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Chapter II - The First Continental Congress
The First Continental Congress 1774
The Boston Committee of Correspondence reacted to the Coercive Acts by urging all colonists to boycott British goods immediately. However, other colonies were not ready to cut off all trade with Britain. Even though many colonists openly defied British authority, they were not unified in a desire to claim political independence. By the Summer of 1774, the "reluctant revolutionaries" had not yet been able to formulate a response to British coercion and called for an inter-colonial congress.
In September of 1774 an "extralegal" congress of delegates from every colony but Georgia assembled in Philadelphia for the First Continental Congress. Initially the fifty-five delegates differed widely in their prescriptions for action, but finally they voted by a narrow margin to adopt a plan for non-importation. non-consumption and non-exportation of goods between the colonies and Great Britain. In a Declaration of Rights the "good people of the several colonies" rejected all British trade legislation after 1763, reconfirmed their rights to life, liberty and property and vowed to cease trade with Britain. Motivated by self-interest as well as ethical principles, the delegates of the First Continental Congress dared unequivocally to defy British political authority.
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