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the defects of the jurisprudence of the colony, and Daniel Horsmanden, who was then a judge of the supreme court, was authorized to collect and revise the laws in force, with notes and ref erences; but that duty was not performed. It is asserted that the incoveniences resulting from his continuance in office, in advanced age and under growing infirmities, was the cause of the adoption of a principle still continued in our constitution, which disqualifies a judge on his attaining the age of sixty years*—a fact exceedingly interesting, as an illustration of the permanent influence which occasional circumstances may exert upon the legislation of a country.

In 1743, a law was passed for the relief of imprisoned debtors, and legacies were made recoverable in courts of common law. The practice of instituting prosecutions by information, which had been constantly regarded with jealousy since the trial of Zenger, gave rise to a bill for regulating such proceedings, but it was lost in the council through the influence of the lieutenantgovernor. The ministry, distrusting the loyalty of a people so bold in the assertion of their rights, availed themselves of the alarm excited by the renewal of hostilities by France, with a view to place the pretender upon the throne, and required that a law should be passed, obliging the inhabitants of the province to take the oaths prescribed by parliament, for the security of the government and of the protestant religion. The assembly complied, after a spirited debate, in which the measure was resisted, because it seemed to impeach the loyalty of the province. The collisions between the ministry and the governor on one side, and the assembly on the other, continued without abatement. The governor, in 1749, renewed his demand for provision for the support of government for five years, and when the house refused, threatened the members with punishment, declaring that the crown could abridge their rights and privileges at pleasure. The assembly resolved that the governor's conduct was arbitrary and illegal, and a violation of their privileges.

In the instructions to Governor Osborne, in 1753, the ministry persisted in all the obnoxious demands which had been so long and uncompromisingly opposed by the assembly. The year 1754 was rendered memorable by the assemblage of the congress of deputies of the several American colonies, at Albany, to devise

*Abolished in 1846.-Ed.

a plan of union for common defence against the French and Indians. A project for a confederacy of the American colonies was prepared by Franklin. It embraced Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina; and proposed that each colony should retain its constitution, but that a general government should be established, with a president-general and council, to be appointed by the crown, and a grand council to be composed of representatives elected by the assemblies of the several states. The apportionment of members in that council is worthy of notice, because it shows the relative population and strength of the colonies at that period, varying essentially from the relative importance of the several states at the present time. Massachusetts was allowed seven representatives, New Hampshire two, Connecticut five, Rhode Island two, New York four, New Jersey three, Pennsylvania six, Maryland four, Virginia seven, North Carolina four, South Carolina four. The powerful machine thus projected for the support of the British throne, was twenty-one years afterward successfully put in motion to resist the encroachments of the British parliament; and it is not impossible that the adaptation of the plan to such a purpose, induced its rejection by the ministry, while the fear that it would strengthen the royal power caused it to be disapproved with equal promptness by the colonial assemblies.*

The passage of the stamp-act in 1765, which levied imposts in violation of a principle which all the American colonies had asserted, and thus far perseveringly maintained, and which provided for the execution of that impolitic measure by means and agents equally obnoxious, produced universal exasperation.

The act was printed and circulated in the streets of New York, with the title of "The Folly of England and the Ruin of America." A congress of deputies met in New York in October, 1765. New York was represented by Robert R. Livingston, John Cruger, Philip Livingston, William Bayard, and Leonard Lispenard. Cadwallader Colden, then lieutenant-governor, announced that the congress was unconstitutional, unprecedented, and unlawful, and he should give it no countenance. The congress solemnly protested that the people of the colonies were entitled to all the

* Dunlap.

rights of Englishmen; that no taxes could be imposed upon them without their consent; that their only legislative representatives were the provincial assemblies; and that the stamp-act, passed by the parliament of Great Britain, without the consent of those assemblies, was subversive of the rights and liberties of the people. The manifestations of popular indignation and resistance obliged the lieutenant-governor, Colden, to surrender the stamps which had been sent over for the use of the province-a concession which he made under protest, and to avert the calamities of a civil war. The law was successfully resisted, and in the subsequent year was repealed; but the moment of the final controversy was now hastening, and every effort of the ministry to maintain the power of the crown, served only to inflame a spirit of resistance, which had become general throughout the colonies.

The press was brought into political action, and prepared the public mind for a conflict of arms. The royal cause was sustained by Dr. Miles Cooper, the president of the college, and other clergymen of the Episcopal church. William Livingston, afterward governor of New Jersey, Gouverneur Morris, and others, defended the rights of the colonies. John Jay, having received an accomplished education, and having already acquired high rank at the bar, engaged on the same side; and, at the same time, John Morin Scott and Alexander Hamilton, who then was only seventeen years of age, entered the controversy. On the 25th of July, 1774, Philip Livingston, John Alsop, Isaac Low, James Duane, and John Jay, were appointed delegates to the first congress at Philadelphia. That body, in adopting a declaration of the rights of the people of the colonies, laid the foundations of independence and union. The committee who reported that paper, were Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia, and Messrs. Jay and Livingston of New York. An address was also made to the people of Great Britain. This state paper, which was prepared by Mr. Jay, was distinguished alike for its elevated tone and glowing language.

The general assembly of New York was convened in 1775. Being in the interest of the crown, that body refused a vote of thanks to the representatives of the colony in the general congress, and, by this and other manifestations of pusillanimity, so effectually forfeited all claims to the public confidence, that the New York committee of safety recommended that a provincial

congress should be elected by the people. Mr. Jay, being a member of this committee, and now a third time elected a delegate to the general congress, surrendered himself to the public service. He distinguished himself, and aided the popular cause, by preparing an address to the people of Canada, invoking their neutrality; and afterward by a similar address, which was made by Congress to their fellow-subjects in Jamaica and Ireland. These papers were among the most effective which were issued by Congress; and which at once inspired the people of the colonies with confidence and zeal in their cause, and secured the respect of a large portion of the people of the mother-country.

The inhabitants of Queens county, on Long Island, had refused to appoint delegates to the provincial congress, and the subject arrested the attention of the General Congress. Mr. Jay, from a committee, submitted a report, with a bold and denunciatory preamble: "Whereas a majority of the inhabitants of Queens county, in the colony of New York, being incapable of resolving to live and die freemen, and being more disposed to quit their liberties than to part with a little proportion of their property, necessary to defend them, have deserted the American cause by refusing to send deputies as usual to the convention of that colony, and evinced, by a public declaration, an unmanly design of remaining inactive spectators of the present contest, vainly flattering themselves, perhaps, that should Providence declare for our enemies, they may purchase their favor and mercy at an easy rate; and, on the other hand, if the war should terminate in favor of America, that then they may enjoy, without expense of blood or treasure, all the blessings resulting from that liberty, which they in the day of trial had abandoned, and in the defence of which many of their more virtuous neighbors and countrymen had nobly died; and it being reasonable that those who refuse to defend their country should be excluded from its protection, and be prevented from doing it an injury," &c. The committee, therefore, recommended measures for putting the inhabitants of Queens county, who had voted against sending deputies to the provincial congress, out of the protection of the united colonies, and to disarm and subject the disaffected. The paper is a happy illustration of the spirit of the times, and of the talents of its author. At the close of the year 1775, when all of the southern portion of New York was in the hands of the enemy, the Amer

ican army had retired from Westchester, baffled in its attempt in Canada, and General Washington was retreating through New Jersey, and the British commander was offering protection and rewards to the timid and irresolute, the pen of Mr. Jay was again called into requisition by the Congress of the United States, and was effectually exercised in a glowing address to their constituents; a document of such extraordinary power, that, if it stood alone, it would be an ample vindication of the firmness and patriotism of Congress. To such labors Mr. Jay added the preparation of the first constitution of the state of New York, which was adopted by the convention in 1777. This work, although it was forty-four years afterward superseded by another, correcting some defects disclosed in its operation, nevertheless asserted the chief popular rights, defined the relative powers of the various departments, and established the great principles of fundamental law as they yet exist, and will continue for all time to come.

It is time, however, to notice other actors who had come upon the stage. Philip Schuyler had secured to himself a thorough knowledge of the French language, then a rare accomplishment in this country, together with varied learning and extensive knowledge of the exact sciences. His favorite studies were finance, military engineering, and political economy. He had been distinguished in the provincial military service, and he first drew to himself the attention of his fellow-citizens, by his efforts in the general assembly in 1775, in the debates which brought the struggle between the ministerial and whig parties to a crisis. George Clinton, afterward governor, and Nathaniel Woodhull, afterward president of the provincial congress, were associated with Schuyler in these debates, which involved not only the immediate causes of irritation, but also the fundamental principles of the British constitution, and of free representative government. To the spirit manifested on that occasion by the indomitable minority, may be attributed in a great measure the acquiescence of the people in the bold recommendation for discarding the general assembly and instituting a new provincial legislature. Thus was the boundary passed, a constitution subverted, and the colony, with her sister provinces, arrayed in open defiance of the British government.

On the 9th of July, 1776, the provincial congress ratified the Declaration of Independence, and immediately assumed the title

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