192 AUTHENTIC HISTORY 



would not have hesitated to extend their vengeance from the Indians to 

 their protectors.^ 



Matthew Smith and James Gibson were the two persons selected by 

 the insurgents to lay their grievances before the Governor and Assem- 

 bly, which they did in the following remonstrance : 

 ^^To the Honourable JOHN PENN^ Esquire^ Oovernor of the Province of 



Pennsylvania^ and of the Counties of Nevj Castle, Kent and Sussex, on 



Delaiuare, and to the Representatives of the Freemen of the said Province, 



in General Assembly met: 



" We, Matthew Smith and James Gibson, in behalf of ourselves and 

 His Majesty's faithful and loyal Subjects, the inhabitants of the frontier 

 Counties of Lancaster, York, Cumberland, Berks, and Northampton, 

 humbly beg leave to remonstrate and lay before you the following griev- 

 ances, which we submit to your wisdom for redress. 



"First. We apprehend that as Freemen and English Subjects, we have 

 an indisputable title to the same privileges and immunities with His 

 Majesty's other Subjects who reside in the interior Counties of Philadel- 

 phia, Chester and Bucks, and therefore ought not to be excluded from 

 an equal share with them in the very important privilege of Legislation ; 

 nevertheless, contrary to the Proprietor's Charter and the acknowledged 

 principles of common justice and equity, our five Counties are restrained 

 from electing more than ten Eepresentatives, viz : four for Lancaster, 

 two for York, two for Cumberland, one for Berks, and one for North- 

 ampton, while the three Counties and City of Philadelphia, Chester and 

 Bucks, elect twenty-six. This we humbly conceive is oppressive, une- 

 qual and unjust, the cause of many of our grievances, and an infringe- 

 ment of our natural privileges of Freedom and equality; wherefore, we 

 humbly pray that we may be no longer deprived of an equal number 

 with the three aforesaid Counties, to represent us in Assembly. 



"Secondly. We understand that a Bill is now before the House of 

 Assembly, wherein it is provided that such persons as shall be charged 

 with killing any Indians in Lancaster County, shall not be tried in the 

 County where the Fact was committed, but in the Counties of Phila- 

 delphia, Chester or Bucks. This is manifestly to deprive British Sub- 

 jects of their known Privileges, to cast an eternal Reproach upon whole 

 Counties, as if they were unfit to serve their Country in the quality of 

 Jurymen, and to contradict the well known Laws of the British Nation 

 in a point whereon Life, Liberty and Security essentially depend, namely, 

 that of being tried by their equals in the neighborhood where their own, 

 their Accusers, and the Witnesses' Character and Credit, with the Cir- 

 cumstances of the Fact, are best known, and instead thereof putting their 

 Lives in the hands of Strangers, who may as justly be suspected of par- 



1 Franklin's Mem. 



