vigation, with most of its territory within thirty miles of streams navigable for boats, its soil rich, and exuberantly productive to the labor of the husbandman and planter, it needed only the hand of independence to make it a powerful, flourishing, and sovereign state. Such was the spectacle that met the eyes of England, ever casting about for something to prey upon, and the result of the scrutiny. was the passage of the stamp act.

The Stamp

Under pretence that the government had asAct. sumed large burdens in their defence, and the apparent obligation on their part, to bear a portion, Lord Grenville, in 1763, notified the agents of the colonies, in London, that, at the ensuing session of parliament, he intended to propose a duty on stamps for the purpose of raising a revenue from the provinces, at the same time giving them the privilege, of suggesting, as a substitute, any other mode of parliamentary taxation, that would be more agreeable to them. In the session which followed, a resolution to the same effect was adopted, but the ministry did not yet venture to take the final step. They were preparing the way. The restrictions on colonial trade were tightened, and a lucrative commerce with the Spanish and French islands was entirely cut off. The indignation of the people was aroused; they saw at once that England designed depriving them of their liberties, and making them the mere subjects of the British parliament. "Assemblies remonstrated, public meetings denounced, and agents petitioned. The measure was resolved upon, and, on the 22d of March, 1765, the Stamp Act was finally imposed.' The interval of two years, which had been intended as a preparation of the minds of the people for submission, only enabled them to gather their energies for universal resistance, in the open manifestation of which, it is true, Massachusetts and Virginia took the lead, from the advantage of * McMahon, 332.

opportunity, though, in unanimity, firmness and success, Maryland surpassed them all. It is its proud boast that its soil was never polluted by the obnoxious stamps. Every where the utmost indignation was excited; the columns of the Maryland Gazette teemed with articles assailing the measure. Pamphlets were issued, public appeals were made, and the minds of the whole people of the province, were arrayed firmly against it. The other colonies expressed their opposition by remonstrances and protests through their legislative bodies; if Maryland did not at once speak out through the same channel, it was because the Assembly was prorogued from 1763, until Sept. 1765, and it could only have recourse to the pen, the press, and open violence. But at the session of Sept. 1765, the earliest opportunity which was presented, the Assembly solemnly protested against the measure, and indignantly complained, that thus for two years they had been deprived of the power of publicly declaring their lasting opposition. Ere that period arrived, the people of the colony had already vindicated their rights, in a more summary manner.

Resistance

ryland.

Zachariah Hood, a native of May nd and a merchant at Annapolis, was appointed, in the to it in Masummer of 1765, stamp distributor for the province. He brought with him from England a cargo of goods, together with the obnoxious stamps. When he arrived in the harbor of Annapolis, the ferment reached its height. The people gathered in crowds at the dock, determined to prevent his landing: an outbreak ensued, in which one of their number, Thomas McNeir, had his thigh broken, and Hood, at the very seat of government, was compelled to draw off from the shore and effect a landing, clandestinely, at another time and place. No sooner had the tidings of his arrival spread through the country, than the people gathered into the city, and prepared to show their utter detestation of the man who could consent to

U

become the instrument of foreign tyranny in enslaving the liberty of his country. The effigy of the stamp distributor was mounted on a one horse cart, with sheets of paper in its hands, and paraded through the streets amidst the execrations of the crowds, while the bells tolled continually a solemn knell. The procession marched to the hill, tied the effigy to the whipping-post, and bestowed upon it nineand-thirty lashes, which the crowd humorously called giving "the Mosaic law" to the stamp distributor. It was then hung upon a gibbet, erected for the purpose, a tar barrel placed under it and set on fire, whence it ignited, and at length, fell into the blaze below and was consumed. Similar was the exhibition of popular feeling in Baltimore, Frederick, Elkridge, and other towns.*

But the punishment of Hood did not stop with his degradation. He offered the large stock of goods, which he had imported at reduced prices, to buy the favor of the people; they not only refused to purchase them, but carried their resentment to such a pitch, as to tear down a house which he was preparing for the reception of his merchandise, lest he should make it the place of deposit for his stamps. At last, they threatened him with personal violence. Trembling for his life, he took refuge in the governor's house; but soon finding that even there he could obtain no protection, he fled in despair, from the province, and did not pause in his flight, until he had found an asylum, in New York, under the guns of fort St. George. His evil fate still pursued him; and, as the governor of Maryland dared not protect him in his palace, so he found no safety even under the guns of a British fortress. A party of New York patriots, considering his flight as a serious fraud upon their brothers of Maryland, and, resolved that no stamp officer should escape the punishment due to his treason, seized him on Long Island, and gave him the alternative * Annals of Annapolis, 90, &c.

of resigning his office and renouncing and abjuring, under oath, its exercise forever, or of being conducted back to Maryland, with labels descriptive of his office affixed upon his back, and delivered up to the just indignation of the people. Hood prayed, protested, and sought to compromise; but the patriots were inexorable. Then he yielded. His abjuration was fully made out and sworn to before a justice at Jamaica, and, having become powerless and despicable, he was set at large.

Thus when the Assembly met, in September, Declaration they found the work of resistance complete; and of the Assembly. it only remained for them solemnly to declare their rights, which had thus been vindicated by the people, by measures, in which the first men of the province had borne an open part. No deliberation was needed, for there was no difference of opinion. Many of the delegates, indeed had been instructed by their constituents, and, thus supported by the expressed will and the open acts of the people, there was neither pause nor hesitation. They immediately acted upon a circular, which Massachusetts had addressed to the colonies, proposing the meeting of a congress of deputies, and on the second day of the session, concurred in the suggestion, and appointed, as the representatives of Maryland, Col. Edward Tilghman, William Murdock and Thomas Ringgold, who received instructions in which they were expressly directed to take care, that any representation or petition, prepared by the congress to be presented to the English government, should contain an assertion of the absolute right of the colonies to be free from taxation "save by their own consent, or that of their representatives, freely chosen and appointed."*

And now, in behalf of the people of Maryland, they proceeded to make a solemn declaration, which stood prominent even in that day of protests and resolutions, and placed • Votes and Proceedings, 1765, p. 7.

the rights of the province upon a broad and incontrovertible ground. On the last day of that short but glorious session of only five days, they unanimously resolved, that the early settlers of Maryland had brought with them all the rights of British subjects, who could not be taxed but by their own consent; that, by the charter of Maryland, these rights had been fully secured to them, and strengthened by the express renunciation, therein made, of the power of the crown to tax the people of the province: that the trial by jury was their birth right-protesting against the establishment of any other tribunal—and, finally, that the people of Maryland always enjoyed the right of being governed by laws to which they themselves had assented, that, as they were not represented in the British parliament, the legis lature of the province alone had the power to impose taxes, and, therefore, that taxes, laid under color of any other authority, were unconstitutional, and an infringement of their rights. Having thus rendered this session, as it were, sacred to liberty, they entered into no other business and, refusing to give the governor the advice, he required, concerning the disposition of the stamp paper which was daily expected to arrive in the province, they were prorogued to meet in November following.

Jany.

Daniel Du- The Proprietary government, feeling its rights infringed on by the stamp act, yielded but a faint assistance to the ministry in carrying the scheme into effect; and Gov. Sharpe, after the commons had refused to interfere, upon the recommendation of the upper house who represented that if the stamps were landed they would certainly be destroyed, determined to deposit them, until further orders from England, in one of the royal cruisers stationed on the Virginia coast. In the meanwhile, the war of words went on. Daniel Dulany, a man eminent for learning and ability, and distinguished as a lawyer, pub* Votes and Proceedings H. D., Sept. 1765, p. 10.