The Eve of the Revolution; A Chronicle of the Breach with EnglandBecker, Carl L. (Carl Lotus)
History
The Eve of the Revolution; A Chronicle of the Breach with England
Becker, Carl L. (Carl Lotus)
United States -- History -- Revolution, 1775-1783; United States -- Politics and government -- 1775-1783
These interests were doubtless well enough represented by the New York
deputies to the Congress, whom Mr. Adams now saw for the first time. Mr.
Jay, it was said, was a good student of the law and a hard worker. Mr.
Low, "they say, will profess attachment to the cause of liberty, but his
sincerity is doubted." Mr. Alsop was thought to be of good heart, but
unequal, as Mr. Scott affirmed, "to the trust in point of abilities."
Mr. Duane--this was Mr. Adams's own impression--"has a sly, surveying
eye, ... very sensible, I think, and very artful." And finally there
was Mr. Livingston, "a downright, straightforward man" who reminded Mr.
Adams that Massachusetts had once hung some Quakers, affirmed positively
that civil war would follow the renunciation of allegiance to Britain,
and threw out vague hints of the Goths and Vandals.
Confiding these matters to his Diary and keeping his own opinion,
Mr. Adams passed on to Philadelphia. There the Massachusetts men were
cordially welcomed, twice over, but straightway cautioned against two
gentlemen, one of whom was "Dr. Smith, the Provost of the College, who
is looking up to Government for an American Episcopate and a pair
of lawn sleeves"--a very soft, polite man, "insinuating, adulating,
sensible, learned, insidious, indefatigable," with art enough, "and
refinement upon art, to make impressions even upon Mr. Dickinson and Mr.
Reed." In Pennsylvania, as in every colony, Mr. Adams found, there was
a tribe of people "exactly like the tribe, in the Massachusetts, of
Hutchinsonian Addressers." Some of this tribe had managed to elbow their
way into the committees of deputies to the Congress, at least from the
middle colonies, and probably from South Carolina as well.
The "most spirited and consistent of any" of the deputies were the
gentlemen from Virginia, among whom were Mr. Henry and Mr. R. H. Lee,
said to be the Demosthenes and the Cicero of America. The latter, Mr.
Adams liked much, a "masterly man" who was very strong for the most
vigorous measures. But it seemed that even Mr. Lee was strong for
vigorous measures only because he was "absolutely certain that the same
ship which carries hence the resolutions will bring back the redress."
If he supposed otherwise, he "should be for exceptions."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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