there any specific explanations, contemporary or otherwise, for why they were made at all. Conceivably they might have resulted from the publication, twelve days before the town meeting convened, of news from England of the formation of the Rockingham ministry, which was known to be sympathetic to America (Massachusetts GazetteMassachusetts Gazette: and the Boston Weekly News-Letter., 12 Sept. 1765). But this is only speculation.
      The variations between the Instructions in the newspapers and in the Braintree Town Records are verbal rather than substantive, except for some sentences printed out of order. In at least this respect, the newspaper text differs significantly from the other two. Once again, however, it is impossible to say whether these variations originated with Adams as he was making a copy of the official Instructions for Draper’s use, or with Draper as he was putting this copy through the press for publication in the Massachusetts GazetteMassachusetts Gazette: and the Boston Weekly News-Letter.. In two instances a word appears in the newspaper that is in Adams’ draft but not in the voted Instructions. Clearly, Draper saw the draft or Adams supplied the words verbally.
      Charles Francis Adams included in his edition of John Adams’ WorksThe Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: with a Life of the Author, ed. Charles Francis Adams, Boston, 1850–1856; 10 vols. (3:465–468) only the text of the Braintree Instructions from the 14 October 1765 Boston Gazette. So that the intricate evolution of one of Adams’ more important early public writings may be followed, the present editors have reprinted John Adams’ draft, the Instructions adopted by the Braintree town meeting, and the Instructions printed in the Massachusetts GazetteMassachusetts Gazette: and the Boston Weekly News-Letter., 10 October 1765. Benjamin Franklin sent the Braintree Instructions as well as those of Boston for publication in the London Chronicle, where they appeared in January 1766. Franklin’s accompanying note explained that American opposition to the Stamp Act had not occurred out of “niggardliness” (Franklin, PapersThe Papers of Benjamin Franklin, ed. Leonard W. Labaree, William B. Willcox (from vol. 15), and others, New Haven, 1959– ., 13:26–28).


Title: II. Instructions Adopted by the Braintree Town Meeting, 24 September 1765
From: Adams, John,Niles, Samuel,Quincy, Norton,Penniman, James,Hayward, John,Braintree, town of
To: Braintree, town of,Ebenezer, Thayer

        Braintree
        1765 Septr. 24

      The Freeholders and other Inhabitants of the Town of Braintree Qualifyd to vote in Town affairs being assembled at the Meeting House in the Middle Precinct of said Town pursuant to warrants for assembling said Town To inform their Representative Respecting their Sentiments Relative to the Stamp Act And other matters of Grievance, Also to see if the Town will instruct their Representative on this important and allarming occasion, Assembled as aforesaid Mr. Norton Quincey Moderator.
      Voted Samll. Niles Esqr., John Adams Esqr., Mr Norton Quincy, Deacon James Penniman and Captn. John Hayward be a Committee to draw instructions for their Representative and present the Same to the Town. The aforesaid Committee Presented the following draught to the Town.

          To Ebenezer Thayer Esqr.
          Sir

         In all the Calamities that have ever befallen this Country we have never felt so great a Concern nor so many allarming apprehensions as at this time. Such is our Loyalty to the King, such our veneration for both Houses of Parliament and Such our Freindship to all our fellow Subjects in Britain that measures which Seem to discover any unkindness towards us in that Country are the more Sensibly and intimately felt. And we can no longer forbear Complaining that many of the measures of the late ministry and Some of the late Acts of Parliament have a Tendency in our apprehension to divest us of some of our most Essential Rights and Liberties.
         We Shall confine our Selves however Cheifly to the Act of Parliament Commonly Called the Stamp Act by which a very burthensome and in our opinion unconstitutional Tax is to be laid upon us all: and we are Subjected to numerous and enormous Penalties which are to be prosecuted, Sued for and recovered at the option of an Informer at a Court of Admiralty without a Jury. We have called this a burthensome Tax because the duties are so numerous and so high and the embarrassments to Business in this infant Sparcely Settled Country so great that it would be totally impossible for the people to Subsist under it even if we had no Controversy att all about the Right and authority of imposing it Considering the present Scarcity of money. We have Reason to think the Execution of that act for a Short Space of time would dreign the Country of Cash, Strip multitudes of the Poorer people of all their property and Reduce them to absolute beggary. And what the Consequence would be of so Sudden a Shock and Such a Convulsive Change in the whole Course of our business and Subsistance, to the peace of the Province We tremble to consider.
         We further apprehend this Tax to be unconstitutional, By the great Charter no americament shall be assessed but by the oath of Honest and Lawfull men of the Vicinage. And by the Same Charter no Freeman shall be taken or imprisoned or be disseised of his Freehold or Liberties or Free Customs nor passed upon nor Condemned but by Lawfull Judgment of his Peers or by the Law of the Land: And we have Always understood it to be a grand and fundamental principal of the British Constitution that no Freeman should be Subjected to any Tax to which he has not given his own Consent in person or by proxy. And the maxims of the Law as we have Constantly Received them are to the Same Effect that no Freeman can be Seperated from his property but by his own act or Fault. We take it clearly therefore to be inconsistant with the Spirit of the Common Law and of the Essential Fundamentall principles of the British Constitution that we should be Subjected to any Tax imposed by the British Parliament because we are not Represented in that assembly in any sense unless it be by a Fiction of Law as insensible in Theory as it would be Injurious in Fact if so heavy a Taxation should be grounded on it. But the most Grievous of all is the allarming Extension of the Powers of Courts of Admiralty. In these Courts one Judge presides alone, no Juries have any Concern there, the Law and the Fact are to be decided by the Same Single Judge whose Commission is only during pleasure and with whom as we are told the most mischievous of all Customs has become established that of taking Commissions on all Condemnations so that he is under a pecuniary temptation always against the Subject. Now if the wisdom of the Mother Country has thought the Independency of the Judges so Essential to an impartial Administration of Justice as to Render them Independent of any Power on Earth, Independent of the King, the Lords, the Commons and the People, nay Independent in Hope and Expectation of the Heir apparent by Continuing their Commissions in Case of a Demise of the Crown, What Justice and Impartiallity are we at Three thousand miles distance from the fountain to expect from Such a Judge of Admiralty. We all along thought the Acts of Trade in this Respect a grievance, But the Stamp Act has erected a vast Number of Sources of New Crimes which may be Committed by any Man and Cannot but be Committed by multitudes and Prodigious Penalties are annexed and all these to be tryed by such a Judge of Such a Court; What can be wanting after this but a weak or wicked Man for a Judge to Render us the most Sordid and forlorn of Slaves. We mean the Slaves of a Slave of the Servant of a Minister of State.
         We cannot help asserting therefore that this part of the Act will make an Essential Change in the Constitution of Juries with Regard to us, is directly repugnant to Magna Charta it Self and will make Such a distinction and Create such a difference between Great Brittain and America as we could not have Expected from the Guardian of Liberty in both.
         As these Sir are our Sentiments of that Act we the Freeholders and other Inhabitants Legally assembled for that Purpose must enjoin it upon you to comply with no Measures or Proposalls for countenancing the same or assisting in the Execution of it but by all Lawfull means consistent with our allegiance to the King and Relation to Great Britain to oppose the Execution of it till we can hear the Success of the Cries and Petitions of America for relief.
         We further Recommend the most Clear and Explicit assertion and vindication of our Rights and Liberties to be entered on the Public Records that the world may know in the Present and all future Generations that We have a Clear Knowledge and a just Sense of those Rights and Liberties and that with Submission to divine Providence we never can be Slaves.
         Nor can We think it adviseable to agree to any Steps for the Protection of Stamp Papers or Stamp officers. Good and wholesome Laws we have already for the Preservation of the Public peace. And we apprehend there is no further danger of Tumults and disorders to which We have a well Grounded aversion. And that any Extraordinary and Expensive Exertions would tend to exasperate the People and endanger the Public tranquility rather than the Contrary.
         Indeed We cannot too often Inculcate upon you our desires that all Extraordinary and Expensive Grants and Measures may upon all occasions as much as possible be avoided. The Public money of this Country is the Toil and Labour of the People who are under many uncommon difficulties and Distresses at this time so that all reasonable Frugality ought to be observed. And we would Recommend Particularly the strictest Care and Firmness to prevent all unconstitutional Draughts upon the Public Treasury. And we cannot avoid Saying that if a particular Enquiry into the state of that Treasury should at the first leasure opportunity be promoted and an Exact State of it published to the People it would have a very good and usefull Tendency.
         All which is Humbly Submitted by the Committee of the Town of Braintree to draw Instructions to their Representative.

          Saml. Niles
          John Adams
          Norton Quincey
          James Penniman
          John Hayward
          Committee

      The above Report being read before the Town was Voted Accepted and ordered a Copy of the Same be Transmitted to their Representative.


Title: III. Instructions as Printed in the Massachusetts Gazette, 10 October 1765
From: Adams, John,Niles, Samuel,Quincy, Norton,Penniman, James,Hayward, John,Braintree, town of
To: Massachusetts Gazette (newspaper),Thayer, Col. Ebenezer

        10 October 1765

      We hear from Braintree that the Freeholders and other Inhabitants of that Town, legally assembled on Tuesday the Twenty fourth of September last, unanimously voted, that Instructions should be given their Representative, for his Conduct in General Assembly, on this great Occasion—The Substance of these Instructions is as follows:
      To EBENEZER THAYER, Esq.
      SIR,
      “In all the Calamities which have ever befallen this Country, we have never felt so great a Concern, or such alarming Apprehensions, as on this Occasion.—Such is our Loyalty to the King, our Veneration for both Houses of Parliament, and our Affection for all our Fellow subjects in Britain, that Measures, which discover any Unkindness in that Country towards Us, are the more sensibly and intimately felt. And we can no longer forbear complaining, that many of the Measures of the late Ministry, and some of the late Acts of Parliament, have a Tendency, in our Apprehension, to divest us of our most essential Rights and Liberties.—We shall confine ourselves, however, chiefly to the Act of Parliament, commonly called the Stamp-Act, by which a very burthensome, and in our Opinion, unconstitutional Tax, is to be laid upon us all; and we subjected to numerous and enormous Penalties, to be prosecuted, sued for, and recovered, at the Option of an Informer, in a Court of Admiralty without a Jury.
      We have called this a burthensome Tax, because the Duties are so numerous and so high, and the Embarrassments to Business in this infant, sparsely-settled Country, so great, that it would be totally impossible for the People to subsist under it, if we had no Controversy at all about the Right and Authority of imposing it. Considering the present Scarcity of Money, we have Reason to think, the Execution of that Act for a short Space of Time would drein the Country of its Cash, strip Multitudes of all their Property, and reduce them to absolute Beggary. And what the Consequence would be to the Peace of the Province, from so sudden a Shock and such a convulsive Change, in the whole Course of our Business and Subsistence, we tremble to consider.—We further apprehend this Tax to be unconstitutional: We have always understood it to be a grand and fundamental Principle of the Constitution, that no Freeman should be subjected to any Tax, to which he has not given his own Consent, in Person or by Proxy. And the Maxims of the Law as we have constantly received them, are to the same Effect, that no Freeman can be separated from his Property, but by his own Act or Fault. We take it clearly, therefore, to be inconsistent with the Spirit of the Common Law, and of the essential fundamental Principles of the British Constitution, that we should be subjected to any Tax, imposed by the British Parliament: because we are not represented in that Assembly in any Sense, unless it be by a Fiction of Law, as insensible in Theory as it would be injurious in Practice, if such a Taxation should be grounded on it.
      But the most grievous Innovation of all, is the alarming Extension of the Power of Courts of Admiralty. In these Courts, one Judge presides alone! No Juries have any Concern there!—The Law, and the Fact, are both to be decided by the same single Judge, whose Commission is only during Pleasure, and with whom, as we are told, the most mischievous of all Customs has become established, that of taking Commissions on all Condemnations; so that he is under a pecuniary Temptation always against the Subject. Now, if the Wisdom of the Mother Country has thought the Independency of the Judges, so essential to an impartial Administration of Justice, as to render them independent of every Power on Earth, independent of the King, the Lords, the Commons, the People, nay independent, in Hope and Expectation, of the Heir apparent, by continuing their Commissions after a Demise of the Crown; What Justice and Impartiality are we, at 3000 Miles distance from the Fountain to expect from such a Judge of Admiralty? We have all along thought the Acts of Trade in this Respect a Grievance: but the Stamp-Act has opened a vast Number of Sources of new Crimes, which may be committed by any Man, and cannot, but be committed by Multitudes, and prodigious Penalties are annexed, and all these are to be tried by such a Judge of such a Court!—What can be wanting, after this, but a weak or wicked Man for a Judge, to render Us the most sordid and forlorn of Slaves? We mean the Slaves of a Slave of the Servants of a Minister of State:—We cannot help asserting therefore, that this Part of the Act will make an essential Change in the Constitution of Juries, and is directly repugnant to the Great Charter itself. For by that Charter “No Amerciament shall be assessed, but by the Oath of honest and lawful Men of the Vicinage.”—And “No Freeman shall be taken, or imprisoned, or disseized of his Freehold, or Liberties, or free Customs, nor passed upon, nor condemned, but by lawful Judgment of his Peers, or by the Law of the Land.”—So that this Act will “make such a Distinction, and create such a Difference between” the Subjects in Great-Britain, and those in America as we could not have expected from the Guardians of Liberty in “Both.”
      As these, Sir, are our Sentiments of that Act, We, the Freeholders and other Inhabitants, legally assembled for this Purpose, must enjoin it upon you, to comply with no Measures or Proposals for countenancing the same, or assisting in the Execution of it, but by all lawful Means, consistent with our Allegiance to the King, and Relation to Great Britain, to oppose the Execution of it, till we can hear the Success of the Cries and Petitions of America for Relief.
      We further recommend the most clear and explicit Assertion and Vindication of our Rights and Liberties, to be entered on the Public Records; that the World may know, in the present and all future Generations, that we have a clear Knowledge and a just Sense of them, and, with Submission to Divine Providence, that we never can be Slaves.
      Nor can we think it adviseable to agree to any Steps for the Protection of stamped Papers, or Stamp-Officers.—Good and wholsome Laws we have already, for the Preservation of the Peace: And we apprehend there is no further Danger of Tumult and Disorder,—to which we have a well-grounded Aversion; and that any extraordinary and expensive Exertions, would tend to exasperate the People and endanger the public Tranquility, rather than the contrary.—Indeed we cannot too often inculcate upon you our Desires, that all extraordinary Grants and expensive Measures, may, upon all Occasions, as much as possible be avoided.—The Public Money, of this Country, is the Toil and Labour of the People, who are under many uncommon Difficulties and Distresses, at this Time: So that all reasonable Frugality ought to be observed. And we would recommend particularly, the strictest Care, and the utmost Firmness to prevent all unconstitutional Draughts upon the Public Treasury.


Title: Report of the Braintree Committee for the Sale of the North Common, 30 September 1765
From: Adams, John,Niles, Samuel,Bass, Jonathan,Braintree, town of
To: Braintree, town of

       Braintree,
       1765 Septr. 30

     The Committee appointed by the Town for the Sale of the North Commons offered their Report to the Town and therewith exhibited a number of Bonds payable to the Treasurer of said Town being the produce of the Sale of said Commons together with the account of their Expences. The Report as follows (viz.). We the subscribers the Committee appointed to make Sale of the North Commons beg leave to report that We have attended that Service and Sold the whole of said Commons except as is hereafter excepted according to our Commission and taken Bonds of the Purchasers for the Considerations of their Deeds. A List of which Bonds as also an account of our Services and Expences in taking the Plans of said Commons and in Selling the same, giving the Deeds and taking the Bonds is herewith exhibited and likewise a list of the Promisory Notes still remaining in our hands which were given as Earnest by those Persons who bid off Lotts in said Commons but have refused to take Deeds. We ask leave further to report that we have given Notice to the Late Leasees of said North Commons to meet us in order to an accommodation of the Controversies between the Town and the said Lessees respecting the Fences and the Stones but We have not been able to accomplish such a settlement. One exception we are oblidged to make in the List of Deeds and Bonds (viz.), that to Luke Lambert which we have not been able to accomplish neither Bond nor Deed being executed according to expectation.

      John Adams
      Samll. Niles
      Jonathan Bass

     The above Report was voted accepted and the account, Bonds and Promisory Notes was Lodged with the Treasurer of said Town. The amount of the whole of said Bonds was blank in MS.
     Then voted the aforesaid Committee be directed and impowered to Call on the late Lessees of said Commons to settle their obligations Respecting the fences also to give an account of and Secure the Town for stones carried off said Lands during the three last years of their Lease and those that neglect or refuse to settle with said Committee within six weeks next ensuing said Committee to Prosecute and Sue for the same in the Name and Behalf of the Town.


Title: To John Adams from Jonathan Sewall, 5 October 1765
From: Sewall, Jonathan
To: Adams, John

      Dear Bror: Adams
      Charlestown 5th. Octr. 1765

     The Bearers John Oliver and Michael Nagail are indicted of the ignominious narrow-Soul’d Crime of Sheep-stealing (at Taunton Superior Court). They depended on my going down to defend them but my Business at Boston Court prevents me. I have therefore advised them to you; they intend also to engage Colo: White with you.
     Their Defence principally rests on these two points which they expect to prove, namely, that they bonâ fide, bought and paid for as many Sheep as were ever seen in their Drove, and that some of them were mark’d with the same Marks as Colo. Northrop’s, whose they are charged with stealing. The proof against them is this, Colo. Northrop will swear that at, or near, the Time when they passed by his Farm he lost the Number of Sheep mentioned in the Indictment, which, as I remember is 50. or upwards. One Ezekiel Gardner swears that about the same Time he lost 15. out of his pasture, and hearing that Oliver and Nagail were seen in his pasture, he pursued them and found his 15. Sheep and they delivered them up to him; and at the same Time he saw a Number of Sheep in their Drove with Colo. Northrop’s mark. This is the material Evidence against which you are sensible is clearly avoided, if they can prove they bought Sheep with the same Mark, and bought the full Number which they brot: home with them (unless the Kings Attorney can prove that they disposed of 50. before they reach’d home; which he cannot do.) Observe, I dont find that any one will swear he saw in their Drove to the Number of Fifty, with Colo. Northrops Mark, or near that Number, but only that they saw some, and this (if they bonâ fide bought of another person, some with the same Mark) proves nothing.
     But let me just add, that even if our Clients Should fail in their proof; yet if it be considered with Attention how difficult it is, when passing thro’ the Country with a Drove, to prevent other sheep from mixing with them; when the Drove are frequently jumping over into pastures, and the Sheep in Inclosures jumping into the Road when they hear the bleating of a large Drove, how easily others mark’d precisely, or nearly, in the same Manner, may get among them unobserved by the Drovers; and if it be considered that the Intention constitutes the Crime. These Things being attended to, I say, the Jury ought to have clear proof of an Intention to steal, before they can declare them guilty, even tho’ they should be satisfyed that some of Northrops Sheep were in their Drove. The Evidence which would prove Conversion, in Case he had brought Trover for the Sheep, will by no Means prove a Theft.
     I hint these Things to you not because I think my Head is better than your’s, but because two Heads are better than one; on the Credit of which proverb you know the Boy advised his Father to take the Dog with him.

     As I really believe them innocent I am concerned for them, and beg you would exert your Talents in their Defence, for which I hope they will give you a hansome Fee.
     I am with great Affection, Your hearty Friend and Bror. (in Law),

      Jon. Sewall


Title: Humphrey Ploughjogger to the Boston Gazette, 14 October 1765
From: Adams, John,Ploughjogger, Humphrey
To: Boston Gazette (newspaper)

      MessieursEdes & Gill,
      Monday, October 14, 1765

     I Han’t rit nothing to be printed a great while: but I can’t sleep a nights, one wink hardly, of late. I hear so much talk about the stamp act and the governor’s speech, that it seems as if ’twould make me crazy. The governor has painted a dreadful picture of the times after the first of November—I hate the thoughts of the first of November. I hope twill be a great storm, and black and gloomy weather, as our faces and hearts will all be. Tis worse than all the fifth of Novembers that ever was. The Pope never did half so much mischief, as that stamp act will do, if the world stands as long as the Pope has done. However, seems to me the governor has represented the times worse than they will be. For in the first place they do say, that thieves and robbers and rioters, ay and lyars too, and all sorts of rogues, may be punish’d as well after the stamp act takes place as before. And as to suing poor folks for money, that does no body no good but the lawyers. But as to trade and shipping and such like, it seems to me we had better be without the most of that than with it—for it only makes rum and such things cheap, and so makes folks drink toddy and flip instead of cyder, when they an’t half so good and holsome—and it mades makes us all beaus, and dresses us up fine. We got into a way on’t o late,—our young men buy them blue surtouts, with fine yellow buttons, and boughton broad cloth coats jackets and breeches—and our young women wear callicoes, chinces and laces, and other nicknacks to make them fine. But the naughty jacks and trollops must leave off such vanity, and go to nitting and spinning. I always used to keep a comely boughten coat to go to meeting in, but I’le vow I’le never put it on again after first November, if the stamp act takes place; I’le cut up the hide of my fat Ox that I’m fatting for my winter’s beef first, and make a coat of that, with the hair on. I’m sure I could be edified as much with the sermon, as if I had on a royal robe, and be as warm in it too. I’ve read somewhere that the folks in old England before Caesar went there, wore such skins of beasts, and yet loved liberty, and knew how to keep it too. I don’t believe our young folks would love to dance together at husking frolicks, and to kiss one another a bit the less, if they wore woolen shirts and shifts of their own making, than they do now in their fine ones. I do say, I won’t buy one shilling worth of any thing that comes from old England, till the stamp act is appeal’d, nor I won’t let any of my sons and daughters; I’de rather the Spittlefield weavers should pull down all the houses in old England, and knock the brains out of all the wicked great men there, than this country should loose their liberty. Our fore fathers came over here for liberty of conscience, and we have been nothing better than servants to ’em all along this 100 years, and got just enough to keep soul and body together, and buy their goods to keep us from freezing to death, and we won’t be their negroes. Providence never designed us for negroes, I know, for if it had it wou’d have given us black hides, and thick lips, and flat noses, and short woolly hair, which it han’t done, and therefore never intended us for slaves. This I know is good a sillogissim as any at colledge, I say we are as handsome as old England folks, and so should be as free.
     So I don’t like the governor’s speech very well, any more than I did tother speech that he made, where he has not done fairly by me. I’me sure I wrote abundance, about Hemp before he said a word about it. Mr. U and I wrote a good many papers, and us’d many arguments for it, and told the way of managing ont, a year or two before the governor said a word about it. Ay, and a great many folks were stirred up to try it, by our writings too, and I believe raly Mr. U and I ought to have the honor and glory and profit ont too—of bringing ont into fashion. I dont see why it would not be reasonable for our Deputies to make Mr. U and I a grant or two for our extraordinary services, as they do sometimes to other great men that dont deserve it half so much.

       Humphry Ploughjogger


Title: To John Adams from William Cooper, 18 December 1765
From: Cooper, William
To: Adams, John

     Boston, 18 December 1765. Printed: JA, Diary and AutobiographyDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 1:265–266. See Notes on the Opening of the Courts 19 Dec. 1765, and Argument before Gov. Bernard 20 Dec. 1765, below.


Title: Notes on the Opening of the Courts, 19 December 1765
From: Adams, John
To:

       19? December 1765

     Right, Wrong and Remedy.
     Common Law is common Right, 1. Inst. 142.a. Cokes Proem to 2d Inst.
     The Law is the Subjects best Birthright. 2. Inst. 56.
     Want of Right and Want of Remedy is all one, for where there is no Remedy, there is no Right, 1. Inst. 95.b.
     The Law provides a Remedy for every Wrong. 1. Inst. 197.b. 2. Inst. 55. 56. 405. but see 1. Inst. 199.b.
     The Law hath a Delight in giving of Remedy. Lit. 323. 1. Inst. 54.b. 199.b. 200.a.
     The Act of Law, never doth Wrong. 1. Inst. 88.b. 148.a.b. 379.a.
     Where the Construction of any Act is left to the Law, the Law will never construe it to work a wrong. Woods. Inst. P. 4. 5.
     A statute must be construed that no innocent man may by a literal Construction receive Damage. Wood Page 9.
     An Act of Parliament can do no Wrong. Holt. 12. Mod. 687. 688. Hill. 13Wm. 3. B. R. City of London vs. Wood.
     Actus dei nemini facit Injuriam.—Actus Legis nulli facit Injuriam.
     Cases of Necessity and Impossibility.
     The Law forces no one to that which is impossible or vain. 1. Inst. 79.a. 92.a. 127.b.—to procure the Stamp Papers is impossible, and to stop Justice would be vain.
     Things of Necessity are to be excepted out of a general Law. 2. Inst. 168.

     There is nothing of greater Necessity than the Administration of Justice,—Justice cannot be administered at present but in the Usual Way.—Therefore the present Case and these Times are excepted out of that general Law the Stamp Act.
     Things for Necessity Sake, or to prevent a Failure of Justice, are excepted out of a Statute. Woods. Inst. Page 9 8.
     Acts of Parliament that are against Reason, or impossible to be performed shall be judged void. 8. Rep. 118. 128. 129. 2. Inst. 587. 588.


Title: Argument before Governor Bernard and the Council in Favor of Opening the Courts, 20 December 1765
From: Adams, John
To: Bernard, Francis,Massachusetts Council,Massachusetts, Governor of

       20 December 1765

     Present his Excellency Francis BernardEsqr. Govr. &c in Council.
     Mr. Adams Innumerable are the Calamities which flow from an Interruption of Justice. Necessity requires that the Doors of Justice should ever be open to hear the Complaints of the Injured and Oppressed.
     The Stamp-Act, I take it, is utterly void, and of no Binding force upon Us; for it is against our Rights as Men, and our Priviledges as Englishmen. An Act made in Defiance of the first Principles of Justice: an Act which rips up the foundation of the British Constitution, and makes void Maxims of 1800 years standing.
     Parliaments may err; they are not infallible; they have been refus’d to be submitted to. An Act making the King’s Proclamation to be a Law, the Executive Powers adjudg’d absolutely void.
     The Stamp Act was made where we are in no Sense represented, therefore no more binding upon Us, than an Act which should oblige Us to destroy One half of Our Species.
     There are certain Principles fix’d unalterably in Nature. Convention and Compact are the Requisites to make any Law obligatory. That the Subject is not bound by Acts, when He is not represented, is a sound Maxim of the Law, and not peculiar to the British Constitution, but a Maxim of the antient Roman Law: “What concerns All shall be judged of by All.”
     The only Reason of the Power of the Parliament in England, is because they are elected by the People; who, if their Liberties are infringed, have a Check at the next Election. Have Americans any such Check? Have they any Voice in Deputation? A Parliament of Great Britain can have no more Right to tax the Colonies, than a Parliament of Paris.
     This Act has never been received from Authority, therefore in a legal Sense we know nothing of it.
     The Necessities of Business, the Cries of the People call aloud for Justice. It has become impossible to execute this Act, therefore if it were binding, we are excus’d by every Law, human or divine, from a Compliance with it. Wood’s Inst. 561. The King’s Writs are ex debitâ Justitiâ, and cannot be denied the Subject. And in Magna Charta, it is said, We deny no Man Justice, we delay no Man Justice. 2 Inst. ch. 29. p. 56.


Title: A Dissertation upon Office-Seekers, 26 December 1765
From: Adams, John
To:

     26 December 1765. Printed: JA, Diary and AutobiographyDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 1:277. Fragment of an unpublished newspaper letter warning Massachusetts freeholders to beware of politicians who openly solicit their votes on election day and, even more reprehensible, seek employment from the Crown.


Title: Editorial Note
From:
To:

      In January 1766 John Adams, signing himself Clarendon, published three letters in the Boston Gazette in reply to William Pym, who had published four letters in the London Public Ledger, 13, 19, 26, 30 August 1765. Only the second of Pym’s letters was reprinted by a Boston newspaper, the Boston Evening-Post, 25 November. Adams’ was not the earliest reply, for Hampden had taken up the challenge in the Boston Gazette, writing a series of eight letters running from 9 December 1765 to 27 January 1766. Hampden, who was James Otis Jr. (JA, Diary and AutobiographyDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 1:287 and note), added a postscript to his last letter: “My most sincere, affectionate and respectful compliments to my Lord of Clarendon, when next you shall see him. Tell him there is great joy even on earth over a repenting sinner, of so eminent a genius.” So the two men kept up the joke; curiously, neither of them noted that the London polemicist had been mistaken about Pym’s first name—John.
      Not all that John Adams had to say appeared in the newspaper, and it is doubtful that he even read all four Pym letters. But he read Hampden, who by his quotations made it plain that he had read all that Pym had written. As so often happened, Adams used the debate as a springboard for his own reflections. He undoubtedly enjoyed the little fiction of these long-dead men commenting upon the reversal of positions of Pym and Clarendon. Where Hampden wrote in astonishment that Pym could have so departed from his principles as to write provocatively about taxation and jury trials, Adams, the student of history, was prepared to believe that the switch gave some insight into “the labyrinth of your Pym’s politicks in 1641” and sorrowfully acknowledged that the change gave rise to “very painful reflections on the frailty, inconstancy and depravity of the human race” (Boston Gazette, 13 Jan.; No. I, below).
      Adams’ first thinking about Pym and how he should be answered was recorded in his diary on 23 December 1765, some two weeks after Hampden had made his first sally (Diary and AutobiographyDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 1:272–273). These early thoughts were a fragmentary draft for his first published letter, No. I, below. There were seven other diary entries, those for 25, 26, 30 December, and 7, 9, 11, 18 January 1766 (sameDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 1:274–275, 275–277, 281–282, 287–288, 288–290, 290–292, 296–299). Those for 25, 26 December, and 7 January were drafts for No. II, and that for 18 January, for No. III, below.
      Although William Pym refers more than once to “fellow subjects,” he takes the typical view that colonies by definition are dependent and that the recent war was fought largely in their interest; thus, they must now expect to pay their share of the costs of empire. He is convinced that the colonies really seek independence and asserts that they in fact become a separate people if they are not bound by the Stamp Act. To some degree he holds Great Britain to blame for the colonies’ behavior, in that its trade policies have encouraged opulence and its administration has encouraged the growth of legislative capacity in the colonies—their raising of taxes, levying forces, and the like. The recent Virginia resolves on the Stamp Act, from which he quotes only the seventh, which was published but not actually passed, he labels as “indecent” (London Public Ledger, 13, 19 Aug. 1765; Morgan, Stamp ActEdmund S. Morgan and Helen M. Morgan, The Stamp Act Crisis, Chapel Hill, 1953– ., p. 91–95). He notes that Ireland, which also has a legislature, has accepted without fuss such laws as Parliament chooses to extend to it. Parliament at a stroke can abrogate any Irish law.
      As for charters, Pym holds that they should be adhered to so far as “public contingencies will admit,” but he insists that Parliament can abrogate them at any time. Parliament must be concerned for the welfare of the larger community; its acts are bound to injure some. But those injured must acquiesce in Parliament’s interpretation of the larger good (same).
      Pym does feel that certain hardships have resulted from British policies. It was a mistake to forbid American trade with the Spanish settlements, a trade mutually beneficial to the colonies and the mother country. He thinks that perhaps the military establishment was increased too much, but that, unfortunately, the riotous behavior of the past months will only seem to justify larger forces. Finally, he sees a genuine grievance in the colonies’ having no representation in Parliament; representation would benefit not only the colonies but the mother country as well. His final letter is devoted wholly to the “absolute necessity” for a proper number of American representatives in Parliament. The alternative may be unification of the colonies to shake off dependence. The price of representation, however, must be abolition of their assemblies, which can be dangerous only if continued. He sees a problem in how much representation to allow them, for without care the time may come when the seat of empire may shift to the “Oronoque” or the Ohio. He would give them enough representatives to provide advice but not enough to dictate. In any event, the colonies must remain the children of the mother country.
      Although Hampden makes virtually a point-by-point refutation of the arguments of Pym, John Adams as Clarendon seems more intrigued with the literary device of debate between these 17th-century gentlemen. Fascinated by the shifts in character, Adams spends about half his second Clarendon letter explaining how the noble lord could take the position he had assumed. Character analysis aside, the meat of the argument for Adams is the unconstitutionality of courts without juries and taxation without consent. He does not comment on Pym’s strictures on Britain’s past policies, nor does he say anything about Ireland’s position in the empire, a matter of some concern in later Revolutionary debates. Most important, Adams says nothing directly about Pym’s proposal to substitute representation in Parliament for local assemblies. In his diary entries he develops the implications of Hampden’s assertion that the courts must be opened without stamps, noting that the people are perfectly loyal (Diary and AutobiographyDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 1:289, 291). Indeed, he sees the “Liberties of Mankind” as in the keeping of America according to God’s design (sameDiary and Autobiography of John Adams, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols., 1:282).
      In asserting that liberty is the noble end of British government, the third published Clarendon letter rises to true eloquence. The British constitution “stands not on the supposition that kings are the favourites of heaven. ... It is not built on the doctrine that a few nobles or rich commons have a right to inherit the earth.” Contemporaries of Adams and some modern scholars who dismiss him as the proponent of aristocratic government have perhaps overlooked his ringing defense of the ordinary people and the vital role they have in constitutional government, both in lawmaking and in determining the facts in jury trials. The people “have no other fortification against wanton, cruel power: no other indemnification against being ridden like horses, fleeced like sheep, worked like cattle, and fed and cloathed like swine and hounds.” Here speaks the lawyer in the best sense of that term—one who reveres the law and the protections it affords, without favor, to all.
      For an interesting interpretation of the Clarendon letters suggesting that Adams used the occasion to pay tribute to his deceased father, Deacon John, under the guise of Clarendon’s recalling his own father’s good advice and high character, see Peter Shaw, The Character of John Adams, Chapel Hill, 1976, p. 50–51.


Title: I. The Earl of Clarendon to William Pym, 13 January 1766
From: Adams, John,Clarendon, Earl of
To: Pym, William,Boston Gazette (newspaper)

       Sir,

        Monday, January 13, 1766

      The revolution which one century has produced in your opinions and principles, is not quite so surprizing to me, as it seems to be to many others. You know, very well, I had always a jealousy, that your humanity was counterfeited, your ardor for liberty canker’d with simulation, and your integrity problematical at least.
      I confess however, that so sudden a transition from licentiousness to despotism, so entire a transformation, from a fiery, furious declaimer against power, to an abject hireling of corruption; tho’ it furnishes a clue to the labyrinth of your politicks in 1641, gives me many very painful reflections on the frailty, inconstancy and depravity of the human race. These reflections nevertheless are greatly molified by the satisfaction I feel in finding your old friend and coadjutor Mr. Hampden, unalter’d and unalterable in the glorious cause of liberty and law. His inflexibility, has confirmed the great esteem my Lord Fau’kland and I, always had of his wisdom, magnanimity and virtue: and we are both of us at present as well convinced of his excellency as a subject and citizen, as we were formerly of his amiable accomplishments in private life. But your apostacy has confirmed our belief of what was formerly suspected, viz. your subornation of witnesses, your perjuries, briberies, and cruelties; and that tho’ your cunning was exquisite enough to conceal your crimes from the public scrutiny, your heart was desperately wicked and depraved.
      Can any thing less abominable have prompted you to commence an enemy to liberty? an enemy to human nature? Can you recollect the complaints and clamours, which were founded with such industry, and supported by such a profusion of learning in law and history, and such invincible reasoning by yourself and your friends; against the star chamber, and high commission; and yet remain an advocate for the newly formed courts of admiralty in America? Can you recall to your memory, the everlasting changes which were rung, by yourself and your party, against ship-money, and the other projects of that disgraceful reign; and on the consent of the subject, as indispensably necessary, to all taxations, aids, reliefs, tallages, subsidies, duties, &c. and yet contend for a taxation of more than Five Million subjects, not only without their consent expressed, or implied, but directly against their most explicit, and determined declarations, and remonstrances?

      You of all mankind should have been the last, to be hired by a minister to defend or excuse such taxes and such courts.—Taxes, more injurious and ruinous, than Danegeld of old, which our countryman Speed says, “emptied the land of all the coyn, the kingdom of her glory, the commons of their content, and the Sovereign of his wanted wonted respects and observance”—Courts, which seem to have been framed in imitation of an ancient jurisdiction, at the bare mention of which I have often seen your eyes lighten, I mean the court of the masters of the King’s forfeitures. I cannot omit so fair an opportunity of repeating the history and unfolding the powers of that court, as it seems to have been the very antitipe of the new courts of admiralty in America, and to have been created and erected with the same powers and for the same purposes. It was in the reign of King Henry the seventh that a British parliament was found to be so timid, or ignorant or corrupt, as to pass an act, that “justices of assize, as well as justices of peace, without any finding or presentment of twelve men, upon a bare information for the King, should have full power and authority, to hear and determine by their discretions, all offences against the form, ordinance and effect of certain penal statutes. This unconstitutional act was passed, in the eleventh year of that reign, and thus the commons were found, to sacrifice that sacred pillar, that fundamental law, that everlasting monument of liberty the great charter, in complaisance to the ravenous avarice of that monarch. In pursuance of this act, Sir Richard Empson and Edmund Dudley, were made justices throughout England, and “masters of the King’s forfeitures. The old sage Coke says that act was against and in the face of that fundamental law, Magna Charta, and that it is incredible what oppressions and exactions, were committed by Empson and Dudley, upon this unjust and injurious act shaking that fundamental law.” And that in the first year of the reign of King Henry the eighth the parliament recited that unconstitutional act, and declared it void.” And those two vile oppressors fell a sacrifice to the righteous indignation of an injured and exasperated nation. And he closes with an admonition, that the fearful end of these two oppressors, should deter others from committing the like, and admonish parliaments, that instead of this ordinary and precious tryal per pares, et per legem terrse, they bring not in absolute and partial tryals by discretion.
      Give me leave, now, to ask you Mr. Pym, what are the powers of the new courts of admiralty in America? Are the tryals in these courts per pares, or per legem terras? Is there any grand jury there to find presentments or indictments? Is there any pettit jury to try the fact guilty or not? Is the tryal per legem terrse, or by the institutes, digests, and codes and novells, of the Roman law? Is there not a judge appointed or to be appointed over all America? Is not this a much more expensive jurisdiction than that of Empson and Dudley as justices over all England? Will you say that no Empsons and Dudleys will be sent to America?—Perhaps not.—But are not the jurisdiction and power, given to the judges greater than that to those oppressors? Besides, how can you prove that no Empsons will be sent there? Pray let me know, are not the forfeitures to be shared by the governors and the informers? Are we not to prophecy the future by the experience of the past? And have not many governors been seen in America, whose avarice, was at least as ravenous as that of Henry the seventh? Have not many of their tools, been as hungry, restless, insolent and unrelenting as Empson and Dudley in proportion to their power? Besides, are not the Americans at such a distance from their King, and the august council of the mother country, and at the same time so poor, as to render all redress of such insolence and rapacity impracticable?
      If you reconsider the nature of these new American taxations, the temper and manners of the people in that country, their religious and civil principles; and if you recollect the real constitution of Great Britain, and the nature of the new courts of admiralty, you will not wonder at the spirit that has appeared in that country. Their resistance is founded in much better principles, and aims at much better ends, than I fear yours did in Charles’s reign, tho’ I own you was much nearer the truth and right of the cause then, than now.—And you know, if you had lived in America, and had not been much changed, you would have been the first, to have taken arms against such a law, if no other kind of opposition would do. You would have torn up the foundations, and demolished the whole fabrick of the government, rather than have submitted; and would have suffered democracy, aristocracy, monarchy, anarchy, any thing or nothing to have arisen in its place.
      You may perhaps wonder to hear such language as the foregoing from me, as I was always in an opposite faction, to yours, while we lived on earth. I will confess to you, that I am in many respects altered, since my departure from the body, my principles in government were always the same, founded in law, liberty, justice, goodness and truth: But in the application of those principles I must confess, my veneration for certain churchmen, and my aspiring ambitious temper sometimes deceived me and led me astray. This was a source of remorse, at times, thro’ my life, and since my seperation, and the sublimation of my faculties, and the purification of my temper, the detestation of some parts of my conduct has been greatly increased. But as these are subjects of very great importance, I shall make them the materials of a correspondence with you for some time to come.

       CLARENDON


Title: II. The Earl of Clarendon to William Pym, 20 January 1766
From: Adams, John,Clarendon, Earl of
To: Pym, William,Boston Gazette (newspaper)

       Sir,

        Monday, January 20, 1766

      You and I have changed Sides. As I told you in my last, I can account for your Tergiversation, only on the Supposition of the Insincerity, Baseness and Depravity of your Heart. For my own Part, as the Change in me is not so great, neither is it so unaccountable. My Education was, in the Law, the Grounds of which were so riveted in me, that no Temptation could induce me, knowingly, to swerve from them. The Sentiments, however, which I had imbibed in the Course of my Education, from the Sages of the Law, were greatly confirmed in me, by an Accident that happened to me, in my Youth. This is an Anecdote, relative to my Father and me, which I presume you must have heard—A Scene, which will remain with indelible impressions on my Soul, throughout my Duration. I was upon that Circuit, which led me down to my native Country, and on a Visit to my aged Father; who gave me an Invitation to take a Walk with him, in the Field. I see the good old Gentleman, even at this Distance of Time, and in his venerable Countenance, that parental Affection to me, that Zeal for the Law, that fervent Love of his Country, that exalted Piety to God and Good will to all Mankind, which constituted his real Character. My Son says he, I am very old, and this will probably be the last Time I shall ever see your Face. Your Welfare is near my Heart. The Reputation you have in your Profession, for Learning, Probity, Skill and Eloquence, will in all Probability, call you to manage the great Concerns of this Nation in Parliament, and to council your King in some of the greatest Offices of State. Let me warn you, against that Ambition, which I have often observed in Men of your Profession, which will sacrifice all, to their own Advancement. And I charge you, on a Father’s Blessing, never to forget this Nation, nor to suffer the Hope of Honors or Profits; nor the Fear of Menaces or Punishments from the Crown, to seduce you from the Law, the Constitution, and the real Welfare and Freedom of this People.—And—these Words were scarcely pronounced, before his Zeal and Concern were too great for his Strength, and he fell upon the Ground before me,—never to rise more! His Words sank deep into my Heart, and no Temptation, no Bias, or Prejudice, could ever obliterate them. And you Mr. Pym, are one Witness for me, that, altho’ I was always of the Royal Party, and for avoiding Violence and Confusion, I never defended what could be proved to be real Infringements on the Constitution, while I sat in Parliament with you I was as heartily for rectifying those Abuses, and for procuring still further Security of Freedom, as any of you. And after the Restoration, when the Nations were rushing into a Delirium with Loyalty, I was obliged, in Order to preserve even the Appearance of the Constitution, to make a Stand. And afterwards, in the Reign of my infamous and detestable, tho’ Royal Son in Law James the Second, I chose to go into Banishment, rather than renounce the Religion and Liberties of my Country.
      I have made these Observations to excuse my Conduct in those Reigns, in some Degree; tho’ I must confess there were many Parts of it, which admit of no Excuse at all. I suffered myself to be blindly attached to the King, and some of his spiritual and temporal Minions, particularly Laud and Stafford, in some Instances, and to connive at their villainous Projects, against my Principles in Religion and Government, and against the dying Precepts of my Father:—Besides my Intimacy with that Sort of Company, had gradually wrought into me, too great a Reverence for kingly and priestly Power, and too much Contempt of the Body of the People; as well as too much Virulence against many worthy Patriots of your Side the Question; with whom, if I had co-operated, instead of assisting the Court, perhaps all the Confusions and Bloodshed which followed might have been prevented, and all the Nation’s Grievances redressed.
      These Reflections were a Sourse of Remorse, at Times, thro’ my Life: And since my Departure from the Earth, I have revolved these Things so often, and seen my Errors so clearly, that were I to write an History of your Opposition now, I should not entitle it a Rebellion; nay I should scarcely call the Protectorate of Cromwell, an Usurpation.
      With such Principles as these, and divested as I am of all Views and Motives of Ambition, as well as all Attachment to any Party, you may depend upon it, the Conduct of Barbados, has given me great Uneasiness. That Island, was settled in the Oliverian Times, by certain Fugitives of the Royal Party, who were zealous Advocates for passive Obedience: And I suppose a Remnant of the servile Spirit of their Ancestors, and of that ruinous Doctrine, has prevailed on them to submit. I own it as a severe Mortification to me, to reflect that I ever acted in Concert with a People with such Sentiments, a People who were capable of so mean, and meaching a Desertion of the Cause both of Liberty and Humanity.* But the gallant Struggle in St. Christopher’s, and on the Continent of NORTH AMERICA, is founded in Principles so indisputable, in the Moral Law; in the revealed Law of God; in the true Constitution of Britain; and in the most apparent Welfare of the British Nation, as well as of the whole Body of the People in America; that it rejoices my very Soul. When I see that worthy People, even in the Reign of a wise and good King fetterd, chained, and sacrificed, by a few abandoned Villains, whose Lust of Gain and Power, would at any Time fasten them in the Interest of France or Rome or Hell, my Resentment and Indignation are unutterable.
      If ever an Infant Country deserved to be cherished, it is America: If ever any People merited Honor and Happiness, they are her Inhabitants. They are a People, whom no Character can flatter or transmit in any Expressions, equal to their Merit and Virtue. With the high Sentiments of Romans, in the most prosperous and virtuous Times of that Common Wealth, they have the tender Feelings of Humanity, and the noble Benevolence of Christians. They have the most habitual, radical Sense of Liberty, and the highest Reverence for Vertue. They are descended from a Race of Heroes, who, placing their Confidence in Providence alone, set the Seas and Skies, Monsters and Savages, Tyrants and Devils, at Defiance for the Sake of Religion and Liberty.
      And the present Generation have shewn themselves worthy of their Ancestors. Those cruel Engines, fabricated by a British Minister, for battering down all their Rights and Privileges; instead of breaking their Courage, and causing Despondency, as might have been expected in their Situation, have raised and spread thro’ the whole Continent, a Spirit, that will be recorded to their Honor with all future Ages. In every Colony from Georgia to New-Hampshire, inclusively, the Executioners of their Condemnation, have been compelled by the unconquerable and irresistable Vengeance of the People to renounce their Offices. Such and so universal has been the Resentment, that every Man, who has dared to speak in Favour of them, or to soften the Detestation in which they are held, how great soever his Character had been before, or whatever were his Fortune, Connections and Influence; has been seen to sink into universal Contempt and Ignominy. The People, even to the lowest Ranks, have become more attentive to their Liberties, more inquisitive about them, and more determined to defend them, than they were ever before known, or had Occasion to be; innumerable have been the Monuments of Wit, Humour, Sense, Learning, Spirit, Patriotism and Heroism, erected in the several Provinces in the Course of this Year. Their Counties, Towns, and even private Clubs and Sodalities, have voted and determined; their Merchants have agreed to sacrifice even their Bread to the Cause of Liberty; their Legislatures have Resolved; the united Colonies have Remonstrated; the Presses have every where groaned; and the Pulpits have thundered: And such of the Crown Officers as have wished to see them enslaved, have every where trembled, and all their little Tools and Creatures been afraid to speak, and ashamed to be seen. Yet this is the People, Mr. Pym, on whom you are contributing for paltry Hire, to rivet and confirm, everlasting Oppression.

       CLARENDON

       * Nova Scotia, Quebec, Pensacola, &c. are more excuseable on account of their Weakness and other peculiar Circumstances.