“Upon the whole, I will beg leave to tell the House what is really my opinion. It is that the Stamp Act _be repealed absolutely, totally, and immediately_.”[2] * * * * * And whether the Stamp Act was repealed “absolutely, totally, and immediately,” John Fiske tells in his thrilling history, “The American Revolution.” THE SONS OF LIBERTY William Pitt was not the only English statesman who championed America. There was Lord Rockingham, at one time Prime Minister of England, also the Earl of Camden, and the celebrated Charles James Fox. And there was Edmund Burke, “one of the earliest friends of America,” with his scratch wig, round spectacles, and pockets stuffed with papers. He pleaded our cause so brilliantly that his hearers were dazzled by his oratory “with its passionate ardour, its poetic fancy, its amazing prodigality of resources, the dazzling succession in which irony, pathos, invective, tenderness, the most brilliant word-pictures, the coolest arguments, followed each other.” And among America’s British friends, was Colonel Barré, a member of the House of Commons. In an indignant speech against the Stamp Act, he referred to the American Patriots as “Sons of Liberty.” When his speech reached America, the name “Sons of Liberty” was adopted by secret societies pledged to resist the Stamp Act. In Boston, the Sons of Liberty held meetings under the Liberty Tree, a huge elm; they met also in Faneuil Hall, since called “the Cradle of American Liberty.” In New York City, the Sons of Liberty erected a tall Liberty Pole, and defended it against the Red Coats. All over the Country, the Sons of Liberty were active, sometimes too violently so, in the cause of American Independence. A LAST SCENE In 1778, a dramatic event took place in the House of Lords. William Pitt, old now and wasted by disease, but the fire of whose genius still burned bright and clear, was about to speak. France had acknowledged the Independence of the United States. Germany was planning to do so; while Spain stood ready to enter into an alliance with the Americans. England was at war with France. The situation of England seemed desperate. And on that dramatic day in the House of Lords, the Duke of Richmond was about to move that the royal fleets and armies should be instantly withdrawn from America, and peace be made on whatever terms Congress might see fit to accept. But William Pitt would not willingly consent to a step that seemed certain to wreck the Empire his genius had won for England. He had got up from his sick bed, and had come into the House of Lords to argue against the motion.