Home / Dawson, Henry B. Westchester County, New York, During the American Revolution. Morrisania, NY: (privately printed by the author), 1886. / Passage

Westchester County, New York, During the American Revolution

Dawson, Henry B. Westchester County, New York, During the American Revolution. Morrisania, NY: (privately printed by the author), 1886. 277 words

The subject was subsequently disposed of, as it then appeared, by a Resolution, offered by John De Lancey and seconded by Benjamin Booth, providing for the nomination of the Delegates by the body of the Committee, of which the conservative aristocrats held the entire control, which resulted in the nomination of Philip Livingston, John Alsop, Isaac Low, James Duane, and John Jay, of whom John Alsop and John Jay, who had been substituted for the two candidates, of the minority, John Morin Scott and Alexander McDougal, by reason of their known peculiarly conservative tendencies, were espepecially obnoxious to that revolutionary minority, as well as to the revolutionary portion of the unfranchised masses whom that minority indirectly represented. Another Resolution, requesting " the Inhab- " itants of this City and County to meet at the City- " Hall, on Thursday, the seventh of July, at twelve " o'clock, to concur in the Nomination of the fore- " going five Persons, or to choose such others in their " stead as in their wisdom shall seem meet," was then adopted; and, the majority, probably, being well-contented with its apparent success, the Committee then adjourned. 1

The minority of the Committee and those with whom it sympathized and acted, in political affairs -- the " Bellwethers " and the "Sheep "of Gouverneur Morris's metaphor -- were not inclined, however, to submit, tamely, to the arbitrary dictation of their " Shepherds,'' composing the majority of that body ; and they promptly determined to carry the contest into a new field, and with heavy reinforcements. For that purpose, anonymous handbills were posted throughout the City, 2 on the day after the Commit-