1The Pennsylvania Assembly: Instructions to Its Delegates in Congress, [14 June 1776] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives of . . . Pennsylvania . . . (Philadelphia, 1776), VI , 740. Since the previous autumn, when the Pennsylvania delegates had been instructed not to vote for independence, the Assembly had come under mounting attack. One ground of attack was apportionment: Philadelphia, the center of radicalism, and the western counties were...
2The Pennsylvania Assembly: Instructions to Its Delegates in Congress, 9 November 1775 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives of Pennsylvania ..., VI (Philadelphia, 1776), 647; AD (draft): Historical Society of Pennsylvania. In May the Pennsylvania Assembly had committed its delegates to military resistance, colonial union, and a continued search for compromise. After the elections in October the new Assembly chose a new Congressional delegation, again...
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the Province of Pennsylvania . . . (6 vols., Philadelphia, 1752–76), VI , 587. Franklin had no more than set foot in Philadelphia before he was plunged into local as well as Congressional politics. The day after he arrived the Assembly chose him unanimously as a delegate to Congress. On June 30 he was appointed to the Pennsylvania committee of safety and...
4Pennsylvania Assembly: Resolutions on the Appointment of Benjamin Franklin as Agent, [26 October 1764] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives of the Province of Pennsylvania, Met at Philadelphia [October 15, 1764] (Philadelphia, 1764), p. 15; also MS certified copy of the first resolution: American Philosophical Society. After the reading of the Remonstrance against Franklin’s possible appointment as agent (printed immediately above) on the morning of October 26, the...
5Pennsylvania Assembly: Instructions to Richard Jackson, 22 September 1764 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 105–6. A quorum of the Assembly gathered on September 11 to begin the short final session before its dissolution. The next day Speaker Franklin laid before the House an extract from the journal of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, June 13, 1764, together with the letter to himself...
6Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 30 May 1764 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 89–91. The Assembly’s message of May 26 (immediately above) had made clear to Governor Penn and his Council that the assemblymen had no intention of including in the supply bill any formal amendment of the acts of 1759 and 1760. It did include references to the Supply Act of 1760, however,...
7Pennsylvania Assembly: Petition to the King, [23–26 May 1764] (Franklin Papers)
I. Draft: Library of Congress. II. DS : Public Record Office When on the morning of May 23 the Assembly received and read the second group of the inhabitants’ petitions to the King asking him to assume the government of Pennsylvania, that body voted “by a great Majority” that a committee be appointed “to prepare and bring in the Draft of a Petition to the King from this House, to accompany the...
8Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, [26 May 1764] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), p. 85. The Assembly had reconvened on May 14 after a seven-week recess, and on the 17th Governor Penn sent down a long message in reply to that of the House on March 24 concerning the £55,000 supply bill. He reviewed the circumstances leading to the order in council of Sept. 2, 1760 , and argued...
9Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, 24 March 1764 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 69–72. Governor Penn apparently spent most of the morning of March 23 composing a reply to the Assembly’s message of the 22d (see immediately above). He signed it in the afternoon and sent it to the Assembly. In it he expressed his deep concern that in the critical military situation the...
10Pennsylvania Assembly: Resolves upon the Present Circumstances, [24 March 1764] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in Votes and Proceedings of the House of Representatives , 1763–1764 (Philadelphia, 1764), pp. 72–4. As soon as the Assembly had considered on March 10 the governor’s message of the 7th rejecting the £50,000 supply bill and had appointed a committee to bring in a new £55,000 bill, it named a second committee of eight members, including Franklin, “to draw up and bring in certain...