Washington
Page 29
That was one measure of relief. His other and more acceptable recourse was an increase of income. Substantial increase in farm income at Mount Vernon might be through the substitution of some other large crop for tobacco. Culture of the troublesome and exacting tobacco-plant would continue until a profitable staple could be grown in its stead. Perhaps it would be wise on the lower Custis farms to make no change; but at Mount Vernon the coveted leaf could not be matured and marketed in a quality to make it yield anything more than cost, if even cost, on the London market. The fact was: Mount Vernon tobacco was second rate. Washington must try something else—wheat, hemp, flax, anything that was profitable. In Alexandria, the firm of Carlyle & Adam was seeking more vigorously each year to encourage the growing of wheat. The market was only a few miles up river, and the financial settlement at 3s. 6d. per bushel would be with friends. Washington was sufficiently encouraged to increase the acreage he normally devoted to wheat. This wheat was in the ground and some at least of the tobacco of 1764 was ready for shipment when, about October 28 or 29, Washington completed another journey to Williamsburg for a session of the General Assembly.
The Burgesses wished to consider, in particular, the subject that had alarmed the Colony in the spring. According to a letter from a committee of the Massachusetts Assembly, passage of a direct tax on the Colonies might be as close as the next session of Parliament. Virginia lawmakers must decide what they would do about it. On November 14 the Burgesses reached their main conclusion. It was the traditional one—to address the throne and protest to the Lords and the Commons. So delicate a task naturally was assigned those members of the House best skilled in letters and in the lore of the British constitution. Peyton Randolph was appointed chairman. With him were associated Richard Henry Lee, Landon Carter, George Wythe, Edmund Pendleton, Benjamin Harrison, Archibald Cary, and John Fleming. The session dragged interminably on while the House debated uninteresting bills, and the special committee weighed words and sanded phrases in perfecting the address to the King and the appeals to the Houses of Parliament.
Relief broke tedium December 10 when the Governor forwarded a letter from Bouquet reporting that he had pressed on from Pittsburgh into the Ohio country and had forced the Indians there to make peace. Col. John Bradstreet had made a treaty in August at Detroit with savages who from the outset showed little intention of respecting it; but the Burgesses were so confident peace would be enforced that they advised the Governor to disband the militia still guarding the frontier.
At last, on December 13, the address to the King and the memorial to the Lords and the remonstrance to the Commons were ready for consideration. The core of the address was a plea that the King would protect the people of Virginia “in the enjoyment of their ancient and inestimable right of being governed by such laws respecting their internal polity and taxation as are derived from their own consent, with the approbation of their sovereign or his substitute.” In the memorial to the Lords, the central argument was that the settlers of Virginia had all the rights and privileges of British subjects and that the descendants of the first comers had done nothing to deprive them of this inheritance. The arguments in the remonstrance to Commons were the same with the added protest that if taxation were justified, it would be unwise because it would be intolerable to a people already burdened by the costs of the war with the French. Virginians would be “reduced to extreme poverty, would be compelled to manufacture those articles” they formally had imported from Britain. Together the three documents included about two thousand words, and they meant much more than their authors realized. The Virginians were not asking a favor: they were asserting a right. They had explored their inheritance and had faith in the weapons they found there. Right, rediscovered, was reenforced. What pride and self-interest prompted, the constitution vindicated. In that spirit the session and the year came to a close. It might not be easy to get the address of Virginia before the King, but the papers could be printed and circulated.
Whatever burden of taxation 1765 might or might not bring Virginia, the year called for no less than seven things at Mount Vernon: Invoices from England must include nothing beyond the articles indispensable in the operation of the farms; no more slaves should be bought; no additional lands should be acquired. These were the economies. Income must be increased by the planting of more wheat, an effort to produce and market hemp profitably, large use of the mill, and greater hauls of the river’s fish.
This was not an impossible plan for reducing the debt to Cary & Co. Good crops and sound management of a property well-stocked, would in time clear the account. The servants were now nearly sufficient in number—eleven in the house, seven on the home plantation, eleven working at trades, nine at Muddy Hole, ten at Dogue Run and seven at the mill—a total of fifty-five. For directing this labor more carefully and undertaking larger farm activities the owner employed his remote cousin, Lund Washington. Lund could discharge many of the irksome duties that had crowded the Colonel’s days. The winter months passed quietly, and the hands were preparing to sow oats, hemp and lucerne when Washington once again set out for Williamsburg. The House met on May 1, 1765, and prepared to debate the subject for which the session primarily had been arranged. This was the revision of the tobacco law, a measure so clumsily amended that it was in great confusion. Indications were for a dull meeting; attendance was below average. Four vacancies were reported—one each in Chesterfield, Amelia, Lunenburg and Louisa. Writs for new elections were requested of the Governor; the session got under way and rumbled slowly along.
Days of routine followed so drearily that many members procured leave to go home for the remainder of the session or left without permission. Then, about May 20, sensations began to develop. Louisa County reported that she had complied with the writ of election and had chosen Patrick Henry of Hanover. Although it was unusual to name a man from another county when he owned no property in the county that chose him, there was nothing in the election law to prohibit it. The oath was administered.
On the twenty-third Washington, the new member from Louisa and the others who had ears for it heard some of the seniors of the House explain the details of the plan, even to the rate of interest Virginia was to pay, for a loan of £250,000 in London and the form of the tax she was to impose until 1795 in order to meet the debt. Debate was not prolonged. Those Burgesses sufficiently versed in matters of finance to understand the resolutions had been lined up in advance; those who did not comprehend could not oppose. The Committee of the Whole reported the resolutions that same day.
On May 24 the measure came up for action by the House. The fledgling Burgess from Louisa arose to challenge the measure. Henry had no schooling in public finance, but he sensed that one aim of the proposal was to permit rich debtors to mortgage their lands to pay for luxuries and he skillfully brought down the complicated “resolves” to language the least-tutored member from the newest frontier county could understand. Vehemently he exposed what he declared to be the favoritism of the plan and the abuses to which it certainly would lead. The leaders had the vote, if not the answer, and proceeded to pass the resolves; but they were doubtful of their handiwork as they sent the resolutions to the Council for concurrence. Either because the unwisdom of the resolutions led a majority to say “No,” or because the patrons took alarm at Henry’s attack, there came back no message from the council chamber that concurrence had been voted. On the contrary, Council rejected the measure.
On the twenty-sixth only a few minor measures remained. Most of the members had started home. Of a total of 116 Burgesses, only thirty-nine besides the Speaker were in their seats when George Johnston of Fairfax moved that the House go into Committee of the Whole to consider the “steps necessary to be taken in consequence of the resolutions of the House of Commons of Great Britain relative to the charging certain Stamp duties in the Colonies and Plantations in America.”
The motion itself announced what had not been published officially—that Commons had set in operation t
he parliamentary procedure for passing the Stamp Act. A copy of the bill had “crept into the House,” as Governor Fauquier later expressed it, and had convinced members that the new tax was to be stiff and inclusive. Some of the details probably were known at the time Johnston made his motion, which Henry seconded. The motion was put and carried; the Speaker left the chair and sat as committee chairman; the thin House looked to Johnston; he deferred to Henry. From his place, the junior Burgess of Louisa County rose, took out a paper and submitted a series of resolutions:
Resolved—
That the first Adventurers and settlers of this his Majesty’s Colony and Dominion brought with them and transmitted to their Posterity and all other his Majesty’s Subjects since inhabiting in this his Majesty’s said Colony, all the Privileges, Franchises and Immunities that have at any Time been held, enjoyed, and possessed by the People of Great Britain.
That by two royal Charters, granted by King James the first the Colonists aforesaid are declared entitled to all the Privileges, Liberties and Immunities of Denizens and natural-born Subjects, to all Intents and Purposes as if they had been abiding and born within the Realm of England.
Resolved—
That the Taxation of the People by themselves or by Persons chosen by themselves to represent them, who can only know what Taxes the People are able to bear, and the easiest Mode of raising them, and are equally affected by such Taxes themselves, is the distinguishing Characteristic of British Freedom and without which the ancient Constitution cannot subsist.
Resolved—
That his Majesty’s liege People of this most ancient Colony have uninterruptedly enjoyed the Right of being thus governed by their own Assembly in the article of their Taxes and internal Police, and that the same hath never been forfeited or in any other way given up, but hath been constantly recognized by the Kings and People of Great Britain.
Resolved—
Therefore, That the General Assembly of this Colony have the only and sole exclusive Right and Power to lay Taxes and Impositions upon the Inhabitants of this Colony and that every Attempt to vest such Power in any Person or Persons whatsoever, other than the General Assembly aforesaid, has a manifest Tendency to destroy British as well as American Freedom.
A majority of the Burgesses favored a protest of some sort against a Stamp Act, but some of the older leaders frowned and shook their heads as they listened to Henry’s paper. One after another of them assailed the resolutions. Their argument must have been that in so far as the resolutions were proper, they duplicated the address, memorial, and remonstrance of 1764 and that conciliation, not denunciation, should be the weapon of the Colonies. When the utmost had been made of this general objection, a motion was put and passed to consider Henry’s resolution seriatim.
Where reference was made to “the Privileges, Franchises and Immunities” the “first Adventurers and settlers” brought with them from Great Britain, the word “liberties” was inserted ahead of the other nouns. Henry probably had no objection to this strengthening of the first resolution, and he certainly could not fail to thank the Burgess who suggested how the language of the second resolution could be improved without any change of meaning. The same thing happened to the third resolution. On each of the first four resolutions the old leaders demanded a division—and in each case lost narrowly. None of the resolutions commanded a larger majority than twenty to seventeen. The firmest of all the declarations, the fifth, now was up for approval or rejection. To some, the mild conclusion may have seemed anti-climactic; but the fifth resolution was the one to which all the others led. That was why Henry had put “therefore” after that particular “resolved” and not after any of the others. There was no power outside the General Assembly that had any right to tax Virginians. Were that power usurped, it would be tyranny. So Henry reasoned.
The debate had angered him. Abuse by his adversaries was a goad. Henry took the floor thoroughly aroused. His words took on the nobility of his theme. Listeners were carried to new heights of thought. Young Thomas Jefferson, standing at the door, was swept back to Troy by the rhythmic eloquence of Henry. “He appeared to me,” said Jefferson long afterwards, “to speak as Homer wrote.” The air became wine. A tax was lost in a principle. Williamsburg became Runnymede. The walls of the chamber melted into the deep background of the Englishman’s struggle to shape his own destiny. Henry’s imagery took bolder and bolder form. With a voice that impaled his hearers, he shouted: “Tarquin and Caesar each had his Brutus, Charles the First his Cromwell, and George the Third—”
“Treason,” ruled the outraged Speaker.
Henry lifted his shoulders still higher as he paused for an instant only—”and George the Third may profit by their example! If this be treason make the most of it!”
Skillful as this was, the Speaker did not intend to permit the utterance or the apparent acquiescence of the House to go unrebuked. Robinson again ruled Henry’s words treasonable. Henry had made his point; he had no intention of having prejudice aroused against his resolutions because of a ruling that the author of them had uttered treasonable words. He apologized to the Speaker and the House and avowed his loyalty to the King. Division was demanded. The count showed the declaration to have been carried by twenty to nineteen.
The Committee of the Whole rose; Peyton Randolph reported to the House that certain resolutions had been adopted and that he was ready to deliver them. As the hour was late, the House voted to receive the report the next day. May 30, when the seniors undertook to defeat Henry’s resolutions, his lines held. All five were adopted with some slight amendments.
In the belief that the declaration of the Colony was now firmly a matter of record, Henry started back to Hanover. The following morning his absence was noted in a House perceptibly thinner than it had been even during the debate on the Stamp Act. Randolph and other leaders proceeded to move that the resolutions be expunged, but, as the five parts of the paper had been adopted one by one, the chair ruled, that the expunging vote be put separately on each resolution. Weakened though Henry’s supporters were by his absence, they held together and beat down the motion to efface from the record the first, the second, the third and the fourth resolutions. The fifth, the resolution carrying the climactic “therefore,” they lost. It was stricken from the Journal.
Governor Fauquier, on June 1, summoned the Burgesses to the council chamber, signed the completed bills and joint resolutions and then, without a word of thanks or reproach, dissolved the House. The King must appeal to his people in new elections. Appeal he might, but Henry had not penned his resolutions in vain. Virginia’s resolves gave the signal for a general outcry over the continent.
It is unlikely that Washington attended the final days of the General Assembly. He probably left Williamsburg early, for there were serious matters to consider at Mount Vernon. A new uncertainty was creeping into the life that defeat of the French had given promise of stability. Washington found the family well, but conditions on the farms were bad. Drought had settled on the Hunting Creek estate. Besides drought, there was rust on the wheat crop which Washington was hoping would offset the decline in returns from the Potomac tobacco.
The hard summer was not without its satisfactions and its honors. Writs of election went out in June for the new House. In Fairfax, there was to be a vacancy. George Johnston decided that he would not be a candidate for the seat he had held since 1758. Washington accordingly declined in Frederick County and declared himself a candidate in Fairfax. The result of a light vote on July 16 was: Washington, 201; John West, 148; John Posey, 131. Washington and West were elected. Washington was entirely satisfied. It was, he confessed, “an easy and a creditable poll.”
Attendance on the new Assembly seemed immediately in prospect. Washington was preparing to start for the capital when word came on July 28 that the session had been prorogued. “I am convinced . . .” said Washington, “that the Governor had no inclination to meet an Assembly at this juncture.” That was the belief in ever
y part of Virginia. The lawmakers of Massachusetts had sent on June 8, 1765, a call for a meeting in New York October 7 of representatives of all the Colonies: Governor Fauquier did not want the Houses of Burgesses to approve participation in this enterprise which he regarded as seditious.
Opposition to the Stamp Act was shifting from argument to resistance. The stamps had been printed in England and were being sent to each of the Colonies for allotment. For Virginia, the designated “Distributor” was Col. George Mercer. Mercer’s known acceptance of the office had cost him already his place in the affection of many of his own people. On the Northern Neck he had been burned in effigy. Thousands of the Colonials were resolved they would not use the tax-paper in any circumstance. Some members of county courts were saying that they would not serve a day after legal processes had to be stamped. Whispers were passed that if an attempt were made to execute the law, men would come from the upcountry to Williamsburg and would seize and destroy the stamps. Washington heard and pondered. He was not excited and had not made common cause with those who advocated an extreme course.
Whether or not the new ministers of a coalition headed by Lord Rockingham ended the calamity of the Stamp Act, the year in Virginia was certain to be a disastrous one on the plantations. While the drought did not prove as ruinous as Washington had expected, the yield of his enlarged acreage of wheat was not more than 1112 bushels. The experiments with flax and hemp bore out Washington’s earlier fears of partial failure that season. Quality was low and the market was undeveloped, though the prospect was not altogether disheartening. The difficult crop year was ending when Washington read the details of the meeting in New York during October of the “Stamp Act Congress.” Twenty-seven from nine Colonies had conferred for about a fortnight and had formulated a “Declaration of Rights and Grievances” to which most Virginians would have subscribed.