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same month a remarkable change in their opinions took place, and they ceased praying for the king and royal family! This was a sort of half wheel, and toward the latter part of June the convention finished its evolutions by a "right about face" and withdrew their restrictions upon the votes of their delegates. Thus relieved, Mr. Paca and his associates continued their efforts to effect a declaration of independence with more zeal than ever, and recorded their votes for the severance of the political bond of union with Britain, on the fourth of July following. On the second of August, they fearlessly affixed their signatures to the parchment.

About the beginning of 1778, Mr. Paca was appointed Chief Justice of the State of Maryland. He performed the duties with great ability and fidelity until 1782, when he was elected President or Governor of the State, under the old Articles of Confederation. He held the executive office one year, and then retired to private life.

a 1789.

In 1788, he was a member of the convention of Maryland, called to act upon the ratification of the Federal Constitution. He was a firm advocate there for its ratification, which event took place in November. After the New Constitution had gone into effect, and offices under it were to be filled, President Washington nominated him Judge for the district of Maryland." This office he held until the period of his death, which was in the year 1799, when he was in the sixtieth year of his age. He was a pure and active patriot, a consistent Christian, and a valuable citizen, in every sense of the word. His death was mourned as a public calamity; and his life, pure and spotless, active and useful, exhibited a bright exemplar for the imitation of the young men of America.

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Carles Canoll of Carrollton

HARLES CARROLL was descended from Irish ancestry. His grandfather, Daniel Carroll, was a native of Littemourna, in Ireland, and was a clerk in the office of Lord Powis, in

the reign of James the Second. Under the patronage f Lord Baltimore, the principal proprietor of Maryland, Mr. Carroll emigrated to that Colony toward the close of the seventeenth century, and became the possessor of a large plantation. His son Charles, the father of the subject of this memoir, was born in 1702, and lived

to the age of eighty years, when he died and left his large estate to his eldest child, Charles, who was then twentyfive years old.

Charles Carroll, the Revolutionary patriot, was born on the twentieth of September, 1737. When he was only eight years of age, his father, who was a Roman Catholic, took him to France, and entered him as a student in the Jesuit College at St. Omer's. There he remained six years, and then went to another Jesuit seminary of learning, at Rheims. After remaining there one year, he entered the College of Louis le Grand, whence he graduated at the age of seventeen years, and then commenced the study of law at Bourges. one year, and then moved to until 1757. He then went to continuing his law studies there. He took apartments in the Inner Temple, where he remained until 1765, and then returned to Maryland, a most finished scholar and well-bred gentleman.

He remained
He remained at Bourges

Paris, where he continued
London for the purpose of

The passage of the Stamp Act, about the time that he returned to America, arrested his attention and turned his mind more intently upon political affairs, of which he had not, for some time, been an indifferent spectator. He at once espoused the cause of the American patriots, and became associated with Chase, Paca, Stone, and others, in the various patriotic movements of the day. They became engaged in a newspaper war with the authorities of Maryland, and so powerfully did these patriots wield the pen, that their discomfited opponents soon beat a retreat behind the prerogatives and power of the royal governor. Mr. Carroll was particularly distinguished as a political writer, and in 1771-'72, his name, as such, became familiar in the other Colonies.

In 1772, he wrote a series of essays against the assumed right of the British government to tax the Colonies with

out their consent. opposition to them, but Mr. Carroll triumphed most emphatically. His essays were signed "The First Citizen," and the name of the author was entirely unknown. But so grateful were the people for the noble defence of their cause which these papers contained, that they instructed the members of the Legislative Assembly of Maryland, to return their hearty thanks to the unknown writer, through the public prints. This was done by William Paca, and Matthew Hammond. When it became known that Mr. Carroll was the writer, large numbers of people went to him and expressed their thanks personally, and he at once stood among the highest in popular confidence and favor.

The Secretary of the Colony wrote in

Mr. Carroll early foresaw that a resort to arms in defence of Colonial rights, was inevitable, and this opinion he fearlessly expressed. His decided character, his stern integrity, and his clear judgment, made him an umpire in many momentous cases,* and in every step he ascended higher and higher the scale of popular favor. He was appointed a member of the first Committee of Safety' of Maryland; and in 1775, he was elected a member of the Provincial Assembly. His known sentiments in favor of independence were doubtless the cause of his not being sooner sent to the General Congress, for, as we have already seen, the Maryland Convention were opposed to that extreme measure.

Anxious to witness the men and their proceedings in

* As an instance of the entire confidence which the people had in his judgment, it is related, that when, in 1773-4, the "tea excitement" was at its height, a Mr. Stewart of Annapolis, imported a quantity of the obnoxious article. The people were exasperated, and threatened to destroy the tea if landed. The Provincial Legislature being then in session, appointed a committee of delegates to superintend the unlading of the cargo and see that no tea was landed. With this the people were not satisfied, and Mr. Stewart appealed to Mr. Carroll to interpose his influence. The latter told him it would be impossible to have any effect upon the public mind in this matter, where such an important principle was concerned, and he advised Mr. Stewart to allow the vessel and cargo to be burned. This advice Mr. Stewart followed, and by his consent the conflagration took place.

the Continental Congress, he visited Philadelphia for the purpose, early in 1776, and so favorably was he known there, that Congress placed him on a committee, with Doctor Franklin and Samuel Chase, to visit Canada on an important mission, the object of which we have mentioned in the life of Mr. Chase. On his return, finding Mr. Lee's motion for independence before Congress, he hastened to Maryland, to endeavor, if possible, to have the restrictive instructions which governed her delegates in the National Assembly, removed. In this he was successful, and when the prohibition was removed, he was elected a delegate to the Continental Congress. With instructions to vote as the judgment of the delegates should dictate, Mr. Carroll proceeded to Philadelphia, where he arrived on the eighth of July, too late to vote for the Declaration of Independence,* but in ample time to affix his signature to the parchment.

Ten days after he took his seat in Congress, Mr. Carroll was placed upon the Board of War, and continued a member of the same during his continuance in that body. He was at the same time a member of the Assembly of Maryland, and all the time which he could spare from his duties at Philadelphia, he spent in the active service of his own State. He was appointed, in 1776, a member of the Convention that framed a Constitution for Maryland as an independent State, and after its adoption, he was chosen a member of the State Senate.

Mr. Carroll continued a member of Congress until 1788, when he relinquished his seat, and devoted himself to the interests of his native State. He was again elected to the

* The question naturally arises, Why did Mr. Carroll append to his signature the place of his residence, "Carrollton"? It is said that when he wrote his name, a delegate near him suggested, that as he had a cousin of the name of Charles Carroll, in Maryland, the latter might be taken for him, and he (the signer) escape attainder, or any other punishment that might fall upon the heads of the patriots. Mr. Carroll immediately seized the pen, and wrote "of Carrollton" at the end of his name, exclaiming "They cannot mistake me now!"

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