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never been explained whence he procured them. It was plain at the time, as it is to-day, that unless the means by which they came into his possession be satisfactorily established, the letters must have been unfairly obtained. Franklin could not fail to have seen the private character of the correspondence, and that its publication would prove of great injury to the writers in the community in which they lived, and would inevitably introduce into the contest new features of bitterness and rancour But Franklin never understood what delicacy even meant. His interest placed on one side, and the course which personal honour dictated on the other, there was never any hesitation on his part to follow the former. His leading teaching was success in life by thrift, industry and prudence, by honesty, if possible; his whole career furnished the proof how he could abandon his theories, when expediency and circumstances so exacted.

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Franklin's conduct in sending the letters to Boston, established the meanness of spirit of which he could be guilty. knew well what would happen when they were received in America; that they would be seized upon by the republican party as justifying its opposition to the authorities, and that the disclosure of the opinions expressed in this private correspondence could be made highly serviceable by its leaders. He affected to protect the writers by appending the condition that, the letters should be shewn to the leading men, but not copied or printed, and that, then they should be returned to him. The insincerity of this limitation is plain on the surface. Had Franklin meant fairly, he would have himself made excerpts, and have acted upon the information which he had himself learned, without betrayal of the writers by name.

The letters were sent to Cushing, speaker of the Massachusetts assembly, and were shown to all on his side of politics. They were finally brought to the notice of the assembly, and there discussed as the disclosure of a plot to subvert the constitution. A vote was carried that the king should be petitioned for the removal from their positions of Hutchinson and Oliver, the governor and lieutenant-governor.

1773]

JOHN TEMPLE.

337

The existence of the letters thus became a matter of notoriety. The difficulty in the further diffusion of them lay in the fact of the engagement that they should not be printed or copied. Under the dishonest and false pretence that other copies had been received, they were printed and distributed among the other provinces. Writers have endeavoured to explain away the proceeding;. they entirely fail to do so, and it can only be related in the language used.

The petition was sent to Franklin, and forwarded by him to lord Dartmouth for presentation, on the 23rd of August, 1773. His letter was in accordance with the constant declaration of loyalty to the commonwealth, made in England to the last moment before the appeal to arms, "that a sincere disposition prevails in the people to be on good terms with the mother country, that the assembly have declared their desire only to be put into the situation they were in before the stamp act. They aim at no novelties, [sic] and it is said that having discovered, as they think, the authors of their grievances to be some of their own people, their resentment against Britain is thence much abated.”

It is proper to bear in mind that this letter was written some months before Franklin publicly accepted the responsibility of having sent the correspondence to America. The printed letters reached England, to cause in political circles much surprise and to create much painful feeling. William Whately, brother of the deceased, his executor, naturally was greatly grieved and troubled by the publication, and dreaded that he would be held responsible for a dishonourable breach of trust. His suspicions were directed to a Mr. John Temple, then in London, who had been surveyor-general of the customs in Boston. Temple had married the daughter of a Dr. Bowdoin, of Boston, of a Huguenot family, who early inherited a large fortune, described even as the largest known at that date. Bowdoin had devoted himself to scientific pursuits, had also taken part in the political troubles, and had accepted the opinions of Samuel Adams, with whom he had formed close relations. Temple was accredited with sympa

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thizing with this party; his relationship to Bowdoin shews that he was not entirely beyond their influence. He had been dismissed from his office, and he looked upon Hutchinson as having been the cause of his removal. Whately felt himself so compromised as a man of honour, that he published a letter in the Public Advertiser, 11th December, 1782, stating that Temple, almost unknown to him, had applied for permission to refer to these letters, and that he had placed several parcels in his hands. He had called upon him, therefore, for some explanation, and Temple had assured him, with regard to the letters in question, "that he had not taken a single letter or an extract" from any single one. Several letters appeared in the papers of the time, in which Temple considered himself attacked, and, to clear his character, he challenged Whately. By the code of honour of the day, he had in reality no ground. of offence against Whately; and, as it has been described, unable to remove the suspicion which had fallen upon him, he picked a quarrel with Whately. The act can only be looked upon as the desperate attempt of a bully, to redeem the stain upon his character.

The duel took place in Hyde Park on December 11th, 1773. Both parties published their account of it. It was conducted in an unusual and extraordinary manner, without seconds. Had either been killed, the probability is that the survivor would have been tried for murder. Whately was wounded by a thrust in the left side: the whole proceeding is inexplicable. It appears plain, that both were utterly without experience with the sword, the weapon used. The duel in no way assisted Mr. Temple, for the belief in his complicity remained, and he was accused of infamous conduct in inflicting the wound, when his adversary had fallen to the ground.

The affair created such attention that Franklin felt that he could no longer be silent, and on the 25th of December he addressed a letter to the Craftsman, which appeared on the 1st of January, 1774. He stated that he wrote on account of the duel concerning a transaction in which "both of them are totally ignorant and innocent." To prevent further mischief

1774]

FRANKLIN'S EXPLANATION.

339

he declared that he alone was the person who obtained and transmitted the letters. They had come into his possession and had never been among the papers of the deceased, which passed into the hands of his brother, so it was impossible for Temple to have taken them. He denied that they were private letters; they were intended to procure public measures, and their tendency was to incense the mother country against the colonies, and to widen the breach. The student of the history of those days will soon learn how little reliance can be placed on any statement made by Franklin. This explanation of his must go for what it is worth. Whether the papers were surreptitiously or accidently obtained, and whoever abstracted or discovered them, Franklin knew that it was information that he was not justified in making public. he was one never to want a reason for anything he did; indeed a dilemma of this character was precisely one which his astute mind could meet by artifice. He argued that he had simply done his duty as agent for the province, this important matter came to his notice, and he was bound to communicate it, dwelling upon his virtuous desire to heal the breach, by shewing that coercive measures were suggested from the other side of the Atlantic. Turn or twist the explanation as modern. writers may, the fact remains, the letters were dishonestly obtained, and malignantly sent to Boston to cause mischier and discord. #

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The narrative concerning the abstraction of these letters is given in full by Mr. Peter Orlando Hutchinson in the Diary and Letters of Thomas Hutchinson, 1883. [Vol. I., pp. 81-93.] It is plain by the journal of governor Hutchinson that he considered they were purloined by Temple, although he does not expressly say so. On July 16th, 1774, he writes in his journal : "Never met with greater civility than from Lord Suffolk. Before dinner he asked if I knew how Dr. F. came by the letters? I said I knew nothing but from the letter he published. "We know," says his Lordship, "that acct is not true." "Have you got certain evidence, my Lord? Yes, we have certain evidence it is not true; and we know where he had the letters." Again on August the 3rd: "Lord Suffolk treated me with singular courtesy. I told him of T.'s (Temple's) desire to see me. He said he saw no objection, but mentioned again in confidence that they knew he took the letters from 'the present Mr. Whately." The king even noticed the matter in the interview with Hutchinson on his arrival in London. "Nothing could be more cruel,” he said, "than the treatment you met in betraying your

On the arrival of the petition for the removal of Hutchinson and Oliver, it was referred to a meeting of the privy council. The first meeting was held on the 17th of January, 1774 Franklin was examined. Wedderburn, representing Hutchinson and Oliver, admitted the genuineness of the letters, but reserved the right to enquire how they were obtained. Franklin was unrepresented by counsel; he had thought, he said, that it was a matter of politics, not of law. Manduit, on the part of the governor and lieutenant-governor of Massachusetts, claimed that they should be heard on the unjust accusations against them. The court accepted this view, and Franklin was allowed the time he asked, three weeks, to obtain counsel. The proceedings were adjourned until the 29th of January, 1774.

On that day the privy council met: the proceedings were open to the public. Many distinguished men were present, among others Burke, and Jeremy Bentham, then a young man of twenty-six. Franklin himself attended. Dunning and Lee addressed the council on the part of the province in support of the petition. The solicitor-general Wedderburn replied. His passionate abuse of Franklin formed the main part of his argument. Then occurred a remarkable scene, when the members of the council, forgetting their judicial position, entered into all this vituperation, laughing, nodding approval of this polished attack, becoming indecent partisans in the dispute which they were summoned judicially to determine. Lord North was the one exception of composure and decorum. The council voted that the petition should be dismissed as groundless, vexatious, and scandalous. On the 7th of February the king confirmed the report, and Franklin was dismissed from his position as postmaster-general.

The whole scene partook of the bad spirit of political life

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private letters." Mr. Peter Hutchinson quotes approvingly the remark of Mr. C. F. Adams in the life of his grandfather, President John Adams [Vol. II., p. 319] Scarcely a doubt can remain that Sir John Temple (he eventually succeeded to a baronetcy) was the man who procured the Hutchinson letters and had them delivered to Franklin."

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