1Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 29 October 1756 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1756–1757 (Philadelphia, 1757), pp. 23–4. When the newly elected Assembly met to organize on October 14, Governor Denny informed it that “several weighty Affairs” required their immediate attention: viz., an embargo on food, clothing, and warlike stores to possessions of France; provision for transporting and quartering British...
2Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 9 February 1757 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1756–1757 (Philadelphia, 1757), pp. 81–2. Under the quartering act of Dec. 8, 1756, public-house keepers were required to accommodate soldiers billeted on them for 4 d. per diem , a rate at which they lost money though they were subject to fines for refusing billets. They petitioned the Assembly for relief on Jan. 3, 1757, and...
3Pennsylvania Assembly: Address to William Denny, 23 August 1756 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives, 1755–1756 (Philadelphia, 1756), p. 130. The Assembly minutes, August 19, record: “The House being informed, that the Gentleman who is appointed to succeed our present Governor, is now on the Road hither from New-York, and will be in Town some Time To-morrow, Adjourned to Five a Clock To-morrow Afternoon.” In the rush to honor...
4Pennsylvania Assembly: Address to the Governor and Reply to the Governor’s Message, 31 August 1756 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives, 1755–1756 (Philadelphia, 1756), p. 134. In undertaking his responsibilities as governor, Denny summoned the Assembly to the council chamber on August 24 to hear a speech reminding it of his duty to protect the province, of the special responsibility of Pennsylvania in the war, since it had been declared in consequence of French...
5Pennsylvania Assembly: Remonstrance to William Denny, [26 January 1757] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1756–1757 (Philadelphia, 1757), pp. 73–4. On Nov. 24, 1756, at the Assembly’s request, Governor Denny had submitted an estimate of military expenses in the province for the coming year totaling over £127,000, and on December 15 the House resolved that £100,000 “be granted to His Majesty for the Service of the current Year.”...
6Pennsylvania Assembly: Message to the Governor, 24 November 1756 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1756–1757 (Philadelphia, 1757), pp. 32–3. After renewing the Mutiny Act and appointing members to attend the Easton conference on November 4, the Assembly had adjourned to the 22nd. On November 23, Franklin and Joseph Galloway were appointed to draft a message requesting copies of such proprietary instructions “as relate to...
7Pennsylvania Assembly: Appointment of Franklin as Agent to Go to England, and His acceptance, [28 January 1757–3 … (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1756–1757 (Philadelphia, 1757), pp. 75, 76, 78. The sequence of events resulting in the appointment of Franklin as agent to represent the Assembly in England in its disputes over the instruction on the taxation of proprietary estates and related grievances is indicated by the following extracts from the Assembly Journals. The...
8Pennsylvania Assembly: Thanks to Franklin, and His Reply, [31 March 1763] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1762–1763 (Philadelphia, 1763), p. 40. Pursuant to a Resolve of the Nineteenth of last Month, that the Thanks of this House be given to Benjamin Franklin, Esq; for his many Services not only to the Province of Pennsylvania, but to America in general, during his late Agency at the Court of Great-Britain, the same were this Day...
9Pennsylvania Assembly: Instructions to Benjamin Franklin, 31 March 1757 (Franklin Papers)
MS (fragment): American Philosophical Society On March 1, 1757, the Assembly named the same committee (plus William West) that had made the report on the Assembly grievances against the Proprietors “to bring in a Draught of the Instructions of the House to Benjamin Franklin, Esq; one of the Commissioners now about to embark for England.” Two days later they reported a draft and were ordered...
10Pennsylvania Assembly: Instructions to Richard Jackson, 22 September 1764 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 105–6. A quorum of the Assembly gathered on September 11 to begin the short final session before its dissolution. The next day Speaker Franklin laid before the House an extract from the journal of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, June 13, 1764, together with the letter to himself...
11Pennsylvania Assembly: Message to the Governor, 22 March 1764 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 64–5. The Assembly passed its £50,000 supply bill on February 24 and delivered it to Governor Penn. He held it until March 7 when he sent it back with a message of rejection. It was expressly contrary to the decree of the Privy Council of Sept. 2, 1760, he said, particularly in the following...
12Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 20 January 1764 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 33–4. During the summer and early autumn of 1763 hostile Indians repeatedly attacked isolated settlements and farms on the Pennsylvania frontier, killing many whites, carrying others off into captivity, and driving the rest in terror from their homes to the relatively few garrisoned forts or...
13Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 11 February 1764 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), p. 43. The plan of early January to send the Indians lodged on Province Island to Sir William Johnson for safety had failed because the New York authorities had refused to cooperate. Governor Penn received a letter on Saturday, January 21, from Capt. J. Schlosser of the Royal American Regiment...
14Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 30 May 1764 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 89–91. The Assembly’s message of May 26 (immediately above) had made clear to Governor Penn and his Council that the assemblymen had no intention of including in the supply bill any formal amendment of the acts of 1759 and 1760. It did include references to the Supply Act of 1760, however,...
15Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 24 March 1764 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 69–72. Governor Penn apparently spent most of the morning of March 23 composing a reply to the Assembly’s message of the 22d (see immediately above). He signed it in the afternoon and sent it to the Assembly. In it he expressed his deep concern that in the critical military situation the...
16Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, [26 May 1764] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), p. 85. The Assembly had reconvened on May 14 after a seven-week recess, and on the 17th Governor Penn sent down a long message in reply to that of the House on March 24 concerning the £55,000 supply bill. He reviewed the circumstances leading to the order in council of Sept. 2, 1760 , and argued...
17Pennsylvania Assembly: Representation to the Proprietors, 23 August 1751 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), pp. 44–6. To the Honourable Thomas Penn , and Richard Penn , Proprietaries of the Province of Pennsylvania, &c. The Representation of the General - Assembly of the said Province, met at Philadelphia, the Twenty-third Day of the Sixth Month, 1751. May it please the Proprietaries , The first...
18Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 3 December 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1755–1756 (Philadelphia, 1756), pp. 52–3. Upon receipt of a renewed, urgent appeal from Gen. William Shirley to attend a forthcoming council in New York, Governor Morris asked the Assembly on December 2 whether it thought he should respond to the appeal, or stay in Pennsylvania to aid in the defense of the province. The next...
19Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 12 April 1754 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1753–1754 (Philadelphia, 1754), p. 50. Although the French had begun their advance into the upper Ohio Valley and Governor Hamilton had urged the Assembly to take steps towards defending the western frontier, that Quaker-controlled body had adjourned, March 9, for eight weeks without doing anything effective (see above, p. 259...
20Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 28 July 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives, 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), p. 117. Col. Thomas Dunbar, commander of Braddock’s army after the defeat on the Monongahela, decided to withdraw his demoralized troops instead of making a new attack from Fort Cumberland, and on July 16 informed Governor Morris that he planned to bring two regiments into winter quarters at...
21Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 19 March 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), pp. 71–2. On December 3, 1754, when the Pennsylvania House had reassembled, Governor Robert Hunter Morris informed them of French advances in the Ohio region and again urged them to take defensive measures. He supported his appeal with several documents, one a letter of July 5, 1754, from Sir...
22Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 17 May 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), pp. 94–7. The Assembly met on May 12 pursuant to its adjournment. They voted Franklin their thanks for his services to the army, resolved to defray the costs of the roads being built through Cumberland County to Wills Creek and the Monongahela, paid a few bills, replied to Governor Morris’...
23Pennsylvania Assembly: Address to the Governor, 11 February 1756 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1755–1756 (Philadelphia, 1756), pp. 59–60. On Sept. 19, 1755, Gen. William Shirley had ordered his officers in Pennsylvania “in the Strongest Manner to avoid” enlisting indentured servants: protests against the practice were mounting, and in any case the approach of winter lessened the need to fill the regular regiments. By...
24Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 20 February 1756 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1755–1756 (Philadelphia, 1756), p. 68. Through the winter of 1755–56, Indian attacks along the frontier and negotiations to regain their allegiance took place simultaneously. The Indians were dependent on the white man, and had to choose between the French and English; hence in the face of growing French power, their...
25Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 20 March 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), p. 73. On the morning of March 18 Governor Morris sent the Assembly a message announcing the arrival of General Braddock in Virginia and urging them to display “Vigour, Unanimity and Dispatch” in taking measures to supply men, provisions, and money for the army’s use. He listed the following...
26Pennsylvania Assembly: Resolves upon the Present Circumstances, [24 March 1764] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 72–4. As soon as the Assembly had considered on March 10 the governor’s message of the 7th rejecting the £50,000 supply bill and had appointed a committee to bring in a new £55,000 bill, it named a second committee of eight members, including Franklin, “to draw up and bring in certain...
27Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 5 August 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), p. 121. Meeting on July 25 after receiving news of Braddock’s defeat, the Assembly resolved that £50,000 be granted for defense of the province and that a committee of the whole consider ways and means of raising it. Following adoption on the 29th of resolves to tax “all Estates, Real and...
28Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 20 August 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), p. 153. We have considered the Governor’s Message of the 16th Instant, with the Extract from Governor Lawrence’s Letter to Governor Phips, in which it is observed, “That if the excellent Laws prohibiting the Transportation of Provisions to Louisburg continue in Force for two Months longer, there...
29Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 15 May 1754 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives, 1753–1754 (Philadelphia, 1754), p. 59. The Pennsylvania Assembly had adjourned twice, on March 9 and again on April 13, without taking action to assist Virginia in the defense of the upper Ohio Valley against the French advance (see above, pp. 229 n, 258). The day after the Assembly met again on May 6, Governor Hamilton informed...
30Pennsylvania Assembly: Message to the Governor, 16 December 1756 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1756 – 1757 (Philadelphia, 1757), pp. 48–9. Franklin and others were appointed on Dec. 16, 1756, to “prepare a Draught of a Message to the Governor, concerning the Report now prevailing in the City of the Governor’s having given Orders for Quartering of Soldiers upon private Houses.” It was brought in, approved, and sent to...
31Pennsylvania Assembly: Orders Concerning Provisions, 2 April 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), pp. 81–2. Resolved , That the Sum of Fifteen Thousand Pounds be now given to the King’s Use; Five Thousand Pounds thereof to repay the Money borrowed for victualling the King’s Troops in Virginia; and that Isaac Norris, Evan Morgan, Joseph Fox, and Benjamin Franklin, Members of this House, and...
32Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 11 November 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1755–1756 (Philadelphia, 1756), p. 21. While Morris and his Council were considering the governor’s message to the Assembly of November 8, Conrad Weiser arrived with Scaroyady and other Indians who came with pleas of action to defend the frontier lest the few still loyal Indians defect or become the victims of their armed and...
33Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 18 November 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1755–1756 (Philadelphia, 1756), p. 29. After Braddock’s defeat, deteriorating relations with the Indians became one of the most troublesome and pressing concerns of the Pennsylvania authorities and an added source of conflict between the governor and the Assembly. William Penn had established the policy of fair play toward the...
34Pennsylvania Assembly: Petition to the King, [23–26 May 1764] (Franklin Papers)
I. Draft: Library of Congress. II. DS : Public Record Office When on the morning of May 23 the Assembly received and read the second group of the inhabitants’ petitions to the King asking him to assume the government of Pennsylvania, that body voted “by a great Majority” that a committee be appointed “to prepare and bring in the Draft of a Petition to the King from this House, to accompany the...
35Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 27 June 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives, 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), p. 110. The Power of calling the Assembly together whenever the Publick Service requires it, in the intermediate Times of their Adjournments, we presume is, and ought to be, lodged in the Governor of this Province; and we do not recollect any Instance in which it has been either disputed or...
36Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 21 August 1751 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1750–1751 (Philadelphia, 1751), p. 82. The Pennsylvania Assembly on October 19, 1750, asked that the Proprietors share the charges arising from Indian treaties. On August 16, 1751, Governor Hamilton reported their refusal. The next day a committee which included Franklin was named to prepare an answer to the governor’s message...
37Pennsylvania Assembly: Resolutions on Expenses for Indian Affairs, 22 August 1751 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1750–1751 (Philadelphia, 1751), pp. 85–6. Resolved, N. C.D. That it is the Opinion of this House, that the Proprietaries Interest will be so greatly advanc’d by keeping up a firm Peace and friendly Correspondence with the Indians, that they ought to bear a proportionable Part of the Charges expended upon all such Treaties as...
38Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 3 December 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives, 1755–1756 (Philadelphia, 1756), p. 52. The Assembly had requested information about an alleged Shawnee complaint, made at the Carlisle conference of 1753, of being cheated in land purchases; and Governor Morris, on November 19, had asked Council members Robert Strettell, Joseph Turner, and Thomas Cadwalader to investigate. Their...
39Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 15 May 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), pp. 91–2. Conditions on the ships bringing German immigrants to Pennsylvania were often nothing short of frightful. Eager to come to America, lured by baseless promises of mercenary “soul-sellers,” the redemptioners poured down the Rhine Valley into Rotterdam, where profit-hungry captains packed...
40Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 7 March 1752 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1751–1752 (Philadelphia, 1752), pp. 36–7. The Assembly passed a bill to re-emit and continue in currency the existing bills of credit and to issue an additional £40,000 in paper money; and sent it to Governor Hamilton for approval on Feb. 26, 1752. The governor and Council unanimously disapproved, and Hamilton gave their reason...
41Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 5 September 1753 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1752–1753 (Philadelphia, 1753), pp. 38–40. After considering the report of a committee on the suspending clause, which Governor Hamilton insisted upon as a condition for approving the £20,000 money bill (see immediately above), the House appointed Evan Morgan, Franklin, Hugh Roberts, Mahlon Kirkbride, and George Ashbridge to...
42Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 31 May 1753 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1752–1753 (Philadelphia, 1753), p. 25. On May 22, 1753, Governor Hamilton informed the Assembly that a large army of French and Indians had passed Oswego on its way to the Ohio country. England’s Indian allies there would be forced to withdraw and English traders would be captured and their goods destroyed. This report, which...
43Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 8 August 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), pp. 123–6. Governor Morris responded on August 6 to the Assembly’s message of the day before, and the Assembly appointed a committee of eight, including Franklin and four other members of the last committee, to prepare a reply. It was reported and approved the next day and sent to the governor on...
44Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 22 August 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755 (Philadelphia, 1755), pp. 155–6. On August 16, while the Assembly was considering the long message to the governor which they sent three days later, Morris informed the House that, since the treasury was exhausted, he would “readily pass a Bill for striking any Sum in Paper-Money the present Exigency may require;...
45Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 8 December 1756 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1756–1757 (Philadelphia, 1757), p. 41. Franklin and John Baynton were appointed on Dec. 8, 1756, to reply to Governor Denny’s message of that date on quartering the British troops momentarily expected in Philadelphia. Submitted the same morning, the reply was approved and sent to Denny at once. Since it is quoted in full in the...
46Pennsylvania Assembly: Message to the Governor on Paper Currency, 25 May 1753 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1752–1753 (Philadelphia, 1753), p. 21. On consideration of the report of the committee on paper currency, trade, and population, submitted August 19, 1752 (see above, p. 344), the Assembly on January 18, 1753, sitting as a committee of the whole, unanimously approved three resolutions: “That it is the Opinion of this Committee...
47Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 19 August 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1754–1755, pp. 144–52. The Assembly’s long message of August 8 to Governor Morris had been the first heavy salvo in the battle over taxation of the proprietary estates. Words, however, could scarcely effect the settlement of the issue, since the governor insisted he was enjoined from approving such bills by the terms of his...
48Pennsylvania Assembly: Resolutions on the Appointment of Benjamin Franklin as Agent, [26 October 1764] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives of the Province of Pennsylvania, Met at Philadelphia [October 15, 1764] (Philadelphia, 1764), p. 15; also MS certified copy of the first resolution: American Philosophical Society. After the reading of the Remonstrance against Franklin’s possible appointment as agent (printed immediately above) on the morning of October 26, the...
49Pennsylvania Assembly: Message to the Governor, 19 December 1756 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1756–1757 (Philadelphia, 1757), pp. 50–3. After Pennsylvania became a theater of war in 1755, it was apparent that the province would soon have to provide quarters for British troops. When the remnants of Braddock’s army passed through Philadelphia that summer, the Assembly hastily extended what it considered were the relevant...
50Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 11 November 1755 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1755–1756 (Philadelphia, 1756), pp. 19–21. Upon learning of Indian attacks at Penn’s Creek and other places in the Susquehanna Valley, Governor Morris summoned the Assembly for Nov. 3, 1755. He urged them to pass a militia law and provide funds for defense, although he cautioned them to “not waste your Time in offering me such...