Madison and Jefferson Read Online Free PDF

restrictions were needed to force the wayward Americans into submission, but the new acts only goaded the various colonies to cooperate more closely. 7
    The opposing sides in this face-off regarded each other as obstinate. In 1774 they grew increasingly adamant. For their part, proud Virginians refused to stand idly by as the Bostonians faced hardships. In May of that year the Virginia House of Burgesses called for a day of fasting and prayer as a show of support. Their royal governor, Lord Dunmore, countered by calling a halt to the session. Jefferson, a burgess, had a hand in the fasting resolution; he issued a plea for the colonies to be of “one Heart and one Mind” in answering “every injury to
American
rights.” It was in the same year that Jefferson, soft-spoken in person, proved himself a staunch critic on paper with
A Summary View of the Rights of British America
, printed in Williamsburg and subsequently reprinted in Philadelphia and London.
    The House of Burgesses, through its Committee of Correspondence, remained in contact with the Massachusetts political organizers. Meeting in rump session at the Raleigh Tavern in Williamsburg, Jefferson and his peers took the decisive step of calling for a “general congress” of the beleaguered colonies. They called as well for a gathering of the best political minds in Virginia. Thus the same men who had previously sat in the House of Burgesses now represented Virginia at an extralegal convention—a shadow government bypassing royal authority. The Virginia Convention met for the first time in August 1774. A few weeks later, when the First Continental Congress convened in Philadelphia, Virginians were given prominence. Peyton Randolph, Speaker of the House of Burgesses, was promptly elected the first president of Congress. 8
    Patriot sentiment disseminated through newspapers. The delegates to Congress were described in supernatural terms as “assembled gods” and “Oracles of our Country.” A Marylander claimed that Congress was not only the American equivalent of Parliament but excelled it “in honor, honesty, and public spirit.” James Madison, Jr., agreed, writing from his Orange County, Virginia, home to his Philadelphia friend William Bradford: “Proceedings of Congress are universally approved of in this Province & I am persuaded will be faithfully adhered to.” Virginia’s leaders accomplished much in a few short months. They created a viable opposition government in their colony and authorized their delegation in Philadelphia to voice “the united wisdom of North America” in the intercolonial congress. 9
    Yet the First Continental Congress was not particularly radical. It may have pronounced an embargo on British goods, but it also adopted a conciliatory posture toward King George III. Then over the winter of 1774–75, British forces stationed in Boston marched on towns where weapons and gunpowder were stored. In April 1775 the redcoats, or “lobsterbacks” as thelocals derisively called them, raided Lexington and Concord in a renewed attempt to capture stores of ammunition. The ensuing fight brought out thousands of villagers, who took deadly aim from inside their homes and behind trees, routing the redcoats. The provincials gained in confidence. If any doubt remained as to the colonies’ future, the Battle of Bunker Hill, in a sweltering June heat, let men and women up and down the coast know that a hot war had begun, one not likely to be confined to the Northeast.
    A second Virginia Convention had been held in March 1775. Patrick Henry made an impassioned speech that was remembered but not recorded. Even before Lexington and Concord, he saw where the struggle was heading, and he appealed to Virginia’s leaders to remain committed to the cause of liberty at all costs. Whether he actually uttered the immortal “Give me liberty or give me death!” or his clever contemporaries edited their own memories in later years, William Wirt’s 1817