"Continental Congress" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of an old soldier, proud of his record, who had served the king in '58, and who takes the lad, Isaac Rice, as his 'personal recruit.' The lad acquits himself superbly. Col. Ethan Allen 'in the name of God and the continental congress,' infuses much martial spirit into the narrative, which will arouse the keenest interest as it proceeds. Crown Point, Ticonderoga, Benedict Arnold and numerous other famous historical names appear in this ...
— Ralph Gurney's Oil Speculation • James Otis
... South Carolina Protest against Slavery (being a letter written from Henry Laurens, second president of the Continental Congress, to his son, Colonel John Laurens; dated Charleston, S.C., August 14th, 1776)." Reprinted by G.P. Putnam, New ...
— A Social History of the American Negro • Benjamin Brawley
... The Continental Congress of 1774 sought to pledge the colonists to discountenance "all exhibitions of shews, plays, and other expensive diversions and entertainments," and such exhibitions languished naturally in war times; but with peace came new ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... case within the District. He would willingly give them exclusive power as far as respected the police and good government of the place, but he would give them no more." Mr. Grayson exclaimed against so large a grant of power—said that control over the police was all-sufficient, and "that the Continental Congress never had an idea of exclusive legislation in all cases." Patrick Henry said: "Shall we be told, when about to grant such illimitable authority, that it will never be exercised? Is it consistent with any principle of prudence or good policy, to grant unlimited, unbounded ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... legible as the day it was cut, full forty years ago. In the grave at the foot of this stone lies buried another Major Bugbee, the great-great-grandson of the first Major. The commission of this gentleman, signed by John Hancock, President of the Continental Congress, still hangs in a frame against the wainscot, over the mantel, in the parlor of the great gambrel-roofed house, whose front-yard fence and garden palings form, for almost half the way, the eastern side of the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... vessels of the American squadron. It would seem that only the most careless seamanship on the part of the Americans could have enabled a twenty-gun vessel to escape from four vessels, each one of which was singly almost a match for her. It is evident that the Continental Congress took the same view of the matter, for Hopkins was soon after dismissed ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... we find ourselves at the fireside of American patriotism. Here is Washington. He is a Virginian, and the American people know him at this time as Colonel Washington. It is the 13th day of June, 1775, and the second Continental Congress is in session at Philadelphia. John Adams of Massachusetts has the floor. He is to show himself at this time the master statesman. Justly has he been called the "Colossus of the Revolution." On his way to Independence Hall this morning he meets his cousin, Samuel Adams, and tells him what he ...
— Boy Scouts Handbook - The First Edition, 1911 • Boy Scouts of America
... some sounding principle of republicanism, than to protect property, cement the union, and perpetuate liberty." The spirit of opposition had from the first an experienced leader in Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts. He had seen many years of service in the Continental Congress which he first entered in 1776. He was a delegate to the Philadelphia convention, in whose sessions he showed a contentious temper, and in the end refused to subscribe to the new Constitution. In the convention debates ...
— Washington and His Colleagues • Henry Jones Ford
... military stores were collected, and all needful preparations were made for war. The other New England colonies fully shared in the excitement of Massachusetts. The note of alarm spread through the land, and a Continental Congress was called to meet at Philadelphia to consider the policy best to be pursued ...
— Ten Great Events in History • James Johonnot
... miller. Here, by means of a white man for an interpreter, the major had demanded the motive of the strangers in coming into the settlement. The answer was a frank demand for the surrender of the Hut, and all it contained, to the authorities of the continental congress. The major had endeavoured to persuade a white man, who professed to hold the legal authority for what was doing, of the perfectly neutral disposition of his father, when, according to Joel's account, to his own great astonishment, ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... he embarked for Philadelphia on his French mission, he gathered together all that he could raise in money, some L3000 to L4000, and paid it over as an unsecured loan for an indefinite period to the Continental Congress. ...
— Benjamin Franklin • John Torrey Morse, Jr.
... resolving, also, that they would not export any provisions, lumber, or other products, whatever, to Great Britain or any of her colonies. These resolutions were accompanied by another, in many of the counties of Virginia, in some of the State conventions, and, finally, in those of the Continental Congress, in which the slave trade, and the purchase of additional slaves, were specially referred to as measures to be at once discontinued. These resolutions, in substance, declare, as the sentiment of the people: That the African trade is injurious ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... rising freely. It is the perfect hour for fishing. Would Graygown dare to drive on alone to the gate of the fortress, and blow upon the long horn which doubtless hangs beside it, and demand admittance and a lodging, "in the name of the great Jehovah and the Continental Congress,"—while I angle down the ...
— Fisherman's Luck • Henry van Dyke
... army from Crown Point in 1776 and the evacuation of Ticonderoga in 1777 were magnified by his enemies into a disgraceful retreat, and he was tried by court martial but acquitted on every charge. He was a delegate from N.Y. to the Continental Congress in 1779, and later joined his son-in-law, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay and others in the movement for the ratification by New York of the Federal constitution. In 1790 he was elected to the U.S. senate. "For bravery and generosity" says John ...
— The Greatest Highway in the World • Anonymous
... Englishmen, no doubt, but harbored in secret for many years by the king's hireling ministers, to enslave America as a preliminary step in the destruction of English liberties. Firm in this belief, the colonists elected their deputies to the First Continental Congress, which was called to meet at Philadelphia on the 1st of September, 1774, in order to unite upon the most effective measures for defending their ...
— Beginnings of the American People • Carl Lotus Becker
... the Second Continental Congress Mr. Jefferson had a leading share in its deliberations, although that body embraced many of the most distinguished men of that period. The most important act of that assembly was the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, which, as I have already stated, he himself drafted. It is ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson
... glanced at the ensuing twenty years, which glided peacefully over the frontier fortress, till Ethan Allen's shout was heard, summoning it to surrender "in the name of the great Jehovah and of the Continental Congress." Strange allies! thought the British captain. Next came the hurried muster of the soldiers of liberty, when the cannon of Burgoyne, pointing down upon their stronghold from the brow of Mount Defiance, announced a new conqueror of Ticonderoga. No virgin fortress, this! Forth rushed ...
— Old Ticonderoga, A Picture of The Past - (From: "The Snow Image and Other Twice-Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... that the United States Marine Corps was authorized by the Continental Congress on November 10, 1775, and therefore has the distinction of being the oldest military branch in the United States service. The corps served valiantly throughout the Revolutionary War, and was disbanded at the close of the war, April ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry
... In 1776 the Continental Congress endeavored to raise a large sum by means of a lottery. On the first of November of that year the following Resolve was passed,—"That a sum of money be raised by way of lottery, to be drawn at Philadelphia." A committee was then empowered to manage this lottery, and agents were appointed in ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 1: Curiosities of the Old Lottery • Henry M. Brooks
... reader. Franklin would have approved it, and was himself a happy illustration of many of the qualities which go to the Emersonian ideal of good manners, a typical American, equal to his position, always as much so in the palaces and salons of Paris as in the Continental Congress, ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... water-side came stealing the Green-Mountain Boys, with their grand and grandiloquent leader, and, at the very gateway where we stand, as tradition says, (et potius Dii numine firment,) he thundered out, with brave, barbaric voice, the imperious summons, "In the name of the great Jehovah and the Continental Congress." No wonder the startled, half-dressed commander is confounded, and "the pretty face of his wife peering over his shoulder" is filled with terror. Well may such a motley crew frighten the fair Europeanne. "Frenchmen ...
— Gala-days • Gail Hamilton
... mourned that the "gold had become dim." Churchmen rejoiced that some of the foremost scholars in Connecticut had returned to the Church. I pass over the trials of the Church in the eighteenth century, to the meeting of the Continental Congress in 1774. It was proposed to open Congress with prayer. Objections were made on account of the religious differences of the delegates. Old Samuel Adams arose, with his white hair streaming on his shoulders,—the same earnest Puritan who, in 1768, had written to England: ...
— Five Sermons • H.B. Whipple
... of the Continental Congress it required a good deal more nerve to fulfill one's duty. The delegate had to journey to Congress on horseback. Sometimes he could find a little country inn at which he could sleep at night, but at others he had to camp in the open as best he could. Frequently a friendly ...
— My Native Land • James Cox
... Boston was closed, and the Massachusetts charter was revoked. Arbitrary power was placed in the hands of the governor. The colonies mourned in sympathy. The assembly of Virginia was dismissed by its governor, but merely reunited, and proceeded to call a continental congress. ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XII. - Modern History • Arthur Mee
... in that chair. This was addressed to John Hancock, president of the Continental Congress. Our venerable colleague refers to Samuel Adams. After the battles of Concord and Lexington, Governor Gage offered pardon to all the rebels who would lay down their arms, excepting Samuel Adams ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... strongly drawn in question, especially by the abolition societies, which embraced many of the most prominent patriots. A public opinion, not indeed unanimous, but largely in the majority, demanded that the "necessary evil" should cease. When the Continental Congress came to the practical work of providing a government for the "Western lands," which the financial pressure and the absolute need of union compelled New York and Virginia to cede to the general Government, Thomas Jefferson ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... was appointed commander-in-chief of the army by the Second Continental Congress, at Philadelphia in May of last year, and who went to Boston and took charge of the army on July third-kept the British penned up in Boston till about the middle of last March, when he fortified Dorchester Heights, overlooking Boston, the work being performed in one night, and next ...
— The Dare Boys of 1776 • Stephen Angus Cox
... Scotch-Irish people of the southwestern counties beyond the mountains had always felt their aloofness from the eastern counties. They were now still further disaffected because of the federal tax on spirituous liquors. They shared the feeling of the Continental Congress, which in 1774 had declared an excise "the horror of all free states." Even before the incidence of the tax was fully felt, protests were drafted at mass-meetings and federal collectors were roughly treated. ...
— Union and Democracy • Allen Johnson
... so on with the other powers. The government of the United States during the confederation period was "a name without a body, a shadow without a substance." An eminent statesman of the time remarked that "by this political compact the continental congress have exclusive power for the following purposes without being able to execute one of them: They may make and conclude treaties; but they can only recommend the observance of them. They may appoint ambassadors; but ...
— Studies in Civics • James T. McCleary
... and Hingham, who were able to bear arms.... Both your brothers were there; your younger brother with his company, who gained honor by their good order that day. He was one of the first to venture on board a schooner, to land upon the island." Mr. Adams was then in the Continental Congress, at Philadelphia.] ...
— The Military Journals of Two Private Soldiers, 1758-1775 - With Numerous Illustrative Notes • Abraham Tomlinson
... not merely college graduates, but they were eminent men. One held the position of president of Princeton and one of Union College, four were judges, two were members of the Continental Congress, one was a member of the governor's council in Massachusetts, one was a member of the Massachusetts war commission in the Revolutionary war, one was a state senator, one was president of the Connecticut house of representatives, three were officers in the ...
— Jukes-Edwards - A Study in Education and Heredity • A. E. Winship
... the chiefs of Indian tribes, with whom treaties were concluded, medals bearing on the obverse the effigy of the reigning British sovereign, and on the reverse friendly legends and emblems of peace. Mr. Kean, member of the Continental Congress from South Carolina, on April 20, 1786, moved: "That the Board of Treasury ascertain the number and value of the medals received by the commissioners appointed to treat with the Indians, from said Indians, and have an equal number, with the arms of the United States, made of silver, and returned ...
— The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 • J. F. Loubat
... said he. "And yet it may not be a matter of giving out," he added more soberly. This mixture of heartiness and gravity seemed to sit well on him. "Surely you have been enterprising, Tom. Where in the name of the Continental Congress did you get ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... westward march into the state of New York and beyond, until now, after yet another century, we find some of their descendants dwelling in a homelike Salem and a Portland of charming beauty on the Pacific coast. Three times between the meeting of the Long Parliament and the meeting of the Continental Congress did the New England colonies receive a slight infusion of non-English blood. In 1652, after his victories at Dunbar and Worcester, Cromwell sent 270 of his Scottish prisoners to Boston, where the descendants of some of them still dwell. After the revocation of the Edict of Nantes ...
— The Beginnings of New England - Or the Puritan Theocracy in its Relations to Civil and Religious Liberty • John Fiske
... The old Continental Congress first assembled in September, 1774; and on the 26th of July, 1775, it resolved "that a Postmaster-General should be appointed for the United Colonies who should hold his office at Philadelphia and ...
— The Postal Service of the United States in Connection with the Local History of Buffalo • Nathan Kelsey Hall
... was to say, "He's doing all that man can do." But this is getting ahead of the story, for young Allison is now on his way to the home of Richard Henry Lee, who later was to propose independence in the Continental Congress, when to do so might mean loss of not only his property but his life as well, for King George would have liked to make an example of at least a few prominent "traitors," could he have got them ...
— Rodney, the Ranger - With Daniel Morgan on Trail and Battlefield • John V. Lane
... safe to go home on private business. Then Adams acted. Quietly laying his plans, on the morning of the seventeenth of June, 1774, he locked the door of the chamber and proposed that the Assembly elect delegates to the Continental Congress. A Tory pleaded sickness and hurried to Gage with the news; but the door was again locked, and the business proceeded. Though the governor sent his secretary with a message dissolving the Assembly, the secretary knocked in vain. The doors were not opened ...
— The Siege of Boston • Allen French
... liked it—was there to be no quiet anywhere? It is poor understanding that does not appreciate John Adams' parry of his wife Abigail's list of grievances, which she declared the Continental Congress must relieve if it would avoid a woman's rebellion. Under the stress of the Revolution children, apprentices, schools, colleges, Indians, and negroes had all become insolent and turbulent, he told her. What was to become ...
— The Business of Being a Woman • Ida M. Tarbell
... at Newbern, in August, 1774, of which John Harvey was President. In April, 1779, they elected delegates to the famous Continental Congress which met at Philadelphia, and Newbern was for some time the most important place in ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... and Public Papers of John Jay, First Chief Justice of the United States and President of the Continental Congress, Member of the Commission to Negotiate the Treaty of Independence, Envoy to Great Britain, Governor of New York, etc., 1782-1793. (New York and London, 1891.) Edited by Henry P. Johnson, Professor of History in the College of ...
— The Education Of The Negro Prior To 1861 • Carter Godwin Woodson
... political or sovereign people, existing and acting in particular communities, organizations, called states. This one people organized as states, meet in convention, frame and ordain the constitution of government, or institute a general government in place of the Continental Congress; and the same people, in their respective State organizations, meet in convention in each State, and frame and ordain a particular government for the State individually, which, in union with the ...
— The American Republic: Its Constitution, Tendencies, and Destiny • A. O. Brownson
... several members of the Continental Congress who have been elected and served as members thereof since the declaration ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis
... the signing of this document by the members of the Continental Congress was a dramatic scene, seldom, if ever, surpassed in the annals of history. As John Hancock placed his great familiar signature upon it, he jestingly remarked, that John Bull could read that without spectacles; and then, becoming more serious, he began to impress upon his comrades the ...
— The True Citizen, How To Become One • W. F. Markwick, D. D. and W. A. Smith, A. B.
... very little about taxation without representation but whetted their anger with grudges more robust. They had been beggared and bullied and shot at from the Bay of Biscay to Barbados, and no sooner was the Continental Congress ready to issue privateering commissions and letters of marque than for them it was up anchor and away to bag a Britisher. Scarcely had a shipmaster signaled his arrival with a deep freight of logwood, molasses, ...
— The Old Merchant Marine - A Chronicle of American Ships and Sailors, Volume 36 in - the Chronicles Of America Series • Ralph D. Paine
... great influence. The result was that the doctrine of natural rights came to be generally accepted by the people of the Colonies as the real foundation of their claims and the real justification for their resistance to the objectionable acts of the King and Parliament. In 1774 the first Continental Congress in its Declaration of Rights declared that the people of the Colonies had those rights by "the immutable laws of nature" as well as by their charters and the principles of the English Constitution. Two years later in the Declaration of Independence the representatives of the ...
— Concerning Justice • Lucilius A. Emery
... handling cartridges," said Josiah grimly, for he was a tutor at Yale, and had done yeoman service in the defense of New Haven. "'Tis a sorry sight to see our beautiful city now laid waste; but that our faith is strong in the Continental Congress and General Washington, I know not ...
— An Unwilling Maid • Jeanie Gould Lincoln
... convention.—Mr. Stockton was thirty-nine years of age at the time of his election. His family had been for several generations distinguished in the annals of New Jersey. His great-grandfather Richard Stockton was a member of the Continental Congress and was a signer of the Declaration of Independence; his grandfather Richard Stockton was a senator of the United States under the administrations of Washington and John Adams; his father was the well-known Commodore Robert F. Stockton, who was conspicuously effective as ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... intercolonial meeting of delegates from the several colonies to restore union and harmony between Great Britain and her American Colonies. Pursuant to these calls there met in Philadelphia in September of that year the first Continental Congress, composed of delegates from 12 colonies. On October 14, 1774, the assembly adopted what has come to be known as the Declaration and Resolves of the First Continental Congress. In that instrument, addressed to His Majesty and to the people of Great Britain, ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... New World experiment in government and the prosperity and strength of the people were due in large measure to the superiority of American women. A few women had urged their claims: Abigail Adams asked her husband, a member of the Continental Congress, "to remember the ladies" in the "new code of laws"; and Hannah Lee Corbin of Virginia pleaded with her brother, Richard Henry Lee, to make good the principle of "no taxation without representation" ...
— Susan B. Anthony - Rebel, Crusader, Humanitarian • Alma Lutz
... most decisive point in the history of slavery. By its decree, in Jefferson's language, there was never to be either slavery or involuntary servitude in the said territory otherwise than in punishment for crimes. It is to the everlasting honor of the southern members then in the Continental Congress that they all voted for this inhibition. Virginia, whose assent as a State was necessary to its validity, she having at this time rights over much of the domain in question, also concurred. Whatever the strictly legal ...
— History of the United States, Volume 3 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews
... sent a delegate to the Continental Congress to win official recognition for Transylvania, eighty-four men at Harrodsburg drew up a petition addressed to Virginia stating their doubts of the legality of Henderson's title and requesting Virginia to assert her authority according to the stipulations ...
— Pioneers of the Old Southwest - A Chronicle of the Dark and Bloody Ground • Constance Lindsay Skinner
... the personal bitterness of politics here. It reminded me of Dr. Duche's description in his famous letter to Washington of the party which carried the Declaration of Independence through the Continental Congress. But it had a special interest for me as confirming the inferences I have often drawn as to Mr. Parnell's relations with his party, from his singular and complete isolation among them. I remember the ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (1 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert
... at first sight seem too sweeping, it is borne out by the facts. During the first sessions of the Continental Congress no question was more pressing than the reorganization of the colonies should they renounce their allegiance to the crown, nor was there one in regard to which the majority of the delegates were more at sea. From, their peculiar education the ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams
... Environment may influence character; but all the good are not poor, nor all the rich bad. Therefore, the Peach Blow Philosopher takes to the woods. He is willing to leave something to the Lord Almighty and the continental congress. Selah!" ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... just reached him that the Continental Congress, sitting in Philadelphia, had drawn up articles of confederation, and that those articles had been signed by the representatives ...
— The Hero of Ticonderoga - or Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys • John de Morgan
... is by inheritance of the first class of New-England men, numbering in his family a signer of the Declaration of Independence, a President of the Continental Congress, and several other persons honorably distinguished in affairs. He is a native of Lebanon, in New Hampshire, where his father is still living—the centre of a circle bound to him by their respect for every public and ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... foreigners, while still veiled from the persons most concerned. Thus, twelve years before the Battle of Bunker's Hill, the Duc de Choiseul predicted and prepared for the separation of the American colonies from England. One month after that, the Continental Congress still clung to the belief that they should escape a division. And so, some seven years ago, the veteran French advocate Guepin, in a most able essay suggested by the "Burns affair" in Boston, prophesied civil war in America within ten years. "Une grande lutte s'apprete donc," ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 45, July, 1861 • Various
... more and more a military aspect. On the 10th of May occurred the surprise and capture, by Ethan Allen and his party, of the important post of Ticonderoga, where during the summer the provincials organized a force to march upon and, if possible, secure the Canadas. The Continental Congress at Philadelphia, after resolving that the issue had been forced upon them by Great Britain, voted to prepare for self-defence. They adopted the New England troops, gathered around Boston, as a Continental force, and appointed Washington to ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston
... a Bostonian and graduate of Harvard, probably gave his time in fuller measure to the cause of independence than any other writer or speaker. For nine years he was a member of the Continental Congress. When there was talk of peace between the colonies and the mother country, he had the distinction of being one of two Americans for whom England proclaimed in advance that there would be no amnesty granted. We can seem to hear him in 1776 in the Philadelphia State House, replying ...
— History of American Literature • Reuben Post Halleck
... case) but to supply our troops with arms of which they stand in too great need. Secondly, to appraise their estates and oblige them to deposite at least the value of one half of their respective property in the hands of the continental congress as a security for their good behaviour. And lastly, to administer the strongest oath that can be devised to act offensively and defensively in support of the common rights. I confess that men so eaten up with bigotry, as the bulk of them appear to be, will not consider themselves ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... in America has, by the repeated voice of its inhabitants, directed and authorized the Continental Congress to publish a formal Declaration of Independence of, and separation from, the oppressive king and Parliament of Great Britain; and we look on every man as an enemy, who does not in some line or other, give his assistance towards supporting the same; at the same time we consider the ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... and the Continental Congress, my dear chap," said Doctor Barnes, likewise drawling. "I'll take that up after a while. I'm in charge here. If you go over there quietly to that other house it may look like an act of courtesy. If you don't—it might ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... taxed declared that he was not a Roman Catholic; and the whole ecclesiastical system of New France was supported and encouraged. The Bill caused much irritation in Protestant New England, which saw some malicious design in the establishment of Roman Catholicism on its borders. The Continental Congress of 1775 denounced the Quebec Act, and even the Declaration of Independence has something to say ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong
... matter of controversy" relating to the township granted by the king to the college nearly at the same time with the Charter, "can be decided by no judicatory but supreme, or one equal to that which incorporated it, i. e., the Continental Congress." ...
— The History of Dartmouth College • Baxter Perry Smith
... the Continental Congress established the Continental Association in order to use the same economic weapon again, the issues in the conflict were more clearly drawn. Many of the moderate colonists who had supported the earlier action, denounced this one as revolutionary, and went over ...
— Introduction to Non-Violence • Theodore Paullin
... Henry in 1773, "gives a gloomy prospect to future times." In the same year George Mason wrote to the legislature of Virginia: "The laws of impartial Providence may avenge our injustice upon our posterity." Conforming his conduct to his convictions, Jefferson, in Virginia, and in the Continental Congress, with the approval of Edmund Pendleton, branded the slave-trade as piracy; and he fixed in the Declaration of Independence, as the corner-stone of America: "All men are created equal, with an unalienable right to liberty." ...
— Memorial Address on the Life and Character of Abraham Lincoln - Delivered at the request of both Houses of Congress of America • George Bancroft
... sir," said the General; and when I was seated he told me how the Continental Congress in July of 1775 had established three Indian departments; how that he, as chief commissioner of this Northern department, which included the Six Nations of the Iroquois confederacy, had summoned the national council, first ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... be seen from these circumstances that no blame could properly attach to General Washington, or the Continental Congress, or the Commissary of Prisoners; the blame belonged to those who were engaged in privateering, all of whom had been accustomed to release, without parole, the crews of the vessels which they captured, or enlist them on other privateers; in both cases removing ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... duties which caused him to become a member of the Continental Congress which made George Washington the commander-in-chief of the Colonial army; he helped to write the Declaration of Independence; he was a commissioner of peace to confer with the British General Howe; he was a member of ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold
... broadest form, as declared by Penn. Taking into consideration the religious character of the Americans, as well as the learning and acumen of that most remarkable body of men who constituted the Continental Congress, it seems not only not improbable, but probable, and indeed necessary to conclude, that the proposition that "all men are created equal" was intended to be the epitome of the doctrine of the Reformation, as that doctrine was broadened by the influence of Penn and his followers. As the Governments ...
— "Colony,"—or "Free State"? "Dependence,"—or "Just Connection"? • Alpheus H. Snow
... 1774, the first Continental Congress met in Philadelphia. Except Georgia, every Colony sent delegates to it. The election of those delegates was in several cases irregular, because the body which chose them was not the Legislature but some temporary ...
— George Washington • William Roscoe Thayer
... educational work among the natives. In some cases the Indians themselves contributed toward the expense of these schools, and in others the United States Government gave meagre aid. As early as 1775 the Continental Congress had appropriated five hundred dollars for the support and education of youths at Dartmouth College. This was, however, less an act of benevolence than of self-interest, since its avowed object was to conciliate the friendship ...
— The Indian Today - The Past and Future of the First American • Charles A. Eastman
... which they never claimed till the present reign; and probably they would not have claimed now, had they not been incited thereto by letters from England. One of these was read, according to the desire of the writer, not only at the Continental Congress but likewise in many congregations throughout the Combined Provinces. It advised them to seize upon all the King's officers; and exhorted them, 'Stand valiantly, only for six months, and in that time there will be such commotions in England that you may have your own ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol X • Various
... more than they themselves require. But Great Britain was, at the time of which we speak, perfectly infatuated. On the 4th of Sept. of the very year in which the Quebec Act was granted, 1774, a Continental Congress was held, of which Peter Randolph, of Virginia, was President, to sympathize with the people of Boston, on account of their disabilities, by reason of the tea riot.[5] But such Congresses produced ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... a joke. Then he conducted the lean, lank, rawboned rustic into the presence of the judges. There were four of these men: Wythe, Pendleton, Peyton and John Randolph. These men were all to be colleagues of the bumpkin at the First Continental Congress at Philadelphia, but that lay in ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard
... Confederation. Agriculture, manufactures, and commerce were at their lowest ebb. There was infinite danger to all the States from local interests and jealousies, and from the apparent impossibility of a much longer adherence to that shadow of a government, the Continental Congress. And even four years afterwards, when every evil had been greatly aggravated, and civil war was added to other calamities, the Constitution of the United States was all but shipwrecked in passing ...
— The Theory of Social Revolutions • Brooks Adams
... Settlements of the United States—nationality, location, date. 8. Troops of the American Revolution, showing the number each State furnished. 9. Battles and Losses of the Revolution. 10. The Declaration of Independence. 11. The Signers of the Declaration of Independence. 12. The Presidents of the Continental Congress. 13. Constitution of the United States. 14. History of the American Flag. 15. Area and Population of the United States. 16. Population of all Cities and Towns in the U. S. having a population of over 10,000. 17. Growth of American Cities having a population of 50,000 and upward. ...
— Thrilling Narratives of Mutiny, Murder and Piracy • Anonymous
... meeting alone did the revolutionary committees hold themselves responsible. The effect of the outbreak of the revolutionary war had been, indeed, to reduce democracy to its simplest terms. The Continental Congress had no power, and only pretended to recommend and advise. The state government, by sundering its relations with the crown, lost its legal title, and for some time after the war began, and as regards Berkshire, until the county voted to accept the new state constitution ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... presence of these three trembling females, I should feel tempted to dispute, at once, the title of his majesty. You may make such a covenant as you will with Mr. Griffith, but if it contain one syllable about submission to your king, or of any other allegiance than that which I owe to the Continental Congress, and the State of Massachusetts, you may as well consider the terms violated at once; for not an article of such an agreement will I consider as binding on me, or on any that shall choose to follow ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... or errors of the Congresses of Washington's time have been repeated in our own day, and seem as natural to us as they doubtless seemed to the men of 1776 and 1796. Thus, the Continental Congress incurred all the evils of a depreciated currency with the same blindness which afflicted the Congress of the Southern Confederacy and the Union Congress during the Civil War, or the Democrat-Populist party of still more recent ...
— Four American Leaders • Charles William Eliot
... act will be the second Continental Congress where George Washington was elected Commander in Chief of the American army and where Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and others were appointed to draw up the Declaration ...
— History Plays for the Grammar Grades • Mary Ella Lyng
... "A continental Congress assembled at Philadelphia," said Grandfather, "and proposed such measures as they thought most conducive to the public good. A provincial Congress was likewise chosen in Massachusetts. They exhorted the people to arm and discipline themselves. A great number of minute ...
— True Stories from History and Biography • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... home by proroguing the session. Nor did he permit them to assemble again until late in the next year, after the repeal of the Stamp Act. By this means he prevented the election of delegates from North Carolina to the Continental Congress which met in New York in 1765 to organize the opposition to ...
— School History of North Carolina • John W. Moore
... upon the inconsistency between demanding freedom in temporal affairs from Great Britain and refusing it in spiritual ones to fellow-citizens. The "Censured Memorial" closes [162] with an expressed determination on the part of the Separatists to appeal to tte Continental Congress if the state continue to refuse to do them justice. Holly, remarking upon the act of 1777, expresses great dissatisfaction with it as falling short of the liberty desired, and, particularly, with its retention of the ...
— The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut • M. Louise Greene, Ph. D.
... wishes exactly, I knew by that word; for he always called every thing he liked, SHE. The sun was SHE; so was his father's old London-made watch; so was the Continental Congress. ...
— Who Spoke Next • Eliza Lee Follen
... of the Continental Congress from 1774 to 1778. In June 1775, with a view to promoting the union of the colonies, he seconded the nomination of Washington as commander-in-chief of the army. His influence in congress was great, and almost from the beginning he was impatient ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... its Preamble, was ordained to 'establish justice,' and 'secure the blessings of liberty'; that in the convention which framed it, and also elsewhere at the time, it was declared not to 'sanction'; that according to the Declaration of Independence, and the address of the Continental Congress, the nation was dedicated to 'Liberty' and the 'rights of human nature'; that according to the principles of common law, the Constitution must be interpreted openly, actively, and perpetually for Freedom; that according to the decision of ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... New York, leaving Lord Cornwallis in command. Washington desired to send his right-hand man, General Greene, to stem the tide of British success, but the Continental Congress chose to send ...
— Hero Stories from American History - For Elementary Schools • Albert F. Blaisdell
... your pardon—I think we shall find it is the majority, particularly outside of the large towns. This news will fly to every corner of the land as fast as horses can carry it, and put the country folk in readiness for whatever the Continental Congress may ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... North America, during this interval, a new President had begun his administration. James Monroe was inaugurated as President in his fifty-ninth year. He had been a member of the Continental Congress, and at thirty-six a Minister to France. Under Madison he served as Secretary of War. Crawford, Calhoun, Meigs, Wirt and Rush were members of his Cabinet, and were all of the dominant Democratic-Republican party. Business throughout the country began to revive almost at once when the ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... ranged against the Opposition and all who held radical or revolutionary views. Here the strife was merely political. But in the Thirteen Colonies the forces of the Crown were ranged against the forces of the new Continental Congress. The small minority of colonists who were afterwards known as the United Empire Loyalists sided with the Crown. A majority sided with the Congress. The rest kept as selfishly neutral as they could. ...
— The Father of British Canada: A Chronicle of Carleton • William Wood
... treasure!" said Hugh, handling the bowl with reverent care. "I knew that General Washington had spent some days at Fernley, but I never heard of this relic of his stay. Margaret, this is really extremely interesting. Go on, and open more of them. Perhaps we shall find tokens of all the Continental Congress. I shall look for at least a model of a kite in silver, with the compliments of B. Franklin. Suppose we try this next. It ...
— Fernley House • Laura E. Richards
... perpetual Union between the several States now represented in the Continental Congress, having been laid before this Town, were distinctly and repeatedly read and maturely considerd, Whereupon; Resolvd, as the opinion of this Town, that the said Articles appear to be well adapted to cement the Union of the said States, to confirm their mutual Friendship, ...
— The Original Writings of Samuel Adams, Volume 4 • Samuel Adams
... fortified Boston Neck as early as 1774, and the First Continental Congress had promptly assured Massachusetts of its sympathy with her solemn protest against that act. It was also the intention of General Gage to fortify Dorchester Heights. Early in April, a British council of war, in which Clinton, Burgoyne, and Percy took part, unanimously ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 5, May, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... government in separate departments and reposing it for its authority upon the will of the people. Jefferson gave you the Declaration of Independence in pursuance of a resolution adopted by the Legislature of Virginia, instructing the delegates in the Continental Congress to propose a Declaration of Independence. The first suggestion of your more perfect union came from the Legislature of Virginia in January, 1786, and your Federal Constitution is construed upon the lines laid down by Edmund Randolph, and proposed in the convention as the basis of the Constitution ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z • Various
... to drive Marjorie's image from his mind. Try as he would, he could not distract his attention to the many problems which ordinarily would have engaged thoughts. What mattered it to him that the French fleet was momentarily expected, or that the Continental Congress was again meeting in the city, or that he had met with certain suspicious looking individuals during the course of the day! There was yet one who looked peculiarly suspicious and who was enveloped, as far as his knowledge was concerned, in a veil of mystery of the strangest depth. ...
— The Loyalist - A Story of the American Revolution • James Francis Barrett
... procure supplies for the army, "then on the point of mutiny for lack of the common necessaries of life." The enterprising men who had the matter in hand addressed themselves to the task of providing three million rations and three hundred hogsheads of rum for the famished troops. The Continental Congress recognized their patriotic conduct and pledged "the faith of the government for the effectual reimbursement of the amount advanced." It fell to Robert Morris, Superintendent of Finance for the government, to organize the ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... welcome you to Boston and to Faneuil Hall. In your presence here, and at the sound of your voices beneath this historic roof, the years roll back and we see the figure and hear again the ringing tones of your great orator, Patrick Henry, declaring to the first Continental Congress, "The distinctions between Virginians, Pennsylvanians, New Yorkers, and New Englanders are no more. I am not a Virginian, but an American." A distinguished Frenchman, as he stood among the graves at Arlington, said, "Only a great people ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... sent as a deputy from Virginia to the first Continental Congress, which met at Philadelphia in September, 1774. He at once took a commanding influence in that body, and on its ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 4 of 8 • Various
... greater influence in securing the independence of the Colonies than Franklin. He was one of the originators of the Continental Congress, and was the author of the plan for a Union of the States. On his way to the Albany Conference in 1754 he drew up a plan of Union, which he presented to said Conference, composed of delegates from seven Northern Colonies. Other members presented plans, but his was preferred and adopted, ...
— From Boyhood to Manhood • William M. Thayer
... and brotherhood, the blow given to Boston smote on every patriotic heart from one end of the country to the other. Virginia and the Carolinas, as well as Connecticut and New Hampshire, felt and proclaimed the cause to be their own. The Continental Congress, then holding its first session in Philadelphia, expressed its sympathy for the suffering inhabitants of Boston, and addresses were received from all quarters, assuring them that the cause was a common one, and should be met by common efforts and common sacrifices. The Congress ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... opportunity for some distinction, which, whatever may have been his earlier plans, opened public life to him as a career. The first work of the convention was to consider and adopt a series of resolutions instructing the Virginian delegates in the Continental Congress, then in session at Philadelphia, to urge an immediate declaration of independence. The next matter was to frame a Bill of Rights and a Constitution of government for the province. Madison was made a member of the committee to which this latter subject was referred. ...
— James Madison • Sydney Howard Gay
... Franklin—then American minister at the Court of Versailles—to his son-in-law, Richard Bache. Lady Juliana Penn wrote in their behalf to John Penn at Philadelphia, and Mademoiselle Pictet to Colonel Kinloch, member of the Continental Congress from South Carolina. Thus supported in their undertaking the youthful travelers sailed from L'Orient on May 27, in an American vessel, the Kattie, Captain Loring. Of the sum which Gallatin, who supplied the capital for the expedition, brought from Geneva, one half had been expended in their ...
— Albert Gallatin - American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII • John Austin Stevens
... re-enacted, or, as in Virginia, rights under it conceded under the royal prerogative. In others, as in Maryland, it was treated as being, by tacit adoption, the birthright of the inhabitants. In the "Declaration and Resolves" of the first Continental Congress, they assert "that the respective colonies are entitled to the Common Law of England," and in the address to the people of Great Britain they complain that the English settlers in Canada "are now the subjects of an arbitrary Government, ...
— The American Judiciary • Simeon E. Baldwin, LLD
... First Continental Congress, 1774.—The members of the Continental Congress met in Carpenter's Hall, Philadelphia, in September, 1774. Never, except in the Federal Convention (p. 137), have so many great men met together. The greatest delegation was that ...
— A Short History of the United States • Edward Channing
... farm-work was now at its highest point of activity, and he was little about house or stable. Furthermore, though twenty thousand minutemen and volunteers were gathered before Boston, though the thirteen colonies were aflame with war preparations, and though the Continental Congress was voting a declaration on taking up arms and appointing a general, nothing but vague report of all ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... the military engineers of our own country, we find that one of the first acts of the Continental Congress, after appointing Washington as commander-in-chief, was to authorize him to employ a number of engineers. It was not, however, until 1777 that a number of engineer officers from the French army arrived in this country, and were appointed in the Continental army. General DuPortail ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 841, February 13, 1892 • Various
... from the mother country, it was necessary to have a distinct flag of their own, and the Continental Congress appointed Dr. Franklin, Mr. Lynch, and Mr. Harrison, a committee to take the subject into consideration. They repaired to the American army, a little over 9,000 strong, then assembled at Cambridge, and after due consideration, ...
— Key-Notes of American Liberty • Various
... was successful to the extent that he was able to prevent Georgia from sending duly accredited representatives to the First Continental Congress; and this fact has been taken by some writers of history to mean that the spirit of liberty and independence was not as earnest and as enthusiastic in Georgia as in the other Provinces. Later, when Georgia was overrun by British and Tory influences, and appeared to be conquered, ...
— Stories Of Georgia - 1896 • Joel Chandler Harris
... the power also of paying a compliment in an impressive and really splendid manner whenever he felt it to be deserved. When Charles Thomson, who for fifteen years had been the honored secretary of the Continental Congress, wrote to announce his retirement, Washington replied: "The present age does so much justice to the unsullied reputation with which you have always conducted yourself in the execution of the duties of your office, and posterity will find your name so honorably ...
— George Washington, Vol. II • Henry Cabot Lodge
... the people of his new home from the time that he came among them, and never had any doubt or hesitation as to the course which duty required him to adopt and pursue. As a writer he was even more successful than as a speaker. A pamphlet which he wrote in December, 1774, vindicating the Continental Congress, attracted much attention, and that and another from his pen were attributed to veteran Whigs, particularly to John Jay; but the evidence of Hamilton's authorship is perfect, or we might well agree with the Tories, and believe that works so able could not have been written by a youth ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... and were allowed to do so. In the first week of June, 1753, the bell was again hung in the belfry of the State House. On July 4, 1776, it was known throughout the city that the final decision on the question of declaring the colonies independent of Great Britain was to be made by the Continental Congress, in session at the State House. Accordingly the old bellman had been stationed in the belfry on that morning, with orders to ring the bell when a boy waiting at the door of the State House below should signal to him that the bill for independence ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... historical eminence, but, besides the obvious drawback of its situation, its capacity and its commissariat resources, except for a host of disembodied intellects, must prove insufficient. There remained the central city of the past, the seat of the Continental Congress, of the Convention and of the first administrations under the Constitution which it framed—the halfway-house between North and South of the early warriors and statesmen, and the workshop in which the political ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... 14th day of June, 1777, the Continental Congress passed the following resolution: "RESOLVED, That the flag of the thirteen United States be thirteen stripes alternate red and white; that the Union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... House, the Governor was informed that the right of the people to assemble, and petition the throne for a redress of their grievances was undoubted, and that this right included that of appointing delegates for such purpose. The House passed resolutions approving of the proceedings of the Continental Congress at Philadelphia (4th of Sept. 1774) and declared their determination to use their influence in carrying out the views of that body. Whereupon, the Governor, by advice of his council, dissolved the Assembly, by proclamation, after a ...
— Sketches of Western North Carolina, Historical and Biographical • C. L. Hunter |
