250 and Counting

Tag: Second Continental Congress

  • July 28, 1775: Reaching Out to Ireland

    Cover art for July 28, 1775: Detail of a broadside of Congress' July 28 declaration to Ireland, as published in a Connecticut newspaper on August 16, 1775

    We told you a short time ago about a document sent to Canada by the Second Continental Congress. It outlined the reasons we got into a shooting match with Britain. It also made a point of noting that we’re not asking them to join us, but we wouldn’t complain too loudly if they did. The Canadians declined and they maintain a connection to Britain even as an independent nation. (As this is written, King Charles III is considered the King of Canada.)

    Some time later, Congress sent a similar letter to Jamaica. For what it’s worth, Jamaica is still a “commonwealth realm”, with Charles III as king. (We didn’t do an episode on that one, but it also happened around this time.)

    And on this day in 1775, Congress sent yet another letter to Ireland. The Irish also managed to stick with the Mother Country for a while, but finally broke away themselves a few years ago.

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  • July 27, 1775: The Army Hospital is Born

    Cover art for July 27, 1775: Posthumous portrait of Dr. Benjamin Church, based on "contemporary description."

    The Continental Congress thought they had a strong candidate in Dr. Benjamin Church as their Surgeon General. And while Church was a generally good doctor as such, and a loyal member of the Sons of Liberty, he wasn’t especially good at leading others to do the same. This eventually turned into a big problem that came to a head in October, when George Washington needed to step in.

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  • July 25, 1775: Early Drafts of History

    Cover art for July 25, 1775: Portrait of Thomas Jefferson. 1791, by Charles Wilson Peale

    First off, let me note that sometime this week we cracked the 1,000-download mark, and we have you to thank for that, especially inasmuch as 40% of that took place in the last 30 days or so. We’re grateful that you’re giving us this little slice of your life each day. We’re also happy to see that the number of daily downloads has grown, slowly but surely, so consider yourself ahead of the curve. You’ve got bragging rights, my friend.

    In yesterday’s episode, Mike teased the commandeering and re-outfitting of a British ship, but further research revealed that that took place on a different date, so we went with this short story plus my longer rant about historical documents.

    Okay…it’s not so much a rant as it is a hissy fit.

    It’s not even that. Look, just listen to it, all right?

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  • July 24, 1775: A Leaked Letter From Someone Who Knows Better

    Cover art for July 24, 1775: Engraving of John Dickinson, approximately mid-1770s, from the New York Public Library Digital Collection.

    Even when it’s Mike’s voice you hear on the episode, it’s Claude who takes the blame for the episode titles.

    It wasn’t a bad thing for members of the Continental Congress to disagree, but some level of decorum was still expected from those members. And almost certainly, one of the commandments was Thou Shalt Not Trash Talk Thy Fellow Delegate. (I may have softened the language a little bit, there.)

    Still, Adams had a right to express whatever frustration he had with John Dickinson, unfortunately the letter in which he did it got intercepted by the British and publicly published; the mere suggestion that there was some dissention among the ranks of a group that typically presented its work as a united front was certainly a Big Deal.

    And it certainly didn’t grease the skids between Adams and Dickinson, nor was that rift ever truly healed.

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  • July 23, 1775: John Adams Has Opinions

    Cover art for July 23, 1775: Portrait of John Adams by Mather Brown, 1788.

    John Adams wrote to his wife twice on this day in 1775. What did you do for your spouse that was such a big deal?

    In these letters, the sparks don’t fly the way they do in many others, but the affection he feels for her is still present nonetheless. That he took the time to write a second, more thoughtful letter after dashing off the first one is a nice measure of his esteem for her, and his ability to use her as a sounding board, even when she’s 300 miles and several days’ travel apart.

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  • July 20, 1775: A Tradition Begins

    Cover art for July 20, 1775: a copy of the original broadside proclaiming the day of fasting, humiliation and prayer.

    As long as we’ve had a Constitution, the United States has had a nominal separation between church and state. What that means is that Congress isn’t able to establish a state-sanctioned religion.

    For longer than we’ve had a Constitution, Congress has proclaimed days of prayer of some kind or another.

    For a long time, these days were announced not as a National Day of Prayer (the current nomenclature), but rather as “a day of fasting, prayer and humiliation.” Now, this isn’t the old Christian kind of humiliation in which haircoats are worn, or self-flagellation is necessary. In this context, “humiliation” refers to self-reflection and expression of sorrow or remorse before God.

    In 1988 televangelist Jimmy Swaggert (who died just a couple of weeks ago) was caught with a prostitute. When he cried on television and gave his “I have sinned” speech, he was humiliating himself before God. Even if he hadn’t done it in front of an audience, it would still be an act of humiliation. Oddly enough, the national presbytery wasn’t buying it as genuine and stripped him of his credentials anyway. And they were right, considering that he was busted a second time with a prostitute a few years later.

    Anyway.

    “Fasting” and “prayer” retain their meanings to this day, so explanations probably aren’t necessary here. It’s worth noting, however, that fasting is meant to have a spiritual purpose and again, can show some level of humility.

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  • July 15, 1775: Breakin’ the Law With Impunity

    Cover art for July 15, 1775: Portrait of Silas Deane by William Johnston, 1766.

    If you’re going to be in rebellion, you may as well do something rebellious.

    Thus was (presumably) the reasoning behind Ben Franklin putting forth a resolution that the Colonies would effectively ignore a ban on the importation of weapons and gunpowder to the Colonies.

    And while we’ve mentioned numerous times that the Congress doesn’t seem to do a lot more than form various Committees, again we need to stress that these were serious men, who gave serious thought to whatever they presented to the larger group, because they knew that any votes had to be unanimous. They took the job with great gravity, and in fact worked long hours. And in Philadelphia in the summer time…that is no joke, my friend. I mentioned it in a Baltimore context during the show, but remember that these cities aren’t very far apart, and thus have similar climates.

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  • July 13, 1775: Speech to the Six Nations

    Cover art for July 13, 1775: Line drawing of the approximate locations of the Upstate New York Tribes in the 1700s.

    The Speech to the Six Nations is one of those documents that pretty much answers what was going on with the Native Americans during the Revolution. Athough to be fair, it largely addresses what happened with the Native Americans in Upstate New York. But that area, being a border with Canada, was pretty important to the Independence cause.

    Part of the reason that the tribes took the document seriously is that each tribe received a series of belts which represented our intent and desire for peace. The belts themselves were reportedly larger than usual for such a task, in the hopes that the tribe leaders would understand the gravity of the situation.

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  • July 6, 1775: The Declaration Before The Declaration

    Cover art for July 6, 1775: Detail of a broadside published in Portsmouth, NH relating the Declaration adopted on this date. (from Library of Congress digital collection)

    Note: I realized belatedly that the episode that dropped yesterday was titled July 7, as was the audio file itself, but if you’ve listened, you know that it was in fact the July 5 file and what we’ve got here are a couple of typos that have mostly been fixed. My apologies for the error and thanks for your forbearance.

    While the Olive Branch Petition was a step toward reconciliation, and the Declaration that Congress adopted today was meant to be in the same vein, in fact it had the opposite effect. Even though the Olive Branch Petition arrived late, the fact that this one, outlining why we’re willing to go to war, effectively cancelled out the other one. Not that it mattered anyway, since King George III declared the Colonies to be in rebellion before he ever saw either one. Plus, much of Parliament was in the mood to squash the Colonies as flat as possible.

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  • July 5, 1775: The Olive Branch Petition

    When the Second Continental Congress convened in May, there was a large faction of delegates who thought that peace with England was still possible, and made a specific effort to draft a message of reconciliation with King George III.

    They finished their document and presented it to the whole body of Congress on this day in 1775, which approved it and it was subsequently prepared and sent to Great Britain. In a few weeks we’ll talk a little bit about what happened at the other end.

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    Note: I realize that the file reads “July 7,” as did the headline on this post originally. That was a typo that got carried over from one to the other via copy and paste. This was in fact the July 5 file and apologies for any confusion.