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wards made use of the same remedy in other cases with the same happy effect.

The integrity and decision of character which Dr. Bartlett possessed in an eminent degree, soon attracted the attention and confidence of his fellow citizens. He was first appointed to the magistracy, and, after filling various honourable offices, finally attained the highest dignities of the state. About the period of his nomination as a magistrate, he was also appointed by governor Wentworth to the command of a regiment of militia, in which he discharged his duties with promptness and fidelity.

In the year 1765, Dr. Bartlett began his political career, as the representative of the town of Kingston in the legislature of the province of New Hampshire, Benning Wentworth being at that time governor, who was superseded in 1767 in favour of his nephew, John Wentworth. Dr. Bartlett was surprised at the mercenary views and actions of the royal governor, and at the debasing subserviency of a majority of the legislature, who were entirely guided by his will. Being himself a stern republican, devoted to the welfare of his country, the performance of his duties necessarily created many unpleasant feelings in his mind: he was compelled frequently to oppose the royal policy, and, included in a small but honourable minority, to vote against flagrant violations of right, and unwarrantable usurpations.

Benning Wentworth, the former governor, had granted charters for a number of towns, reserving some of the best rights for himself, and valuable tracts for the benefit of the episcopal church. The new governor re-granted several towns which his predecessor had before chartered, and chartered new towns interfering with the former grants, taking care to follow the example of the late governor by appropriating some of the best lands in each grant to himself. The

injured parties and their friends, together with all those who valued rectitude in public proceedings, strongly complained of this infringement of common justice. The greater part of the people were also puritans in sentiment, and disliked the grants to the church of England: they suspected that the British government intended artfully to establish that kind of religion in America. This produced jealousies and collisions between the governor and his party, and the patriots and aggrieved people: Dr. Bartlett took an active part in support of the latter, as one of the then minority.

But although this was a matter of considerable interest and importance to the province, and claimed the attention of the zealous and patriotic representatives of the people, other subjects infinitely dearer to them had been arising for some years and had now become of sufficient consequence to absorb all others, and exercise more deeply the political sagacity and firmness, alike of those in power and those who were determined to support all popular privileges. This was the controversy between Great Britain and her colonies. Governor Wentworth, a man of much sagacity, early saw the advantage of uniting with the royal cause, those who had already obtained an influence in the province by their talents, integrity or zeal. With this view he appointed Dr. Bartlett, notwithstanding his opposition, a justice of the peace, an office not very considerable in itself, but which showed the inclinations of the governor, and was an opening to future favours should they be merited by a corresponding subservience. The attempt, however, was abortive; he was not to be allured from his duty and principles by executive patronage; and at the session held in June, 1768, we find him resolutely opposing a grant called for by the governor.

The current of discord between England and the province continued to flow with increasing strength until the year 1774, and unceasing bickerings between the assembly and the governor gave constant accessions to the minority. To prevent their becoming a majority, the governor called, by the king's writ, three members from three new townships, whilst many other towns, of much older standing, and more populous, were neglected, and never enjoyed the privilege of representation except in the newly established conventions. Among these new representatives was a colonel Trenton, whose bold and overbearing conduct in the house disgusted many of the wavering members. This political manœuvre highly exasperated the assembly against the governor.

Dr. Bartlett was a zealous and active member, and invariably acted upon principles of patriotism, and in support of the rights of the people. Private meetings of the leaders of opposition, the principal among whom were Dr. Bartlett, Dr. Thompson, Colonel Giddinge, and Colonel Nathaniel Folsom, were held. At the meeting of the assembly in the spring of 1774, the house of representatives, conformably to the proceedings of the assemblies in the other colonies, appointed a committee of correspondence. The governor immediately dissolved the assembly, hoping by that means to dissolve the committee also. But they were not restricted by forms, and being summoned by the committee, the representatives re-assembled, and addressed circulars to all the towns in the province, requesting them to send deputies to hold a convention at Exeter, for the purpose of choosing delegates to a general congress, to meet in Philadelphia in September, 1774. A committee of safety was appointed, of which colonel Weare was elected president, and colonel Thompson, secretary. On the twenty-first of July, 1774, the congress convened at Exeter met, and consisted of eighty

five members, who elected Dr. Bartlett, and John Pickering, Esq., a lawyer of Portsmouth, as delegates to the proposed general congress. The latter gentleman refused the appointment, and Dr. Bartlett having recently lost his house by fire, was also compelled to decline. Nathaniel Folsom and John Sullivan were then appointed, and empowered to attend and assist in the general congress of delegates from the other colonies, and aid the prosecution of such measures as might have the most likely tendency to extricate the colonies from the serious difficulties in which they were involved, to secure and perpetuate their rights, liberties and privileges, and to restore that peace, harmony and mutual confidence which once happily subsisted between them and the parent country.

Dr. Bartlett, however, retained his seat in the provincial assembly, and continued to oppose himself with unabating vigour to the arbitrary designs of the British ministry. The collisions between the governor and assembly indeed were now continual, and the former was obliged to resort to repeated prorogations; these he continued until the year 1775, when it became manifest, from the obstinacy of the British parliament and royal governors, that either a civil war or submission to slavery would speedily take place. In the month of February, 1775, Dr. Bartlett received very flattering testimonials of the spirited and patriotic tenor of his conduct: he was formally notified by the clerk of the court of common pleas under governor Wentworth, that his name was erased from the commission of the peace for the county of Rockingham, and received a letter, bearing the same date, advising him that the governor had, with the advice of counsel, dismissed him from his command in the militia. Colonel Thompson and many other leaders of the whigs were honoured in the same manner.

The events of the year 1775 imposed arduous duties upon the committee of safety, several of whom, and, among the rest Dr. Bartlett, were members of the colonial assembly, in which a strong majority had become opposed to governor Wentworth. On the fourth of May he summoned a new assembly, and determined, as he said, "to plant the root of peace in New Hampshire," he laid before them the proposal made and voted in parliament, which was called lord North's conciliatory proposition, at the same time earnestly entreating them to direct their counsels to such measures, as might effectually lead to an affectionate reconciliation with the mother country. The house desired a short recess, that they might consult with their constituents on so momentous a question, and the governor reluctantly consented to adjourn them till the twelfth of June. But the American blood, which had, on the nineteenth of April, been shed at Lexington, and the absurd and inconsistent conduct of general Gage, who had despatched the expedition against Concord, upon the same day that he issued writs for calling a general assembly in Massachusetts, to consider the proposed terms of reconciliation, had highly exasperated the people: they could neither recognize the spirit of conciliation, nor repose confidence in the propositions of parliament, when accompanied with barbarous acts of hostility.

At the adjourned meeting of the twelfth of June, the governor again recommended "the conciliatory proposition;" but the first step taken by the house, in obedience to the voice of the convention, was to expel the three members whom the governor had summoned by the king's writ; upon which he adjourned the assembly to the eleventh of July. Colonel Trenton, one of the expelled members, having freely indulged in abusive language out of doors, was assaulted by the popuVOL. I.-L1

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