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torial domain of Great Britain, (which domain all 

 civilians define to be an absolute right of soil, and of 

 water within a marine league from the shore.) 



If our title be derived from possession when did that 

 possession commence ? Did it commence on the day of 

 the settlement of Jamestown, or Plymouth ; of the cap 

 ture of Louisbourgh ; of the surrender of the French 

 provinces in North America ; of the signing of the 

 Treaty of Peace of 1763 ; of the battle of Lexington ; 

 of the disclaimer made by the Provincial Congress of 

 Massachusetts of the authority of Gov. Gage ; or on the 

 day in which the Declaration of Independence was sign 

 ed ? 



I believe there are none in America who will say that 

 this nation was independent of the British crown before 

 the 4th day of July, 1776, except it be Mr. John Quincy 

 Adams and his venerable father ; if the arguments and 

 the opinions of the son are to be believed, America never 

 was subject to the British crown, and the father says 

 that he declared America to be independent twenty-one 

 years previous to the signing of the immortal declaration. 

 What kind of independence was meant I am unable to 

 say. It is certain that in all the provinces except Rhode 

 Island and Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Maryland, the 

 Governors held their appointments from the crown, and 

 subject to the pleasure of the king, and all the provincial 

 officers received their appointments from the Governors. 

 Rhode Island and Connecticut claimed no inherent civil 

 rights but derived them from the charters of Charles II. 

 The modern doctrine of the rights of man, so zealously 

 attacked by the younger Adams, was not then under 

 stood. In the proprietary governments the proprietors 

 held by grant from the crown, and subject to the crown. 



If my recollection serves me, the elder Adams called 

 himself a true and loyal subject of the king of Great 

 Britain in the autumn of 1774, and all the other mem 

 bers of the first Congress. The Americans who resisted 

 the king s troops at Lexington never dreamed that they 

 were not subjects of the king, the Provincial Congress 

 never disclaimed the king but only the king s Governor, 



