CHAPTER XXV.

HOW SOUTH CAROLINA ADVANCED TO INDEPENDENCE.

FEBRUARY-JULY 1776.

THE American congress needed an impulse from the resolute spirit of some government springing wholly from the people. On the eighth of February 1776, the convention of South Carolina, by Drayton their president, presented their thanks to John Rutledge and Henry Middleton for their services in the American congress, which had made its appeal to the King of kings, established a navy, treasury, and general post-office, exercised control over commerce, and granted to colonies permission to create civil institutions, independent of the regal authority. The next day arrived Gadsden, the highest officer in the army of the province, and he in like manner received the welcome of public gratitude. In return, he presented the standard which was to be used by the American navy, representing in a yellow field a rattlesnake of thirteen full-grown rattles coiled to strike, with the motto: DON'T TREAD ON ME. When, on the tenth, the report on reforming the provincial government was considered and many hesitated, Gadsden spoke out for the absolute independence of America. The majority had thus far refused to contemplate the end toward which they were irresistibly impelled. One member avowed his willingness to ride post by day and night to Philadelphia, in order to assist in reuniting Great Britain and her colonies; the elder Laurens "bore his testimony against the principles of Common Sense;"" but the criminal laws could not be enforced for want of officers; public and private affairs were running into confusion; the imminent danger of invasion

was proved by intercepted letters; so that necessity compelled the adoption of some adequate system of rule.

While a committee of eleven was preparing the organic law, Gadsden, on the thirteenth, began to act as senior officer of the army. Companies of militia were called down to Charleston, and the military forces augmented by two regiments of riflemen. In the early part of the year Sullivan's Island was a wilderness, thickly covered with myrtle, live-oak, and palmettos; there, on the second of March, William Moultrie was ordered to complete a fort large enough to hold a thousand men.

Within five days after the convention received the act of parliament of the preceding December which authorized the capture of American vessels and property, they gave up the hope of reconciliation; and, on the twenty-sixth of March 1776, asserting "the good of the people to be the origin and end of all government," and enumerating the unwarrantable acts of the British parliament, the implacability of the king, and the violence of his officers, they established a constitution for South Carolina. The executive power was intrusted to a president who was endowed with a veto on legislation and was commander-in-chief; the congress resolved itself into a general assembly, till their successors should be elected by the people in the following October. The numerous and arbitrary representation, which had prevailed originally in the committee of 1774 and had been continued in the first and second congress of 1775, was confirmed by the new instrument, so that Charleston kept the right of sending thirty members to the general assembly. The old laws prescribing the qualifications of the electors and the elected were continued in force. A legislative council of thirteen was to be elected by the assembly out of their own body; the assembly and the legislative council elected jointly by ballot the president and vice-president. The privy council of seven was composed of the vice-president, three members chosen by ballot by the assembly, and three by the legislative council. The judges were chosen by joint ballot of the two branches of the legislature, by whose address they might be removed, though otherwise they were to hold office during good behavior.

On the twenty-seventh, John Rutledge was chosen president, Henry Laurens vice-president, and William Henry Drayton chief justice. On accepting office, Rutledge addressed the general assembly: "To preside over the welfare of a brave and generous people is in my opinion the highest honor any man can receive. In so perilous a season as the present, I will not withhold my best services. best services. I assure myself of receiving the support and assistance of every good man in the colony; and my most fervent prayer to the omnipotent Ruler of the universe is, that under his gracious providence the liberties of America may be forever preserved."

On the next day the oaths of office were administered; then, to display the existence of the new constitution, the council and assembly, preceded by the president and vicepresident and by the sheriff bearing the sword of state, walked out in a solemn procession from the state-house to the exchange, in the presence of the troops and the militia of South Carolina. The people, with rapture and tears of joy, crowded round the men whom they had chosen to office from among themselves.

Early in April the legislative bodies addressed the president: "Conscious of our natural and unalienable rights, and determined to make every effort to retain them, we see your elevation from the midst of us to govern this country, as the natural consequence of unprovoked, cruel, and accumulated oppressions. Chosen by the suffrages of a free people, you will make the constitution the great rule of your conduct; in the discharge of your duties under that constitution we will support you with our lives and fortunes."

In words penned by Drayton and Cotesworth Pinckney, the assembly condemned the British plan of sending commissioners to treat with the several colonies as a fraudulent scheme for subverting their liberties by negotiations, and resolved to communicate with the court of Great Britain only through the continental congress.

When, on the eleventh of April, they closed their session, "On my part," said Rutledge, "a most solemn oath has been taken for the faithful discharge of my duty; on yours, a solemn assurance has been given to support me therein. The

constitution shall be the invariable rule of my conduct. I repose the most perfect confidence in your engagement. If any persons in your parishes and districts are still strangers to the merits of the dispute between Great Britain and the colonies, you will explain it to them fully, and teach them their inherent rights. The endeavors to engage barbarous nations to imbrue their hands in the innocent blood of helpless women and children, and the attempts to make ignorant domestics subservient to the most wicked purposes, are acts at which humanity must revolt.

"Seeing no alternative but unconditional submission or a defence becoming men born to freedom, no man who is worthy of life, liberty, or property will hesitate about the choice. Superior force may lay waste our towns and ravage our country, it can never eradicate from the breasts of free men those principles which are ingrafted in their very nature.

"Of this colony the reputation for generosity and magnanimity is universally acknowledged. I trust that the only strife among brethren will be, who shall do most to serve and to save an injured country."

On the twenty-third of April the court was opened at Charleston, and the chief justice after an elaborate exposition charged the grand jury in these words: "The law of the land authorizes me to declare, and it is my duty to declare the law, that George III., king of Great Britain, has abdicated the government, that he has no authority over us, and we owe no obedience to him.

"It has been the policy of the British authority to cramp and confine our trade so as to be subservient to their commerce, our real interest being ever out of the question; the new constitution is wisely adapted to enable us to trade with foreign nations, and thereby to supply our wants at the cheapest markets in the universe; to extend our trade infinitely beyond what has ever been known; to encourage manufactures among us; and to promote the happiness of the people from among whom, by virtue and merit, the poorest man may arrive at the highest dignity. The Almighty created America to be independent of Britain; to refuse our labors in this divine work is to refuse to be a great, a free, a pious, and a happy people!"

Rutledge was equal to the office which he had accepted; order and method grew at once out of the substitution of a single executive for committees; from him the officers of the regiments, as well as of the militia, derived their commissions. To prepare for the British army and naval squadron which were known to be on the way, the mechanics and laborers of Charleston, assisted by great numbers of negroes from the country, were employed in fortifying the town. When the veteran Armstrong arrived to take the command of the army, he found little more to do than receive the hospitalities of the inhabitants.

The British fleet and transports designed to act in Carolina did not leave Cork harbor till February; they were scattered by a storm soon after going to sea; they met most violent adverse gales and winds; and not till the third of May, after a passage of more than eighty days, did Sir Peter Parker, Cornwallis, and such ships as kept them company, enter Cape Fear river and deliver to Clinton his instructions. These instructions directed him to proclaim pardon to all but "the principal instigators of the rebellion, to dissolve provincial congresses and committees of safety, to restore the regular administration of justice, to arrest the persons and destroy the property of all who should refuse to give satisfactory tests of their obedience." From North Carolina he might proceed at his own choice to Virginia or to South Carolina, in like manner "to seize the persons and destroy the property of rebels." If he proceeded to South Carolina he was to reduce Charleston, as a prelude to the fall of Savannah,

All joined "to lament the fatal delays." It was too late to invade North Carolina, which had suppressed its loyal insurrection. With the formidable armament Clinton inclined to look into the Chesapeake, which would bring him nearer New York; but Lord William Campbell urged an attack on Charleston; and, as intelligence was received "that the works erected by the rebels on Sullivan's Island, which was the key to the harbor, were unfinished, Clinton acquiesced in the proposal of the commodore to attempt the reduction of that fortress by a sudden attack."

Before leaving his government, Martin had sent a party to