liberty, a man of good family, and, like so many of the patriot leaders,
a lawyer. His speech was the first definite pronouncement for a new
order of things.

"I am determined," he said, "to sacrifice estate, ease, health,
applause, and even life, to the sacred calls of my country." He referred
to the "kind of power, the exercise of which cost one king of England
his head and another his throne." Such language, publicly spoken, was
new. His argument was, to Englishmen, irrefutable. No precedent, no
English statute, could stand against the Constitution. "This writ, if
declared legal, totally annihilates" the privacy of the home.
"Custom-house officers might enter our houses when they please, and we
could not resist them. Upon bare suspicion they could exercise this
wanton power.... Both reason and the Constitution are against this
writ.... Every act against the Constitution is void."[11] The speech,
continued for four hours, was a brilliant example of keen logic combined
with burning eloquence.

This is Otis's great service to the cause of the Revolution. Fiery and
magnetic, but moody and eventually unbalanced, he gave place in the
public confidence to men perhaps of lesser talents, but with equal zeal
and steadier purpose. Yet his service was invaluable. His speech
expressed for his countrymen the indignation of the hour, and it pointed
the way to younger men. To one at least of his hearers, John Adams, it
was "like the oath of Hamilcar administered to Hannibal."[12] To many it
was the final appeal that settled them in their patriotism. For history
the scene has been called the beginning of the Revolution.

Yet it had no immediate results, for Hutchinson--and the service was
forgotten by neither his friends nor his opponents--secured delay of
judgment in the case until the English courts could uphold him against
his wavering associates. Nevertheless, it is safe to assume that the
public indignation secured moderate measures on the part of the customs
officials, since we hear of few complaints. And the affair had its
influence on the public attitude toward the Stamp Act, five years later.

The Stamp Act was the first definite assertion of the right to tax
America. In 1763 the Sugar Act had been reenacted, but its provisions,
taxing only importations from foreign colonies, yielded little revenue.
The king's treasury was already feeling the drains upon it, and a pack
of eager office-seekers was clamoring to be let loose