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Mr. Whately wished to avoid the charge of having given them, Mr. Temple of having taken them. At length the dispute became so personal and pointed, that Mr. Temple thought it necessary to call the surviving brother into the field. The letter of provocation appeared in the morning, and the parties met in the afternoon. Dr Franklin was not then in town; and it was only after some interval that he received the intelligence. What had passed he could not foresee; but he considered it to be his duty, and therefore he endeavored to prevent what still might otherwise follow by publishing the following article:

TO THE PRINTER OF THE PUBLIC

SIR,

ADVERTISER.

FINDING that two gentlemen have been unfortunately engaged in a duel, about a transaction and its circumstances, of which both of them are totally ignorant and innocent; I think it incumbent upon me to declare (for the prevention of farther mischief, as far as such a declaration may contribute to prevent it) that I alone am the person who obtained and transmitted to Boston the letters in question. Mr. W. could not communicate them, because they were never in his possession; and for the same reason, they could not be taken from him by Mr. T.-They were not of the nature of private letters between friends. They were written by public officers to persons in public stations, on public affairs, and intended to procure public measures; they were therefore handed to other public persons who might be influenced by them to produce those measures. Their ten

dency was to incense the mother country against her colonies, and by the steps recommended, to widen the breach: which they affected. The chief caution expressed with regard to privacy, was, to keep their contents from the colony agents; who the writers apprehended might return them, or copies of them to America. That apprehension was, it seems, well founded: for the first agent who laid his hands

on then, thought it his duty to transmit them to his consti

tuents,

B. FRANKLIN.

Agent for the House of Representatives of Massachusetts Bay.

Craven-street, Dec. 25, 1773,

It will be seen by the dates, that this publication by Dr. Franklin, and the transactions which led to it, followed the presentation of the Massachusetts' petition, and preceded the letter of Mr. Mauduit to the council; and it will be seen in the narration that follows of the proceedings before the privy council, that these letters and publications, were brought into view, and produced effects, which ought to be a perpetual lesson to statesmen,

The committee of privy council met on the 11th of January, 1774.

PRESENT. The lord president of the council.

The secretaries of State, and many other lords.

Dr. Franklin and Mr. Bollan, agents for Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts.

Mr. Mauduit, agent for the governor of Massachusetts, with Mr. Wedderburn as his counsel.

Dr. Franklin's Letter and the Address, Mr. Pownall's Letter, and Mr. Mauduit's Petition, were read. Mr. Wedderburn. The address mentions certain papers: I could wish to be informed what are those papers ? Dr. Franklin. They are the letters of Mr. Hutchinson and Mr. Oliver,

Court. Have you brought them?

Dr. Franklin. No, but here are attested copies.

Court. Do you mean to found a charge upon them?......if you do, you must produce the letters.

Dr. Franklin. These copies are attested by several gen tlemen at Boston, and a notary public.

Mr. Wedderburn. My lords, we shall not take advantage of any imperfection in the proof. We admit that the letters are Mr. Hutchinson's and Mr. Oliver's hand writing: reserving to ourselves the right of enquiring how they were obtained.

Dr. Franklin. I did not expect that council would have been employed on this occasion.

Court. Had you not notice sent you of Mr. Mauduit's having petitioned to be heard by counsel on behalf of the governor and lieutenant governor.

Dr. Franklin. I did receive such notice; but I thought this had been a matter of politics, not of law, and have not brought my counsel.

Court. Where a charge is brought, the parties have a right to be heard by counsel or not, as they choose.

Mr. Mauduit. My lords, I am not a native of that country, as these gentlemen are. I know well Dr. Franklin's abilities, and wish to put the defence of my friends more upon a parity with the attack; he will not therefore wonder that I choose to appear before you lordships with the assist. ance of counsel. My friends, in their letters to me, have desired (if any proceedings, as they say, should be had upon this address) that they may have a hearing in their own justification, that their innocence may be fully cleared, and their honor vindicated, and have made provision accordingly. I do not think myself at liberty therefore to give up the assistance of my counsel in defending them against this unjust accusation.

Court. Dr. Franklin may have the assistance of counsel, orgo on without it, as he shall choose.

Dr. Franklin. I desire to have counsel.

Court. What time do you want?

Dr. Franklin. Three weeks.

Ordered that the further proceedings be on Saturday the 29th instant.

The committee of privy council met according to their adjournment, on the 29th January following, when Mr. John Dunning (afterwards lord Ashburton) and Mr, John

Lee, both eminent lawyers, appeared as counsel, on behalf of the Massachusett's assembly. Mr. Wedderburn (afterwards lord Loughborough) appeared as counsel for the governor and lieutenant-governor.

The matter being a complaint from the Massachusett's assembly, their counsel were first heard of course. Mr. Wedderburn, was very long and laborious, and indecently acrimonious in his answers. Instead of justifying his clients, or vindicating their conduct in the administration, which was the matter complained of, Mr. Wedderburn bent the whole force of his discourse, which was an inflammatory invective, against Dr. Franklin, who sat with calm equanimity an auditor of this injudicious and indecorous course of proceeding.

The principal but of his acrimony was the matter of dispute between Mr. Temple and Mr. Whately; and the letter published by Dr. Franklin in the Public Advertiser of 25th December, 1773.

Mr. Dunning had substantiated the complaints of the assembly by exhibiting the letters, which were at this time published in a pamphlet; and also in the Remembrancer of 1773; and he stood upon their letters as proof of their being unworthy of the confidence of the government as well as of the assembly of Massachusetts. Among other matters, he stated, that Andrew Oliver had suggested to the ministry" to stipulate with the merchants of England, "and purchase from them large quantities of goods pro

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per for the American market; agreeing before hand to "allow them a premium equal to the advance of their "stock in the trade, if the price of their goods was not "enhanced by a tenfold demand in future, even though "the goods might lay on hand till this temporary stagna"tion of business ceased. By such a step," said he, "the game will be up with my countrymen." That Oliver had on other occasions (in a letter to the ministry, dated Feb. 15, 1769,) indirectly recommended assassination ;' his words being, that some method should be devised to take off the original incendiaries, whose writings supplied

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the fuel of sedition through the Boston Gazette."s And he referred to the case of Mr. Otis, who, notwithstanding he held the office of king's advocate, under the predecessor of governor Hutchinson, had been at night attacked by one Robinson, a commissioner of the king's customs, at the head of a gang of ruffians armed with swords and bludgeons; who on entering the house, extinguished the lights, and after leaving the respectable gentleman covered with wounds, fled. and found a refuge on board a king's ship. Mr. Hutchinson by one declaration alone, he said, justified all the complaints of Massachusetts, and called for an immediate dismission of an officer so hostile to the rights and liberties of his countrymen. He who had declared "there must be an abridgment of English liberties in the colonies," was justly charged with "making wicked and injurious representations, designed to influence the ministry, and the nation, and to excite jealousies in the breast of the king against his faithful subjects."

The speeches of Messrs. Dunning and Lee were never reported at length; but the extracts which they read were marked for them by Dr. Franklin, of which the following

is one.

EXTRACTS FROM HUTCHINSON'S CORRESPONDENCE.

Boston, June 22, 1772. "The union of the colonies is pretty well broke; I hope I shall never see it renewed. Indeed our sons of liberty are hated and despised by their former brethren in New York and Pennsylvania; and it must be something very extraordinary ever to reconcile them."

Boston, December 8, 1772.

"You see no difference between the case of the colonies and that of Ireland. I care not in how favorable a light you look upon the colonies, if it does not separate us from

5 The writers alluded to were Messrs. Otis, Dexter, Warren, Adams, Quincey, Mayben, and Cooper. Mr. Otis was so much injured by the wounds he received, as never after to recover, and afterwards died in a state of mental derangement, produced by his] wounds.

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