WEBVTT NOTE 49. New York Breaks Nonimportation 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.360 Volume 3, Chapter 49, New York Breaks Non-Importation 2 00:00:07.360 --> 00:00:12.320 The Americans were now confronted with a fateful choice. 3 00:00:12.320 --> 00:00:18.800 Should they be courageous, cleaved to principle, and honor solemn pledges by continuing their 4 00:00:18.800 --> 00:00:26.220 boycott of British imports until all the Townsend duties were removed, and perhaps the other 5 00:00:56.220 --> 00:01:02.980 urging every colony to strengthen its resolve and to maintain the general boycott until 6 00:01:02.980 --> 00:01:11.020 repeal of all the Townsend Acts, including the Customs Board and the Vice Admiralty Courts. 7 00:01:11.020 --> 00:01:14.940 This general plea was repeated two months later. 8 00:01:14.940 --> 00:01:21.660 Most of the colonies, however, lacked the iron determination of South Carolina and became 9 00:01:21.660 --> 00:01:28.560 Being mired in indecision, first to break the united front of the colonies against imports 10 00:01:28.560 --> 00:01:36.700 were the merchants of Albany, who on May 10 decided to confine their boycott, henceforth, 11 00:01:36.700 --> 00:01:44.460 to tea alone. In a few weeks, learning that they were alone, the same merchants rescinded 12 00:01:44.460 --> 00:02:03.460 The Next Attempted Breach came in Rhode Island a few days later, when the merchants of Newport and Providence ended their agreement and discharged their committees of inspection. 13 00:02:03.460 --> 00:02:09.900 Nearly the last to join the movement, and even then pressured by inter-colonial boycotts, 14 00:02:09.900 --> 00:02:15.820 Rhode Island's merchants were eager to resume trade and to ignore the larger principles 15 00:02:15.820 --> 00:02:17.420 at stake. 16 00:02:17.420 --> 00:02:21.460 Newport proved especially eager to resume full trade. 17 00:02:21.460 --> 00:02:27.300 Rhode Island's action incensed the merchants and citizens of the other colonies, and these 18 00:02:27.300 --> 00:02:33.140 Providence determined that if Rhode Island valued trade above all, its trade would suffer 19 00:02:33.140 --> 00:02:39.640 more from rescinding the boycott than from maintaining it. Within a week, mass meetings 20 00:02:39.640 --> 00:02:45.540 at Philadelphia and New York and a meeting of Boston merchants pledged an absolute boycott 21 00:02:45.540 --> 00:02:51.420 against the merchants of Rhode Island. Providence quickly rescinded its action and joined the 22 00:02:51.420 --> 00:02:56.940 boycott against the importers of Newport. Providence merchants were kept in line by 23 00:02:56.940 --> 00:03:03.180 by its town meeting, which repeatedly voted, overwhelmingly, to continue the general boycott. 24 00:03:03.180 --> 00:03:08.820 By the end of June, ports in Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey and the Carolinas, 25 00:03:08.820 --> 00:03:14.860 as well as Chester, Wilmington, Newcastle and Baltimore, had enthusiastically joined 26 00:03:14.860 --> 00:03:18.060 the boycott against Newport. 27 00:03:18.060 --> 00:03:23.220 Sloops from Newport were turned back from ports from one end of the coast to the other. 28 00:03:23.220 --> 00:03:31.580 Finally, under this pressure, Newport merchants on August 20 resumed non-importation and appointed 29 00:03:31.580 --> 00:03:37.440 a Committee of Inspection. The boycotts by other colonies were rescinded, but many were 30 00:03:37.440 --> 00:03:43.860 still reluctant to trade with Rhode Island and especially with Newport. Newport was the 31 00:03:43.860 --> 00:03:50.300 center of mercantile defections in the colonies, and the blame devolved principally upon the 32 00:03:50.300 --> 00:03:56.420 the leading Jewish merchants of that city. Jewish violators in Newport were apparently 33 00:03:56.420 --> 00:04:03.820 more significant than were Tories. Of particular importance was Aaron Lopez, one of the wealthiest 34 00:04:03.820 --> 00:04:11.540 merchants in the colonies. As a non-cooperator in the boycott, Lopez received lavish flavors 35 00:04:11.540 --> 00:04:17.780 from the royal customs officials. His captains, for example, were exempted from swearing their 36 00:04:17.780 --> 00:04:32.860 The first permanent break in non-importation came in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, another 37 00:04:32.860 --> 00:04:36.900 latecomer to the boycott that needed colonial pressure. 38 00:04:36.900 --> 00:04:42.420 When it became known that Portsmouth merchants were merrily importing British goods, Boston 39 00:04:42.420 --> 00:04:48.460 and Merchants instituted a boycott in mid-June and were followed by Connecticut towns and 40 00:04:48.460 --> 00:04:55.220 even unanimously by the inhabitants of neighboring little Rye, New Hampshire. But pressure proved 41 00:04:55.220 --> 00:05:01.620 vain. A Boston radical visiting Portsmouth was driven out of town for fear of tar and 42 00:05:01.620 --> 00:05:08.620 feathers. The Portsmouth town meeting voted overwhelmingly against a boycott. 43 00:05:08.620 --> 00:05:15.940 Not Portsmouth, however, but the great port towns, especially Boston, New York and Philadelphia, 44 00:05:15.940 --> 00:05:23.060 would be the decisive force for or against continuing the boycott movement. 45 00:05:23.060 --> 00:05:26.140 In Boston, the reaction was never in much doubt. 46 00:05:26.140 --> 00:05:31.860 The formidable Sam Adams saw clearly that the partial repeal was essentially a device 47 00:05:31.860 --> 00:05:55.860 and he urged continuing non-importation until all British taxes were removed and the Customs Board and Admiralty Courts eliminated and even until the Sugar Act, the Declaratory Act and the other oppressive measures since the Seven Years War were removed. 48 00:05:55.860 --> 00:06:05.860 The T-tax was rejected not only on principle, but also, as by far, the major revenue earner of all the Townsend duties. 49 00:06:05.860 --> 00:06:17.860 The May elections in Boston returned nearly all of the radical leaders, and the Boston town meeting manfully denounced English attempts to destroy colonial liberty. 50 00:06:17.860 --> 00:06:28.860 It scoffed at any asserted prerogative of the king to violate natural or constitutional rights, or to impose his will upon the fundamental laws of the land. 51 00:06:28.860 --> 00:06:40.860 Some Boston merchants tried to abandon the boycott and restrict non-importation to tea only, but the town overwhelmingly refused to grant its approval. 52 00:06:40.860 --> 00:07:04.860 Governor Hutchinson, under instructions from Lord Hillsborough, tried to split the resistance movement during May by shifting the Massachusetts legislature from radical Boston to Cambridge, but in this attempt he failed, as town after town voted to support the boycott and the patriotic merchants of Boston. 53 00:07:04.860 --> 00:07:14.860 Hutchinson lamented that the resistance of the boycott was supported by the whole body of the people, as well as by the elected government officials. 54 00:07:14.860 --> 00:07:33.860 Thus, in Marblehead, Robert Jameson, a teacher, lost all his pupils for refusing to abide by the boycott, and his house was threatened late at night by mobs calling out with a loud voice to kill that dog, Jameson, a governor's man and a bastard of liberty. 55 00:07:33.860 --> 00:07:40.700 and Liberty. Hutchinson asked for a strengthened riot act to punish a mob that had tarred 56 00:07:40.700 --> 00:07:45.940 and feathered a customs officer at Gloucester. The assembly told the governor that he had 57 00:07:45.940 --> 00:07:52.940 better investigate the cause of the riots, grievances against oppression. Moreover, it 58 00:07:52.940 --> 00:07:59.420 incisively pointed out that far worse than isolated, uncoordinated acts of violence was 59 00:07:59.420 --> 00:08:06.420 As violence committed systematically and unpunished against the people by the standing army of 60 00:08:06.420 --> 00:08:13.080 Great Britain, penetrating sharply beneath the righteous veil that the existence of a 61 00:08:13.080 --> 00:08:20.080 state apparatus cast over its organized violence, the Massachusetts Assembly denounced the army 62 00:08:20.840 --> 00:08:27.840 as a continuing unlawful body that committed continuing assaults and massacres. 63 00:08:29.420 --> 00:08:38.420 To this flagrant subversion of royal and military supremacy, the governor replied by dissolving the general court. 64 00:08:40.420 --> 00:08:53.420 While Boston posed no problem to the resistance movement, sharp struggles over how to react to the Townsend repeal were waged within the other two crucial cities, New York and Philadelphia. 65 00:08:53.420 --> 00:09:04.420 In contrast to relatively democratic and liberal Massachusetts, both Philadelphia and New York were plagued by strong Tory factions. 66 00:09:04.420 --> 00:09:13.420 The Philadelphia merchants also suffered from lack of uniformity in the non-importation agreements among the various colonies. 67 00:09:13.420 --> 00:09:20.420 Thus, Maryland accepted imports of coarse woolens, and the Philadelphia agreement did not. 68 00:09:20.420 --> 00:09:26.420 This permitted the Maryland merchants to appropriate the Philadelphia trade in woolens. 69 00:09:26.420 --> 00:09:31.420 Of the nineteen members of the Enforcing Committee of Merchants of Philadelphia, 70 00:09:31.420 --> 00:09:41.420 seven, headed by Chairman John Reynold, a Quaker, resigned and began to agitate for rescinding the boycott. 71 00:09:41.420 --> 00:09:47.420 But the artisans and retail traders of Philadelphia insisted on continuing the boycott, 72 00:09:47.420 --> 00:09:53.600 Boycott, backed by encouragement from the merchants of Boston and New York. 73 00:09:53.600 --> 00:09:59.580 By the time of the June 5 general meeting of subscribers to non-importation, the pressure 74 00:09:59.580 --> 00:10:04.360 on the merchants had succeeded in ending their disaffection. 75 00:10:04.360 --> 00:10:11.000 In Boston, false news that the Philadelphia merchants had decided to abandon non-importation 76 00:10:11.000 --> 00:10:16.640 led the Boston merchants to follow, but the Boston town meeting quickly forced the merchants 77 00:10:16.640 --> 00:10:23.040 back into line, even before the falsity of the rumor was revealed. 78 00:10:23.040 --> 00:10:30.640 One decisive factor in ending defection in Philadelphia was the letters by Benjamin Franklin 79 00:10:30.640 --> 00:10:39.080 to his Tory allies urging continued all-out adherence to the boycott. This body blow to 80 00:10:39.080 --> 00:10:50.620 In the first place, Franklin was very deeply involved in speculation in royal grants to 81 00:10:50.620 --> 00:10:56.240 western lands, and his chief enemy was Lord Hillsborough. 82 00:10:56.240 --> 00:11:02.260 The natural consequence of Hillsborough's enmity was to push Franklin into friendships 83 00:11:02.260 --> 00:11:08.240 and association with the opposition, and into disenchantment with government policies in 84 00:11:08.240 --> 00:11:15.560 in general. Furthermore, Franklin always knew on which side his bread was buttered, and 85 00:11:15.560 --> 00:11:21.360 several colonial assemblies, Georgia, New Jersey, as well as Pennsylvania, had recently 86 00:11:21.360 --> 00:11:29.920 appointed him as their London agent. Now, in 1770, the key agency post from Massachusetts 87 00:11:29.920 --> 00:11:36.740 was vacant, and no Tory could hope to obtain this position. Franklin's call to Philadelphia 88 00:11:36.740 --> 00:11:45.780 to Stand Fast drew him closer, in Philadelphia, to Charles Thompson, iron manufacturer, distiller, 89 00:11:45.780 --> 00:11:53.620 and leader of the artisan's movement for non-importation, and away from Galloway's Tories. The Tory 90 00:11:53.620 --> 00:12:00.480 Press in England, not without justice, assailed Franklin as Dr. Double Face and the Judas 91 00:12:00.480 --> 00:12:25.480 and the Strenuous Objections of Sam Adams and the Bitter Attacks of the Boston Gazette. 92 00:12:25.480 --> 00:12:40.480 However, Lee was chosen as alternate or substitute agent, and Adams kept up his correspondence with the libertarian Lee, an able and staunch advocate for the rights of America, rather than with Franklin. 93 00:12:40.480 --> 00:12:51.480 Franklin was able to secure the appointment by splitting the liberal leadership and securing the support of the radical Congregational Minister, the Reverend Samuel Cooper. 94 00:12:51.480 --> 00:13:04.480 To do this, he changed his old tune and flatly denied any legislative sovereignty of Parliament over the colonies, conceding allegiance only to the King. 95 00:13:04.480 --> 00:13:10.480 Philadelphia then also stood fast. New York was still to speak. 96 00:13:10.480 --> 00:13:18.480 When it did, this oligarchically dominated province sundered the united front of colonial resistance, 97 00:13:18.480 --> 00:13:25.440 Whereas the radicals were in total control of Boston and Philadelphia was veering leftward, 98 00:13:25.440 --> 00:13:32.920 the Battle of Golden Hill had intensified a growing conservative reaction among erstwhile 99 00:13:32.920 --> 00:13:40.600 liberals symbolized in the persecution of radical leader Alexander McDougal, a reaction 100 00:13:40.600 --> 00:13:48.560 sufficient to wreck radical influence in as oligarchically controlled a colony as New 101 00:13:48.560 --> 00:13:50.180 York. 102 00:13:50.180 --> 00:13:57.640 As early as March 1770, the growing reaction had become evident. The annual festivities 103 00:13:57.640 --> 00:14:03.320 commemorating repeal of the Stamp Act had always been cordially celebrated by all the 104 00:14:03.320 --> 00:14:09.760 liberal forces in the province led by the Sons of Liberty. The Sons suddenly found their 105 00:14:09.760 --> 00:14:15.920 are claimed to lead the celebration challenged by a secessionist organization, the Friends 106 00:14:15.920 --> 00:14:23.960 of Liberty and Trade, which organized its own. And so, while the sons toasted the imprisoned 107 00:14:23.960 --> 00:14:31.240 McDougal in continuance of the boycott until total repeal, the Friends ignored the McDougal 108 00:14:31.240 --> 00:14:40.880 issue and drank ambiguously to trade in navigation and a speedy removal of their embarrassments. 109 00:14:40.880 --> 00:14:46.280 It must be noted that New York merchants felt aggrieved that New York had relatively the 110 00:14:46.280 --> 00:14:54.040 best record of abiding by the non-importation agreement and had therefore suffered the greatest 111 00:14:54.040 --> 00:14:56.400 loss of trade. 112 00:14:56.400 --> 00:15:02.040 The list of friends included the leading merchants and property owners in New York, especially 113 00:15:02.040 --> 00:15:11.720 the powerful Oliver Delancey, John Alsop, Isaac Lowe, Leonard Lispenard, James Beekman, Gabriel 114 00:15:11.720 --> 00:15:18.560 Ludlow, and Peter Van Schaak. When news of Townsend repeal arrived, the New 115 00:15:18.560 --> 00:15:24.800 York radicals were able to control matters by leading popular agitation. Tentative efforts 116 00:15:24.800 --> 00:15:30.800 of Merchants to Abandon the Agreements were overruled. Recreant Boston merchant Nathaniel 117 00:15:30.800 --> 00:15:36.840 Rogers, who had come to a presumably more hospitable New York, was hanged in effigy 118 00:15:36.840 --> 00:15:42.040 and had to flee the province. A committee of the Suns informed Philadelphia merchants 119 00:15:42.040 --> 00:15:49.040 that New York would stand fast. They were right so far. Furthermore, a general meeting 120 00:15:49.040 --> 00:16:00.040 A meeting of New York inhabitants on May 30 voted by a large majority to preserve the boycott intact and to boycott any who dared to violate it. 121 00:16:00.040 --> 00:16:05.040 Another mass meeting on June 5 confirmed this decision. 122 00:16:05.040 --> 00:16:10.040 But the people of New York were one thing, the merchants another. 123 00:16:10.040 --> 00:16:16.140 A committee of merchants headed by Isaac Lowe promptly rejected the popular resolutions and 124 00:16:16.140 --> 00:16:22.480 called for an inter-colonial congress of merchants to meet at Norwalk, Connecticut on June 18 125 00:16:22.480 --> 00:16:28.160 to adopt a uniform and clearly a far looser agreement. 126 00:16:28.160 --> 00:16:33.700 The idea of the Norwalk Congress was promptly rejected by the merchants of the other colonies. 127 00:16:33.700 --> 00:16:39.040 The Boston merchants unanimously rejected any idea of deviation from the agreement. 128 00:16:39.040 --> 00:16:43.760 And the merchants of Essex County, New Jersey, would only consider meeting to strengthen 129 00:16:43.760 --> 00:16:46.280 the boycott. 130 00:16:46.280 --> 00:16:49.680 The Philadelphia merchants also stood firm. 131 00:16:49.680 --> 00:16:55.600 Of all the American port towns, only Hartford agreed to send delegates. 132 00:16:55.600 --> 00:17:01.180 With the Norwalk Congress necessarily abandoned, the New York merchants moved towards scuttling 133 00:17:01.180 --> 00:17:04.040 the boycott by themselves. 134 00:17:04.040 --> 00:17:07.000 They employed a cunning device. 135 00:17:07.000 --> 00:17:12.840 Merchants went through New York City visiting each person individually and asking him whether 136 00:17:12.840 --> 00:17:20.320 he would vote for continuing the boycott provided Philadelphia and Boston concurred or for removing 137 00:17:20.320 --> 00:17:24.360 it on all commodities except tea. 138 00:17:24.360 --> 00:17:32.080 The merchants triumphantly reported an overwhelming, popular vote of confidence, 1,180 in favor 139 00:17:32.080 --> 00:17:59.080 The New York merchants then sent news of this vote to Boston and Philadelphia to win their agreement, but the other towns were singularly uninspired by a canvas that encouraged the maximum of implicit intimidation of the voters. 140 00:17:59.080 --> 00:18:03.080 Even the Hartford merchants refused to alter the boycott. 141 00:18:03.080 --> 00:18:14.080 The New York Radicals also pointed out that the poll was composed of only one-fourth of the eligible voters and excluded rural folk entirely. 142 00:18:14.080 --> 00:18:28.080 Undaunted by their inability to persuade the merchants, let alone the populace, of any other town to betray the non-importation movement, the merchants of New York decided to do it themselves. 143 00:18:28.080 --> 00:18:33.120 Although a public meeting called by the merchants overwhelmingly rejected the idea of another 144 00:18:33.120 --> 00:18:41.480 poll of individuals, the merchants organized a second canvas on July 7, this time asking 145 00:18:41.480 --> 00:18:48.720 whether people favored rescinding the boycott even though Philadelphia and Boston had refused. 146 00:18:48.720 --> 00:18:54.440 The radicals, led by Isaac Sears and Alexander McDougal, organized a public meeting the same 147 00:18:54.440 --> 00:19:02.400 The same day that voted unanimously to retain the boycott, that night two mobs clashed. 148 00:19:02.400 --> 00:19:09.120 The radicals, parading with the inscription, liberty and no importation but in union with 149 00:19:09.120 --> 00:19:19.720 the other colonies, were routed by a conservative mob armed with sticks led by Judge Elias Desprossis, 150 00:19:19.720 --> 00:19:23.440 president-elect of the New York Chamber of Commerce. 151 00:19:23.440 --> 00:19:30.440 Two days later, the merchants reported a popular victory in its highly irregular canvas. But 152 00:19:30.440 --> 00:19:38.840 the less than 800 yes votes were a minority, as against abstentions among those polled. 153 00:19:38.840 --> 00:19:43.860 But the committee of merchants was interested only in token face-saving, and that night 154 00:19:43.860 --> 00:19:51.260 they hastened to announce their resolve to import every British good except tea. The mighty 155 00:19:51.260 --> 00:19:59.220 Non-Importation Movement had been shattered on the rock of New York reaction. 156 00:19:59.220 --> 00:20:04.620 From that point on, the radical leadership in the colonies fought a valiant but doomed 157 00:20:04.620 --> 00:20:08.700 fight to preserve non-importation. 158 00:20:08.700 --> 00:20:12.940 When the Committee of Merchants of New York gloatingly informed the other colonies of 159 00:20:12.940 --> 00:20:17.540 their deed, angry reaction was quick to pour in from all sides. 160 00:20:17.540 --> 00:20:23.760 In Philadelphia, a great mass meeting of the city and county on July 14 condemned New York's 161 00:20:23.760 --> 00:20:30.640 action as a sordid and wanton defection from the common cause and announced a boycott against 162 00:20:30.640 --> 00:20:35.840 New York. The meeting of Boston merchants voted unanimously to burn the New York letter 163 00:20:35.840 --> 00:20:42.180 publicly. The Albany merchants blasted their New York City colleagues for unaccountable 164 00:20:42.180 --> 00:21:12.180 In New Jersey, indignation was particularly rife. Students at Princeton College, including James Madison, publicly burned the letter in a funeral service for the betrayed cause. Mass meetings in the towns of Woodbridge and New Brunswick, and in Essex, Sussex, Burlington, and Somerset counties, voted to censure and boycott New York. An unfortunate fruit peddler in Woodbridge, hailing from New Jersey, 165 00:21:12.180 --> 00:21:19.260 New York was dumped into a pond to cool as courage. In Connecticut, merchants and other 166 00:21:19.260 --> 00:21:25.300 individuals of New Haven resolved to boycott New York. An all-Connecticut meeting at New 167 00:21:25.300 --> 00:21:31.080 Haven on September 13, representing merchants and farmers from the great majority of towns 168 00:21:31.080 --> 00:21:38.160 in the colony, resolved to boycott all British imports from New York. The southern colonies 169 00:21:38.160 --> 00:21:43.600 These did not display as much zeal in denouncing New York's action, with the predictable 170 00:21:43.600 --> 00:21:50.440 exception of Charleston. There, a mass meeting on August 22 unanimously voted to punish New 171 00:21:50.440 --> 00:21:57.480 York's scandalous revolt from the common cause of freedom by an absolute boycott. This was 172 00:21:57.480 --> 00:22:04.680 no idle talk. Sea captains from New York were in subsequent months forbidden trading rights 173 00:22:04.680 --> 00:22:11.080 in Charleston's Port. In the southern colonies, reaction was much more diffuse, but Talbot 174 00:22:11.080 --> 00:22:16.640 County, Maryland resolved to support an absolute boycott of New York, and the merchants and 175 00:22:16.640 --> 00:22:23.640 inhabitants of Wilmington and Brunswick, North Carolina, unanimously reaffirmed the boycott. 176 00:22:23.640 --> 00:22:30.360 Although, as author Schlesinger writes, the patriotic indignation of the other provinces 177 00:22:30.360 --> 00:22:48.360 The Strain of New York's Merchants Obtaining Business that Could Go Elsewhere, was Too Much to Bear 178 00:22:48.360 --> 00:22:58.360 In Philadelphia, the seven dissident merchants joined with seven others to demand a house-to-house poll in the Craft in New York Manor 179 00:22:58.360 --> 00:23:13.360 When a committee of merchants, headed by Charles Thomson, refused, the dissident merchants managed to call a small public meeting of subscribers to the boycott on September 20 to gain a majority for rescinding the agreement. 180 00:23:13.360 --> 00:23:19.280 Agreement. On the flimsy pretext of this majority, the dissident merchants resolved 181 00:23:19.280 --> 00:23:26.160 to end the boycott except on tea and this despite a virtually unanimous advance vote 182 00:23:26.160 --> 00:23:32.280 by a mass meeting of Philadelphia citizens to continue the boycott and a similar vote 183 00:23:32.280 --> 00:23:39.400 of a Philadelphia grand jury. With New York and Philadelphia now fallen, could even mighty 184 00:23:39.400 --> 00:23:46.080 Boston be Far Behind? In mid-September a huge mass meeting of a thousand merchants 185 00:23:46.080 --> 00:23:51.640 and traders of Boston had urged on Philadelphia an inter-colonial Congress 186 00:23:51.640 --> 00:23:56.720 of Merchants to strengthen the agreement. But the call came too late and 187 00:23:56.720 --> 00:24:02.980 Philadelphia had irredeemably defected from the boycott. The bulk of Boston 188 00:24:02.980 --> 00:24:07.720 merchants had long been restive under the boycott and now they had their chance. 189 00:24:07.720 --> 00:24:17.480 On October 12, the Boston merchants unanimously voted to confine their boycott to tea. 190 00:24:17.480 --> 00:24:25.160 The great non-importation movement, to all intents and purposes, was ended. 191 00:24:25.160 --> 00:24:32.840 General Gage exalted that interest had thus triumphed over patriotism. 192 00:24:32.840 --> 00:24:38.640 With the great ports brought low, the other colonies could put up no further resistance. 193 00:24:38.640 --> 00:24:45.280 At a meeting of the General Committee of Maryland on October 25, the Baltimore merchants, led 194 00:24:45.280 --> 00:24:51.760 by Jonathan Hudson, affirmed their absolute determination to end the boycott and duly 195 00:24:51.760 --> 00:24:57.800 ignored the resolution of the meeting, which included assemblymen, counselors and planters, 196 00:24:57.800 --> 00:25:04.840 as well as merchants to abide by the agreements and to boycott any Baltimore violators. 197 00:25:04.840 --> 00:25:10.600 The merchants simply resumed all British imports except tea. 198 00:25:10.600 --> 00:25:18.160 In Virginia, never enthused about the agreements, non-importation would be quietly repealed early 199 00:25:18.160 --> 00:25:19.960 next July. 200 00:25:19.960 --> 00:25:24.960 In North Carolina, it simply disappeared without a trace. 201 00:25:24.960 --> 00:25:32.560 But South Carolina died hard. Radical sentiment dwindled, but was still strong. A general 202 00:25:32.560 --> 00:25:39.680 meeting of subscribers met on December 13 to decide South Carolina's course. Even now, 203 00:25:39.680 --> 00:25:46.400 though alone among the colonies, South Carolina's magnificent radical movement fought on. Thomas 204 00:25:46.400 --> 00:25:52.800 Lynch, planter and eminent radical leader, traveled fifty miles to plead with all his 205 00:25:52.800 --> 00:26:08.400 Sam Adams, for his part, denounced the defecting merchants who, like a spaniel, meanly cringed 206 00:26:08.400 --> 00:26:13.080 and kissed the rod that whipped them. 207 00:26:13.080 --> 00:26:19.000 Lynch was backed wholeheartedly by fellow leaders Christopher Gadsden and John McKenzie. 208 00:26:19.000 --> 00:26:25.760 The radicals urged continuing the boycott coupled with open importation of the banned goods 209 00:26:25.760 --> 00:26:34.020 from Holland, but their valiant effort was in vain, and even South Carolina surrendered. 210 00:26:34.020 --> 00:26:40.220 Notwithstanding, the assembly considered boycotting the northern provinces in protest against 211 00:26:40.220 --> 00:26:46.420 their betrayal, but finally abandoned the idea as punishing every northerner for the 212 00:26:46.420 --> 00:26:52.420 The Sins of Some of Their Merchants Unstated was the realization that a one-colony 213 00:26:52.420 --> 00:27:02.100 boycott would not be very effective. By the end of 1770, an uneasy stability had settled 214 00:27:02.100 --> 00:27:09.180 upon the American colonies. A few things had been achieved. The bulk of the Townsend duties 215 00:27:09.180 --> 00:27:17.000 These were now repealed, and the British troops were out of Boston. The non-importation movement 216 00:27:17.000 --> 00:27:23.720 had helped in the former, although its impact in Britain had been greatly lessened by coincidentally 217 00:27:23.720 --> 00:27:30.840 increased demands for British products on the continent, and violent rebellion in Boston 218 00:27:30.840 --> 00:27:33.980 had accomplished the latter. 219 00:27:33.980 --> 00:27:41.560 But the major towns and tax, on T, remained, as did the Customs Commissioners, who returned 220 00:27:41.560 --> 00:27:48.080 to Boston in December, the Vice Admiralty Courts, and their new hierarchical powers, 221 00:27:48.080 --> 00:27:51.840 and the previous Trade and Navigation Acts. 222 00:27:51.840 --> 00:27:57.640 British troops remained at Castle William, and the Navy was now stationed in Boston Harbor, 223 00:27:57.640 --> 00:28:03.520 Thus permitting Boston to remain as the potential center of future crisis. 224 00:28:03.520 --> 00:28:08.600 Ominous rumblings of threats against Boston and against the Massachusetts Charter were 225 00:28:08.600 --> 00:28:15.440 only temporarily dampened by the war crisis with Spain, as were intentions to make official 226 00:28:15.440 --> 00:28:20.920 salaries in the colonies independent of their assemblies. 227 00:28:20.920 --> 00:28:27.400 Peaceful resolution of the Spanish crisis in early 1771, by the way, further strengthened 228 00:28:27.400 --> 00:28:34.040 and the hold of the Tory North Ministry by discrediting the war hysteria of Chatham and 229 00:28:34.040 --> 00:28:36.920 Shelburne in opposition. 230 00:28:36.920 --> 00:28:42.880 The experience of the Townsend Crisis imparted certain lessons to the radical leaders in 231 00:28:42.880 --> 00:28:44.160 America. 232 00:28:44.160 --> 00:28:50.880 In the first place, it was clear that revolutionary violence was a powerful weapon against the 233 00:28:50.880 --> 00:28:57.840 of the British, where it could be employed as against stamp distributors, customs officers, 234 00:28:57.840 --> 00:29:03.640 or British troops, it either accomplished its task of getting rid of the oppressive 235 00:29:03.640 --> 00:29:10.640 officials or effectively mobilized mass support by raising popular indignation against the 236 00:29:12.000 --> 00:29:19.000 violence of the British. In some cases it is true as in the Battle of Golden Hill, violent 237 00:29:19.000 --> 00:29:26.120 Rebellion led to a victorious counter-revolutionary reaction, but these two consequences were 238 00:29:26.120 --> 00:29:28.640 not contradictory. 239 00:29:28.640 --> 00:29:34.560 In any case, violence radically polarized public opinion, and the question to be weighed 240 00:29:34.560 --> 00:29:39.760 was which newly polarized side would be the stronger. 241 00:29:39.760 --> 00:29:46.080 Since the revolutionary movement was a mass movement of the American people, in most cases 242 00:29:46.080 --> 00:29:50.280 Such polarization could only help the radical cause. 243 00:29:50.280 --> 00:29:56.440 Second, while voluntary boycott of British goods was certainly a vital weapon, it had 244 00:29:56.440 --> 00:30:03.500 proved most effective when used in conjunction with violence, as in the stamp crisis. 245 00:30:03.500 --> 00:30:09.080 When the boycott dragged on for several years, as in the Townsend crisis, inevitable strains 246 00:30:09.080 --> 00:30:14.240 might lead to a breach in the agreement, and one important breach was bound to end the 247 00:30:14.240 --> 00:30:15.240 movement. 248 00:30:15.240 --> 00:30:22.160 Furthermore, it was realized that a boycott movement confined to merchants would be particularly 249 00:30:22.160 --> 00:30:24.280 vulnerable to break up from within.