private
wealth would justify his necessarily great loss of time. Hence, he moved
back to Braintree, resigning his seat in the Legislature, but still
retaining his law office in Boston. A comparative lull in politics made
his presence in that body less needed, but still he was consulted as to
all the more difficult points in the controversy with Governor
Hutchinson, and freely gave his aid. Indeed, it was not long before he
moved back to Boston, but thoroughly resolved to avoid politics, and to
devote his undivided attention to his professional work. Soon after his
return to Boston he wrote a series of letters on the then mooted
question of the independence of the judiciary, and the payment by the
Crown of the salaries of the Judges. Soon after this he was elected by
the general Court to the Provincial Council, but was rejected by
Governor Hutchinson.

The destruction of tea, and the Boston port bill that followed, soon
brought matters to a crisis. These events produced the congress of 1774.
Mr. Adams was one of the five delegates sent from Massachusetts, and his
visit to Philadelphia at this time was the first occasion of his going
beyond the limits of New England. In the discussions in the committee on
the declaration of colonial rights, he took an active part in resting
those rights on the law of nature as well as the law of England; and
when the substance of those resolutions had been agreed upon he was
chosen to put the matter in shape. In his diary the most trustworthy and
graphic descriptions are to be found of the members and doings of that
famous but little known body. The session concluded, Mr. Adams left the
city of brotherly love with little expectation, at that time, of ever
again seeing it.

Immediately after his return home he was chosen by his native town a
member of the provincial congress then in session. That congress had
already appointed a committee of safety vested with general executive
powers; had seized the provincial revenues; had appointed general
officers, collected military stores, and had taken steps toward
organizing a volunteer army of minute-men. The governor--Gage--had
issued a proclamation denouncing these proceedings, but no attention was
ever paid to it. Gage had no support except in the five or six regiments
that guarded Boston, a few trembling officials and a small following
from the people.

Shortly after the adjournment of this congress Adams occupied himself in
answering thr