of
Parliament, and that three of the judges, in violation of the
Constitution, had accepted seats in the new Council. The Chief Justice
and his colleagues repairing in a body to the Governor represented the
impossibility of exercising their office in Boston or in any other part
of the province; the army was too small for their protection; and
besides, none would act as jurors. Thus the authority of the new
Government, as established by Act of Parliament, perished in the
presence of the Governor, the judges and the army.--_Ib._, pp. 111, 112.

The English historian, Dr. Andrews, remarks on this subject:

"The list of the new (Legislative) Council appointed by the Crown
consisted of thirty-six members. But twelve of the number declined their
commissions, and most of those who accepted were speedily obliged to
resign them in order to save their property and persons from the fury of
the multitude. The judges newly appointed experienced much the same
treatment. All the inferior officers of the Courts of Judicature, the
clerks, the juries, and all others concerned, explicitly refused to act
under the new laws. In some places the populace shut up the avenues to
the court-houses; and upon being required to make way for the judges and
officers of the court, they declared that they knew of no court nor
establishment in the province contrary to the ancient usages and forms,
and would recognize none.

"The former Constitution being thus destroyed by the British
Legislature, and the people refusing to acknowledge that which was
substituted in its room, a dissolution of all government necessarily
ensued. The resolution to oppose the designs of Great Britain produced
occasionally some commotions; but no other consequences followed this
defect of government. Peace and good order remained everywhere
throughout the province, and the people demeaned themselves with as much
regularity as if the laws still continued in their full and formal
rigour." (Andrews' History of the War, Vol. I., pp. 145, 146.)]

CHAPTER XX.

THE GENERAL CONGRESS OR CONVENTION AT PHILADELPHIA, SEPTEMBER AND
OCTOBER, 1774.

The word Congress, in relation to the United States, is synonymous with
the word Parliament in Great Britain, signifying the Legislature of the
nation at large; but before the revolution the word Congress was used,
for the most part, as synonymous with Convention--a voluntary meeting of
delegates elected by towns or counties for cer