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The Reverend
James Maury to the Reverend John Camm, December 12, 1763 Dear SIR: Accordingly,
at December Court, a select jury was ordered to be summoned; but, how
far they who gave the order, wished or intended it to be regarded, you
may judge from the sequel. The Sheriff went into a public room, full
of gentlemen, and told his errand. One excused himself (Peter
Robinson of King William) as having already given his opinion in a
similar case. On this, as a person then present told me, he
immediately left the room, without summoning any one person there. He
afterwards met another gentleman (Richard Sq. Taylor) on the
green, and, on his saying he was not fit to serve, being a
churchwarden, he took upon himself to excuse him, too, and, as far as
I can learn, made no further attempts to summon gentlemen. These
you'll say, were but feeble endeavors to comply with the directions of
the Court in that particular. Hence, he went among the vulgar herd.
After he had selected and set down upon his list about eight or ten of
these, I met him with it in his hand, and on looking over it, observed
to him that they were not such jurors as the Court had directed him to
get, being people of whom I had never heard before, except one, whom,
I told him, he knew to be a party in the cause, as one of the
Collector's Securities, and, therefore, not fit for a juror on that
occasion. Yet this man's name was not erased. He was even called in
Court, and, had he not excused himself, would probably have been
admitted. For. I cannot recollect, that the Court expressed either
surprise or dislike that a more proper jury had not been summoned.
Nay, though I objected against them yet, as Patrick Henry (one of the
Defendant's lawyers) insisted they were honest men, and, therefore,
unexceptionable, they were immediately called to the book and sworn.
Three of them, as I was afterwards told, nay, some said four, were
Dissenters of that denomination called New Lights,
which the Sheriff, as they were all his acquaintance, must have
known. Messrs. Gift and McDowall, the two most consider considerable
purchasers in that county, were now called in to imported, that,
during the months of May and June, 1759, tobacco had currently sold at
50s. per hundred, and that himself, at or about the latter end of the
last of those months, had sold some hundreds of
hhds [hogsheads] at that price, and, amongst the rest, one hundred
to be delivered in the month of August, which, however, were not
delivered till September. That of the latter only proved, "That
50s. was the current price to tobacco that season." This was the
sum of the evidence for the Plaintiff. Against him, was produced a
receipt to the Collector, to the best of my remembrance in
these words: "Received of Thomas
Johnson, Jun’r, at this and some former payments, £144, current
money, by James Maury." After
the lawyers on both sides had displayed the force and weight of the
evidence, pro and con to their Honors, the jurors, and one of those
who appeared for the Defendants had observed to them that they must
find, (or if they must find, I am not sure which, but think the
former) for the Plaintiff, but need not find more than one farthing;
they went out, and, according to instruction (though whether according
to evidence or not, I leave you to judge), in less than five minutes
brought in a verdict for the Plaintiff, one penny damages. Mr. Lyons
urged, as the verdict was contrary to evidence, the jury ought be sent
out again. But no notice was taken of it, and the verdict admitted
without hesitation by the Bench. He then moved to have the evidence of
Messrs. Gift and McDowell recorded, with as little effect. His next
motion, which was for a new trial shared the same fate. He then moved
it might be admitted to record, "that he had made a motion for a
new trial, because he considered the verdict contrary to evidence, and
that the motion had been rejected;" which, after much
altercation, was agreed to. He
lastly moved for an appeal, which, too, was granted. This,
sir. As well as I can remember, is a just and impartial narrative of
the most material occurrences in the trial of that cause. One
occurrence more, tho' not essential to the cause, I can't help
mentioning, as a striking instance of the loyalty, impartiality and
attachment of the Bench to the Church of England in particular, and to
religion at large. Mr. Henry, mentioned above (who had been called in
by the Defendants, as we suspected, to do what I some time ago told
you of), after Mr. Lyons had opened the cause rose and harangued the
jury for near an hour. This harangue turned upon points as much out of
his own depths, and that of the jury, as they were foreign from the
purpose; which it would be impertinent to mention here. However,
after he had discussed those points, he labored to prove "that
the act of 1758 had every characteristic of good law,‑ that it
was a law of general utility, and could not, consistently with what he
called the original compact between King and people, stipulating
protection on the one hand and owe obedience on the other be
annulled." Hence, he inferred, "that a King, by disallowing
Acts of this salutary nature, from being the father of his people,
degenerated into a Tyrant and forfeits all right to his subjects'
obedience." He
further urged “that the only use of an Established Church and Clergy
in society is to enforce obedience to civil sanctions, and that the
observance of those which are called duties of imperfect obligation;
that, when a Clergy ceases to answer these ends, the community have no
further need of their ministry, and may justly strip them of their
appointments; that the Clergy of Virginia, in this particular instance
of their refusing to acquiesce in the law in question, had been so far
from answering, that they had most notoriously counteracted, those
great ends of their institution; that, therefore, instead of useful
members of the state, they ought to be considered as enemies of the
community; and that, in the case now before them Mr. Maury, instead of
countenance, and protection and damages, very justly deserved to be
punished with signal severity." And
then he perorates to the following purpose, "that excepting they
(the jury) were disposed to rivet the chains of bondage on their own
necks, he hoped they would not let slip the opportunity which now
offered, of making such an example of him as might, hereafter, be a
warning to himself and his brethren, not to have the temerity, for the
future, to dispute the validity of such laws, authenticated by the
only authority, which, in his conception, could give force to laws for
the government of this Colony, the authority of a legal representative
of a Council, and of a kind and benevolent and patriot Governor." You'll
observe I do not pretend to
remember his words, but take this to have been the sum and substance
of this of his labored oration. When he came to that part of it where
he undertook to assert, "that a King, by annulling or disallowing
acts of so salutary a nature, from being the Father of his people
degenerated into a Tyrant, and forfeits all right to his subjects'
obedience." ‑ the more sober part of the audience were
struck with horror. Mr. Lyons called out aloud, and with an honest
warmth to the Bench, “That the gentleman had spoken treason,"
and expressed his astonishment "that their worship could hear it
without emotion, or any mark of dissatisfaction." At
the same instant, too, amongst some gentlemen in the crowd behind me,
was a confused murmur of Treason, Treason! Yet Mr. Henry went on in
the same treasonable and licentious strain, without interruption from
the Bench, nay, even without receiving the least exterior notice of
their disapprobation. One of the jury, too, was so highly pleased with
these doctrines, that, as I was afterwards told, he every now and then
gave the traitorous declaimer a nod of approbation. After
the Court was adjourned, he apologized to me for what he had said,
alleging that his sole view in engaging in the cause, and in saying
what he had, was to render himself popular. You see, then, it is so
clear a point in this person's opinion, that the ready road to
popularity here, is, to trample under foot the interests of religion,
the rights of the church, and the. prerogative of the crown. If this 'be not pleading
for the "assumption of a power to bind the King's hands," if
it be asserting "such supremacy in provincial Legislatures"
as is inconsistent with the dignity of the Church of England, and
manifestly tends to draw the people of these plantations from their
allegiance to the King, tell me, my dear sir, what is so, if you can.
Mr. Cootes, merchant on James River, after Court said "he would
have given a considerable sum out of his own pocket, rather than his
friend Patrick should have been guilty of a crime, but little, if any
thing inferior to that which brought Simon Lord Lovett to the
block;" and justly observed that he exceeded the most seditious
and inflammatory harangues of the Tribunes of old Rome. |