Why stand we here idle? What is it the gentlemen wish? What would
they have? Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the
price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what
course others may take, but as for me, GIVE ME LIBERTY, Or GIVE ME
DEATH!"
Within the following month occurred the battle of Lexington.
Washington, Jefferson and Patrick Henry were members of the committee
appointed to arrange a plan for preparing Virginia to act her part in
the struggle. When Washington, June, 20, 1775, received his commission
as commander-in-chief of the American army, Jefferson succeeded to the
vacancy thus created, and the next day took his seat in congress.
A few hours later came the news of the battle of Bunker Hill.
Jefferson was an influential member of the body from the first. John
Adams said of him: "he was so prompt, frank, explicit and decisive upon
committees that he soon seized upon every heart." Virginia promptly
re-elected him and the part he took in draughting the Declaration of
Independence is known to every school boy.
His associates on the committee were Franklin, John Adams, Roger Sherman
and Robert R. Livingston. It was by their request that he prepared the
document (see fac-simile, page 49,) done on the second floor of a small
building, on the corner of Market and Seventh Streets.
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