Adopted by the Massachusetts Assembly

Enacted June 16, 1773; excerpted from The Life of Thomas Hutchinson, Royal Governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay

"…The writer of these letters, signed Thomas Hutchinson, has been thus exerting himself, by his 'secret confidential correspondence,' to introduce measures, destructive of our constitutional liberty, he has been practising every method among the people of this province, to fix in their minds an exalted opinion of his warmest affection for them…. "

From Resolves of the House of Representatives …

In the spring of 1773, the so-called Hutchinson letters (discussed earlier) were read at a meeting of the Massachusetts Assembly (also known as the House of Representatives). The letters had been written between 1767 and 1769 by Governor Thomas Hutchinson (1711–1780), Lieutenant Governor Andrew Oliver (1706–1774), and others, to friends in England. The letters commented on colonial reactions to...