Letter from Major Benjamin Floyd, of Brookhaven, Suffolk County, New-York, to Mr. Rivington

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Mr. RIVINGTON: A Committee of Observation for several Districts met on the 23d of February last, in Smithtown, Suffolk County, Long-Island; they should have told the publick that the few from Brookhaven were not of the Committee. Whether any Committee the County has been chosen, in the manner they speak of, we know not. Brookhaven never was: represented; so it has not, it cannot, approve of the Congress. We mean to consider only what concerns us — the fifth and sixth of the Committee Resolves.

Why does this Committee so highly disapprove of the Major and others? Is it because he fulfils his oath to, and exerts his power in defence of, Government? Does his example shame and upbraid them? They assuredly would commend and justify his conduct, were they not enchanted by seditious, independent, republican principles! It is your opinion, that most of the subscribers In Messrs. Gaine and Rivington' s writing, were induced, &c. It is our opinion, that your opinion is a mere fiction. Have you heard both sides? Was there neither partiality or prejudice in the way? You may have an opinion that such as oppose you are traitors; this may lead you to proclaim them; this may excite you to imbrue your guilty hands in the blood of the saints! By what law did you form the opinion; what evidence have you to support it? For our part, we contemn the Court, and its arbitrary mandates, that carries its statutes and laws in its bosom. Tell us the law we have transgressed, "the unfair means we used," and who has used any. We, who carried the Petition, used none; the people needed none, being generally glad of an opportunity to sign it. You must know the Constitution disavows ill arts; it condemns tyranny and slavery, and yours among others. You say you, are informed a Court of Inquisition would have said as much. Who are your informers? "A great number are dissatisfied:" we call upon you now to name them, for "we are highly dissatisfied" with your unfair manner of stating things. We know not any "that are dissatisfied with what they have done?" But we know some who are sorry that they missed the opportunity of "signing it." But we will bury this pious Resolve, with the solemnity or your next saying it is replete with the most impudent falsehoods and grossest misrepresentation.

A very ingenious writer, who is an honour to the Province somewhere says, "that Four Pence upon the Hundred for the fibs, falsehoods, and misrepresentations of America' s Sons, would pay a considerable part of the Nation' s Debt." We are of his opinion.

"The Major and abetters of the ingenious A. W. Farmer" call upon you to prove "them traitors." If they are in no sense traitors, it is base and abominable "to

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esteem and treat them as traitors to their Country." If what is generally said be true, that the Congress made no laws, then it can be no transgression to trample upon and contemn the Association. For where there is no law, there can be no transgression. Now if you fail in proof of so high and presumptuous an imputation, the impartial publick must esteem you a most abusive and unlawful body. No sacred, pretext or design can justify the commission of the least evil.

Tell us what moved you to proclaim our patriotick Printers traitors? Do you really mean to immure the Colonies in Popish darkness, by suppressing the vehicles of light, truth, and liberty? Are none to speak, write, or print, but by your permission? Does a conscience of guilt and tyranny hurry the Committees to starve and murder our virtuous Printers? One would conclude, from Mr. Holt' s papers, that they had lost virtue, honour, humanity, and common sense. A free Press has been the honour and glory of Englishmen; by it our most excellent Constitution has been raised to greater perfection than any in the world. But we are become the degenerate plants of a new and strange vine; and now it seems ignorance must be the mother of both devotion and politicks.

The Major and friends to Government desire the Committee, who had no right to represent Brookhaven, to take back the odious, despicable epithet of traitors, as it is peculiarly adapted to the enemies of the Country, and the deluded abetters of the rebellious saints at Boston. For we, in our turn, "think that they (if any) ought to be esteemed and treated as traitors to their Country, and enemies to the liberties of America."

Signed by Major Benjamin Floyd, and a great number of others.

Letter from Major Benjamin Floyd, of Brookhaven, Suffolk County, New-York, to Mr. Rivington, in Reply to Some Resolutions Adopted by a Committee at Smithtown, on the 23rd of February. [1775-03-06] Floyd, Benjamin, Major. [S4-V2-p0036] [Document Details][Complete Volume]