"A town meeting was called, and a committee of correspondence appointed, to write circular letters to all the towns in the province, and to induce them to unite in measures. The committee made a report, containing several resolutions contradictory to the supremacy of the British legislature. After setting forth, that all men have a right to remain in a state of nature as long as they please, they proceed to a report upon the natural rights of the colonists as men, christians, and subjects; and then form a list of infringements and violations of their rights. They enumerate and dwell upon the British parliament's having assumed the power of legislation for the colonies in all cases whatsoever--the appointment of a number of new officers to superintend the revenues--the granting of salaries out of the American revenue, to the governor, the judges of the superior court, the king's attorney and solicitor general. The report was accepted; copies printed; and six hundred circulated through the towns and districts of the province, with a pathetic letter addressed to the inhabitants, who were called upon not to doze any longer, or sit supinely in indifference, while the iron hand of oppression was daily tearing the choicest fruits from the fair tree of liberty. The circular letter requested of each town a free communication of sentiments on the subjects of the report, and was directed to the select men, who were desired to lay the same before a town meeting, which has been generally practised, and the proceedings of the town upon the business have been transmitted to the committee at Boston. This committee have their particular correspondents in the several towns, who, upon receiving any special information, are ready to spread it with dispatch among the inhabitants. It consists of twenty-one persons of heterogeneous qualities and professions, &c." _Gordon's Hist. Am. War_, vol. I. p. 312. * * * * * NOTE--No. VII.--_See Page 425._ THE FOLLOWING IS A LIST OF THE MEMBERS COMPOSING THE FIRST CONGRESS: _New Hampshire._ John Sullivan, Nathaniel Fulsom. _Massachusetts Bay._ James Bowdoin, Thomas Cushing, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine. _Rhode Island and Providence Plantations._ Stephen Hopkins, Samuel Ward. _Connecticut._ Eliphalet Dyer, Roger Sherman, Silas Deane. _From the city and county of New York, and other counties in province of New York._ James Duane, Henry Wisner, John Jay, Philip Livingston, Isaac Low, John Alsop. _From the county of Suffolk, in the province of New York._ William Floyd. _New Jersey._ James Kinsey, William Livingston, John Dehart, Stephen Crane, Richard Smith. _Pennsylvania._ Joseph Galloway, Charles Humphreys, Samuel Rhoads, George Ross, John Morton, Thomas Mifflin, Edward Biddle, John Dickinson. _Newcastle, Kent, and Sussex, on Delaware._ Cesar Rodney, Thomas M'Kean, George Read. _Maryland._