Independence

INDEPENDENCE. There is much conflicting evidence as to when colonists came to the conclusion that political independence from Britain might be desirable. As early as 1701 the Board of Trade thought that the American thirst for independence was notorious. Trying to calm British fears, Benjamin Franklin in a pamphlet published in London in 1763 asserted that the Americans would probably never claim independence. Few Americans before 1763 desired independence. Thereafter, the anger provoked by ill-considered British imperial policies contributed significantly to their growing inclination to contemplate such a step. An unidentified Frenchman traveling through the colonies at the height of the Stamp Act crisis in 1765 reported that "no nation was better calculated for independence, the people were disposed to it, and there was nothing they talked of more" (American Historical Review, p. 84). In 1768 the German soldier Johann De Kalb, traveling from the Carolinas to New England, observed that "all the people here are imbued with such a spirit of independence and even license, that if all the provinces can be united under a common representation, an independent state will certainly come forth in time" (ANB). But in 1768 Samuel Adams was undoubtedly in the minority in thinking of independence as a political objective. The idea certainly began to grow in the five years preceding the war, but Rhode Island regiments reporting for the siege of Boston spoke of themselves as being "in his Majesty's service," and Congress in its "Declaration of the Causes and Necessity for Taking Up Arms" (6 July 1775) said: "We have not raised armies with the ambitious design of separating from Great Britain and establishing independent states" (Jensen, p. 842).

There was no general drift by the colonies toward the idea of independence until near the close of 1775. People recognized that the steps already taken to manage and maintain the war effort, including establishing new state governments, amounted to something very much like practical independence. Southerners were particularly incensed by the efforts of Lord Dunmore, the royal governor of Virginia, to raise armed units of runaway slaves. Edward Rutledge of South Carolina wrote home from Philadelphia on 8 December 1775 with some hard questions:

What are the sentiments of the English nation? Are the people of that country determined to force us into independence?… Do they expect that after our towns have been destroyed, our liberties repeatedly invaded, our women and children driven from their habitations,… our slaves emancipated for the express purpose of massacring their masters, can they, I say, after all their injuries, expect that we shall return to our former connection with a forgiving and cordial disposition? (Smith, p. 463)

Still, in late 1775 the idea of separation was so radical that delegates to Congress delicately approached the problem of how they could lead the people toward an acceptance of independence. Thomas Paine, whose pamphlet Common Sense was published on 10 January 1776 and quickly and widely read thereafter, jolted the political system with his matter-of-fact advocacy of independence. The publication of Common Sense probably did more than any other single event to clarify thinking on the issue. The North Carolina convention had the distinction of being the first of the ad hoc, extralegal political bodies that now governed the colonies to give official sanction to the call for independence when, on 12 April 1776, it authorized its delegates to join others in Congress who might advocate such a movement. On 4 May the Rhode Island Assembly publicly announced its independence, the first colony to do so. The first colony to instruct its delegates to Congress to take the initiative on this matter was Virginia (15 May 1776), and on 7 June Richard Henry Lee moved a resolution "that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States" (Jensen, p. 867). John Adams seconded the motion, and played an important role in building the congressional consensus that produced the Declaration of Independence.

Such conservative delegates as John Dickinson of Pennsylvania, James Wilson of Pennsylvania, Robert R. Livingston of New York, and even Edward Rutledge remained cautious about independence, overwhelmed by the peril of fighting a war and pessimistic about the future. Dickinson said, "I fear the virtue of Americans. Resentment of the injuries offered to their country may irritate them to counsels and to actions that may be detrimental to the cause they would dye to advance" (Smith, pp. 352-353). Other delegates of proven courage and patriotism, among them Robert Morris of Pennsylvania, John Jay of New York, George Read of Delaware, James Duane of New York, and Benjamin Harrison of Virginia, also believed that independence was premature. According to Carter Braxton of Virginia (14 April 1776), independence "is in truth a delusive bait which men inconsiderably catch at without knowing the hook to which it is affixed. It is an object to be wished for by every American, when it can be obtained with safety and honor" (Smith, p. 522).

SEE ALSO De Kalb, Johann; Declaration of Independence; Paine, Thomas.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

American Historical Association. The American Historical Review. Vol. 27. New York, 1921–1922.

Bailyn, Bernard. The Origins of American Politics. New York: Knopf, 1968.

???????. The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution. Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1967.

Becker, Carl L. The Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political Ideas. Rev. ed. New York: Knopf, 1942.

Bumstead, John M. "'Things in the Womb of Time': Ideas of American Independence, 1633–1763." William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd series, 31 (1974): 533-564.

Jensen, Merrill, ed. English Historical Documents, Volume IX: American Colonial Documents to 1776. David C. Douglas, general editor. New York: Oxford University Press, 1955.

Knollenberg, Bernard. Origin of the American Revolution, 1759–1766. Edited by Bernard W. Sheehan. Indianapolis, Ind.: Liberty Fund, 2002.

Maier, Pauline. American Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence. New York: Knopf, 1997.

Smith, Paul H., et al., eds. Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789. Vol. 2: August 1774–August 1775. Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1976.

???????. Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789. Vol. 3: January 1-May 15, 1776. Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1978.

???????. Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774–1789. Vol. 4: May 16-August 15, 1776. Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1979.

                              revised by Harold E. Selesky