1
The failure to bring about a non-importation union placed
the Boston merchants in the dilemma of either resigning
themselves nervelessly to business depression or pursuing
a vigorous course independently of the other great ports.
The failure to bring about a non-importation union placed
the Boston merchants in the dilemma of either resigning
themselves nervelessly to business depression or pursuing
a vigorous course independently of the other great ports.
Arthur Schlesinger - Colonial Merchants and the American Revolution
Bos.
Eve.
Post,
Aug. 21, 1769.
1 The chief facts concerning this agreement of Boston and the other
towns may be found in: 4 M. H. S. Colls. , vol. iv, pp. 350-351; M. H.
S. Mss. , 9r L, p. 37, 70-74; Bos. Gas. , Feb. 29, Mch. 7, 1768; Bernard
to Hillsborough, Bos. Eve> Post, Aug. 21, 1769. The merchants of
Portsmouth, N. H. , refused'to accede to this agreement. Brit. Papers
{"Sparks Mss. "), vol. i, pp. 7-8.
1 N. Y. Gas. & Merc. , Apr. 18, 1768; N. Y. Journ. , June 28, 1770. The
terms of this agreement had not been formulated without considerable
difference of opinion. Some of the more radical merchants wished to
include the Quartering Act with the Townshend duties as the object
of the non-importation. But this proposal was rejected by the major-
ity. Others insisted that the Boston plan of immediate non-importation
should be followed, for the six months' interval would enable unscru-
pulous men to enlarge their orders and defeat the purpose of the
agreement. This again met with little favor. Article by " G" in ibid. ,,
Apr. 21, 1768.
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? 1 I6 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
The agreement was signed by every merchant and trader
in New York, save two or three unimportant ones, within
less than two days. Another outcome of the conferences
of the merchants was the formation of the New York
Chamber of Commerce, with the avowed purpose of en-
couraging commerce and industry and of procuring better
trade laws. 1 The Committee of Merchants at Boston were
informed of the New York agreement; and an answer was
returned that, although the Boston merchants considered the
New Yorkers mistaken in not stopping trade 1mmediately,
nevertheless, for the sake of unanimity, they would accept
their proposal. 8
In Philadelphia, the movement for co-operation with
Boston and New York was devoid of any real vitality, not-
withstanding that the great proponent of non-importation,
John Dickinson, was an influential citizen of that place.
The merchants as a whole did not yet suffer from the trade
embarrassments, which the sea ports farther north were
experiencing or which they themselves had experienced
during the critical years 1764-1766. 8 "A. B. " represented
the. merchants' point of view in a set of queries in the
Pennsylvania Chronicle July 25. 1768. The aribnymous
author, probably Joseph (jalloway, questioned the wisdom
of severing commercial connections with England except in
1 Bos. News-Letter, Jan. 5, 1769; Memorial History of the City of
New York (Wilson, J. G. , ed. ), vol. iv, p. 516.
* Letter of N. Y. Merchants' Committee to Philadelphia Committee,
N. Y. Journ. , June 28, 1770. The Boston meeting to consider the New
York proposal was probably held on May 2. Bos. Gas. , May 2, 1768.
* Dickinson's "Farmer's Letters," in contrast to his pamphlet against
"The Late Regulations" of 1764-1765, made no claim to severe times;
and only a few articles in the newspapers spoke of business stagnation
and currency stringency or advocated local manufactures, thus " Philo-
Patriae" in Pa. Chron. , Dec. 2, 1767; "Lover of Pennsylvania" in
ibid. , Jan. 4, I1, 1768; "Freeborn American" and "Monitor" in Pa.
Gtu. , Feb. 9, Apr. 14, 1768.
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? COMMERCIAL REFORM 117
cases of dire necessity, for he declared that all the wool in
North America would not supply the colonists with hats and
stockings alone . Among his queries were these: Had the
merchants in their letters to England done all they could to
induce the mercantile houses there to agitate for repeal?
If the merchants should take action, ought not non-impor-
tation to be restricted to dutied imports alone? Was the
provincial legislature not the proper body to take cognizance
of the situation, and would anarchy not ensue from the
adoption of other measures? Even' if it were prudent for
New England merchants to resort to non-importation, might
it not be imprudent for Pennsylvania and other provinces
where the circumstances differed widely? Was it consis-
tent with the rights of mankind for one province to insist
that another should adopt its measures, more especially for
a people who called themselves " Sons of Liberty "?
"A Chester County Farmer" claimed that the farmers
would be slow to be inveigled into local manufacturing
again after their experience during Stamp Act days, for
the " ill-timed Resolution," made at the time of the repeal,
to cast aside all homespun, had dealt a staggering blow
to the people who had invested their capital in pastures,
sheep, looms, spinners, etc. 1 The situation was further
complicated by the long-standing local controversy over
the desirability of continuing the proprietary government. 2
A meeting of the merchants and traders of Philadelphia
was held on March 26, 1768, to act upon the proposal of
the Boston merchants. The Boston letter was not favcr-
1 Pa. Ga*. , June 16, 1768. It should be noted that the pseudonym was
another one of Joseph Galloway's, according to Ford in his edition of
Dickinson's Writings, vol. i, p. 435.
1" A. L. " in Pa. Chron. , May 30, 1768. In this controversy Galloway
and Dickinson were the local leaders of the royal and proprietary par-
ties respectively.
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? H8 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
ably received and, after a heated debate, the meeting ad-
journed without taking action. 1
On April 25, John Dickinson addressed a merchants'
meeting in order to induce favorable action. He first dwelt
eloquently on the effort of Great Britain to check the in-
dustrial and commercial development of the colonies. He
cited the prohibition of steel furnaces and slitting mills,
the acts against the exportation of hats and woolens, the
requirement of exporting logwood by way of England,
and the heavy restraints on the wine trade. He maintained
that the acts of trade compelled the colonists to pay twenty
to forty per cent higher for goods from England than they
could be gotten from other countries. He then reviewed
the Quartering Act and the Townshend Acts and showed
that their tendency was to diminish the control of the people
over their provincial governments, f. e. their "Liberty. "
"As Liberty is the great and only Security of Property;
as the Security of Property is the chief Spur to Industry,"
he urged the merchants to join with Boston and New York,
to forego a present advantage, and to stop importation
from Britain until the unconstitutional acts were repealed. *
Remaining unconvinced by these appeals to an alleged
self-interest, the merchants were fiercely assailed from
another angle. Under the signature of "A Freeborn
American," Charles Thomson, himself not disinterested in
his cause as an iron manufacturer and distiller, quoted the
1 Dickinson, Writings (Ford), vol. i, p. 410; Pa. Gas. , Mch. 31, I7>? 8.
1 Pa. J. ourn. , Apr. 28, 1768; also Dickinson, Writings (Ford), vol . i,
pp. 411-417. On the same day as Dickinson's speech, the Pennsylvania
Chronicle contained an able article entitled, "Causes of the American
Discontents before 1768," written by Benjamin Franklin under the
signature "F. and S. " This was a trenchant analysis covering many
of the same points, and had been published originally for Engl1sh con-
sumption in the London Chronicle, Jan. 7, 1768. Franklin, Writings
(Smyth), vol. v, pp. 78-89.
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? COMMERCIAL REFORM
words of the "Pennsylvania Farmer" to the effect that:
"A people is travelling fast to destruction, when indi-
viduals consider their interests as distinct from those of
the public. " The merchants were told that the eyes of
their customers, as well as of God, had been on them ex-
pectantly for a long time; and that eagerness for a few
pence or pounds should not deter them from joining
strength with Boston and New York. 1 A contributor in
the Pennsylvania Gasette of June 2 urged that the people
of the city take affairs into their own hands and agree
to buy only American manufactures. A few days later,
the merchants received a letter from the Committee of
Merchants at New York, reminding them that, unless they
adopted non-importation by June 14, the merchants of
New York and Boston would be absolved from their agree-
ments. 8 The Philadelphia merchants remainedujuaflyed;
the appointed day arr1ved and passefl! and the project of
a noj1-imprvrfa<1rm leofjpua -- of -- thp gjea*' trad1ng tOWnS
The delinquency of the merchants occasioned a most
virulent attack on their motives by John Dickinson in the
form of a broadside, entitled "A Copy of a Letter from
a Gentleman of Virginia to a Merchant in Philadelphia. "
The manuscript copy, which the printer used in getting
up the broadside, was in the handwriting of a third person,
making it evident, so the editor of Dickinson's Writings
thinks, that Dickinson desired to conceal his connection
with it. The writer did not mince words in charging that
the merchants were actuated by self-interest. During the
Stamp Act, when their " Patriotism and private Interests"
1 Pa. Gas. , May 12, 1768. Ford, op. cit. , vol. i, p. 435, ascribes the
pseudonym to Thomson.
1 Letter of June 6, 1768; N. Y. Journ. , June 28, 1770.
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? I2Q THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
were intimately connected, the merchants had entered into a
non-importation agreement, he said. But they had been able
to shift the burden of the Townshend taxes on their cus-
tomers, and the abstract question of right did not concern
them. The principle involved they considered of slight
importance as compared with their personal comfort and
profit.
1
The failure to bring about a non-importation union placed
the Boston merchants in the dilemma of either resigning
themselves nervelessly to business depression or pursuing
a vigorous course independently of the other great ports.
After one or two meetings for discussion, the merchants
chose the latter alternative in an agreement drawn up Au-
gust 1, 1768. 2 The preamble attributed the commercial
distress to money stringency--a condition growing daily
more severe because of "the large Sums collected by the
Officers of the Customs for Duties on Goods imported,"
to restrictions on trade laid by the recent acts of Parlia-
ment, to the heavy war taxes, and to bad success in the
cod and whale fisheries. All subscribers of the agreement
pledged themselves to send no further orders for fall goods,
to discontinue all importations from Great Britain for
one year beginning January 1, 1769,* except coal, wool-
cards, duck, cardwire, shot, and four or five articles neces-
sary for carrying on the fisheries, and to cease the im-
portation of tea, glass, paper and painters' colors until the
duties on them should be removed. Several days later,
1 Writings, voL i, pp. 433-445-
1 Mass. Gas. & News-Letter, Nov. 17, 1769; Bos. Gas. , July 25, Aug.
1, 8, 15, 1768; Bos. Post-Boy, May 8, 1769; Bos. Eve. Post, May 8, 1769;
Hosmer, Hutchinson, p. 432; Brown, John Hancock His Book, p. 163.
1 At a meeting on Oct. 17, 1769, the merchants removed the one-year
limitation and made the period of operation contingent upon the repeat
of the Townshend duties. Mass. Gas. & News-Letter, Nov. 9, 17, 1769.
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? COMMERCIAL REFORM I21
Hutchinson informed an English friend that all the mer-
chants in town, save only sixteen, had signed the agreement.
The example of the Boston merchants stimulated the
other trading towns of the province to emulation. Within
the next few months, agreements were signed by the mer-
chants of Salem, Plymouth, Cape Ann and Nantucket.
Marblehead, somewhat belated, joined in October of the
following year. 1 New vigor was also injected into the
movement for the non-consumption of tea. The Boston
Gasette reported "from the best Authority" that fifteen
hundred families of Boston had relinquished the use of
tea, and that most of the inhabitants of Charlestown, Lex-
ington, Dedham, Weymouth and Hingham, as well as the
students at Harvard, had done likewise. 2 The Boston
town meeting revived its efforts to provide work for the
poor of the town, "whose Numbers and distresses are
dayly increasing by the loss of its Trade & Commerce. "
Rejecting the earlier plan of a popular subscription, the
town, on March 13, 1769, voted a subsidy out of town funds
for a free spinning school, and placed it under charge of
William Molineux. The venture proved sufficiently suc-
cessful for the town meeting, three years later, to vote
thanks to the manager for the faithful performance of his
duties. 8
Within a year of the date of the merchants' agreement,
TWrrm that the ministry was prepared, to
yield up all the Townshend duties except the tax on tea; *
and the merchants were forced to consider whether 1t was
1 Essex Gas. , Sept. 6, 1768; N. Y. Journ. , June 22, 1769; Mass. Gas.
& News-Letter, Nov. 2, 1769.
1 Issues of Oct. 24, 1768; Mch. 27, 1769.
1 Bos. Town Recs. (1758-1769), pp. 273-277; ibid. (1770-1777), p. 73.
4 Hillsborough's circular letter of May 13, 1769. N. Y. Col. Docs. ,
vol. viii, pp. 164-165.
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? 122 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
worth while to continue the controversy under the cir-
cumstances. On July 26, 1769, they voted unanimously
that such a partial repeal would by no means relieve the
trade situation and was designed to prevent the establish-
ment of colonial manufactures. At this meeting and a
succeeding one of August n, they materially strengthened
the enforcement feature of the non-importation agree-
ment by providing for a boycott of all vessels and all mer-
chants dealing in merchandise proscribed by the agree-
ment. At the same time, the list of articles which might
be imported was somewhat extended. 1 They agreed,
further, on October 17, that, if any British merchandise
should be consigned to them on commission, they would
either refuse to receive it or ship it back at the first oppor-
tunity. 2 A paper was also circulated among the inhabi-
tants of Boston, pledging them to buy no goods imported
contrary to the merchants' agreement, and to support the
merchants in any further efforts to render the measures
effectual. 8
Meantime, domestic manufacturing entered a new stage:
spinning was taken up by women's circles in churches all
over New England and thus popularized as a social diver-
sion. The atrabilious Peter Oliver declared: " The female
spinners kept on spinning six Days of the Week; and on the
seventh, the Parsons took their turns and spun out their
prayers and sermons to a long thread of Politics. " * From
1 Mass. Gas. , July 31, 1769; Bos. Gas. , Aug. 14. In a meeting on
April 27, the merchants had already resolved to buy of no one articles
which were imported, contrary to the agreement, from Great Britain or
any province. Ibid. , May 1.
1 Mass. Gas. & News Letter, Nov. 9, 17, 1769.
*M. H. S. Ms. : 151, 1, 15. With a similar purpose in view, the
venrlue-masters and brokers signed an agreement not to handle any
goods debarred by the merchants' agreement. Bos. Ga:. , Aug. 21, 1769.
4 Brit. Mus. , Egerton Mss. , no. 2671 (L. C. Transcripts).
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? COMMERCIAL REFORM
123
January to September, 1769, twenty-eight spinning bees
were noted in the newspapers; and this probably represented
a fraction of the entire number held. Many instances of in-
dividual industry were cited; and the little town of Middle-
town, Mass. , established a record of weaving 20,522 yards
of doth in the year 1769, an average of more than forty
yards for every adult and child in the population. 1 Money
prizes were occasionally offered for the making of textiles;
and efforts were even made to foster silk culture in this way. 2
All this pother resulted in some progress toward a greater
independence of imported textiles. 8
Nevertheless, it is clear that the people were interested
only in tiding over a difficult period and not in laying the
foundations of permanent industries. It was an exceptional
case when men, like Upham and his associates at Brookfield,
Mass. , "erected a Building 50 Feet in Length and two
Stories high, for a Manufactory House," and installed
looms and collected workmen for the weaving of woolens. 4
Manufacturing pntprpri^ which would, in all probability,
collapse the moment trade with England was renewed,
did no! appeal as attract1ve 1nvestments to men of capital;
and as a class they refused to lend support. 11
1 Mass. Gas. & Post-Boy, Men. 12, 1770.
1 Bos. Gas. , Apr. 10, Oct. 16, 1769; May 1, 1770.
8 Note, for example, the articles offered for sale by John Gore, Jr. , in
the Boston Gaselle, June 12, 1769: "North-American Manufactures,
viz Blue, black, claret coloured and mix'd Cloths, Whilton mix'd Cotton
and Linnen, masqueraded ditto, superfine mix'd double Camblet for
Mens Summer or Womens Winter Ware, half-yard and 3 qr Diaper,
fine 7-8th Nutfield Linnen, fine Hatfield Thread, Mens ribb'd worsted
Hose, white cotton and linnen Tow-cloth, Lynn Shoes, Pole Combs,
Cards, &c, N. B. All sorts of Mens and Womens Ware manufactured
in New England, taken in Exchange for English Goods. "
4 Bos. Gas. , Oct. 3, 1768. For a similar enterprise, vide the advertise-
ment of Thomas Mewse in Bos. Post-Boy, Sept. 11, 1769.
5 E. g. , vide article by " A. Z. " and an advertisement of Charles Mil-
ler in Bos. Gas. , Feb. 20, 1769.
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? THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
papers of New England and elsewhere made a great fuss
over local manufactures; and it was no doubt the propagan-
dist character of such notices that caused many Americans
to refer to them as "great puffs" and " newspaper manu-
factures. " *
Not many days elapsed after the
jnent of Boston hefnrp tfrp M,. . , v^rlr merchants decided
_take a similar stand. On August 27, 1768, an agreement
was signed by nearly 'all the merchants and traders, which
was more stringent in its terms than the Boston agreement.
The subscribers were obligated to countermand all orders
sent to England after August 1 5 and to cease the importation
of goods shipped from Great Britain after November 1,
until the Townshend duties should be repealed. 2 Some
concession was made to the criticism that the project was
promoted chiefly by smuggling merchants, by providing that
no goods should be imported from Hamburg and Holland,
directly or indirectly, other than had already been ordered,
except tiles and bricks. 8 Any goods sent over contrary to
the agreement were to be stored in a public warehouse until
the Townshend duties were repealed. Finally, it was pro-
vided that any subscribers who violated the agreement
should be deemed " Enemies to their Country. "
A few days later, the tradesmen of the city signed an
agreement to withhold patronage from all merchants, -who
refused to sign or to obey the merchants' agreement, and
1Franklin, Writings (Smyth), vol. v, p. 116; "True Patriot" in Bos.
Eve. Post, Nov. 23, 1767.
*N. Y. Gas. & Merc. , Mch. 13, 1769; also N. Y. Journ. , Sept. 8, 1768.
Excepted from this general prohibition were: coal, salt, sail cloth,
woolcards, card-wire, grindstones, chalk, lead, tin, sheet-copper and
German steel.
1 This list of exceptions was later extended to include corn-fans, mill-
stones, and all those articles which were permitted to be imported from.
Great Britain.
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Aug. 21, 1769.
1 The chief facts concerning this agreement of Boston and the other
towns may be found in: 4 M. H. S. Colls. , vol. iv, pp. 350-351; M. H.
S. Mss. , 9r L, p. 37, 70-74; Bos. Gas. , Feb. 29, Mch. 7, 1768; Bernard
to Hillsborough, Bos. Eve> Post, Aug. 21, 1769. The merchants of
Portsmouth, N. H. , refused'to accede to this agreement. Brit. Papers
{"Sparks Mss. "), vol. i, pp. 7-8.
1 N. Y. Gas. & Merc. , Apr. 18, 1768; N. Y. Journ. , June 28, 1770. The
terms of this agreement had not been formulated without considerable
difference of opinion. Some of the more radical merchants wished to
include the Quartering Act with the Townshend duties as the object
of the non-importation. But this proposal was rejected by the major-
ity. Others insisted that the Boston plan of immediate non-importation
should be followed, for the six months' interval would enable unscru-
pulous men to enlarge their orders and defeat the purpose of the
agreement. This again met with little favor. Article by " G" in ibid. ,,
Apr. 21, 1768.
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? 1 I6 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
The agreement was signed by every merchant and trader
in New York, save two or three unimportant ones, within
less than two days. Another outcome of the conferences
of the merchants was the formation of the New York
Chamber of Commerce, with the avowed purpose of en-
couraging commerce and industry and of procuring better
trade laws. 1 The Committee of Merchants at Boston were
informed of the New York agreement; and an answer was
returned that, although the Boston merchants considered the
New Yorkers mistaken in not stopping trade 1mmediately,
nevertheless, for the sake of unanimity, they would accept
their proposal. 8
In Philadelphia, the movement for co-operation with
Boston and New York was devoid of any real vitality, not-
withstanding that the great proponent of non-importation,
John Dickinson, was an influential citizen of that place.
The merchants as a whole did not yet suffer from the trade
embarrassments, which the sea ports farther north were
experiencing or which they themselves had experienced
during the critical years 1764-1766. 8 "A. B. " represented
the. merchants' point of view in a set of queries in the
Pennsylvania Chronicle July 25. 1768. The aribnymous
author, probably Joseph (jalloway, questioned the wisdom
of severing commercial connections with England except in
1 Bos. News-Letter, Jan. 5, 1769; Memorial History of the City of
New York (Wilson, J. G. , ed. ), vol. iv, p. 516.
* Letter of N. Y. Merchants' Committee to Philadelphia Committee,
N. Y. Journ. , June 28, 1770. The Boston meeting to consider the New
York proposal was probably held on May 2. Bos. Gas. , May 2, 1768.
* Dickinson's "Farmer's Letters," in contrast to his pamphlet against
"The Late Regulations" of 1764-1765, made no claim to severe times;
and only a few articles in the newspapers spoke of business stagnation
and currency stringency or advocated local manufactures, thus " Philo-
Patriae" in Pa. Chron. , Dec. 2, 1767; "Lover of Pennsylvania" in
ibid. , Jan. 4, I1, 1768; "Freeborn American" and "Monitor" in Pa.
Gtu. , Feb. 9, Apr. 14, 1768.
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? COMMERCIAL REFORM 117
cases of dire necessity, for he declared that all the wool in
North America would not supply the colonists with hats and
stockings alone . Among his queries were these: Had the
merchants in their letters to England done all they could to
induce the mercantile houses there to agitate for repeal?
If the merchants should take action, ought not non-impor-
tation to be restricted to dutied imports alone? Was the
provincial legislature not the proper body to take cognizance
of the situation, and would anarchy not ensue from the
adoption of other measures? Even' if it were prudent for
New England merchants to resort to non-importation, might
it not be imprudent for Pennsylvania and other provinces
where the circumstances differed widely? Was it consis-
tent with the rights of mankind for one province to insist
that another should adopt its measures, more especially for
a people who called themselves " Sons of Liberty "?
"A Chester County Farmer" claimed that the farmers
would be slow to be inveigled into local manufacturing
again after their experience during Stamp Act days, for
the " ill-timed Resolution," made at the time of the repeal,
to cast aside all homespun, had dealt a staggering blow
to the people who had invested their capital in pastures,
sheep, looms, spinners, etc. 1 The situation was further
complicated by the long-standing local controversy over
the desirability of continuing the proprietary government. 2
A meeting of the merchants and traders of Philadelphia
was held on March 26, 1768, to act upon the proposal of
the Boston merchants. The Boston letter was not favcr-
1 Pa. Ga*. , June 16, 1768. It should be noted that the pseudonym was
another one of Joseph Galloway's, according to Ford in his edition of
Dickinson's Writings, vol. i, p. 435.
1" A. L. " in Pa. Chron. , May 30, 1768. In this controversy Galloway
and Dickinson were the local leaders of the royal and proprietary par-
ties respectively.
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? H8 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
ably received and, after a heated debate, the meeting ad-
journed without taking action. 1
On April 25, John Dickinson addressed a merchants'
meeting in order to induce favorable action. He first dwelt
eloquently on the effort of Great Britain to check the in-
dustrial and commercial development of the colonies. He
cited the prohibition of steel furnaces and slitting mills,
the acts against the exportation of hats and woolens, the
requirement of exporting logwood by way of England,
and the heavy restraints on the wine trade. He maintained
that the acts of trade compelled the colonists to pay twenty
to forty per cent higher for goods from England than they
could be gotten from other countries. He then reviewed
the Quartering Act and the Townshend Acts and showed
that their tendency was to diminish the control of the people
over their provincial governments, f. e. their "Liberty. "
"As Liberty is the great and only Security of Property;
as the Security of Property is the chief Spur to Industry,"
he urged the merchants to join with Boston and New York,
to forego a present advantage, and to stop importation
from Britain until the unconstitutional acts were repealed. *
Remaining unconvinced by these appeals to an alleged
self-interest, the merchants were fiercely assailed from
another angle. Under the signature of "A Freeborn
American," Charles Thomson, himself not disinterested in
his cause as an iron manufacturer and distiller, quoted the
1 Dickinson, Writings (Ford), vol. i, p. 410; Pa. Gas. , Mch. 31, I7>? 8.
1 Pa. J. ourn. , Apr. 28, 1768; also Dickinson, Writings (Ford), vol . i,
pp. 411-417. On the same day as Dickinson's speech, the Pennsylvania
Chronicle contained an able article entitled, "Causes of the American
Discontents before 1768," written by Benjamin Franklin under the
signature "F. and S. " This was a trenchant analysis covering many
of the same points, and had been published originally for Engl1sh con-
sumption in the London Chronicle, Jan. 7, 1768. Franklin, Writings
(Smyth), vol. v, pp. 78-89.
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? COMMERCIAL REFORM
words of the "Pennsylvania Farmer" to the effect that:
"A people is travelling fast to destruction, when indi-
viduals consider their interests as distinct from those of
the public. " The merchants were told that the eyes of
their customers, as well as of God, had been on them ex-
pectantly for a long time; and that eagerness for a few
pence or pounds should not deter them from joining
strength with Boston and New York. 1 A contributor in
the Pennsylvania Gasette of June 2 urged that the people
of the city take affairs into their own hands and agree
to buy only American manufactures. A few days later,
the merchants received a letter from the Committee of
Merchants at New York, reminding them that, unless they
adopted non-importation by June 14, the merchants of
New York and Boston would be absolved from their agree-
ments. 8 The Philadelphia merchants remainedujuaflyed;
the appointed day arr1ved and passefl! and the project of
a noj1-imprvrfa<1rm leofjpua -- of -- thp gjea*' trad1ng tOWnS
The delinquency of the merchants occasioned a most
virulent attack on their motives by John Dickinson in the
form of a broadside, entitled "A Copy of a Letter from
a Gentleman of Virginia to a Merchant in Philadelphia. "
The manuscript copy, which the printer used in getting
up the broadside, was in the handwriting of a third person,
making it evident, so the editor of Dickinson's Writings
thinks, that Dickinson desired to conceal his connection
with it. The writer did not mince words in charging that
the merchants were actuated by self-interest. During the
Stamp Act, when their " Patriotism and private Interests"
1 Pa. Gas. , May 12, 1768. Ford, op. cit. , vol. i, p. 435, ascribes the
pseudonym to Thomson.
1 Letter of June 6, 1768; N. Y. Journ. , June 28, 1770.
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? I2Q THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
were intimately connected, the merchants had entered into a
non-importation agreement, he said. But they had been able
to shift the burden of the Townshend taxes on their cus-
tomers, and the abstract question of right did not concern
them. The principle involved they considered of slight
importance as compared with their personal comfort and
profit.
1
The failure to bring about a non-importation union placed
the Boston merchants in the dilemma of either resigning
themselves nervelessly to business depression or pursuing
a vigorous course independently of the other great ports.
After one or two meetings for discussion, the merchants
chose the latter alternative in an agreement drawn up Au-
gust 1, 1768. 2 The preamble attributed the commercial
distress to money stringency--a condition growing daily
more severe because of "the large Sums collected by the
Officers of the Customs for Duties on Goods imported,"
to restrictions on trade laid by the recent acts of Parlia-
ment, to the heavy war taxes, and to bad success in the
cod and whale fisheries. All subscribers of the agreement
pledged themselves to send no further orders for fall goods,
to discontinue all importations from Great Britain for
one year beginning January 1, 1769,* except coal, wool-
cards, duck, cardwire, shot, and four or five articles neces-
sary for carrying on the fisheries, and to cease the im-
portation of tea, glass, paper and painters' colors until the
duties on them should be removed. Several days later,
1 Writings, voL i, pp. 433-445-
1 Mass. Gas. & News-Letter, Nov. 17, 1769; Bos. Gas. , July 25, Aug.
1, 8, 15, 1768; Bos. Post-Boy, May 8, 1769; Bos. Eve. Post, May 8, 1769;
Hosmer, Hutchinson, p. 432; Brown, John Hancock His Book, p. 163.
1 At a meeting on Oct. 17, 1769, the merchants removed the one-year
limitation and made the period of operation contingent upon the repeat
of the Townshend duties. Mass. Gas. & News-Letter, Nov. 9, 17, 1769.
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? COMMERCIAL REFORM I21
Hutchinson informed an English friend that all the mer-
chants in town, save only sixteen, had signed the agreement.
The example of the Boston merchants stimulated the
other trading towns of the province to emulation. Within
the next few months, agreements were signed by the mer-
chants of Salem, Plymouth, Cape Ann and Nantucket.
Marblehead, somewhat belated, joined in October of the
following year. 1 New vigor was also injected into the
movement for the non-consumption of tea. The Boston
Gasette reported "from the best Authority" that fifteen
hundred families of Boston had relinquished the use of
tea, and that most of the inhabitants of Charlestown, Lex-
ington, Dedham, Weymouth and Hingham, as well as the
students at Harvard, had done likewise. 2 The Boston
town meeting revived its efforts to provide work for the
poor of the town, "whose Numbers and distresses are
dayly increasing by the loss of its Trade & Commerce. "
Rejecting the earlier plan of a popular subscription, the
town, on March 13, 1769, voted a subsidy out of town funds
for a free spinning school, and placed it under charge of
William Molineux. The venture proved sufficiently suc-
cessful for the town meeting, three years later, to vote
thanks to the manager for the faithful performance of his
duties. 8
Within a year of the date of the merchants' agreement,
TWrrm that the ministry was prepared, to
yield up all the Townshend duties except the tax on tea; *
and the merchants were forced to consider whether 1t was
1 Essex Gas. , Sept. 6, 1768; N. Y. Journ. , June 22, 1769; Mass. Gas.
& News-Letter, Nov. 2, 1769.
1 Issues of Oct. 24, 1768; Mch. 27, 1769.
1 Bos. Town Recs. (1758-1769), pp. 273-277; ibid. (1770-1777), p. 73.
4 Hillsborough's circular letter of May 13, 1769. N. Y. Col. Docs. ,
vol. viii, pp. 164-165.
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? 122 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
worth while to continue the controversy under the cir-
cumstances. On July 26, 1769, they voted unanimously
that such a partial repeal would by no means relieve the
trade situation and was designed to prevent the establish-
ment of colonial manufactures. At this meeting and a
succeeding one of August n, they materially strengthened
the enforcement feature of the non-importation agree-
ment by providing for a boycott of all vessels and all mer-
chants dealing in merchandise proscribed by the agree-
ment. At the same time, the list of articles which might
be imported was somewhat extended. 1 They agreed,
further, on October 17, that, if any British merchandise
should be consigned to them on commission, they would
either refuse to receive it or ship it back at the first oppor-
tunity. 2 A paper was also circulated among the inhabi-
tants of Boston, pledging them to buy no goods imported
contrary to the merchants' agreement, and to support the
merchants in any further efforts to render the measures
effectual. 8
Meantime, domestic manufacturing entered a new stage:
spinning was taken up by women's circles in churches all
over New England and thus popularized as a social diver-
sion. The atrabilious Peter Oliver declared: " The female
spinners kept on spinning six Days of the Week; and on the
seventh, the Parsons took their turns and spun out their
prayers and sermons to a long thread of Politics. " * From
1 Mass. Gas. , July 31, 1769; Bos. Gas. , Aug. 14. In a meeting on
April 27, the merchants had already resolved to buy of no one articles
which were imported, contrary to the agreement, from Great Britain or
any province. Ibid. , May 1.
1 Mass. Gas. & News Letter, Nov. 9, 17, 1769.
*M. H. S. Ms. : 151, 1, 15. With a similar purpose in view, the
venrlue-masters and brokers signed an agreement not to handle any
goods debarred by the merchants' agreement. Bos. Ga:. , Aug. 21, 1769.
4 Brit. Mus. , Egerton Mss. , no. 2671 (L. C. Transcripts).
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? COMMERCIAL REFORM
123
January to September, 1769, twenty-eight spinning bees
were noted in the newspapers; and this probably represented
a fraction of the entire number held. Many instances of in-
dividual industry were cited; and the little town of Middle-
town, Mass. , established a record of weaving 20,522 yards
of doth in the year 1769, an average of more than forty
yards for every adult and child in the population. 1 Money
prizes were occasionally offered for the making of textiles;
and efforts were even made to foster silk culture in this way. 2
All this pother resulted in some progress toward a greater
independence of imported textiles. 8
Nevertheless, it is clear that the people were interested
only in tiding over a difficult period and not in laying the
foundations of permanent industries. It was an exceptional
case when men, like Upham and his associates at Brookfield,
Mass. , "erected a Building 50 Feet in Length and two
Stories high, for a Manufactory House," and installed
looms and collected workmen for the weaving of woolens. 4
Manufacturing pntprpri^ which would, in all probability,
collapse the moment trade with England was renewed,
did no! appeal as attract1ve 1nvestments to men of capital;
and as a class they refused to lend support. 11
1 Mass. Gas. & Post-Boy, Men. 12, 1770.
1 Bos. Gas. , Apr. 10, Oct. 16, 1769; May 1, 1770.
8 Note, for example, the articles offered for sale by John Gore, Jr. , in
the Boston Gaselle, June 12, 1769: "North-American Manufactures,
viz Blue, black, claret coloured and mix'd Cloths, Whilton mix'd Cotton
and Linnen, masqueraded ditto, superfine mix'd double Camblet for
Mens Summer or Womens Winter Ware, half-yard and 3 qr Diaper,
fine 7-8th Nutfield Linnen, fine Hatfield Thread, Mens ribb'd worsted
Hose, white cotton and linnen Tow-cloth, Lynn Shoes, Pole Combs,
Cards, &c, N. B. All sorts of Mens and Womens Ware manufactured
in New England, taken in Exchange for English Goods. "
4 Bos. Gas. , Oct. 3, 1768. For a similar enterprise, vide the advertise-
ment of Thomas Mewse in Bos. Post-Boy, Sept. 11, 1769.
5 E. g. , vide article by " A. Z. " and an advertisement of Charles Mil-
ler in Bos. Gas. , Feb. 20, 1769.
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? THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
papers of New England and elsewhere made a great fuss
over local manufactures; and it was no doubt the propagan-
dist character of such notices that caused many Americans
to refer to them as "great puffs" and " newspaper manu-
factures. " *
Not many days elapsed after the
jnent of Boston hefnrp tfrp M,. . , v^rlr merchants decided
_take a similar stand. On August 27, 1768, an agreement
was signed by nearly 'all the merchants and traders, which
was more stringent in its terms than the Boston agreement.
The subscribers were obligated to countermand all orders
sent to England after August 1 5 and to cease the importation
of goods shipped from Great Britain after November 1,
until the Townshend duties should be repealed. 2 Some
concession was made to the criticism that the project was
promoted chiefly by smuggling merchants, by providing that
no goods should be imported from Hamburg and Holland,
directly or indirectly, other than had already been ordered,
except tiles and bricks. 8 Any goods sent over contrary to
the agreement were to be stored in a public warehouse until
the Townshend duties were repealed. Finally, it was pro-
vided that any subscribers who violated the agreement
should be deemed " Enemies to their Country. "
A few days later, the tradesmen of the city signed an
agreement to withhold patronage from all merchants, -who
refused to sign or to obey the merchants' agreement, and
1Franklin, Writings (Smyth), vol. v, p. 116; "True Patriot" in Bos.
Eve. Post, Nov. 23, 1767.
*N. Y. Gas. & Merc. , Mch. 13, 1769; also N. Y. Journ. , Sept. 8, 1768.
Excepted from this general prohibition were: coal, salt, sail cloth,
woolcards, card-wire, grindstones, chalk, lead, tin, sheet-copper and
German steel.
1 This list of exceptions was later extended to include corn-fans, mill-
stones, and all those articles which were permitted to be imported from.
Great Britain.
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