Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume X.djvu/298

 292 RICHARD HENRY LEE of the first named committee, and reported its papers. Mr. Jay wrote the address to the people of England ; that to the king was prob- ably Lee's; but that Lee wrote the memorial to the people of British America is undis- puted. This is one of the most masterly state papers of the period. It has been justly said to have " the double merit of including all the qualities which a public writing ought to pos- sess, and of excluding all that it ought not." It was in speaking of this memorial and the addresses to the king and people of England, that Chatham pronounced his celebrated eu- logy upon " the general congress at Philadel- phia." Lee's memorial declares in the second paragraph, with solemn earnestness, that " in every case of opposition by the people to their rulers or of one state to another, duty to Al- mighty God, the Creator of all, requires that a true and impartial judgment be formed of the measures leading to such opposition; . . . that, neither affection on the one hand, nor re- sentment on the other, being permitted to give a wrong bias to reason, it may be enabled to take a dispassionate view of all circumstances, and to settle the public conduct on the solid foundations of wisdom and justice." The equally solemn conclusion is : " We think our- selves bound in duty to observe to you that the schemes agitated against these colonies have been so conducted, as to render it pru- dent that you should extend your views to mournful events, and be in all respects pre- pared for every contingency." In the spring of 1775 Lee was unanimously elected by his neighbors of Westmoreland a delegate to the convention to meet at Richmond in March. He there powerfully supported Patrick Henry's motion for the prompt embodiment of the militia, and was placed upon the committee to prepare a plan of defence. The convention, which had already passed a vote of thanks to himself and his associated delegates, then ap- pointed him to the second congress. He ac- cordingly proceeded to Philadelphia in May, and was placed upon the committees to prepare munitions of war, to encourage the manufac- ture of saltpetre and arms, and to devise means for the prompt transmission of intelligence be- tween the colonies. As chairman of the com- mittee appointed for the purpose, he drew up the commission and instructions of Gen. Wash- ington as commander-in-chief of the armies of America. Lee's greatest public act at this time, however, was the preparation of the address to the inhabitants of Great Britain, the solemn and lofty tone of which places it in the first rank of American state papers. After a recital of the wrongs inflicted upon the colonies, it proceeds : "And shall the descendants of Britons tamely submit to this ? No, sirs ! we never will, while we revere the memory of our gallant and vir- tuous ancestors. . . . Admit that your fleets could destroy our towns, and ravage our sea- coasts ; these are inconsiderable objects, things of no moment, to men whose bosoms glow with the ardor of liberty. . . . Your ministers (equal foes to British and American freedom) have added to their former oppressions an at- tempt to reduce us by the sword to a base and abject submission. On the sword, therefore, we are compelled to rely for protection. Of this at least we are assured, that our struggle will be glorious, our success certain ; since even in death we shall find that freedom which in life you forbid us to enjoy." In May, 1776, the Virginia house of burgesses directed her delegates to propose to declare the colonies independent ; and at the request of his asso- ciates Lee accordingly moved " that these uni- ted colonies are and of right ought to be free and independent states ; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown ; and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain is and ought to be totally dissolved." Lee's speech upon intro- ducing the resolutions is said to have been one of the greatest that he ever delivered. They were seconded by John Adams, and a fiery de- bate immediately sprang up as to the propriety of the resolutions at that time, which lasted from the 7th to the 10th of June. On that day it was resolved that the subject should be postponed until the first Monday in July, and meanwhile, as the resolutions might be agreed to, that a committee should be appointed to draft a declaration of independence. Of this committee Lee, by established parliamentary usage, would have been the chairman ; but on the evening of the 10th he received sudden in- telligence of the dangerous illness of his wife, and returned immediately to Virginia. On the next day, the llth, the committee was ap- pointed, with Jefferson as chairman. In Au- gust Lee returned to his seat, and continued in the performance of his arduous public duties until June, 1777. During this time, indeed, he labored so uninterruptedly as seriously to in- jure his health. From the moment of his en- trance into congress to the middle of the year 1777 he had served upon about 100 important committees, generally acting as chairman, and performing the greater portion of the labor of all. On June 5 it was ordered by congress, "that Richard Henry Lee have leave of ab- sence, his health and private affairs requiring his return to Virginia." The private affair was a vindication of his character and public action from charges brought against him in the Virginia assembly, the effect of which had been to induce that body to leave him out in their recent appointment of delegates to the next congress. The indignation of Lee's friends was great. His brother, Francis Light- foot Lee, and Mann Page, jr., then in congress, taking fire at the condemnation of their asso- ciate "in his absence, without opportunity of defence," wrote to the speaker of the house, tendering a resignation of their seats. The people of Westmoreland, ever true to Lee, had already elected him a member of the assembly, and he promptly made his appearance bef or*