Page:Notes on the State of Virginia (1802).djvu/257

Rh The petition of the council and burgeſſes of Virginia to the king, their memorial to the lords, and remonſtrance to the commons in the year 1764, began the preſent conteſt; and theſe having proved ineffectual to prevent the paſſage of the ſtamp-act, the reſolutions of the houſe of burgeſſes of 1765 were paſſed, declaring the independence of the people of Virginia on the parliament of Great-Britain, in matters of taxation. From that time till declaration of independence by congreſs in 1776, their journals are filled with aſſertions of the pu b lic rights.

The pamphlets publiſhed in this ſtate on the controverted queſtion were,

1766, An Inquiery into the rights of the Britiſh colonies, by Richard Bland.

1769, The Monitor's Letters, by Dr. Arthur Lee.

1774, A ſummary View of the rights of Britiſh America.

1774, Conſiderations, &c. by Robert Carter Nicholas.

Since the declaration of independence this ſtate has had no controverſy with any other, except with that of Pennſylvania, on their common boundary. Some papers on this ſubject paſſed between the executive and legiſlative bodies of the two ſtates, the reſult of which was a happy accommodation of their rights.

To this account of our hiſtorians, memorials, and pamphlets, it may not be unuſeful to add a chronological catalogue of American ſtate-papers, as far as I have been able to collect their titles. It is far from being either complete or correct.