The Rights of the Colonists

Adams wrote this essay as a member of the Boston Committee of Correspondence. Adams and other “patriots,” as they were and are often still called, established this group in response to developments in tax and fiscal policy between the British Crown and colonial legislatures in North America. Colonists feared growing British influence in the colonies as the Crown (among other things) seized responsibility for paying officials like judges and governors. This structure aligned officials in the colonies with the Crown rather than with the colonists whom they supposedly served. In an era when the Crown and the colonists had diverging social and political goals, the potential for corruption within the British imperial system was significant.

Adams’s arguments in the essay reflect the teachings of the European Enlightenment and specifically of English philosopher John Locke. Adams cites Locke by name and presents Locke’s teachings as settled assumptions without arguing for their validity. Locke’s body of work was centrally concerned with personal liberty and rights as well as questions about how society and governments protect or infringe on rights. These themes were particularly pertinent to Adams, who wrote the essay after several years of resisting British taxation in the period leading to the American Revolution.