Quakers in the American Revolution

Last updated

By the mid-18th century, members of the Religious Society of Friends lived throughout the thirteen British colonies in North America, with large numbers in the Pennsylvania colony in particular. The American Revolution created a difficult situation for many of these Friends, informally known as "Quakers," as their nonviolent religious tenets often conflicted with the emerging political and nationalistic ideals of their homeland. Early in the conflict's history, Quakers participated in the revolutionary movement through nonviolent actions such as embargoes and other economic protests. However, the outbreak of war created an ideological divide among the group, as most Quakers remained true to their pacifist beliefs and refused to support any military actions. Nevertheless, a sizable number of Quakers still participated in the conflict in some form, and dealt with the repercussions of doing so.

Contents

Background

By 1750, Quakers lived across the colonies, with settlements in New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Delaware, New York, Maryland, and both North and South Carolina. In addition, Quakers heavily settled in both the Pennsylvania and New Jersey colonies, and controlled the former both culturally and politically. Though widespread, many of these communities maintained contact with each other and with Quakers in Great Britain. This sustained communication complimented Quaker attitudes towards their community and society at large- for the most part Quakerism encouraged a high degree of internal unity, as well as a cultural separation from outsiders. Nevertheless, this separation usually did not negatively affect Quaker communities, and across the colonies (and especially in Pennsylvania) members of the Society of Friends thrived. [1]

Quaker Theology promoted diplomacy and rejected any forms of physical violence. The faith accepted the authority of secular governments, but refused to support war in any form. This is commonly referred to as the Peace Testimony. Those who acted against the religion's tenants and refused to repent were usually expelled from the faith.

Many of these religious guidelines were dictated at regular meetings. Biweekly Preparative meetings acted as the regular worship times, while regional Monthly meetings dealt with disciplining those who acted against the faith's beliefs. Additionally, annual Yearly Meetings served as the highest authority on both spiritual and practical matters. Of these, the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting held the most recognized authority. [2]

By the second half of the eighteenth century, many Quakers held positions of authority in the Pennsylvania Assembly. However, the onset of the French and Indian War caused most Quaker members to leave their governing positions. This experience encouraged many within the faith to forsake external success and instead focus on religious reform. Consequently, Pennsylvania Quakers became much more strict concerning their congregation's conduct, and expelled increasingly more members for such offenses. Other Quaker communities soon followed Pennsylvania's example. [3]

Early stages of the Revolution

Many Quaker merchants nonviolently protested the 1765 Stamp Act through non-importation agreements Parliament Stamp Act1765.jpg
Many Quaker merchants nonviolently protested the 1765 Stamp Act through non-importation agreements

Though opposed to violence, Quakers nonetheless played a part in the growing tensions between Britain and the colonies. Due to their ties to the British Society of Friends and economic situation, Pennsylvania Quakers largely supported reconciliatory measures in the early years of disagreement. [4] In addition, the 1763 Paxton Riots challenged Quaker domination in the colony and increased fears of religious persecution dramatically. [5]

However, by 1765 some in the community began to criticize the increased British taxation under the newly passed Stamp Act. Quaker merchants from both sides of the Atlantic opposed the act, and many peacefully protested its economic impact and lack of colonial representation. Almost immediately after the act was passed, eighty Quaker merchants from Philadelphia signed a non-importation agreement. [6] Quaker leadership largely attempted to keep the protests nonviolent, and their moderating influence kept events Pennsylvania and New Jersey comparatively peaceful next to those in New England.

This relative peace disappeared in 1767 with the passage of the Townshend Acts. Much like before, Pennsylvania Quakers attempted to curtail protests against the acts, but by mid-1768 were unable to contain the swell of anti-British sentiments. Instead of suppressing conflicts, the Friends were losing political support to more radical factions without reservations towards violence. [7]

During the war

The American Revolutionary War created significant issues for the Quakers and their pacifism. The population of Pennsylvania could no longer be controlled or kept from conflict - for example, groups of Philadelphians began to assemble as informal militias in direct violation of the Pennsylvania Assembly. [8] With the publication of the Declaration of Independence in 1776, Quaker communities all across the colonies were forced to deal with a situation that could no longer be resolved without violence.

Quaker Assemblies respond

Pennsylvania's Quakers devoted considerable time to the issues of the war in their Yearly Meetings. Even as late as 1775 those at the Meetings protested the increased hostilities, and argued they had attempted to prevent them:

We have by repeated public advices and private admonitions, used our endeavours to dissuade the members of our religious society from joining with the public resolutions promoted and entered into by some of the people, which as we apprehended, so now we find have increased contention, and produced great discord and confusion. [9]

Additionally, Quakers rejected not only the conflict itself, but also refused to pay any taxes or fines that supported a militia. The Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of 1776 outlined this rule for its constituents:

It is our judgment [it laid down] that such who make religious profession with us, and do either openly or by connivance, pay any fine, penalty, or tax, in lieu of their personal services for carrying on war; or who do consent to, and allow their children, apprentices, or servants to act therein do thereby violate our Christian testimony, and by doing so manifest that they are not in religious fellowship with us. [10]

Some Friends also refused to use the paper money, called "Continentals," which the Second Continental Congress produced during the war. They viewed the currency as supporting a violent cause and therefore against their religious beliefs. Unlike with the issue of direct taxation, however, Quaker leaders never reached a consensus regarding the Continental, and oftentimes allowed individuals to decide for themselves whether or not to use the currency. [11]

These restrictions did not stop all Quakers from participating in the war effort, and as a result high numbers of Friends were disciplined for some level of involvement. Historian Arthur J. Mekeel calculates that between 1774 and 1785 1,724 Quakers were disowned from the faith for participating in the Revolution in some way, shape or form. [12]

Alternative Quaker responses

The individual Quaker's response to the American Revolution varied widely. While some supported the colonies and others were avowed loyalists, the majority of Friends followed their faith and largely stayed out of the conflict. [13]

Quakers active in the Revolution

American General Nathanael Greene chose to support the American Revolution over Quaker pacifism Nathanael Greene by John Trumbull 1792.jpeg
American General Nathanael Greene chose to support the American Revolution over Quaker pacifism

Individual Quakers, made choices to fight in the American Revolution despite the doctrine of pacifism. The Chase Chronicle, a publication of the Chase-Chace Family Association incorporated in Hartford Connecticut in 1899, contained articles of note about Col. Thomas Chase that gives perspective as to one of the reasons why some Quakers participated in the American Revolution, “When we stop to recall the Quaker Doctrine, it seems paradoxical to give Col. Thomas Chase, the prefix of a military title, yet it belongs to him by right of distinguished service in the Revolutionary War and we can only conclude that while the Quakers believed in peace in the abstract, it could not interfere with their patriotic duty in times of need.”. [14]

Daniel Chase. [15] also served in the American Revolution, and while words are scarce as to why, his ancestry, gives some clue. He was a descendant of Stephen Bachiler’s daughter Deborah, whose son, Daniel Wing, was instrumental in resisting oppressive laws in the town of Sandwhich and was one of the first 18 families to convert to the faith in 1658 (see History of the Quakers#Sandwhich and_Daniel Wing). His service in the American Revolution was a continuation of what had by this time, become a tradition from generation to generation, to resist oppression and unfair laws.

Future founders of the Free Quakers also participated in the war. These Friends considered the Revolution to be a fight for a divinely-ordained new system of government that would change the world for the better. [16] The Free Quakers were expelled for violating the Peace Testimony, but after the Revolution founded a short-lived sect of Quakerism based on those principles.

Several notable figures in the American Revolution were also Quakers. Thomas Paine, author of the pamphlet Common Sense , was born into a Quaker family, and Quaker thought arguably influenced his writings and philosophies. [17] Similarly, the American General Nathanael Greene was raised Quaker, and, as historian William C. Kashatus III states, "wrestled with a fundamental ideological dilemma: 'Was it possible to balance an allegiance to the state without deviating from the principles of the Society of Friends?'" [18] Greene likely dealt with this internal conflict throughout his life, and after the war never completely returned to the Society of Friends. [19]

Quaker relief efforts

Some Quakers also participated in relief effort during the war without fighting in it. In the winter of 1775–1776 Friends from Pennsylvania, New Jersey and elsewhere donated money and goods to the inhabitants of Boston while the British occupied the city. This and other donations throughout the war were accepted with varying degrees of suspicion by both American and British forces. In addition, individuals sometimes attempted relief efforts by tending to wounded after battles or comforting prisoners of war. [20]

Impact on Quakers during the war

General John Sullivan falsely accused Quakers of spying for the British with the 1777 "Spanktown Papers" GeneralJohnSullivanByTenney.jpg
General John Sullivan falsely accused Quakers of spying for the British with the 1777 "Spanktown Papers"

Quakers who refused to support the war often suffered for their religious beliefs at the hands of non-Quaker Loyalists and Patriots alike. Some Friends were arrested for refusing to pay taxes or follow conscription requirements, particularly in Massachusetts near the end of the war when demand for new recruits increased. [21] However, substantially more Quakers experienced economic hardship. Throughout the war, British and American forces seized both Quaker and Non-Quaker goods for their armies, yet Non-Quaker authorities throughout the colonies seized additional property from Quakers, both for refusing to pay taxes and occasionally for opposing the war effort. [22]

Occasionally, suspicious non-Quakers also accused Friends of being British sympathizers or spies. In August 1777 American General John Sullivan supposedly discovered a letter from the (fictitious) Quaker Yearly Meeting at Spanktown, NJ (modern-day Rahway) that contained movements and information on American military forces. Sullivan subsequently wrote to John Hancock, president of the Continental Congress, and accused the Quakers of being loyalists and traitors. [23] These "Spanktown Papers" Sullivan 'discovered' were clear forgeries, but nonetheless turned many against the Friends. [24] Sullivan's forgeries convinced a committee of the Continental Congress composed of John Adams, Richard Henry Lee, and William Duer to exile twenty leading Philadelphia Quakers to Staunton, Virginia for more than seven months. [25]

After the war

The American Revolutionary War officially ended with the 1783 Treaty of Paris. Quaker communities throughout the newly established United States of America immediately began to influence small factors in the formation of new governments. For example, before this time a public official usually needed to swear an oath of allegiance to the state, yet this rule was altered to allow affirmations as well, allowing Quakers to freely participate in the government. [26]

However, the Revolutionary War negatively impacted many Quakers as well. Partially thanks to the negative climate following the "Spanktown Papers" and partially because of economic factors, beginning in 1783 hundreds of Quakers left the United States and moved to Canada, with many settling in Pennfield, New Brunswick. Some of these Friends had been expelled from the faith for siding with the British during the war, and others had been genuine pacifists, but none could remain in the United States after the nation had gained independence. [27]

The Revolution's legacy impacted American Quakers in one other major way. Before the war, many Quakers possessed extensive economic and political power in several states, most notably in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. However, the war had alienated the pacifist Quakers from their neighbors, causing most Friends in power to begin withdrawing from active political life as early as the 1760s. The Revolution increased American Quakers' sense of isolation, consequently making postwar Quakerism less culturally diverse and more dogmatically unified. American Quakers would never regain the amount of political influence they had once possessed. [28]

Notes

  1. ↑ Arthur J. Mekeel, The Quakers and the American Revolution (York: Sessions Book Trust, 1996), 1–2.
  2. ↑ Mekeel, The Quakers and the American Revolution, 3–4.
  3. ↑ Mekeel, The Quakers and the American Revolution, 7–8.
  4. ↑ Mekeel, The Quakers and the American Revolution, 14–17.
  5. ↑ William Pencak, ed., Pennsylvania's Revolution (University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2010), 8–9.
  6. ↑ Mekeel, The Quakers and the American Revolution, 22.
  7. ↑ Pencak, Pennsylvania's Revolution, 20–22.
  8. ↑ Pencak, Pennsylvania's Revolution, 24.
  9. ↑ , James Pemberton, "The TESTIMONY of the People called QUAKERS, given forth by a Meeting of the Representatives of said People, in PENNSYLVANIA and NEW JERSEY, held at Philadelphia the 24th day of the 1st Month, 1775." (Philadelphia: The Pennsylvania Gazette, 1775)
  10. ↑ Rules of Discipline and Christian Advices of the Yearly Meeting of Friends for Pennsylvania and New Jersey (1797), in Peter Brock, Pacifism in the United States: From the Colonial Era to the First World War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968), 200.
  11. ↑ Peter Brock, Pacifism in the United States: From the Colonial Era to the First World War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968), 206.
  12. ↑ Mekeel, The Quakers and the American Revolution, 391.
  13. ↑ William C. Kashatus III, Conflict of Conviction: A Reappraisal of Quaker Involvement in the American Revolution (Lanham: University Press of America, 1990), 101.
  14. ↑ Banks, MD, Charles E. (1910). "Col. Thomas Chase". The Chase Chronicle. 4 (Oct): 38. Retrieved 17 June 2022.
  15. ↑ Banks, MD, Charles E. (1910). "Col. Thomas Chase". The Chase Chronicle. 4: 30. Retrieved 17 June 2022.
  16. ↑ Kashatus, Conflict of Conviction, 108.
  17. ↑ Kashatus, Conflict of Conviction, 2.
  18. ↑ Kashatus, Conflict of Conviction, 36.
  19. ↑ Kashatus, Conflict of Conviction, 49.
  20. ↑ Mekeel, The Quakers and the American Revolution, 343–353.
  21. ↑ Brock, Pacifism in the United States, 242–243.
  22. ↑ Brock, Pacifism in the United States, 247–250.
  23. ↑ Mekeel, The Quakers and the American Revolution, 198–199.
  24. ↑ Brock, Pacifism in the United States, 252.
  25. ↑ Anne M. Ousterhout, A State Divided: Opposition in Pennsylvania to the American Revolution (New York: Greenwood Press, 1987), 165–168.
  26. ↑ Mekeel, The Quakers and the American Revolution, 371–372.
  27. ↑ Brock, Pacifism in the United States, 255–256.
  28. ↑ Brock, Pacifism in the United States, 257.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Keith (missionary)</span>

George Keith was a Scottish religious leader, a Presbyterian turned Quaker turned Anglican. He was born in Peterhead, Aberdeenshire, Scotland, to a Presbyterian family and received an M.A. from the University of Aberdeen. Keith joined the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in the 1660s, accompanying George Fox, William Penn, and Robert Barclay on a mission to the Netherlands and Germany in 1677.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Middle Colonies</span> Subset of British American Thirteen Colonies

The Middle Colonies were a subset of the Thirteen Colonies in British America, located between the New England Colonies and the Southern Colonies. Along with the Chesapeake Colonies, this area now roughly makes up the Mid-Atlantic states.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Province of Pennsylvania</span> British colony in North America (1681–1776)

The Province of Pennsylvania, also known as the Pennsylvania Colony, was a British North American colony founded by William Penn, who received the land through a grant from Charles II of England in 1681. The name Pennsylvania was derived from "Penn's Woods", referring to William's father Admiral Sir William Penn.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Dickinson</span> Founding Father of the United States

John Dickinson, a Founding Father of the United States, was an attorney and politician from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Wilmington, Delaware. Dickinson was known as the "Penman of the Revolution" for his twelve Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania, published individually in 1767 and 1768, and he also wrote "The Liberty Song" in 1768.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Britain Yearly Meeting</span> Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends

The Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Britain, also known as the Britain Yearly Meeting, is a Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in England, Scotland, Wales, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. It is the national organisation of Quakers living in Britain. Britain Yearly Meeting refers to both the religious gathering and the organisation. "Yearly Meeting", or "Yearly Meeting Gathering" are usually the names given to the annual gathering of British Quakers. Quakers in Britain is the name the organisation is commonly known by.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timothy Matlack</span> Delegate to the Second Continental Congress

Timothy Matlack was an American politician, military officer and businessman. A brewer and beer bottler who emerged as a popular and powerful leader in the American Revolutionary War, Matlack served as Secretary of Pennsylvania during the conflict and was a delegate to the Second Continental Congress in 1780. Matlack was known for his excellent penmanship, and in 1776 was chosen to inscribe the original United States Declaration of Independence on vellum.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Testimony of peace</span>

The testimony of peace is the action generally taken by members of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) for peace and against participation in war. Like other Quaker testimonies, it is not a "belief", but a description of committed actions, in this case to promote peace, and refrain from and actively oppose participation in war. Quakers' original refusal to bear arms has been broadened to embrace protests and demonstrations in opposition to government policies of war and confrontations with others who bear arms, whatever the reason, in the support of peace and active nonviolence. Due to this core testimony, the Religious Society of Friends is considered one of the traditional peace churches.

The Religious Society of Friends began as a proto-evangelical Christian movement in England in the mid-17th century in Lancashire. Members are informally known as Quakers, as they were said "to tremble in the way of the Lord". The movement in its early days faced strong opposition and persecution, but it continued to expand across the British Isles and then in the Americas and Africa.

Yearly Meeting is a term used by members of the Religious Society of Friends, or Quakers, to refer to an organization composed of constituent meetings or churches within a geographical area. The constituent meetings are called Monthly Meetings in most of the world; in England, local congregations are now called Area Meetings, in Australia Monthly Meetings are called Regional Meetings. "Monthly" and "Yearly" refer to how often the body meets to make decisions. Monthly Meetings may be local congregations that hold regular Meetings for Worship, or may comprise a number of Worship Groups. Depending on the Yearly Meeting organization, there may also be Quarterly Meetings, Half-Yearly Meetings, or Regional Meetings, where a number of local Monthly Meetings come together within a Yearly Meeting.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pennsylvania in the American Revolution</span>

Pennsylvania was the site of many key events associated with the American Revolution and American Revolutionary War. The city of Philadelphia, then capital of the Thirteen Colonies and the largest city in the colonies, was a gathering place for the Founding Fathers who discussed, debated, developed, and ultimately implemented many of the acts, including signing the Declaration of Independence, that inspired and launched the revolution and the quest for independence from the British Empire.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Quakers</span> Family of Christian religious movements

Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements are generally united by a belief in each human's ability to experience the light within or see "that of God in every one". Some profess a priesthood of all believers inspired by the First Epistle of Peter. They include those with evangelical, holiness, liberal, and traditional Quaker understandings of Christianity. There are also Nontheist Quakers, whose spiritual practice does not rely on the existence of God. To differing extents, the Friends avoid creeds and hierarchical structures. In 2017, there were an estimated 377,557 adult Quakers, 49% of them in Africa.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Benjamin Lay</span> American Quaker activist

Benjamin Lay was an Anglo-American Quaker humanitarian and abolitionist. He is best known for his early and strident anti-slavery activities which would culminate in dramatic protests. He was also an author, farmer, vegetarian, and distinguished by his early concern for the ethical treatment of animals.

The Quaker movement began in England in the Seventeenth Century. Small Quaker groups were planted in various places across Europe during this early period. Quakers in Europe outside Britain and Ireland are not now very numerous although new groups have started in the former Soviet Union and satellite countries. By far the largest national grouping of Quakers in Europe is in Britain.

Quakers are members of a Christian religious movement that started in England as a form of Protestantism in the 17th century, and has spread throughout North America, Central America, Africa, and Australia. Some Quakers originally came to North America to spread their beliefs to the British colonists there, while others came to escape the persecution they experienced in Europe. The first known Quakers in North America arrived in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1656 via Barbados, and were soon joined by other Quaker preachers who converted many colonists to Quakerism. Many Quakers settled in the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, due to its policy of religious freedom, as well as the British colony of Pennsylvania which was formed by William Penn in 1681 as a haven for persecuted Quakers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Holy Experiment</span>

The "Holy Experiment" was an attempt by the Religious Society of Friends, also known as Quakers, to establish a community for themselves and other persecuted religious minorities in what would become the modern state of Pennsylvania. They hoped it would show to the world how well they could function on their own without any persecution or dissension.

A Book of Discipline may refer to one of the various books issued by a Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, setting out what it means to be a Quaker in that Yearly Meeting. The common name for this book varies from one Yearly Meeting to another and includes Book of Discipline, Faith and Practice, Christian Faith and Practice, Quaker Faith and Practice, Church Government and Handbook of Practice and Procedure. Each Book of Discipline is updated periodically by each Yearly Meeting according to the usual practice of decision making within the Religious Society of Friends.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Penn</span> Colonial American writer and religious thinker (1644–1718)

William Penn was an English writer and religious thinker belonging to the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, a North American colony of England. He was an early advocate of democracy and religious freedom, notable for his good relations and successful treaties with the Lenape Native Americans.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1688 Germantown Quaker Petition Against Slavery</span>

The 1688 Germantown Quaker Petition Against Slavery was the first protest against enslavement of Africans made by a religious body in the Thirteen Colonies. Francis Daniel Pastorius authored the petition; he and three other Quakers living in Germantown, Pennsylvania, signed it on behalf of the Germantown Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends. Clearly a highly controversial document, Friends forwarded it up the hierarchical chain of their administrative structure—monthly, quarterly, and yearly meetings—without either approving or rejecting it. The petition effectively disappeared for 150 years into Philadelphia Yearly Meeting's capacious archives; but upon rediscovery in 1844 by Philadelphia antiquarian Nathan Kite, latter-day abolitionists published it in 1844 in The Friend, in support of their antislavery agitation.

Joseph Moore, was notable as a Quaker peace negotiator sent to the talks between Native leaders of the Western Confederacy and American government representatives at Sandusky, Ohio, in 1793. The issue was whether or not American settlers would be allowed to settle west of the Ohio River.

The American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) is a Religious Society of Friends (Quaker) founded organization working for peace and social justice in the United States and around the world. AFSC was founded in 1917 as a combined effort by American members of the Religious Society of Friends to assist civilian victims of World War I. It continued to engage in relief action in Europe and the Soviet Union after the Armistice of 1918. By the mid-1920s it focused on improving racial relations in the U.S., as well as exploring ways to prevent the outbreak of another conflict before and after World War II. As the Cold War developed, it moved to employ more professionals rather than Quaker volunteers, over time attempting to broaden its appeal and respond more forcefully to racial injustice, women's issues, and demands of sexual minorities for equal treatment. They also work for world peace.

References

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.