Address of Committee of Correspondence to the Freeholders

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To the Freeholders of the County of ESSEX, in the Province of NEW-JERSEY, qualified to vote for Representatives in the Legislature:

GENTLEMEN: The zeal you have hitherto manifested in support of the constitutional liberties of your country will unquestionably prompt you to carry into execution, with firmness and unanimity, the wise and prudent Resolutions lately entered into by the Delegates of this Continent, in General Congress. In the eleventh Article of the Association, formed in behalf of themselves and their constituents, it was agreed "That a Committee be appointed in every County, City, and Town, by those who are qualified to vote for Representatives in the Legislature, whose business it shall be to observe the conduct of all persons touching the said Association." We, your Committee of Correspondence, cannot in the least doubt your ready and immediate compliance with the Article; for, as the salutary effects to arise from this Association, must, under God, depend upon the fidelity of individuals in carrying it precisely into execution; so, should any inhabitant of this Colony be found so lost to a sense of publick virtue, as to violate the same in any instance, such person, pursuant to the said Article, may, by your Committees, "be held up to publick notice, as unfriendly to the liberties of his country, and all dealings with him or her be thenceforward broken off." We have therefore thought fit to recommend to you, that for the more extensive observation of the conduct of individuals, Committees be chosen for each of the three Precincts into which the County is divided, viz: Elizabethtown, Newark, and Achquakanung; and we do hereby give notice to and request the Freeholders of the respective Precincts, to convene for that purpose, as follows: for the Borough of Elizabeth, at the Court House, in Elizabethtown, on Tuesday, the sixth day of December next, at two o' clock, P˙ M˙; for Newark, at the Court House, in Newark, on Wednesday, the seventh day of December; and for Achquakanung, on Monday, the twelfth day of December, at the Bridge, opposite the house of Timothy Day. And we do also recommend to you, that ten at least of the most reputable inhabitants for Achquakanung, fifteen for Newark, and twenty for Elizabethtown, be elected for the above purpose.

As Delegates for the several Colonies are again to be appointed, to meet at Philadelphia, on the tenth day of May next, it will be farther expedient that the inhabitants make choice of a new Committee of Correspondence, with power to instruct the Representatives for this County, when convened in General Assembly, to join in the appointment of Delegates for the Colony to meet in the said Congress. But if the said General Assembly shall not appoint Delegates for that purpose, by the first day of April next, then

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STEPHEN CRANE,
ELIAS BOUDINOT,
JOHN DE HART,
Jo˙ RIGGS Jun˙,
WILLIAM LIVINGSTON,
JOHN CHETWOOD,
ISAAC OGDEN,
HENRY GERRITS,
W˙ P˙ SMITH.

County of Essex, November 28, 1774.