Thomas Gage Quotes
It is needless to trouble your Lordship with daily Publications of determined resolutions not to obey the Acts of Parliament … The Country People are exercising in Arms… and getting Magazines of Arms and Ammunition … People are resorting to this town [Boston] for Protection…. Sedition flows copiously from the Pulpits. The Commissioners of Customs have thought it no longer safe or prudent to remain at Salem.
This quotation shows that the dissent leading to the American Revolution did not emerge suddenly in 1776 after the Battle of Bunker Hill. Dissent, sedition and even violence was documented here in 1774. Salem at the time was the second largest port in the colony and the customs tax collectors—Loyalist Americans—were run out of Salem.
Thomas Gage, 1721-1787, English General and Royal Governor of Massachusetts, Letter to Lord Dartmouth, the Secretary of State for America, September 12, 1774
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Several years before the Battle of Bunker Hill, revolutionary activity had already broken out in the American colonies—See {634132} for an example. This law gave the British authorities much more “clout” in dealing with the “seditious” American activities. It protected English law enforcement officials from being tried in local Colonial courts for murder or assault in putting down insurrections. George Washington and other Patriots were outraged over this law. See {634131}.
Several years before the Battle of Bunker Hill, revolutionary activity had already broken out in the American colonies—See {634132} for an example. Parliament passed the Administration of Justice Act of 1774 which gave the British authorities much more “clout” in dealing with the “seditious” American activities. It protected English law enforcement officials from being tried in local Colonial courts for murder or assault or unnecessary force in putting down insurrections in the colonies. Washington and other patriots used this term to describe the Act. Their reason was that under the new law, a British Soldier could kill a colonist and would not be subject to arrest and trial in local colonial courts. So there was no check on the law enforcement authorities use of unnecessary or arbitrary force. English troops could commit murder and never be accountable to the people—hence the name. Ironically, in America today, most of the Federal and state laws on the subject tend to give law enforcement officials the same kind of immunity and impunity which the Founding Fathers found so objectionable. Civilian review boards of police use of force are no allowed in many American communities.
General Thomas Gage was a British Army general officer and colonial official best known for his many years of service in North America, including his role as British commander-in-chief in the early days of the American Revolution.
