Fortunately such
periods were not very long. The latest instance was in the reign of
Charles I, who got on without a parliament from 1629 to 1640.[9] In
the American colonies the dissolution of the assembly by the governor
was not especially dangerous, but it sometimes made mischief by
delaying needed legislation. During the few years preceding the
Revolution, the assemblies were so often dissolved that it became
necessary for the people to devise some new way of getting their
representatives together to act for the colony. In Massachusetts this
end was attained by the famous "Committees of Correspondence." No one
could deny that town-meetings were legal, or that the people of
one township had a right to ask advice from the people of another
township. Accordingly each township appointed a committee to
correspond or confer with committees from other townships. This system
was put into operation by Samuel Adams in 1772, and for the next two
years the popular resistance to the crown was organized by these
committees. For example, before the tea was thrown into Boston
harbour, the Boston committee sought and received advice from every
township in Massachusetts, and the treatment of the tea-ships was from
first to last directed by the committees of Boston and five neighbour
towns.
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