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By the following Letters,
To The Publick
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bound by all the ties of honour, and the duty they owe to their posterity religiously to maintain the engagements entered into by the Delegates in their behalf. These Delegates received deputations from the Counties of Ulster, Albany, Dutchess, and West Chester; and, I am well informed, Colonel Philips was the Chairman of the respective Committees of his County, who authorized our Delegates to act for them, and that he was zealous for their appointment. The Counties of Orange, Suffolk, and Kings, sent other Delegates to the Congress. These eight Counties which were thus represented in the General Congress, are a great majority of the Colony, whether this is determined by Counties, inhabitants, wealth or the number of members they send to the General Assembly; it being evident their Representatives are twenty-three of thirty-one that constitute that body. Hence it appears how void of truth that assertion is of the shameless "Westchester Farmer," that "not a hundredth part of the people of this Province had any vote in sending the Delegates." This is a sample of his Pamphlets, which abound with barefaced falsehoods. It is a sure evidence of a bad cause when its advocates are drove to these vile arts to advance it. Of the six Counties unrepresented in the General Congress, four of them are new, thinly inhabited, and very remote from the capital; and the Farmers live so distant from each other that it would be difficult to convene them for the purpose of choosing Delegates; especially as the time when they were chosen in the other Counties, was the most valuable season for husbandry. The two old Counties may be ranked among the smallest of our Counties, the number of Freeholders in Richmond being under four hundred. From all this it appears the majority of Counties, inhabitants, and property, were represented in the Grand Continental Congress; and, therefore, there is no reason to doubt but the present Assembly will (after the laudable example of a former House, on a similar occasion) approve the acts of the late General Congress; especially if it be considered that the very Assembly now convened have given their thanks to our Merchants for a former restriction of our trade, intended to effect a repeal of the Tea Act, which still exists, besides many others since past, which threaten destruction to this Continent.
Notes
nts
Ante Folio, 297; and June 7, 1774,
Ante Folio, 303.