American Quotations by William J. Federer 2024

Fairfax Resolves (July 18, 1774): <At a General Meeting of the Freeholders and other Inhabitants of the County of Fairfax, at the Court House in the Town of Alexandria, on Monday, the 18th day of July, 1774: GEORGE WASHINGTON, Esquire, Chairman, and ROBERT HARRISON, Gentleman, Clerk. RESOLVED, That this Colony and Dominion of Virginia cannot be considered as a conquered country, and, if it was, that the present inhabitants are the descendants, not of the conquered, but of the conquerors. That the same was not settled at the national expense of England, but at the private expense of the adventurers,...

Virginia Proclamation (May 24, 1774) Thomas Jefferson drafted a Day of Fasting, Humiliation and Prayer Resolution, which was introduced on the floor of the Virginia House of Burgesses by Robert Carter Nicholas, Treasurer. The Resolution was approved with virtually no comment: <This House, being deeply impressed with apprehension of the great dangers, to be derived to british America, from the hostile Invasion of the City of Boston, in our Sister Colony of Massachusetts bay, whose commerce and harbour are, on the first Day of June next, to be stopped by an Armed force, deem it highly necessary that the said...

Massachusetts Provincial Congress (1774) resolved: <Resistance to tyranny becomes the Christian and social duty of each individual....Continue steadfast, and with a proper sense of your dependence on God, nobly defend those rights which heaven gave, and no man ought to take from us.> 1774MP001 In 1774, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress reorganized the Massachusetts militia, providing that over one-third of all new regiments be made up of "Minutemen." The minutemen, known as such because they would be ready to fight at a minute's notice, would drill as citizen soldiers on the parade ground, then go to the church to hear exhortation and...

Boston Tea Party (December 16, 1773) followed just three years after the Boston Massacre, where five Americans were killed by British soldiers who were commandeering homes. The British then began imposing on the Colonies taxation, which eventually became unbearable. Early in the year of 1773, the men of Marlborough, Massachusetts, declared unanimously: <Death is more eligible than slavery. A free-born people are not required by the religion of Jesus Christ to submit to tyranny, but may make use of such power as God has given them to recover and support their laws and liberties... [We] implore the Ruler above the...

First Jewish Sermon Published in America (May 28, 1773): <Preached at the Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island, by an emissary from the Holy Land, Haim Isaac Karigal, to celebrate Shavu'ot, one of the three Jewish pilgrimage festivals. The sermon was preached in Spanish interspersed with Hebrew, and translated into English by Abraham Lopez.> 1773FJ001 -- American Quotations by William J. Federer, 2024, All Rights Reserved, Permission granted to use with acknowledgement. Endnotes: 1773FJ001. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). First Jewish Sermon Published in America, May 28, 1773, Preached in Spanish at the Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island, by...