Dickinson, John

DICKINSON, JOHN. (1732–1808). American political theorist. Born on 8 November 1732 in Talbot County, Maryland, John Dickinson studied law for three years before going to London for another three years of study at the Temple (1753–1757). Returning to Philadelphia, he was admitted to the bar and quickly became a prominent lawyer. In October 1760 he was elected to the assembly of the lower counties of Delaware, where his family owned property, becoming speaker of that body. In 1762, after losing re-election in Delaware, he was elected representative from Philadelphia to the Pennsylvania legislature. Here his conservative views threw him into the role of leading the unpopular Proprietary Party in opposition to Benjamin Franklin, who wanted a royal government. Dickinson won this battle and Franklin lost his bid for re-election. A vigorous opponent of the Stamp Act, Dickinson attended the congress of 1765 and is credited with doing most of the work on the "Declaration of Rights and Grievances." In an essay published in 1765 entitled "The Late Regulations Respecting the British Colonies … Considered," Dickinson advocated enlisting the aid of British merchants to secure the repeal of the Sugar and Stamp Acts. His Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania (1768), which called for peaceful resistance to the arbitrary government of the British Parliament, had a major impact on political thought in England as well as America.

In 1771 Dickinson drew up the first "Petition to the King," which won unanimous acceptance from the assembly, but he fell in popular estimation by condemning the often violent approach of the New England radicals. In 1774 he disapproved of any more assistance to Boston beyond sending an expression of sympathy. He epitomized the conservative Patriot viewpoint in his "Essay on the Constitutional Power of Great Britain over the Colonies in America," which urged caution in America's resistance to British authority. The Pennsylvania assembly selected Dickinson as a delegate to the first Continental Congress, drafting their "Petition to the King" and "Address to the People of Quebec," in which they sought Canadian support.

Made chairman of a Committee of Safety and Defense on 23 June 1775, Dickinson held this position a year. He also became a colonel of the first battalion raised in Philadelphia. In the Second Continental Congress he continued to advocate peaceful methods. He wrote the "Olive Branch Petition," adopted 5 July 1775 over the furious objections of New England delegates, and crafted the final version of the "Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of taking up Arms." He voted against the Declaration of Independence, insisting that a peaceful settlement was still possible and believing that the colonies lacked the central government and the support of allies needed for a successful war. Nonetheless, he headed the committee that drafted the Articles of Confederation, and led his regiment to Elizabethtown to combat the British. Dissatisfied by the direction events were taking, he quit both the assembly and Congress and moved to Delaware. He served as a private in the Delaware militia during the Philadelphia campaign, and in October 1777 he was a made a brigadier general of militia.

Dickinson returned to Congress in February 1779 as a delegate from Delaware, but he resigned in the fall. In 1781 he became president of the Supreme Executive Council of Delaware, and when he returned to live in Philadelphia he held the same office in Pennsylvania from 1782 to 1785. In 1787 he was a delegate from Delaware to the convention that framed the federal Constitution, and the next year he published nine letters, signed "Fabius," urging its adoption. In 1791, Dickinson was a delegate to and president of the Delaware constitutional convention. He then served in the assembly until he resigned because of ill health in 1793. During his last 15 years he held no public office, but in 1797 he published fourteen letters advocating friendship with France. He died on 14 February 1808.

SEE ALSO Articles of Confederation; Stamp Act.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Flower, Milton E. John Dickinson: Conservative Revolutionary. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1983.

Jacobson, David L. John Dickinson and the Revolution in Pennsylvania, 1764–1776. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1965.

                            revised by Michael Bellesiles