, stand the
English Government would once more back down. Upon the conduct of
radicals and conservatives alike, this persistent belief, one of those
delusions which often change the course of history, exercised, indeed, a
decisive influence. Even as high a Son of Liberty as Richard Henry Lee
would have favored more cautious measures in the First Congress had he
not been certain that "the same ship which carries home the resolutions
will bring back the redress." Inspired among radicals partly by the
feeling that so just a cause could not fail, the conviction was chiefly
grounded upon information sent home by Americans residing in England. If
Congress is unanimous, wrote Franklin in September, 1774, "you cannot
fail of carrying your point. If you divide you are lost." Josiah Quincy,
sent to England in order to get first-hand information, wrote letter
after letter to men in every part of America, assuring them that the
oppression of the colonies was an affair of corrupt ministers who were
not supported by one in twenty of the inhabitants of Great Britain.
"Corruption and the influence of the Crown hath led us into bondage," is
the common cry here. "To Americans only we look for salvation." But
yesterday a noble lord had assured him that, "this country will never
carry on a civil war against America; we cannot, but the ministry hope
to carry all by a single stroke." Certainly, he assured his friends, the
common opinion here is that "if the Americans stand out, we must come to
their terms."

Above all, therefore, America must stand out; she must be "firm and
united," waiting the day when England would come to her terms. But the
difficulty was to be firm and at the same time united; for with every
measure bolder than the last, conservative men grew timid or deserted
the cause to swell the ranks of the Loyalist party. It was precisely to
preserve the appearance of unity where none existed that the journals of
the First Congress had been falsified; for this reason alone many
conservatives had voted for the Association; and in the year 1775, after
the battle of Lexington had precipitated a state of war, radical members
of the Second Congress voted for conciliatory petitions, and
conservatives voted to take up arms against the British troops, in the
hope that if the colonists showed themselves unanimous in the profession
of loyalty, and at the same time unanimous in their determination to
resort to forcible resistance as a last r