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:
We stand today on the brink of history.
Whether we also stand today on the brink of high treason is yet to be known.
In April, Carter Henry Harrison stepped onto the front porch of the Effingham Tavern in Cumberland County and read out a resolution that called for the Colonies to “abjure any allegiance to His Brittanick Majesty and bid him a goodnight forever.”
The property owners of Cumberland County gathered outside the tavern cheered their approval, and with that, instructed Harrison — their delegate to the Virginia Convention — “positively to declare for an independency.”
With that, the freeholders of Cumberland County became the first in Virginia (and perhaps the first anywhere in the Colonies) to declare their desire to cut our ties with Great Britain and fashion a new country. Not quite two months later, the Colonies from Georgia to New Hampshire (but not those further north) teeter on the edge of doing just that.
Like a tide that at first seems to come in slowly and then suddenly rises up to crash on the shore, this groundswell for independence — or “independency” as some prefer — has been building for a long time, yet still has taken some by surprise.
Just last November, the Albemarle County lawyer and politician Thomas Jefferson wrote to his cousin:
“Believe me, dear Sir: there is not in the British empire a man who more cordially loves a union with Great Britain than I do.” Today, Jefferson sits on a committee in Philadelphia that has been instructed to draft a proposed Declaration of Independence. It is only fair to point out that in his November letter, after Jefferson vouched his affection for Great Britain, he went on to declare that “by the God that made me, I will cease to exist before I yield to a connection on such terms as the British Parliament propose; and in this, I think I speak the sentiments of America.”
However, the events of the past few months have run more quickly than anyone could have imagined. In April, the freeholders of first Cumberland and Charlotte counties declared themselves in favor of independence. North Carolina soon followed with its own resolution that authorized its delegates to the Congress in Philadelphia to vote in favor of independence should that measure come before the body. Since then, perhaps more than 90 such resolutions have been passed in one form or another by one body or another. Some have been in town or county meetings. In South Carolina, the chief justice of that Colony’s highest court simply included them in jury instructions: “the law of the land authorizes me to declare … that George the Third, King of Great Britain … has no authority over us, and we owe no obedience to him.”
On May 4, the Colony of Rhode Island went the furthest and simply declared itself an independent state. Rhode Island is small but fierce. It is also home to two active ports, Newport and Providence, that have allowed it to amass an unusual amount of wealth. Rhode Island can easily imagine itself standing alone in the world, much like the Italian city-state of Venice, also a busy port. In mid-May, the Virginia Convention instructed its delegates to Congress “to propose to that respectable body to declare the United Colonies free and independent States, absolved from all allegiance to, or dependence upon, the Crown or Parliament of Great Britain.” The middle Colonies have been the most cautious about this talk of independence, but in early May, a special election in Pennsylvania installed a legislature with more independence-minded legislators. The tides have certainly swelled toward a formal break with Britain.
Now we come to this: The Virginia delegate Richard Henry Lee, acting on his Colony’s instruction, has put a formal resolution in favor of independence before Congress: “Resolved, that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.”
There are words for this, but we don’t know yet which ones to use. If this independence enterprise fails, the word that surely applies is treason. Men in England have been hanged for less. If, though, it should succeed, Lee’s resolution will mark the start of a new era the likes of which we have not seen: A new nation upon the earth.
Know this: Lee’s resolution will come to a vote. There will soon come a time for choosing. We just don’t know when.
The mere introduction of this resolution has thrown Congress into turmoil. Delegates from five Colonies had not yet received instructions from their capitals, and those men are unlikely to vote for such a radical measure. Some have talked of leaving the Congress should it take that fateful step. Others of less hesitant blood contend that Lee’s resolution does nothing more than describe the world as it is: We are already independent of the king. Most of our royal governors have departed, forcibly or otherwise. The king has declared us rebels beyond his protection. Independence need not be declared because independence has already happened.
Words matter, though, and as a matter of law, there should be some words to describe our current condition. Congress has postponed a vote in hopes that a majority can be mustered in favor of a break — but just in case that majority asserts itself, Congress has already appointed a committee to draft a declaration explaining this action to the world. Not surprisingly, the vocal Massachusetts radical John Adams is on this committee; so is Pennsylvania’s Benjamin Franklin, known for his witticisms. One might think that Lee would have been named to this panel — after all, it’s his resolution that the committee hopes to explain — but he is headed back to Virginia, so Jefferson has been named in his stead, along with Robert Livingstone of New York and Roger Sherman of Connecticut.
Committees have rarely produced great works of prose, and so we have no great hope for this particular body. However, word reaches us that this committee has delegated the initial draft to Jefferson, which gives us some hope that its words might be memorable. Jefferson is a noted wordsmith; he is reputed to be the author of the widely circulated pamphlet “A Summary View of the Rights of British America,” which makes the case that the Colonies owe no allegiance to Parliament, only to the crown. It would only take a few word changes for Jefferson to cross out references to the crown, as well.
Just as I was about to send these words to the typesetter, news sweeps in from the north like a gale: Connecticut has instructed its delegates to support independence. The following day, similar news came from New Hampshire and Delaware. The political deadlock in Pennsylvania has been broken; it, too, now sides with independence. And in New Jersey, the legislature has declared its governor “an enemy to the liberties of this country” and ordered him arrested. A vote there in favor of independence now seems likely.
As for that now-imprisoned New Jersey governor: His name is William Franklin. He is the son of, yes, Benjamin Franklin. The two apparently no longer talk. Such are the complications before us. By the time I am able to report to you again, we can expect news from Philadelphia, which now seems likely to be in favor of independence — or, as London will see it, a capital crime.
