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In 1774 the king and Parliament suspended Massachusetts's government. The new royal governor, Thomas Gage, dissolved the assembly, restricted the town meetings, and replaced all elected sheriffs, magistrates, and other officials with his own appointees. But Gage found he could not govern by decree. In the late summer and fall of 1774 county conventions assembled throughout the colony, calling on citizens to choose their own officials and to pay taxes to collectors appointed by their county conventions and calling on all counties to choose members of a new legislative body to replace the dissolved General Court. The conventions asked the Continental Congress, which the colonies had formed in response to the attack on Massachusetts, for advice in how to proceed with framing a government, and in June 1775, after the battles of Lexington, Concord, and Bunker Hill, Congress recommended that Massachusetts choose an assembly and governor's...