ation of that city,
it having maintained an uninterrupted organization from the year
1724, about forty years after the establishment of the colonial
government by William Penn, and was much in use during the early
days of the revolution. The doors of the State House, where the
continental congress intended to meet, were found closed against
it; but the Carpenter Company, numbering many eminent patriots,
offered its hall for their use; and here met the first continental
congress, September 5, 1774. John Adams, describing its opening
ceremonies, said:

Here was a scene worthy of the painter's art. Washington was
kneeling there, and Randolph, Rutledge, Lee and Jay; and by their
side there stood, bowed in reverence, the Puritan patriots of New
England, who at that moment had reason to believe that an armed
soldiery was wasting their humble households. It was believed
that Boston had been bombarded and destroyed.[3] They prayed
fervently for America, for the congress, for the province of
Massachusetts Bay, and especially for the town of Boston. Who can
realize the emotions with which in that hour of danger they
turned imploringly to heaven for Divine interposition. It was
enough to melt a heart of stone. I saw the tears gush into the
eyes of old, gray, pacific Quakers of Philadelphia.

The action of this congress, which sat but seven weeks, was
momentous in the history of the world. "From the moment of their
first debate," said De Tocqueville, "Europe was moved." The
convention which in 1781 framed the constitution of the United
States, also met in Carpenter Hall in secret session for four
months before agreeing upon its provisions. This hall seemed the
most appropriate place for establishing the centennial rooms of the
National Woman Suffrage Association, but the effort to obtain
it proved unavailing[4] as will be seen by the following
correspondence:

_To the President and Officers of the Carpenter Company of
Philadelphia:_

The National Woman Suffrage Association will hold its
headquarters in Philadelphia the centennial season of 1876, and
desires to secure your historic hall for that purpose. We know
your habit and custom of denying its use to all societies, yet we
make our request because our objects are in accord with the
principles which emanated from within its walls a hundred years
ago, and we shall use it