Page:Nature and Character of our Federal Government.djvu/28

 made no discrimination between them in the general course of her colonial policy. Their rights, as British subjects, had never been well defined; and some of the most important of these rights, as asserted by themselves, had been denied by the British crown. As early as 1765 a majority of the colonies had met together in congress, or convention, in New York, for the purpose of deliberating on these grave matters of common concern; and they then made a formal declaration of what they considered their rights, as colonists and British subjects. This measure, however, led to no redress of their grievances. On the contrary, the subsequent measures of the British government gave new and just causes of complaint; so that, in 1774, it was deemed necessary that *the colonies should again meet together, in order to consult upon their general condition, and provide for the safety of their common rights. Hence the congress which met at Carpenters' Hall, in Philadelphia, on the 5th of September, 1774. It consisted of delegates from New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut from the city and county of New York, and other counties in the province of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Newcastle, Kent, and Sussex in Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and South Carolina. North Carolina was not represented until the 14th September, and Georgia not at all. It is also apparent, that New York was not represented as a colony, but only through certain portions of her people; in like manner, Lyman Hall was admitted to