THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 173 



was colonial redress ; to that, and not to independence did tlie first 

 Congress direct its thoughts, its words, its action. The events of that 

 time followed in such quick succession, leading so rapidly on to inde- 

 pendence, and now seen to be so rapidly connected with such a result, that 

 we are apt to forget that independent existence as a nation was not, for 

 some time after the contest began, aimed at, or even desired. The heart 

 of the people felt and avowed a sincere and natural reluctance to break 

 away from an ancient allegiance. Thus contemplating a continuance 

 of the colonial condition and not looking beyond it, the desire was to 

 render colonial resistance as effective as possible, by bringing as 

 large an amount of it as possible to l)ear on the ministry and parliament. 

 Accordingly repeated exertions were made to induce all the colonies to 

 make common cause. The Congress, composed at first of the delega- 

 tions of twe;lve colonies, from New Hampshire to South Carolina, 

 appealed to the other colonies. Nova Scotia, St. Johns, and earnestly 

 and urgently to Canada. The addresses to these British provinces fill 

 a large space in the journal of the first Congress. The hope was that 

 all British America might be brought to think, feel, and to act in unison 

 in a cause then regarded as a temporary one, simply colonial redress, 

 the restoration of a former colonial policy with which the colonist was 

 content. 



And here let me remark in passing that this attempted policy of gen- 

 eral colonial co-operation appears to me to explain both the use and the 

 disuse of a term which for several years was a very familiar one, but 

 afterwards became obsolete in our political vocabulary and for a long time 

 has had only a historical significance. I refer to the word " continentaV 

 as employed both formally a*nd familiarly in the titles "the coniintntal 

 Congress," " the contuicntal Army," and in a phrase of less agreeable 

 association '' the co7?^i??c;itoZ Currenc3^" The term was an appropiiate 

 one when it was meditated to make the colonial resistance co-extensive 

 with the British communities on the continent; and such was the plan 

 when the word came into use, and it passed into disuse when it was 

 at length ascertained that such enlarged co-operation was not to be ac- 

 complished, but that out of the conflict there was to arise a new nation- 

 ality not co-extensive with the continental extent of British power in 

 America. 



The second Congress, I mean that of 1775, clung to the same hope 

 and the same policy of colonial combination on the most enlarged scale ; 

 and this feeling continued even after the beginning.of hostilities. Again 

 did Congress address to the non-participant provinces elaborate appeals 

 and invitations : again did they communicate arguments to Canada to 

 demonstrate the hidden perils of the Quebec bill, to showthe superiorit}' 

 of the common law over the civil law, to expound rehgious toleration, 

 persuading the French Canadian that Roman Cathohc and Protestant 

 might dwell together securely and harmoniously as in the cantons of 

 Switzerland. 



Nay, further, the Congress indulged the expectation of even more 

 than cis-Atlantic opposition, for it sent its voice from Philadelphia 

 across the sea to the people of Ireland. In the earliest scheme of con- 

 federation — that submitted to Congress by Dr. Franklin, in July, 1775 

 — one of the articles expressly provided for the admission of Ireland, 



