The year 2026 marks the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Cardinal News has embarked on a project to tell the little-known stories of Virginia’s role in the march to independence. As part of this, I’m writing monthly columns about the politics of the era, written the same way I’d write them today. The events described here took place in April 1776. You can sign up for our monthly newsletter here:
The people of Cumberland County have now said what many others have been thinking: That perhaps a king across the ocean should not be our king, at all.
There is a word for this: Treason.
That, of course, is only if the endeavor fails.
Otherwise, the word truly is independence. (Or, as some these days prefer, “independency.”)
For those just catching up with the news, the Cumberland County Committee for Safety has adopted a resolution directing its delegate to the Virginia Convention “positively to declare for an independency.” With that vote, Cumberland County appears to have become the first governing body to stake its claim to a complete break with Great Britain. Charlotte County followed suit the next day.
North Carolina, as it often does, will dispute Virginia’s claim to primacy. Its Provincial Congress, meeting earlier this month, passed its “Halifax Resolves” that encouraged North Carolina’s three delegates to the Continental Congress to work with others to pursue independence.
North Carolina deserves credit for saying that much, but that resolution was still hedged. Cumberland County hedged nothing.
Where North Carolina merely voted that its delegates should be “empowered to concur with the other delegates of the other Colonies in declaring Independency,” Cumberland County directed its delegate to take action. This is the difference between leadership and followership, but let’s not quibble with our neighbors. The important thing is that popular sentiment seems to be moving in the same direction — that our differences with London are now so great that they cannot be resolved, that only a total and irrevocable break is the solution.
Not everyone has arrived at that conclusion and perhaps not all will, but more are starting to do so, as the Cumberland and Charlotte committees have just shown.
In truth, we have been moving to this point for some time now. It’s been a full year since British regulars fired on the local militia in Massachusetts, setting off a series of events that led to our own George Washington being named as commander-in-chief of the Continental forces. Over the course of the past year, royal governors — including our own in Virginia — have been forced to flee and Colonies have set about governing themselves. We have literally had independence since the day that Lord Dunmore fled Williamsburg. The question now is do we dare say so? And where would that lead?
Throughout this fight, we have considered our enemy to be the British Parliament and all we have done is to insist upon our rights as Englishmen, as guaranteed in the English Bill of Rights. We have emphatically sworn allegiance to King George III and looked to him to uphold our rights, yet he has repeatedly ignored our pleas and sided with Parliament. Perhaps we are now starting to realize that the king is not going to uphold our rights, after all, that perhaps the problem is not a mere disagreement with Parliament but the entirety of our relationship with Great Britain.
Years of political disputes have brought us to this point, but what has pushed many people over the edge has not been some new tax or an act of war but simply words on a page — the 47-page pamphlet known as “Common Sense” that has become the talk of taverns throughout the Colonies.
The author, Thomas Paine, is a former English tax collector who recently arrived in Philadelphia — so sick from the voyage that he had to be carried off the ship by Benjamin Franklin’s personal physician. Paine recovered quickly, it seems, and then made a quick mark on his new country as editor of the Pennsylvania Magazine, a publication known for its sharp political commentary.
“Common Sense” was published separately, and anonymously, in January, but it was no secret that the publisher was Paine. The signatory, “An Englishman,” left no mystery among those who follow the written word. When Paine was formally identified as the author in March, he claimed the pamphlet sold more than 120,000 copies in its first three months. That seems implausible because there may not be that many people in North America who can read, but regardless of the precise number, the circulation is undoubtedly high — and the impact enormous.
In “Common Sense,” Paine makes the case for independence and does so in clear language that it can be easily understood even by those who cannot read: His work is often read aloud for those who do not know their letters.
Paine argues passionately against the monarchy: “In England a king hath little more to do than to make war and give away places; which in plain terms, is to impoverish the nation and set it together by the ears. A pretty business indeed for a man to be allowed eight hundred thousand sterling a year for, and worshipped into the bargain! Of more worth is one honest man to society and in the sight of God, than all the crowned ruffians that ever lived.”
He calls for an elected government, with an executive chosen more or less by lottery: A drawing would be held to pick a colony and that colony would put forth an executive to govern for a time until the next lottery. At that point, the colony that supplied the president would be dropped from the colony so that, over time, each would have a turn. To protect the interests of political minorities, a three-fifths vote would be required to pass a law or elect a president.
This is truly revolutionary thinking, but it has fired imaginations from New Hampshire to Georgia. Where it has fired imaginations in Cumberland County, we cannot say, but something has. A year ago, Virginia had a royal governor in residence. Today, we don’t, and all hint of royal authority has evaporated like a morning mist. Are we already independent?
