By the time the Fourth New York Congress made a quorum at White Plains on 9 July, the Continental Congress had already acted on independence, and the first order of business for the New York legislature was consideration of a letter from their delegates in Philadelphia enclosing a copy of the Declaration of Independence. John Jay drafted the committee report on the Declaration, which was adopted on the afternoon of 9 July (below). “While we lament the cruel necessity which has rendered that measure unavoidable,” his report asserted, “we approve the same, and will, at the risk of our lives and fortunes, join with the other colonies in supporting it.” The next day the provincial congress changed its name to “the Convention of the Representatives of the State of New-York,” and the business of administering a state threatened by enemy invasion superseded debates on loyalty to the Crown or the wisdom of precipitate action in declaring independence.

Military exigencies occupied Jay and the convention for much of the last six months of 1776, and there was little time that year for the convention’s avowed purpose of perfecting a new “frame of government” for New York. Committees played a vital part in the convention, since the state legislators found it almost impossible to convene regularly. Their place of meeting was changed twice in the first eight months of the convention’s existence; on 29 August 1776 sessions were moved to Fishkill, while on 19 February 1777 the seat of government was transferred to the west side of the Hudson at Kingston. Indeed the body met as a “Convention,” rather than as a Committee of Safety appointed during Convention adjournments, for less than three months in the period July 1776–March 1777. The periods of full convention sessions were 9 July–28 August, 5 September–7 October, 15 October, and 6 December 1776. Thus, Jay’s most important work was done in special committees of the convention: the Secret Committee responsible for fortifying the Hudson and the Committee for Detecting Conspiracies. At the same time, his personal concerns lay with his family and his wife’s parents, whose homes were threatened by the British advance.1

The change in Jay’s attitudes occurring during this period can best be judged by the undated resolution printed below. On 1 July 1776 he had written Robert R. Livingston of the “Fear and Trembling” with which he awaited details of a resolution “granting certain Powers to the General” (above). But after working closely with Washington on the problems of New York’s defense, Jay prepared this resolution, probably in July or August 1776, which would have committed New York to allowing the commander complete tactical freedom in order to liberate Washington from “Plans drawn by or Consultations with large Assemblies of Politicians unpracticed in the Art of War.”