The Letters of Richard Henry Lee, Volume 1, 1762-1778; Collected and Edited by James Curtis Ballagh, Ph.D. L.L.D. (Associate Professor of American History at the Johns Hopkins University)
New York, NY: The Macmillan Company, 1911. Presumed First Edition, First printing. Hardcover. xxvii, [1], 467, [9] pages. Footnotes. Contains frontis illustration of Richard Henry Lee from a portrait by Gilbert Stuart. Includes Preface, as well as letters from Richard Henry Lee from August 27, 1762 through December 26th, 1778. Cover has some wear. Pages have some staining and discoloration. Richard Henry Lee, sometime President of the Continental Congress and mover of the resolutions for a Declaration of Independence, Foreign Alliances, and a Plan of Confederation, exerted a profound influence upon political and constitutional movements in his state and in America from the beginning of the Stamp Act agitation to the close of his public career in 1792. Probably no member of Congress, except possibly John Adams, served in a more important capacity and on so many and such effective committees of Congress, and at the same time maintained such literary activity as shown in his extensive correspondence. James Ballagh collected about 500 of Lee's letters, the majority of which have never before been printed. The editor was an Associate Professor of American History at the Johns Hopkins University when this work was published. HE continued to have a increasingly distinguished academic career until his death in 1944. Richard Henry Lee (January 20, 1732 – June 19, 1794) was an American statesman and Founding Father from Virginia best known for the June 1776 Lee Resolution, the motion in the Second Continental Congress calling for the colonies' independence from Great Britain leading to the United States Declaration of Independence, which he signed. He also served a one-year term as the President of the Continental Congress, was a signatory to the Articles of Confederation, and was a United States Senator from Virginia from 1789 to 1792, serving during part of that time as the second President pro tempore of the upper house. He was a member of the Lee family, a historically influential family in Virginia politics.
Lee was elected sixth president of Congress under the Articles of Confederation on November 30, 1784, in the French Arms Tavern, Trenton, New Jersey. Congress convened on January 11, 1785, in the old New York City Hall, with Lee presiding until November 23, 1785. Although he was not paid a salary, his household expenses were covered in the amount of $12,203.13.
Lee abhorred the notion of imposing federal taxes and believed that continuing to borrow foreign money was imprudent. Throughout his term, he maintained that the states should relinquish their claims in the Northwest Territory, enabling the federal government to fund its obligations though land sales. He wrote to friend and colleague Samuel Adams:
I hope we shall shortly finish our plan for disposing of the western Lands to discharge the oppressive public debt created by the war & I think that if this source of revenue be rightly managed, that these republics may soon be discharged from that state of oppression and distress that an indebted people must invariably feel.
Debate began on the expansion of the Ordinance of 1784 and Thomas Jefferson's survey method; namely, "hundreds of ten geographical miles square, each mile containing 6086 and 4-10ths of a foot" and "sub-divided into lots of one mile square each, or 850 and 4-10ths of an acre" on April 14. On May 3, 1785, William Grayson of Virginia made a motion, seconded by James Monroe, to change "seven miles square" to "six miles square."
The Land Ordinance of 1785 passed on May 20, 1785, yet the federal government lacked the resources to manage the newly surveyed lands. Not only did Native Americans refuse to relinquish their hold on the platted territory, but much of the remaining land was occupied by squatters. With Congress unable to muster magistrates or troops to enforce the dollar-per-acre title fee, Lee's plan ultimately failed, although the survey system developed under the Land Ordinance of 1785 has endured.
Correspondents in this volume include: John Dickinson, Landon Carter, Samuel Adams, Lightfoot Lee, Gouverneur Morris, George Washington, Silas Deane, William Shippen, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, Robert Morris, Thomas Paine, John Adams, Henry Laurens. Condition: Good.
Keywords: Richard Henry Lee, Letters, Correspondence, Continental Congress, Declaration of Independence, John Dickinson, Landon Carter, Samuel Adams, Lightfoot Lee, Gouverneur Morris, George Washington, Silas Deane, William Shippen, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jeffe
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