Portrait of a Patriot: The Major Political and Legal Papers of Josiah Quincy Junior (Publications of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts)
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Josiah Quincy Jr. (1744-1775), Boston lawyer and patrio...)
Josiah Quincy Jr. (1744-1775), Boston lawyer and patriot penman, had he lived longer could have been a leader of the new American Republic with a name familiar in most households. In a four-volume series, the Colonial Society of Massachusetts will reprint his major political and legal writings. Editor Neil Longley York provides a significant biographical introduction, followed by Quincy’s Political Commonplace Book, in which the patriot noted down passages from his wide reading in politics and history that he believed relevant to his own times. Thus, readers have an unusual opportunity to enter into the extraordinary mind of a patriot immediately before the Revolution. A new edition of Quincy’s London Journal follows, the record of his last-ditch efforts to stave off the impending conflict by seeking some possible ground for compromise with leading British politicians in the months before the battles at Lexington and Concord. Although the peace mission ultimately failed, the journal provides a fascinating record of how British society and leading figures in the government appeared to a young lawyer from a distant colony.
Portrait of a Patriot, Vol. 5: The Law Reports, Part 2 (1765-1772)
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The most unique and important of all early American law...)
The most unique and important of all early American law reports are those of Josiah Quincy Jr. (1744–1775). These are the first reports of continental America’s oldest court, the Superior Court of Judicature of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, direct ancestor to today’s Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Quincy’s candid accounts of events great and small shed light on life in the American colonies just before the Revolution. Reports such as Paxton’s Case of the Writs of Assistance (1761) have become great landmarks of American constitutional law, cited by the Supreme Court of the United States. Others, such as Hanlon v. Thayer (1764), involved important women’s rights, or, such as Oliver v. Sale (1762) and Allison v. Cockran (1764), vividly demonstrated the legal establishment of slavery. Even the so-called routine cases―those involving sale of goods and early consumer protection, keeping a "bawdy house," women fighting for their children’s legitimacy, pirates, apprentices, militia men, double-crossers and frauds, "fences" for stolen goods, and many more―provide an invaluable picture of our early legal system and colonial society.
Daniel R. Coquillette not only provides new annotations for these cases first annotated by Samuel Quincy Jr. in 1865, but also includes an extensive introduction that sets out a lucid and compelling road map to these historic reports and their continuing significance.
Volumes 4 and 5 complete this five-volume series.
Distributed for the Colonial Society of Massachusetts
Josiah Quincy was born on February 23, 1744 in Boston, Massachussets, United States. He was fifth in descent from Edmund and Judith Quincy who came to Massachusetts with the Rev. John Cotton in 1633. Josiah was the youngest of the three sons of Josiah Quincy, a prosperous Boston merchant, and his wife, Hannah Sturgis of Yarmouth, Massachussets. Since he died at the age of thirty-one and during the lifetime of his father, his contemporaries usually referred to him as Josiah Quincy, Jr.
Education
Josiah Quincy received his early schooling at Braintree under Joseph Marsh. In 1759 he entered Harvard, taking his bachelor's degree in 1763 and his master's three years later. On the latter occasion he delivered the English oration, which was considered the highest academic honor. Immediately upon his graduation he began the study of law in the office of Oxenbridge Thacher, one of the leading lawyers of Boston.
Career
When Thacher died in July 1765 and Quincy took charge of the office, continuing his law studies. In spite of his youth, his ability and character enabled him to retain a large part of Thacher's lucrative practice. It was during these early years that he wrote Reports of Cases in the Superior Court of Judicature of the Province of Massachusetts Bay between 1761 and 1772, which, edited by S. M. Quincy, was printed from the original manuscript in 1865. Quincy took an active interest in the political crisis of the times and published two articles, signed "Hyperion, " in the Boston Gazette of September 28 and October 5, 1767.
In 1770 Quincy wrote a number of essays on the non-importation agreement and other questions, taking strongly the Patriot side. Among these may be mentioned: "An Address of the Merchants, Traders, and Freeholders of the Town of Boston, " denouncing violators of the non-importation agreement, published as a broadside with the caption At a Meeting of the Merchants & Traders at Faneuil Hall, on the 23rd of January, 1770. Among these may be mentioned: "An Address of the Merchants, Traders, and Freeholders of the Town of Boston, " denouncing violators of the non-importation agreement, published as a broadside with the caption at a Meeting of the Merchants & Traders at Faneuil Hall, on the 23rd of January, 1770. Then two essays signed "An Independent, " in the Boston Gazette, February, 12 and 26, 1770; another, signed "An Old Man, " in the same journal, August 6, 1770; and the report of the committee appointed to draft instructions for the representatives of the Town of Boston, May 15, 1770.
After the attack by a Boston mob on the British soldiers had resulted in the "Boston Massacre" of March 5, 1770, Quincy and John Adams undertook, from a stern sense of duty, the task of defending the soldiers in court, although Quincy's elder brother, Samuel, solicitor-general of Massachusetts, assisted by Robert Treat Paine, conducted the prosecution. Quincy's father expressed horror at this action of his youngest son, not comprehending the fact that it was the finest act in his career and saved the good name of Massachusetts. During the next two years Quincy continued actively to practise law and wrote a number of articles for the press, including one signed "Mentor" urging the annual commemoration of the "Massacre". He now began to develop symptoms of tuberculosis, and decided to make a trip to a warmer climate.
On February 8, 1773, he sailed for Charleston, S. C. , whence he returned by land to Boston, reaching home in May.
His "Journal" of this trip, printed in the Memoir by his son is an interesting and useful record of the sentiment of that time in the Carolinas, Virginia, and Maryland.
It is probable that the two series of articles in the Boston Gazette beginning June 7, 1772, and December 20, 1773, the first signed "Marchmont Nedham, " the second called "Nedham's Remembrancer" were from his pen. In May 1774 he published his chief political work, Observations of the Act of Parliament Commonly Called the Boston Port-Bill with Thoughts on Civil Society and Standing Armies, in which he presented the case against the bill with great ability and set forth the theories that were the basis of his criticism. As a result he received an anonymous letter warning him that his life would be in danger if he should continue his course.
Although only thirty years old, he had now become one of the leaders of the Patriot cause, not only in Massachusetts but throughout the colonies, and was in correspondence with such men as John Dickinson. He was, of course, in the inner councils of the Boston group. His gift for oratory had also made him a power with the people. It was thought that he might be of use at the English court by presenting the case of the colonies in the proper light, and it was arranged that he should go to England, but the plan was kept secret as long as possible so that no misrepresentation might be made before his arrival. For that reason he went on board ship quietly at Salem, September 28, 1774. His father wrote him that when the news leaked out all of the Tories and some of the Whigs resented his sudden departure. Quincy kept a journal of this trip which is of considerable historical interest. He landed on November 8, and proceeded to London. There he had interviews with Lord North, Lord Dartmouth, and other leading men, but without result.
Events were moving rapidly and his friends in Boston wished him to return. What this information was has never been learned. Probably it was already too late for any information he possessed to change the course of events. His health was failing, but in spite of the warnings of his physician he started for home on March 16, 1775. He was most anxious to communicate by word of mouth information which he had gleaned from interviews in London and which he did not feel at liberty to put in writing. What this information was has never been learned. Quincy grew steadily worse on the voyage and died with his message undelivered, a week after the battle of Lexington, a few hours before the ship entered Gloucester harbor, Massachusets. Probably it was already too late for any information he possessed to change the course of events.
By his will he bequeathed to his son, when he should have reached the age of fifteen, the works of Algernon Sidney, John Locke, Bacon, Gordon's Tacitus, and Cato's Letters.
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Josiah Quincy Jr. (1744-1775), Boston lawyer and patrio...)
Views
Quotations:
"Blandishments will not fascinate us, nor will threats of a "halter" intimidate. For, under God, we are determined that wheresoever, whensoever, or howsoever we shall be called to make our exit, we will die free men".
Personality
Josiah Quincy was always frail and extremely sensitive.
Connections
On October 26, 1769, Josiah married Abigail, the eldest daughter of William Phillips, a rich and prominent merchant. Quincy left one son, Josiah, his only daughter having died on April 13, 1775.