* He added sagely: "Many great events have
proceeded
from much
smaller causes.
smaller causes.
Arthur Schlesinger - Colonial Merchants and the American Revolution
org/access_use#pd-google
? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM 55
of the sources from which the prosperity of his community
arose. 1
For the most part, this literature of protest contained a
cogent presentation of the economic springs of mercantile
prosperity. The prevailing note was sounded by a com-
ment in Thacher's pamphlet on the recent action of Parlia-
ment: "Does not this," he asked, "resemble the conduct
of the good wife in the fable who killed her hen that every
day laid her a Golden Egg? " The new measures for en-
forcing the acts of trade were roundly denounced, especially
the provisions for protecting customs officers from damage
suits in case of mistaken seizures, and the provisions grant-
ing to the informer or prosecutor the right to choose the
court in which he wished to sue. These regulations were
termed a denial of the common law and of trial by jury.
The new duties on foreign wines were complained of, on the
ground that wines had now to be brought to America by a
roundabout and expensive route. The restricting of iron
exports to Great Britain caused protest, especially in Penn-
sylvania, because cargoes of iron had always found a ready
market in Portuguese ports.
The chorus of denunciation rose loudest on the subject of
the new mojagggs duties. This appeared to the pamphleteers
a species of economic strangulation by which the colonies
were cut off from the source of their specie supply. "The
duty of 3d. per gallon on foreign molasses is well known
1 Dickinson, John, The Late Regulations respecting the British Colo-
nies . . . considered (Philadelphia, 1765). Though published after the
passage of the Stamp Act, attention was given almost exclusively to
the economic effects of the acts of 1764. Note the striking similarity of
Dickinson's views to Charles Thomson's arguments, urged in a letter
of November, 1765, to a London mercantile house. Thomson. Papers
(AT. Y. Hist. Soc. Colls. , vol. xi), pp. 7-12. Thomson was an importer
and also had interests in iron manufacturing and in rum distilling.
Harley, L. R. , Life of Charles Thomson (Philadelphia, 1900), passim.
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? ejb * THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
to every man in the least acquainted with it to be much
higher than that article can possibly bear and therefore must
operate as an absolute prohibition," declared Hopkins. If
the merchants and distillers suffered losses, the provincial
farmers would become deeply involved, because their surplus
stock and products had been sent to the foreign islands in
exchange for molasses. If there were no specie in cir-
culation, debts could not be paid to England, importations
must be reduced, and local manufacturing undertaken.
With the volume of money rapidly shrinking, it was charged
that the prohibition of further issues of legal-tender money
was calculated to heighten the distress, since paper money
had generally served a useful purpose as a circulating
medium within provincial boundaries. Finally, some
warmth was displayed in referring to the commercial sys-
tem as a whole, and the question asked whether the dis-
advantages which the colonies suffered under it and the en-
hanced prices which the colonists paid for British importa-
tions loaded with British taxes at home were not equivalent
to a tax directly levied in America.
The assumptions and arguments, urged by the pamph-
leteers, received substantial confirmation from the prostra-
tion of industry which began to be apparent throughout the
commercial provinces. This period of economic depression
was not, as they contended, produced entirely by the re-
strictive legislation of 1764. The beginning of the change
was traceable to the more vigorous enforcement of the old
Molasses Act in 1763. A more important cause was the
collapse of the artificial war-tirpe nrr^pprity whirV> fl1p prr>-
vinces had enioved. 1 The presence of British forces in
1Franklin, Writings (Smyth), vol. v, pp. 71-73; speech of P. Cust,
M. P. , in Bos. Chron. , June 11, 1770; Colden, Letter Books, vol. ii, pp.
77-78; article in Pa. Journ. , Mch. 21, 1765; Burke's "Observations on
the Right Honourable Mr. Grenville's State of the Nation," Bos.
Chron. , June 26, 1769; "A Friend to the Colony" in Prov. Gaz. , Mch.
26, 1768; "The Citizen" in Pa. Journ. , Jan. 26, 1769.
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? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM
57
America had caused a great influx of coin for the paying
and provisioning of the troops; and the high cash prices
paid by the French for foodstuffs added to the supply of
specie. Under such stimulus, prices soared; merchants in-
creased their stocks and undertook speculative risks; farm-
ers enlarged their operations; people generally began to
adopt more luxurious modes of living. The close of the
war and the disbanding of the greatest part of the army
dried up these sources of abundant specie. Merchants and
farmers found themselves deprived of their profitable mar-
kets, with an overplus of supplies on hand. An especially
serious blow was administered to those merchants who had
succeeded during the war in monopolizing the trade of
Havana and the French West Indian islands, after these
colonies had fallen into the possession of England. The
restoration of these islands at the conclusion of peace greatly
diminished this trade. The rice planters of South Carolina
and Georgia would have shared in the distress, had not
Parliament enabled them by the act of 1764 to continue to
export their staple to these new markets.
But the chief cause of the hard times was the restrictive
legislation of 1764. The Boston Post-Boy of June 3, 1765
declared that not one-fifth as many vessels were employed
in the West Indian trade as before the regulations of the
preceding year, and that cash had practically disappeared
from circulation. The mercantile community experienced
"a most prodigious shock" at the ta1lures ot . Nathaniel
Wheelwright. John bcollay, Joseph bcott arid fefTatrrmher
Boston merchants of note. John Hancock, whose own
trad1ng connect1ons were with many parts of the world,
wrote that "times are very bad, . . . the times will be
worse here, in short such is the situation of things here that
we do not know who is and who [is] not safe. " l
n Hancock His Book, pp. 61-62. He concluded: "The affair of
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? 58 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
Conditions were bad at Newport, also. 1 A statement,
issued by leading citizens of New York, lamented the
dwindling of trade, the extreme scarcity of cash, the pro-
hibition of paper money and the recent restrictions placed
on commerce. 2 A New York merchant of twenty years'
standing withdrew from trade because he was apprehensive
of the effects of the new regulations. He testified before
a committee of Parliament that, whereas the price of mo-
lasses at New York had formerly been 1s. 6d. to 1s. gd. per
gallon, the threepenny duty had increased it by one or two-
pence, and the price of the rum distilled from it had ad-
vanced sufficiently to enable Danish rum to undersell the
American on the Guinea coast. The ten or a dozen New
York vessels, formerly engaged in the slave trade, were now
idle. 3 In Pennsylvania, it was complained that " Trade is
become dull, Money very scarce, Contracts decrease, Law-
Suits increase so as to double the number of Writs issued
in every County within two Years past . . . "4 The farm-
Wheelwright's failure with such aggravated Circumstances is the great-
est shock to trade that ever happened here. " In another letter he
wrote: "Money is Extremely Scarce & trade very dull. If we are not
reliev'd at home we must live upon our own produce & manufactures. "
Ibid. , pp. 63-64. Hancock had taken over his uncle's business upon the
latter's death in August, 1764; and, according to Thomas Hutchinson,
old Thomas Hancock had amassed great wealth by "importing from
St. Eustatia great quantities of tea in molasses hogsheads, which sold
at a very great advance. " Mass. Bay, vol. ill, pp. 297-298.
1 Newport Merc. , Feb. 25, 1765.
1 Statement of the Society of Arts, Agriculture and Oeconomy, Wey-
ler's N. Y. Gas. , Dec. 10, 1764.
? Testimony of William Kelly, Feb. 11, 1766, Brit. Mus. Addl. Mss. ,
no. 33030 (L. C. Transcripts), ff. 130, 134-135, 137.
'"The Farmer" in Pa. Journ. , Aug. 23, 1764. The Philadelphia
merchant, Benjamin Marshall, wrote on Oct. 22, 1764: "Cash Mon-
strous scarce (I believe we must learn to Barter), as the Men of War
are here so strict that nothing can escape them . . . " Pa. Mag. , vol.
xx, p. 208. Vide also the business correspondence of S. Rhoads, Jr. , at
this period. Ibid. , vol. xiv, pp. 421-426.
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? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM 59
ers of the commercial provinces were involved in the gen-
eral distress. "Merchants and Farmers are breaking and
all things going into confusion," wrote a New Englander
despondently. 1 "What is your City without Trade, and
what the Country without a Market to vend their Com-
modities? " queried a Pennsylvania writer. 2
The merchants did not remain idle while their profits
evaporated and their debts accumulated. They had been
excited to activity by the first rumors that the old Molasses
Act might again be renewed in 1764. A keen observer de-
clared in retrospect, several years later, that the union among
the colonies had derived " its original source from no Object
of a more Respectable Cast than that of a Successful prac-
tice in Illicit Trade, I say contrived, prompted and pro-
moted by a Confederacy of Smuglers in Boston, Rhode
Island and other Seaport Towns on that Coast. "* These
gentry were aided and abetted by the rum-distillers, who
were particularly powerful in New England. 4 John Adams
was franker than most historians when he reflected in his
old age: " I know not why we should blush to confess that
molasses was an essent1al ingredient in American inde-
pendence. U3""
The first move was made by the merchants of Boston,
in April, 176. 1, when they nrgani*gd fop "Soripfty for
encouraging Trade and Commerce within the Province
1 N. H. Go*. , Dec. 7, 1764.
1" The Farmer " in Pa. Journ. , Aug. 23, 1764.
1 Letter of Richard Oswald, a native American and a Londoner in
the American trade, to Dartmouth, Feb. 9, 1775; Stevens, Facsimiles,
vol. xxiv, no. 2032, pp. 3-4.
* In another portion of his letter Oswald alluded to "the great Rum
Distillers of Boston who began all this disturbance. " Ibid.
* He added sagely: "Many great events have proceeded from much
smaller causes. " Works, vol. x, p. 345.
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? 60 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
of Mass^hntu-tfa Bay " 1 There was to be a standing
committee of fifteen to watch trade affairs and to call
a general meeting of members whenever occasion de-
manded. A memorial was drawn up for presentation to
the General Court; and accounts of their activities were
sent to the merchants in other provinces. The committee
also corresponded with influential members of Parliament. 1
Further action was called for by an article in the
Boston Evening Post, November 21 and 28, 1763. The
writer proposed that, at the instance of the Boston mer-
chants, a provincial committee of merchants representing
the maritime towns should urge the General Court to peti-
tion Parliament for a revision of the acts of trade, par-
ticularly for the removal or substantial reduction of the
duties on foreign molasses and sugar. Perhaps in response
to this suggestion, a sub-committee of the Boston merchants
requested a meeting with committees of the merchants of
Marblehead, Salem and Plymouth; and the result was that
the merchants of these ports also presented memorials to the
General Court.
The merchants of New York were the next to take action.
Of these merchants, Lieutenant Governor Colden said:
"Many of them have rose suddenly from the lowest Rank
of the People to considerable Fortunes, & chiefly by illicit
Trade in the last War. They abhor every limitation of
Trade and Duty on it, & therefore gladly go into every
Measure whereby they hope to have Trade free. " * They
1 M. H. S. Ms. , 91 L, pp. 23-25. The rules of organization were
signed by one hundred forty-seven merchants. For a more detailed
account of this organization, vide Andrews, C. M. , "The Boston
Merchants and the Non-Importation Movement," Col. Soc. Mass. Pubs. ,
vol. xix, pp. 161-167.
1 Bos. Gas. , Jan. 16, Oct. 29, 1764.
'Letter Books, vol. ii, p. 68. Vide also Parliamentary History of
England (Cobbett, W. , ed. ), vol. xvi, p. 125.
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? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM 6l
met at Burn's Long Room on January 27, 1764 and took
under consideration the declining state of trade. _^. com-
mittee was appointed to memorialize the-Jejdslature on the
situat1on and to ask their interposition with Parliament.
The committee later established regular meeting nights. 1
A communication in the New York Gasette and Post-Boy
of February 2 commended the rational action of the mer-
chants and declared riotous opposition would be " seditious
and injurious to Government" when redress might be ob-
tained by dutiful petition. At the suggestion of theJMew
York Committee of Merchants, the merchants of Phila-
delphia became active, and appointed a committee to urge
the Pennsylvania Assembly to solicit Parliament to dis-
continue the molasses duties of 1733. 2
In every case the legislatures took the desired step, al-
though little was done until after the new duties of 1764
had become a law. 8 Only Rhode Island had been fore-
handed enough to petition for the repeal of the old Molasses
Act prior to the new legislation of Parliament. In June,
the Massachusetts House of Representatives ordered its
agent in London to press for a repeal of the new dut1es and
also to protest against the Sfflmp Art 'iru;"t' J"og TM" the
government's program for 1765. A committee was ap-
pointed to urge the other legislatures on the continent to
join in the movement. In July the Rhode Island Assembly
appointed a committee for the same purpose; and a com-
mittee of the New York Assembly began a similar pro-
paganda in October. *~
1 Weyler's N. Y. Co*. , Jan. 30, 1764; N. Y. Gas. & Post-Boy, Feb. a;
N. Y. Merc. , Mch. 5, 1764. The memorial was read in the provincial
assembly on Apr. 20, 1764.
* Bos. Post-Boy, Mch. 26, 1764.
* Frothingham, R. , The Rise of the Republic of the United States
(Boston, 1881), pp. 173-174.
* The New York committee was instructed to correspond "on the
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? 62 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
(The problem of the commercial provinces was to enlist
the support of the plantation provinces in their campaign
for remedial legislation. In this way, a united front could
be shown to Parliament and the chances for success greatly
increased. The tobacco provinces were readier of response
than any of the others, because of the unsatisfactory condi-
tion of crops and crop prices and because of the scarcity
of money J " The Courts are filled with Law-Suits, and
many People are obliged to sell their Estates," wrote a Vir-
ginian. 1 George Washington, one of the large Virginia
planters, was forced to explain to a creditor that he had
fallen " so much in arrears " because he had not had " even
tolerable crops" for three straight years, and when he had
one, it did not sell well. 2 But these conditions could not
be attributed to the acts of 1764, and did not seem to pre-
vail in the more southerly provinces.
The position of the commercial provinces was greatly
strengthened strategically by the fact that the Stamp Act
was on the boards for active consideration by Parliament
in 1765. A stamp tax was clearly a departure from the
ancient custom of the home government. It was more
purely a fiscal measure than was the so-called Sugar Act of
1 764, its incidence was more obvious and it fell on people in
all the provinces. Thus, -nncprl stam r"
an opportunitv to the mercantile 1"frffjfftff f^tir IIP -a
Subject Matter of the Act, commonly called the Sugar Act; on the
Act restraining Paper Bills of Credit in the Colonies from being a
legal Tender; and of the several other Acts of Parliament lately passed,
with relation to the Trade of the Northern Colonies: And also on the
Subject of the impending Dangers which threaten the Colonies, of being
taxed by Laws to be passed in Great-Britain. " Note the sequence.
Pa. Gas. , Nov. 28, 1764.
1 Virginia and Maryland news in Prov. Gas. , Jan. 19, 1765; Bos.
Post-Boy, June 10, July 29.
1 Writings (Ford, W. C, ed. ), vol. ii, pp. 200-202.
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? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM 63
general disrnntpnf as w^ll ag tn I'nrr^go Wal His
Consciously or not, the northern legislatures made the most
of the occasion. In their official utterances, they dovetailed
in with their economic indictment of the Sugar Act a protest
against the proposed Stamp Act as an inexpedient and un-
constitutional measure. 1 Their efforts to secure continental
co-operation were successful : . petitions and remonstrances
were sent from Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina,
and, with considerablp reluctance, from Georgia. 2
Meantime, the hard times had been causing people in the
commercial provinces to retrench expenses; and in some
cases this object was accomplished by concerted effort. A
clear-seeing writer in the Providence Gazette, October 6,
1 764, proposed a continental agreement to suspend tradg
with the British West Indies, in order to strike a body blow
at the West India interest in Parliament; but it was ten
years too soon for such a proposal to win favorable re-
sponse. Fifty merchants of Boston set an example in
August, 1 764. by signing an agreement to discard laces and
ruffles, to buy no English cloths but at a fixed price, and
to forego the elaboratp and eyp^^vo mourning nf'thp
t1mes for the very simplest display. * The mourning reso-
1 As Oswald observed to Dartmouth in 1775, the disgruntled mer-
chants had had "the art to interweave in their System of Grievances
. . . some others of a political nature and apparently of a more liberal
cast than do[e]s really lye at the bottom of their designs. " Stevens,
Facsimiles, vol. xxiv, no. 2032, p. 5.
1 Of the commercial group, Connecticut and Pennsylvania now joined
in with the others. The southern legislatures generally included a com-
plaint against certain restrictions placed in 1764 upon the exportation
of lumber, a matter that was satisfactorily adjusted by Parliament in
1765. South Carolina also complained of the Currency Act. Docu-
mentary History of the American Revolution (Gibbes, R. W. , ed. ), vol.
ii, pp. l-d. The Virginia Committee of Correspondence expressed
alarm at the duties on Madeira wine but seemed pleased at the Cur-
rency Act. Va. Mag. , vol. xii, pp. 6-1 1.
* Newport Merc. , Aug. 20, 1764; also AT. Y. Gas. & Post-Boy, Aug. 30.
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? 64 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
lutions were so well kept by the people generally that it was
reported that there had been only one or two violations after
four months' trial, although almost one hundred funerals
had occurred; and it was estimated that the saving would be
more than ? 10,000 sterling a year. 1 Burials " according to
the new mode" were recorded by the newspapers in New
Hampshire, Rhode Island, New Jersey and New York.
In September the tradesmen of Boston followed in the
path of the merchants, by agreeing to wear only leather of
Massachusetts manufacture for their work clothes. 2 In
November the students of Yale took unanimous action to
abstain from the use of foreign liquors. * The people of
New York apparently took no formal action; but five fire
companies of Philadelphia attempted to counteract the high
price of mutton by agreeing to refrain from the purchase of
lamb. * One company added a pledge against the drinking
of imported beer.
The logical counterpart of the efforts for the disuse of
imported superfluities was the
_manufactures. This movement had greatest vitality in New
York, where a number of prominent men in December, 1764,
organized the " Society for H1o frnmnn'op r,f A rtv Agri-
culture and Oecpnomy, and proceeded to award premiums
fora great variety of local productions, to print informing
pamphlets, and to promote the formation of similar societies
throughout the province8 Ja_other provinces, the news-
1 Bos. Eve. Post, Jan. 21, 1765; Bos. Post-Boy, Oct. 1, 8, 1764, July 1,
1/65.
'Ibid. , Oct . 1, 1764.
*N. Y. Gas. & Post-Boy, Nov. 22, 1764.
4 Pa. Gaz. , Feb.
? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM 55
of the sources from which the prosperity of his community
arose. 1
For the most part, this literature of protest contained a
cogent presentation of the economic springs of mercantile
prosperity. The prevailing note was sounded by a com-
ment in Thacher's pamphlet on the recent action of Parlia-
ment: "Does not this," he asked, "resemble the conduct
of the good wife in the fable who killed her hen that every
day laid her a Golden Egg? " The new measures for en-
forcing the acts of trade were roundly denounced, especially
the provisions for protecting customs officers from damage
suits in case of mistaken seizures, and the provisions grant-
ing to the informer or prosecutor the right to choose the
court in which he wished to sue. These regulations were
termed a denial of the common law and of trial by jury.
The new duties on foreign wines were complained of, on the
ground that wines had now to be brought to America by a
roundabout and expensive route. The restricting of iron
exports to Great Britain caused protest, especially in Penn-
sylvania, because cargoes of iron had always found a ready
market in Portuguese ports.
The chorus of denunciation rose loudest on the subject of
the new mojagggs duties. This appeared to the pamphleteers
a species of economic strangulation by which the colonies
were cut off from the source of their specie supply. "The
duty of 3d. per gallon on foreign molasses is well known
1 Dickinson, John, The Late Regulations respecting the British Colo-
nies . . . considered (Philadelphia, 1765). Though published after the
passage of the Stamp Act, attention was given almost exclusively to
the economic effects of the acts of 1764. Note the striking similarity of
Dickinson's views to Charles Thomson's arguments, urged in a letter
of November, 1765, to a London mercantile house. Thomson. Papers
(AT. Y. Hist. Soc. Colls. , vol. xi), pp. 7-12. Thomson was an importer
and also had interests in iron manufacturing and in rum distilling.
Harley, L. R. , Life of Charles Thomson (Philadelphia, 1900), passim.
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? ejb * THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
to every man in the least acquainted with it to be much
higher than that article can possibly bear and therefore must
operate as an absolute prohibition," declared Hopkins. If
the merchants and distillers suffered losses, the provincial
farmers would become deeply involved, because their surplus
stock and products had been sent to the foreign islands in
exchange for molasses. If there were no specie in cir-
culation, debts could not be paid to England, importations
must be reduced, and local manufacturing undertaken.
With the volume of money rapidly shrinking, it was charged
that the prohibition of further issues of legal-tender money
was calculated to heighten the distress, since paper money
had generally served a useful purpose as a circulating
medium within provincial boundaries. Finally, some
warmth was displayed in referring to the commercial sys-
tem as a whole, and the question asked whether the dis-
advantages which the colonies suffered under it and the en-
hanced prices which the colonists paid for British importa-
tions loaded with British taxes at home were not equivalent
to a tax directly levied in America.
The assumptions and arguments, urged by the pamph-
leteers, received substantial confirmation from the prostra-
tion of industry which began to be apparent throughout the
commercial provinces. This period of economic depression
was not, as they contended, produced entirely by the re-
strictive legislation of 1764. The beginning of the change
was traceable to the more vigorous enforcement of the old
Molasses Act in 1763. A more important cause was the
collapse of the artificial war-tirpe nrr^pprity whirV> fl1p prr>-
vinces had enioved. 1 The presence of British forces in
1Franklin, Writings (Smyth), vol. v, pp. 71-73; speech of P. Cust,
M. P. , in Bos. Chron. , June 11, 1770; Colden, Letter Books, vol. ii, pp.
77-78; article in Pa. Journ. , Mch. 21, 1765; Burke's "Observations on
the Right Honourable Mr. Grenville's State of the Nation," Bos.
Chron. , June 26, 1769; "A Friend to the Colony" in Prov. Gaz. , Mch.
26, 1768; "The Citizen" in Pa. Journ. , Jan. 26, 1769.
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? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM
57
America had caused a great influx of coin for the paying
and provisioning of the troops; and the high cash prices
paid by the French for foodstuffs added to the supply of
specie. Under such stimulus, prices soared; merchants in-
creased their stocks and undertook speculative risks; farm-
ers enlarged their operations; people generally began to
adopt more luxurious modes of living. The close of the
war and the disbanding of the greatest part of the army
dried up these sources of abundant specie. Merchants and
farmers found themselves deprived of their profitable mar-
kets, with an overplus of supplies on hand. An especially
serious blow was administered to those merchants who had
succeeded during the war in monopolizing the trade of
Havana and the French West Indian islands, after these
colonies had fallen into the possession of England. The
restoration of these islands at the conclusion of peace greatly
diminished this trade. The rice planters of South Carolina
and Georgia would have shared in the distress, had not
Parliament enabled them by the act of 1764 to continue to
export their staple to these new markets.
But the chief cause of the hard times was the restrictive
legislation of 1764. The Boston Post-Boy of June 3, 1765
declared that not one-fifth as many vessels were employed
in the West Indian trade as before the regulations of the
preceding year, and that cash had practically disappeared
from circulation. The mercantile community experienced
"a most prodigious shock" at the ta1lures ot . Nathaniel
Wheelwright. John bcollay, Joseph bcott arid fefTatrrmher
Boston merchants of note. John Hancock, whose own
trad1ng connect1ons were with many parts of the world,
wrote that "times are very bad, . . . the times will be
worse here, in short such is the situation of things here that
we do not know who is and who [is] not safe. " l
n Hancock His Book, pp. 61-62. He concluded: "The affair of
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? 58 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
Conditions were bad at Newport, also. 1 A statement,
issued by leading citizens of New York, lamented the
dwindling of trade, the extreme scarcity of cash, the pro-
hibition of paper money and the recent restrictions placed
on commerce. 2 A New York merchant of twenty years'
standing withdrew from trade because he was apprehensive
of the effects of the new regulations. He testified before
a committee of Parliament that, whereas the price of mo-
lasses at New York had formerly been 1s. 6d. to 1s. gd. per
gallon, the threepenny duty had increased it by one or two-
pence, and the price of the rum distilled from it had ad-
vanced sufficiently to enable Danish rum to undersell the
American on the Guinea coast. The ten or a dozen New
York vessels, formerly engaged in the slave trade, were now
idle. 3 In Pennsylvania, it was complained that " Trade is
become dull, Money very scarce, Contracts decrease, Law-
Suits increase so as to double the number of Writs issued
in every County within two Years past . . . "4 The farm-
Wheelwright's failure with such aggravated Circumstances is the great-
est shock to trade that ever happened here. " In another letter he
wrote: "Money is Extremely Scarce & trade very dull. If we are not
reliev'd at home we must live upon our own produce & manufactures. "
Ibid. , pp. 63-64. Hancock had taken over his uncle's business upon the
latter's death in August, 1764; and, according to Thomas Hutchinson,
old Thomas Hancock had amassed great wealth by "importing from
St. Eustatia great quantities of tea in molasses hogsheads, which sold
at a very great advance. " Mass. Bay, vol. ill, pp. 297-298.
1 Newport Merc. , Feb. 25, 1765.
1 Statement of the Society of Arts, Agriculture and Oeconomy, Wey-
ler's N. Y. Gas. , Dec. 10, 1764.
? Testimony of William Kelly, Feb. 11, 1766, Brit. Mus. Addl. Mss. ,
no. 33030 (L. C. Transcripts), ff. 130, 134-135, 137.
'"The Farmer" in Pa. Journ. , Aug. 23, 1764. The Philadelphia
merchant, Benjamin Marshall, wrote on Oct. 22, 1764: "Cash Mon-
strous scarce (I believe we must learn to Barter), as the Men of War
are here so strict that nothing can escape them . . . " Pa. Mag. , vol.
xx, p. 208. Vide also the business correspondence of S. Rhoads, Jr. , at
this period. Ibid. , vol. xiv, pp. 421-426.
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? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM 59
ers of the commercial provinces were involved in the gen-
eral distress. "Merchants and Farmers are breaking and
all things going into confusion," wrote a New Englander
despondently. 1 "What is your City without Trade, and
what the Country without a Market to vend their Com-
modities? " queried a Pennsylvania writer. 2
The merchants did not remain idle while their profits
evaporated and their debts accumulated. They had been
excited to activity by the first rumors that the old Molasses
Act might again be renewed in 1764. A keen observer de-
clared in retrospect, several years later, that the union among
the colonies had derived " its original source from no Object
of a more Respectable Cast than that of a Successful prac-
tice in Illicit Trade, I say contrived, prompted and pro-
moted by a Confederacy of Smuglers in Boston, Rhode
Island and other Seaport Towns on that Coast. "* These
gentry were aided and abetted by the rum-distillers, who
were particularly powerful in New England. 4 John Adams
was franker than most historians when he reflected in his
old age: " I know not why we should blush to confess that
molasses was an essent1al ingredient in American inde-
pendence. U3""
The first move was made by the merchants of Boston,
in April, 176. 1, when they nrgani*gd fop "Soripfty for
encouraging Trade and Commerce within the Province
1 N. H. Go*. , Dec. 7, 1764.
1" The Farmer " in Pa. Journ. , Aug. 23, 1764.
1 Letter of Richard Oswald, a native American and a Londoner in
the American trade, to Dartmouth, Feb. 9, 1775; Stevens, Facsimiles,
vol. xxiv, no. 2032, pp. 3-4.
* In another portion of his letter Oswald alluded to "the great Rum
Distillers of Boston who began all this disturbance. " Ibid.
* He added sagely: "Many great events have proceeded from much
smaller causes. " Works, vol. x, p. 345.
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? 60 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
of Mass^hntu-tfa Bay " 1 There was to be a standing
committee of fifteen to watch trade affairs and to call
a general meeting of members whenever occasion de-
manded. A memorial was drawn up for presentation to
the General Court; and accounts of their activities were
sent to the merchants in other provinces. The committee
also corresponded with influential members of Parliament. 1
Further action was called for by an article in the
Boston Evening Post, November 21 and 28, 1763. The
writer proposed that, at the instance of the Boston mer-
chants, a provincial committee of merchants representing
the maritime towns should urge the General Court to peti-
tion Parliament for a revision of the acts of trade, par-
ticularly for the removal or substantial reduction of the
duties on foreign molasses and sugar. Perhaps in response
to this suggestion, a sub-committee of the Boston merchants
requested a meeting with committees of the merchants of
Marblehead, Salem and Plymouth; and the result was that
the merchants of these ports also presented memorials to the
General Court.
The merchants of New York were the next to take action.
Of these merchants, Lieutenant Governor Colden said:
"Many of them have rose suddenly from the lowest Rank
of the People to considerable Fortunes, & chiefly by illicit
Trade in the last War. They abhor every limitation of
Trade and Duty on it, & therefore gladly go into every
Measure whereby they hope to have Trade free. " * They
1 M. H. S. Ms. , 91 L, pp. 23-25. The rules of organization were
signed by one hundred forty-seven merchants. For a more detailed
account of this organization, vide Andrews, C. M. , "The Boston
Merchants and the Non-Importation Movement," Col. Soc. Mass. Pubs. ,
vol. xix, pp. 161-167.
1 Bos. Gas. , Jan. 16, Oct. 29, 1764.
'Letter Books, vol. ii, p. 68. Vide also Parliamentary History of
England (Cobbett, W. , ed. ), vol. xvi, p. 125.
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? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM 6l
met at Burn's Long Room on January 27, 1764 and took
under consideration the declining state of trade. _^. com-
mittee was appointed to memorialize the-Jejdslature on the
situat1on and to ask their interposition with Parliament.
The committee later established regular meeting nights. 1
A communication in the New York Gasette and Post-Boy
of February 2 commended the rational action of the mer-
chants and declared riotous opposition would be " seditious
and injurious to Government" when redress might be ob-
tained by dutiful petition. At the suggestion of theJMew
York Committee of Merchants, the merchants of Phila-
delphia became active, and appointed a committee to urge
the Pennsylvania Assembly to solicit Parliament to dis-
continue the molasses duties of 1733. 2
In every case the legislatures took the desired step, al-
though little was done until after the new duties of 1764
had become a law. 8 Only Rhode Island had been fore-
handed enough to petition for the repeal of the old Molasses
Act prior to the new legislation of Parliament. In June,
the Massachusetts House of Representatives ordered its
agent in London to press for a repeal of the new dut1es and
also to protest against the Sfflmp Art 'iru;"t' J"og TM" the
government's program for 1765. A committee was ap-
pointed to urge the other legislatures on the continent to
join in the movement. In July the Rhode Island Assembly
appointed a committee for the same purpose; and a com-
mittee of the New York Assembly began a similar pro-
paganda in October. *~
1 Weyler's N. Y. Co*. , Jan. 30, 1764; N. Y. Gas. & Post-Boy, Feb. a;
N. Y. Merc. , Mch. 5, 1764. The memorial was read in the provincial
assembly on Apr. 20, 1764.
* Bos. Post-Boy, Mch. 26, 1764.
* Frothingham, R. , The Rise of the Republic of the United States
(Boston, 1881), pp. 173-174.
* The New York committee was instructed to correspond "on the
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? 62 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
(The problem of the commercial provinces was to enlist
the support of the plantation provinces in their campaign
for remedial legislation. In this way, a united front could
be shown to Parliament and the chances for success greatly
increased. The tobacco provinces were readier of response
than any of the others, because of the unsatisfactory condi-
tion of crops and crop prices and because of the scarcity
of money J " The Courts are filled with Law-Suits, and
many People are obliged to sell their Estates," wrote a Vir-
ginian. 1 George Washington, one of the large Virginia
planters, was forced to explain to a creditor that he had
fallen " so much in arrears " because he had not had " even
tolerable crops" for three straight years, and when he had
one, it did not sell well. 2 But these conditions could not
be attributed to the acts of 1764, and did not seem to pre-
vail in the more southerly provinces.
The position of the commercial provinces was greatly
strengthened strategically by the fact that the Stamp Act
was on the boards for active consideration by Parliament
in 1765. A stamp tax was clearly a departure from the
ancient custom of the home government. It was more
purely a fiscal measure than was the so-called Sugar Act of
1 764, its incidence was more obvious and it fell on people in
all the provinces. Thus, -nncprl stam r"
an opportunitv to the mercantile 1"frffjfftff f^tir IIP -a
Subject Matter of the Act, commonly called the Sugar Act; on the
Act restraining Paper Bills of Credit in the Colonies from being a
legal Tender; and of the several other Acts of Parliament lately passed,
with relation to the Trade of the Northern Colonies: And also on the
Subject of the impending Dangers which threaten the Colonies, of being
taxed by Laws to be passed in Great-Britain. " Note the sequence.
Pa. Gas. , Nov. 28, 1764.
1 Virginia and Maryland news in Prov. Gas. , Jan. 19, 1765; Bos.
Post-Boy, June 10, July 29.
1 Writings (Ford, W. C, ed. ), vol. ii, pp. 200-202.
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? FIRST CONTEST FOR REFORM 63
general disrnntpnf as w^ll ag tn I'nrr^go Wal His
Consciously or not, the northern legislatures made the most
of the occasion. In their official utterances, they dovetailed
in with their economic indictment of the Sugar Act a protest
against the proposed Stamp Act as an inexpedient and un-
constitutional measure. 1 Their efforts to secure continental
co-operation were successful : . petitions and remonstrances
were sent from Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina,
and, with considerablp reluctance, from Georgia. 2
Meantime, the hard times had been causing people in the
commercial provinces to retrench expenses; and in some
cases this object was accomplished by concerted effort. A
clear-seeing writer in the Providence Gazette, October 6,
1 764, proposed a continental agreement to suspend tradg
with the British West Indies, in order to strike a body blow
at the West India interest in Parliament; but it was ten
years too soon for such a proposal to win favorable re-
sponse. Fifty merchants of Boston set an example in
August, 1 764. by signing an agreement to discard laces and
ruffles, to buy no English cloths but at a fixed price, and
to forego the elaboratp and eyp^^vo mourning nf'thp
t1mes for the very simplest display. * The mourning reso-
1 As Oswald observed to Dartmouth in 1775, the disgruntled mer-
chants had had "the art to interweave in their System of Grievances
. . . some others of a political nature and apparently of a more liberal
cast than do[e]s really lye at the bottom of their designs. " Stevens,
Facsimiles, vol. xxiv, no. 2032, p. 5.
1 Of the commercial group, Connecticut and Pennsylvania now joined
in with the others. The southern legislatures generally included a com-
plaint against certain restrictions placed in 1764 upon the exportation
of lumber, a matter that was satisfactorily adjusted by Parliament in
1765. South Carolina also complained of the Currency Act. Docu-
mentary History of the American Revolution (Gibbes, R. W. , ed. ), vol.
ii, pp. l-d. The Virginia Committee of Correspondence expressed
alarm at the duties on Madeira wine but seemed pleased at the Cur-
rency Act. Va. Mag. , vol. xii, pp. 6-1 1.
* Newport Merc. , Aug. 20, 1764; also AT. Y. Gas. & Post-Boy, Aug. 30.
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? 64 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
lutions were so well kept by the people generally that it was
reported that there had been only one or two violations after
four months' trial, although almost one hundred funerals
had occurred; and it was estimated that the saving would be
more than ? 10,000 sterling a year. 1 Burials " according to
the new mode" were recorded by the newspapers in New
Hampshire, Rhode Island, New Jersey and New York.
In September the tradesmen of Boston followed in the
path of the merchants, by agreeing to wear only leather of
Massachusetts manufacture for their work clothes. 2 In
November the students of Yale took unanimous action to
abstain from the use of foreign liquors. * The people of
New York apparently took no formal action; but five fire
companies of Philadelphia attempted to counteract the high
price of mutton by agreeing to refrain from the purchase of
lamb. * One company added a pledge against the drinking
of imported beer.
The logical counterpart of the efforts for the disuse of
imported superfluities was the
_manufactures. This movement had greatest vitality in New
York, where a number of prominent men in December, 1764,
organized the " Society for H1o frnmnn'op r,f A rtv Agri-
culture and Oecpnomy, and proceeded to award premiums
fora great variety of local productions, to print informing
pamphlets, and to promote the formation of similar societies
throughout the province8 Ja_other provinces, the news-
1 Bos. Eve. Post, Jan. 21, 1765; Bos. Post-Boy, Oct. 1, 8, 1764, July 1,
1/65.
'Ibid. , Oct . 1, 1764.
*N. Y. Gas. & Post-Boy, Nov. 22, 1764.
4 Pa. Gaz. , Feb.
