WEBVTT NOTE 76. Oppressing the Tories 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.000 Volume 4, Part 9, The Impact of the Revolution 2 00:00:05.000 --> 00:00:10.000 Volume 4, Chapter 76, Oppressing the Tories 3 00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:14.000 A myth has been promulgated by neoconservative historians 4 00:00:14.000 --> 00:00:19.000 that the American Revolution was a uniquely mild revolution, 5 00:00:19.000 --> 00:00:23.000 so mild as to be scarcely a revolution at all. 6 00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:28.000 In an America that now frowns strongly on the concept of revolution, 7 00:00:28.000 --> 00:00:33.000 This sort of mythologizing should not come as a surprise. 8 00:00:33.000 --> 00:00:40.000 The Revolutionary's treatment of its Tory minority, however, scarcely fits this myth. 9 00:00:40.000 --> 00:00:48.000 Civil War raged throughout the United States and Tory terror bans abounded in North and South. 10 00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:55.000 An estimated 50,000 American Tories joined the British Army during the course of the Revolution 11 00:00:55.000 --> 00:01:02.280 And during the 1780-81 campaign, 10,000 loyalists were under arms. 12 00:01:02.280 --> 00:01:07.200 In this kind of ferocious civil conflict, in which the life of the revolution itself 13 00:01:07.200 --> 00:01:14.380 was at stake, it is unreasonable to expect consistently libertarian methods of handling 14 00:01:14.380 --> 00:01:19.600 the Tories from even the most liberal supporters of the revolution. 15 00:01:19.600 --> 00:01:26.360 The 19th century Canadian historian Egerton Ryerson was quite right in pointing out the 16 00:01:26.360 --> 00:01:32.280 inconsistency of the revolutionaries. The Declaration of Independence had been made 17 00:01:32.280 --> 00:01:38.720 in the name of and for the professed purposes of liberty, but the very first acts under 18 00:01:38.720 --> 00:01:45.000 it were to deprive a large portion of the colonists not only of liberty of action, but 19 00:01:45.000 --> 00:01:48.040 What Liberty of Thought and Opinion 20 00:01:48.040 --> 00:01:52.760 Everywhere Tories were deprived of civil rights and freedom of speech and press. 21 00:01:52.760 --> 00:01:59.200 They were especially taxed and were arrested for the duration of the war on mere suspicion 22 00:01:59.200 --> 00:02:02.780 and without benefit of habeas corpus. 23 00:02:02.780 --> 00:02:08.200 They were herded together and shipped into prison camps far from the British lines in 24 00:02:08.200 --> 00:02:12.360 which they were sometimes forced to work for the revolution. 25 00:02:12.360 --> 00:02:17.520 They were tarred and feathered, banished, and their lands and properties were confiscated 26 00:02:17.520 --> 00:02:24.520 by the state. Sometimes they were even executed. They were forced to take test oaths, they 27 00:02:24.520 --> 00:02:30.240 were disfranchised and barred from public office, and they were generally forbidden 28 00:02:30.240 --> 00:02:37.120 to practice as professional men. In many cases, family punishment was imposed and relatives 29 00:02:37.120 --> 00:02:42.720 Victims of absent Tories were jailed for the behavior of their errant kinsmen and held 30 00:02:42.720 --> 00:02:44.800 as hostages. 31 00:02:44.800 --> 00:02:52.440 Local vigilante action kept watch on suspected Tories and imposed harsh penalties on them. 32 00:02:52.440 --> 00:02:57.760 Banishment from the country, with little money allowed to be taken out, was a favorite punishment 33 00:02:57.760 --> 00:03:00.600 for Tories and suspected Tories. 34 00:03:00.600 --> 00:03:08.880 Thus Massachusetts began its systematic policy of banishment in 1777 by providing for majorities 35 00:03:08.880 --> 00:03:14.700 at town meetings to name Tories and then to bring them to trial. 36 00:03:14.700 --> 00:03:18.160 Convicted Tories were to be deported at their own expense. 37 00:03:18.160 --> 00:03:23.800 The following year Massachusetts imposed a test oath for which refusal to sign would 38 00:03:23.800 --> 00:03:25.800 bring banishment. 39 00:03:25.800 --> 00:03:31.380 After that year Massachusetts went further to bring into practice the hated and tyrannical 40 00:03:31.380 --> 00:03:38.520 act of a tainter, a legislative declaration of guilt without benefit of trial. 41 00:03:38.520 --> 00:03:45.480 Two hundred and sixty suspected Tories were attainted, imprisoned and banished. 42 00:03:45.480 --> 00:03:50.900 How far even the liberals were inclined to go may be illustrated by Thomas Jefferson's 43 00:03:50.900 --> 00:03:54.920 action in the case of Josiah Phillips. 44 00:03:54.920 --> 00:04:01.000 Phillips had organized a Tory terror gang in Princess Anne County, Virginia. 45 00:04:01.000 --> 00:04:06.600 As a member of the Virginia Assembly, Jefferson pushed through a bill of attainder and outlawry, 46 00:04:06.600 --> 00:04:13.040 declaring Phillips guilty of murder, plunder and high treason, and proclaiming Phillips 47 00:04:13.040 --> 00:04:20.040 and all of his unnamed associates to be outlaws, whom any man could kill with impunity. 48 00:04:20.040 --> 00:04:27.040 Thus, Jefferson was willing to use a hated and despotic outlawry procedure rarely used 49 00:04:27.040 --> 00:04:34.440 in the American colonies and dying out even then in comparatively statist England. 50 00:04:34.440 --> 00:04:42.460 The Continental Congress, in October 1775, urged the imprisonment of anyone who might, 51 00:04:42.460 --> 00:04:47.360 in the opinion of the provincial committees of safety, endanger the safety of the colony 52 00:04:47.360 --> 00:04:54.260 of the Liberties of America, and two years later it recommended confiscation of the property 53 00:04:54.260 --> 00:05:01.300 of all Tories who had supposedly forfeited their right of protection, but Congress could 54 00:05:01.300 --> 00:05:07.400 merely recommend only the states and localities could take action against the Tories, one 55 00:05:07.400 --> 00:05:14.200 such state program of action against its Tories has been subjected to detailed study, that 56 00:05:14.200 --> 00:05:16.640 of New Jersey. 57 00:05:16.640 --> 00:05:21.600 As in the other states, enforcement was in the hands of the Attorney General, in this 58 00:05:21.600 --> 00:05:24.160 case William Patterson. 59 00:05:24.160 --> 00:05:30.700 The chief centers of legal prosecution were the 13 county courts in New Jersey, composed 60 00:05:30.700 --> 00:05:34.780 of local justices of the peace sitting together. 61 00:05:34.780 --> 00:05:42.200 But the traditional legal machinery proved too cumbersome a weapon, and in early 1777, 62 00:05:42.200 --> 00:05:48.120 New Jersey set up a Council of Safety, chosen by the Legislature and including the Attorney 63 00:05:48.120 --> 00:05:55.600 General, armed with the power to jail any man even suspected of Toryism. 64 00:05:55.600 --> 00:06:01.400 The Council of Safety travelled all over the state, whipping up the zeal of local officials 65 00:06:01.400 --> 00:06:09.720 and often taking the administration of anti-Tory law into its own hands, hearing witnesses, 66 00:06:09.720 --> 00:06:15.240 Ordering the Seizure of Suspects and the Imprisonment of Alleged Tories. 67 00:06:15.240 --> 00:06:24.160 In one day, in July 1777, the New Jersey Council of Safety arrested no fewer than 48 suspected 68 00:06:24.160 --> 00:06:25.160 Tories. 69 00:06:25.160 --> 00:06:31.120 Juridical safeguards were disregarded, and Patterson could, for example, indict as well 70 00:06:31.120 --> 00:06:32.760 as prosecute. 71 00:06:32.760 --> 00:06:38.160 In practice, in fact, Attorney General Patterson did most of the Council's work. 72 00:06:38.160 --> 00:06:44.680 Anyone making seditious remarks, however slight, or failing to turn out for militia duty, was 73 00:06:44.680 --> 00:06:50.960 apt to be suspected and denounced as a Tory, and also to be forced to take a test oath 74 00:06:50.960 --> 00:06:54.100 swearing loyalty to the revolution. 75 00:06:54.100 --> 00:07:02.880 The peak of Tory prosecution in New Jersey took place during 1777 and 1778, when almost 76 00:07:02.880 --> 00:07:05.600 all the cases were prosecuted. 77 00:07:05.600 --> 00:07:13.420 By October 1778, New Jersey was presumably cleansed of Tories and the Council of Safety 78 00:07:13.420 --> 00:07:15.620 was dissolved. 79 00:07:15.620 --> 00:07:22.660 As we have remarked, the Revolution did not spare its Tories the ultimate penalty, execution. 80 00:07:22.660 --> 00:07:29.960 Two were hanged in Philadelphia in 1778 and several were executed in North Carolina. 81 00:07:29.960 --> 00:07:36.120 Many active Tories were executed by state militia and guerrilla bands, and many armed 82 00:07:36.120 --> 00:07:42.300 Tory prisoners were executed in reprisal for British killings of rebels. 83 00:07:42.300 --> 00:07:48.560 The eminent historian Robert R. Palmer has offered a critically important comparison 84 00:07:48.560 --> 00:07:54.720 of the degree of radicalism in the American and French revolutions, the number of emigres 85 00:07:54.720 --> 00:07:59.780 who felt compelled to flee the country during the revolution. 86 00:07:59.780 --> 00:08:09.540 The French Revolution created 129,000 exiles out of a total population of about 25 million, 87 00:08:09.540 --> 00:08:14.240 an emigre ratio of 5 per 1,000. 88 00:08:14.240 --> 00:08:21.700 The American Tory emigres amounted to what Palmer very conservatively sets at 60,000 89 00:08:21.700 --> 00:08:40.700 In a population of about 2.5 million, 24 emigres per 1,000. But at least half a million of the American population were slaves who could hardly be considered to be in the same category as other inhabitants of the colonies. 90 00:08:40.700 --> 00:08:47.740 A more likely estimate for Tory emigration in the Revolution is 100,000. 91 00:08:47.740 --> 00:08:54.580 At this corrected rate, 50 Americans out of every 1,000 were emigres during the Revolution, 92 00:08:54.580 --> 00:09:02.020 a rate fully tenfold the exile rate in the supposedly more radical French Revolution. 93 00:09:02.020 --> 00:09:09.580 Furthermore, as Palmer reminds us, an important nucleus of conservatism was permanently lost 94 00:09:09.580 --> 00:09:16.740 to the United States. The French emigres returned to France. The emigres from the American Revolution 95 00:09:16.740 --> 00:09:24.180 did not return. They peopled the Canadian wilderness, for example, New Brunswick. Only 96 00:09:24.180 --> 00:09:30.300 individuals without political influence drifted back to the United States. Anyone who knows 97 00:09:30.300 --> 00:09:35.580 the significance for France of the return of the emigres will ponder the importance 98 00:09:35.580 --> 00:09:41.500 for the United States of this fact which is so easily overlooked because negative and 99 00:09:41.500 --> 00:09:48.660 invisible except in a comparative view. Americans have really forgotten the loyalist. The sense 100 00:09:48.660 --> 00:09:54.780 in which there was no conflict in the American Revolution is the sense in which the loyalists 101 00:09:54.780 --> 00:10:01.180 are forgotten. The American consensus rests in some degree on the elimination from the 102 00:10:01.180 --> 00:10:10.180 and the National Consciousness as well as from the country of a once important and relatively numerous element of dissent. 103 00:10:10.180 --> 00:10:15.180 As the revolution wore on and finances became tight, 104 00:10:15.180 --> 00:10:22.180 confiscation of Tory land became an increasingly tempting method of financing the war, 105 00:10:22.180 --> 00:10:27.180 certainly a method of reparation more just than inflation. 106 00:10:27.180 --> 00:10:36.180 Confiscation began as a method employed by scattered private individuals operating on what might be called the homestead principle. 107 00:10:36.180 --> 00:10:47.180 Individuals, nearby rebel soldiers and local committees expropriated the treasures, livestock, timber, furniture and clothing of Tory families. 108 00:10:47.180 --> 00:10:54.180 Private appropriation of the property of Tories was not prosecuted as theft by the authorities. 109 00:10:54.180 --> 00:11:02.180 At this point, the states stepped in, deciding to stake out booty from Tories for their own privileged use. 110 00:11:02.180 --> 00:11:10.180 Tom Paine, in common sense, had advanced the idea of seizing Tory property to finance the revolution, 111 00:11:10.180 --> 00:11:17.180 and the Congressional Resolution of late 1777 spurred the states to follow this advice. 112 00:11:17.180 --> 00:11:32.180 Generally, the states first sequestered Tory-owned lands to themselves, and then later sold the lands at auction, the state pocketing the proceeds. In this way, Tory lands were redistributed throughout the country. 113 00:11:32.180 --> 00:11:41.180 Every state carried out the confiscation of Tory property, although the specific procedures often varied from state to state. 114 00:11:41.180 --> 00:11:48.180 Generally, the states seized Tory property by a tender, with no provision for jury trial. 115 00:11:48.180 --> 00:11:53.180 In some cases, the regular executive officers conducted operations. 116 00:11:53.180 --> 00:11:56.180 In others, special commissions were appointed. 117 00:11:56.180 --> 00:12:01.180 Auction sales were often made on credit to ease the burden on purchasers, 118 00:12:01.180 --> 00:12:09.180 and sometimes payment could be made in state treasurer's certificates issued to public creditors in the state. 119 00:12:09.180 --> 00:12:20.180 No Tories were permitted to buy the estates and this effectively prohibited collusive purchases by Tory friends of the expropriated. 120 00:12:20.180 --> 00:12:34.180 It is instructive to note the moral justification that a largely liberal society gave for the blatantly uncompensated confiscation of the property of the American Tories. 121 00:12:34.180 --> 00:13:04.180 The Virginia House of Delegates declared, at the end of 1782, that the confiscation laws were strongly dictated by that principle of common justice, which demands that if virtuous citizens, in defense of their natural rights, risk their life, liberty and property, on their success, vicious citizens who side with tyranny and oppression, or cloak themselves under the mask of neutrality, should at least hazard their 122 00:13:04.180 --> 00:13:10.180 and not enjoy the labors and dangers of those whose destruction they wished. 123 00:13:10.180 --> 00:13:20.180 The result of this redistribution was a significantly more democratic and less concentrated ownership of land in the country. 124 00:13:20.180 --> 00:13:26.180 For many large Tory estates were broken up by the confiscation process. 125 00:13:26.180 --> 00:13:33.180 Indeed, state policy was to divide up the large estates and sell them in small tracts 126 00:13:33.940 --> 00:13:40.460 to prevent dangerous monopolies of land. In North Carolina there was considerable redistribution 127 00:13:40.460 --> 00:13:47.260 of land and at low prices that small farmers could afford. Thus the vast holdings of the 128 00:13:47.260 --> 00:13:54.260 noted Tory, Henry McCullough, were confiscated by the state and sold to eighty separate families. 129 00:13:54.260 --> 00:13:59.700 in the United States, such large estates as those of Tories John Wentworth in New Hampshire, 130 00:13:59.700 --> 00:14:07.660 Sir William Peperell in Maine, and Sir James Wright in Georgia were confiscated and redistributed, 131 00:14:07.660 --> 00:14:14.460 and various proprietary lands in Maryland, the Penn families in Pennsylvania, Lord Fairfax's 132 00:14:14.460 --> 00:14:19.980 tract in the northern neck of Virginia, and Lord Granville's in North Carolina were swept 133 00:14:19.980 --> 00:14:21.260 away. 134 00:14:21.260 --> 00:14:26.700 Where quit rents abolished, they were confiscated by the state and resold to separate private 135 00:14:26.700 --> 00:14:34.320 owners. In this way, the revolution swept away these important remnants of feudalism. 136 00:14:34.320 --> 00:14:40.420 On the other hand, Penn's private manors in Pennsylvania and their quit rents, totaling 137 00:14:40.420 --> 00:14:49.700 over 500,000 acres, were reconfirmed by the Pennsylvania legislature rather than confiscated. 138 00:14:49.700 --> 00:14:56.100 Lord Granville's estate, it should be remembered, constituted one-third of North Carolina, while 139 00:14:56.100 --> 00:15:03.700 Fairfax's northern neck domain totaled over five million acres. Interestingly enough, 140 00:15:03.700 --> 00:15:10.500 Lord Fairfax had settled down in permanent residence in Virginia in the 1740s, and he 141 00:15:10.500 --> 00:15:18.700 was never a Tory. Virginia, therefore, graciously waited until his death to confiscate his estate, 142 00:15:18.700 --> 00:15:24.780 A sign that elimination of this feudal land monopoly was a concern of Virginians, separate 143 00:15:24.780 --> 00:15:30.860 from the urge to punish Tories. Furthermore, land monopoly was significantly attacked by 144 00:15:30.860 --> 00:15:39.180 the confiscation, division and sale of ungranted royal estates and timberlands in New Hampshire, 145 00:15:39.180 --> 00:15:44.980 New York and the southern states. Whenever the state has privileges to dispense, they 146 00:15:44.980 --> 00:15:51.980 They will tend to be granted to the state officials themselves, or their favorites, or to be sold to the highest bidder. 147 00:15:51.980 --> 00:16:00.980 Hence, inevitably, corruption and special privilege entered into the lucrative disposal of the confiscated lands. 148 00:16:00.980 --> 00:16:05.980 Haskett shows this process of privilege as it developed in New Jersey. 149 00:16:05.980 --> 00:16:10.980 Confiscations and dispositions were made by appointed county commissioners. 150 00:16:10.980 --> 00:16:15.980 These commissioners were therefore suppliers of special privileges. 151 00:16:15.980 --> 00:16:30.980 Accordingly, they generally failed to advertise the land sales, doctored the auditing of the assets and rigged the bidding so as to sell the land parcels to favored buyers at bargain prices. 152 00:16:30.980 --> 00:16:39.980 Moreover, the county commissioners often kept the sale money, invested it for their personal accounts and only paid the money into the government later. 153 00:16:39.980 --> 00:17:02.980 in highly depreciated currency. Indeed, one shrewd commissioner of Somerset County, Frederic Frelinghuysen, ended up as owner of two of the seven confiscated estates he helped to sell. By 1781, New Jersey had only received $28,000 from its sales of land. 154 00:17:02.980 --> 00:17:10.100 of Land. Neither Attorney General Patterson nor the Assembly ever acted to stop this wholesale 155 00:17:10.100 --> 00:17:17.100 corruption. Not surprisingly, since Patterson was an old friend of Freilin Heisen, indeed 156 00:17:17.100 --> 00:17:23.820 both Patterson and his brother-in-law became owners of confiscated Somerset estates. In 157 00:17:23.820 --> 00:17:30.860 fact, Freilin Heisen, Patterson and Patterson's family wound up as owners of over half the 158 00:17:30.860 --> 00:17:35.260 and the confiscated Tory estates in Somerset County. 159 00:17:35.260 --> 00:17:41.520 Yet despite the widespread corruption, land distribution in New Jersey was still significantly 160 00:17:41.520 --> 00:17:47.220 broadened and made more democratic as a result of the revolution. 161 00:17:47.220 --> 00:17:54.220 Over 500 Tory estates in the state were confiscated, parceled out and sold in New Jersey.