Mr. Read was a republican to the core, and from the commencement to the close of the revolution, was a bold and unyielding advocate of equal rights and liberal principles. When the question of rights and wrongs became a subject of investigation between the two countries, he resigned the commission of attorney-general held under the crown, that he might enter the arena of discussion free and unshackled. In 1765 he was elected a member of the Assembly of the state of Delaware, and was instrumental in laying deep the foundations of the superstructure of liberty. He was prudent, calm, and discreet in all his actions; but firm, bold and resolute. He was a member of the Committee of the Delaware Assembly that so ably addressed the king upon the subject of grievances and redress. He was in favour of exhausting the magazine of petition and remonstrance, and if to no purpose, then to replenish with powder and ball. He did not, nor did any of the signers of the declaration, at the commencement of British oppression, contemplate a dissolution of the ties that bound the colonies to the mother country. But he understood well the rights secured to them by magna charta and the constitution of Great Britain; and he knew that those rights were trampled upon by the hirelings of the crown. To vindicate them he was firmly resolved. He opposed the principle of taxation without representation, and of raising a revenue in America to pamper royalty in England. He knew and weighed well the superior physical powers of his opposers; but he believed the majesty of eternal justice and the kind aid of Heaven, would sustain the patriots in their glorious cause. Nor did he reckon in vain. His written appeal to his constituents of the 17th of August, 1769, calling upon them to resist the encroachments of tyranny, was couched in bold and forcible language, portraying, in colours deep and strong, their rights and their wrongs, making the path of duty plain before them. He sanctioned the various non-importation resolutions, passed by his own and other colonies; the first prominent mode adopted to thwart the designs and impositions of the British ministry after finding that petitions and remonstrances were treated with contumely. He was chairman of the committee of the Delaware patriots, appointed for the purpose of carrying these resolutions into effect. He was also chairman of the committee of twelve, appointed by the people of Newcastle, on the 29th of June, 1774, to obtain subscriptions for the Boston sufferers, who were writhing under the lash of the infamous port bill, passed by parliament, for the purpose of properly chastising the refractory inhabitants of that patriotic city. In February following, he remitted to the Boston committee, nine hundred dollars, money received from his constituents, which was eloquently acknowledged by Samuel Adams, who was one of his faithful correspondents.