Five-minute digest
Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania
Summary
Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania is a series of twelve public letters that John Dickinson printed in the Pennsylvania Chronicle beginning with the issue of November 30–December 3, 1767, and continuing weekly into February 1768. Writing as a modest farmer settled near the Delaware River, a man of small estate, a good library and a contented mind, Dickinson addressed his countrymen in the British colonies about the measures Parliament had passed in 1767 under Charles Townshend. The first letter concerns the act suspending the New York assembly for failing to supply British troops as the Quartering Act required. Dickinson argues that if Parliament may punish one colony for refusing a burden, it may punish all, and he calls on the other colonies to support their sister province. The second letter turns to the duties on paper, glass, painters' colours and tea. Dickinson grants that Parliament may lawfully regulate the trade of the whole empire, but he points out that these duties were laid expressly to raise a revenue, and so are taxes in disguise. The third letter answers readers who feared his writing would inflame the public. He recommends petitions first, then economic pressure by withholding trade, and treats force as a last resort. The middle letters work through objections. Letter IV rejects the line between internal and external taxes that some had drawn after the Stamp Act. Letter V reviews more than a century and a half of imperial practice in which no statute had been passed solely to raise money from the colonies. Letter VI separates duties that regulate commerce from duties that raise revenue, and says the intention of a law decides which it is. Letter VII warns that small duties set great precedents and defines a free people by the constitutional checks under which they live. Letters VIII to X examine where the money was to go: to pay royal governors and judges, making them independent of the assemblies, and possibly to fund pensions and places as in Ireland. Letter XI urges a constant watchfulness over liberty, and Letter XII closes with a chain of principles, a plea for unity, and a verse from Deuteronomy on teaching such truths to children. The letters were reprinted in most American newspapers and as pamphlets in several American cities, in London with a preface by Benjamin Franklin, in Dublin, and in French. Boston's town meeting voted its thanks to the Farmer in March 1768. The library text is the 1903 Outlook Company reprint of the Boston edition, with R. T. H. Halsey's historical introduction and the addresses of thanks that followed.
Top Lessons
The purpose of a law tells you what it is
Dickinson concedes that Parliament may regulate the trade of the empire, and he does not quarrel with duties that serve that end. His argument is that the Townshend duties announce in their own preamble that they exist to raise a revenue. By reading the words of the statute closely, he shows that a measure called a duty can in fact be a tax.
Resistance with dignity
The Farmer is firm about rights and careful about means. Letter III sets out an order of action: petitions, then economic pressure, and force only at the very last. He believes a just cause can be harmed by turbulence and that calm, lawful conduct persuades friends abroad and keeps the colonists' own consciences clear.
Small precedents and the habit of vigilance
Dickinson asks readers to judge a measure by what it makes possible, not only by what it costs now. A small duty, once accepted, becomes a precedent for larger ones, so he calls for a perpetual jealousy over liberty. Letter VII's definition of a free people rests on constitutional checks rather than on the good intentions of rulers.
The cause of one is the cause of all
From the first letter, Dickinson argues that the colonies stand or fall together. New York's suspended assembly matters to Pennsylvania because the same power could be turned on any province. His closing letter makes benevolence and unanimity among the colonies a condition of preserving their rights.
Verified Quotes
“He certainly is not a wise man, who folds his arms and reposeth himself at home, seeing with unconcern the flames that have invaded his neighbour's house, without any endeavours to extinguish them.”
“The cause of liberty is a cause of too much dignity, to be sullied by turbulence and tumult.”
“Let us behave like dutiful children, who have received unmerited blows from a beloved parent.”
“Those who are taxed without their own consent, given by themselves, or their representatives, are slaves.”
“For who are a free people? not those over whom government is reasonably and equitably exercised”
“A perpetual jealousy respecting liberty, is absolutely requisite in all free states.”
“Some states have lost their liberty by particular accidents; but this calamity is generally owing to the decay of virtue.”
“Let these truths be indelibly impressed on our minds--that we cannot be happy without being free--that we cannot be free without being secure in our property--that we cannot be secure in our property, if, without our consent, others may, as by right, take it away”
Medical Lens
The letters have no medical subject. Their bodily images are political metaphors: Letter IX says the ax is laid to the root of the tree and the whole body must perish, and Letter XII warns that a speck of decay on a remote limb should alarm the whole body and compares British restrictions to the spear of Telephus, which could heal the wound it made. These belong to the long tradition of the body politic rather than to the medicine of the period.