Tax resistance in the “Peace Churches” →
Quakers →
18th century Quakers →
Anthony Benezet
, a group of Quakers in Pennsylvania refused to pay taxes for the French-and-Indian War.
They sent this letter to their fellow Friends, and launched the American war tax resistance movement.
We salute you in a fresh and renewed sense of our Heavenly Father’s love, which hath graciously overshadowed us in several weighty and solid conferences we have had together with many other Friends upon the present situation of the affairs of the Society in this province; and in that love we find our spirits engaged to acquaint you that under a solid exercise of mind to seek for counsel and direction from the High Priest of our profession, who is the Prince of Peace, we believe he hath renewedly favoured us with strong and lively evidences that in his due and appointed time, the day which hath dawned in these later ages foretold by the prophets, wherein swords should be beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, shall gloriously rise higher and higher, and the spirit of the gospel which teaches to love enemies prevail to that degree that the art of war shall be no more learned, and that it is his determination to exalt this blessed day in this our age, if in the depth of humility we receive his instruction and obey his voice.
And being painfully apprehensive that the large sum granted by the late Act of Assembly for the king’s use is principally intended for purposes inconsistent with our peaceable testimony, we therefore think that as we cannot be concerned in wars and fightings, so neither ought we to contribute thereto by paying the tax directed by the said Act, though suffering be the consequence of our refusal, which we hope to be enabled to bear with patience.
[And we take this position even t]hough some part of the money to be raised by the said Act is said to be for such benevolent purposes as supporting our friendship with our Indian neighbours and relieving the distresses of our fellow subjects who have suffered in the present calamities, for whom our hearts are deeply pained; and we affectionately and with bowels of tenderness sympathize with them therein; and we could most cheerfully contribute to those purposes if they were not so mixed that we cannot in the manner proposed show our hearty concurrence therewith without at the same time assenting to, or allowing ourselves in, practices which we apprehend contrary to the testimony which the Lord hath given us to bear for his name and Truth’s sake.
And having the health and prosperity of the Society at heart, we earnestly exhort Friends to wait for the appearing of the true Light and stand in the council of God, that we may know him to be the rock of our salvation and place of our refuge forever.
And beware of the spirit of this world, that is unstable and often draws into dark and timorous reasonings, lest the God thereof should be suffered to blind the eye of the mind, and such not knowing the sure foundation, the Rock of Ages, may partake of the terrors and fears that are not known to the inhabitants of that place where the sheep and lambs of Christ ever had a quiet habitation, which a remnant have to say, to the praise of his name, they have been blessed with a measure of in this day of distress.
And as our fidelity to the present government and our willingly paying all taxes for purposes which do not interfere with our consciences may justly exempt us from the imputation of disloyalty, so we earnestly desire that all who by a deep and quiet seeking for direction from the Holy Spirit are, or shall be, convinced that he calls us as a people to this testimony may dwell under the guidance of the same divine Spirit, and manifest by the meekness and humility of their conversation that they are really under that influence, and therein may know true fortitude and patience to bear that and every other testimony committed to them faithfully and uniformly, and that all Friends may know their spirits clothed with true charity, the bond of Christian fellowship, wherein we again salute you and remain your friends and brethren.
Signed by Abraham Farrington, John Evans, John Churchman, Mordecai Yarnall, Samuel Fothergill, Samuel Eastburn, William Brown, John Scarborough, Thomas Carleton, Joshua Ely, William Jackson, James Bartram, Thomas Brown, Daniel Stanton, John Woolman, Isaac Zane, William Horne, Benjamin Trotter, Anthony Benezet, John Armitt, John Pemberton.
Now that We Won’t Pay!: A Tax Resistance Reader is complete and I’ve finished patting myself on the back for a job well done, I’ve started to work on a spin-off project: a reader that concentrates on war tax resistance by American Quakers .
I planned to take the existing sections of this material from We Won’t Pay! and add a little more context and a handful of additional works.
But the more I researched, the more I found, and so this is turning out to be a bigger project than I’d anticipated.
I’ll share some of what I find here on The Picket Line as I uncover it.
Today, some excerpts from Isaac Sharpless’s book about the Pennsylvania colony: A Quaker Experiment in Government.
There was a difficult balancing act in Pennsylvania, where Quakers for the first time held political power and were able to try to turn their ethical principles into guidelines for social organization.
The English government, under which the colony was founded, was sporadically tolerant of and persecutory towards the Quakers — and so the colony felt the need to mollify the mother country and assure it of their loyalty and harmlessness.
From time to time, the demands of the crown would conflict with Quaker principles.
In , a requisition was made on Pennsylvania for eighty men with officers for the defense of New York.
The Council advised calling together the Assembly, but not until harvest was over.
The Assembly united with the Council in refusing the bald request, reminding the Governor of Fletcher’s promise that the last appropriation should not “be dipped in blood,” but should be used “to feed the hungry and clothe the naked” Indians, and suggested the such of it as had not been used as promised should go towards the present emergency.
The Council finally offered two bills, one to make an appropriation, and one to demand a return to Penn’s Frame of Government, which was held in abeyance since his return to power.
As the Governor had to take both or neither he dissolved the Assembly.
he was willing to make the required concession, and urged that the money was needed in New York “for food and raiment to be given to those nations of Indians that have lately suffered extremely by the French, which is a fair opportunity for you, that for conscience cannot contribute to war, to raise money for that occasion, be it under the color of support of government or relief of those Indians or what else you may call it.”
The Assembly made the necessary vote and the Constitution of was obtained in payment.
The next time the pacific principles of the Assembly were tried was in , when the English Government asked for £350 for the purpose of erecting forts on the frontiers of New York on the plea that they were for the general defense.
Penn, who was then in the Province, faithfully observed his promise “to transmit,” but declined to give any advice to the Assembly.
The members were evidently greatly agitated, and repeatedly asked copies of his speech, which was in fact only the King’s letter.
After some fencing two reports appeared.
One, from the Pennsylvania delegates, urged their poverty, owing to taxes and quit-rents, also the lack of contributions of other colonies, but added plainly, “We desire the Proprietor would candidly represent our conditions to the King, and assure him of our readiness (according to our abilities) to acquiesce with and answer his commands so far as our religious persuasions shall permit, as becomes loyal and faithful subjects so to do.”
The other answer came from the Delaware portion of the Assembly, excusing themselves because they had no forts of their own.
When the Assembly met, a month later, Penn again referred to the King’s letter, but nothing was done, and the matter was not pressed.
Governor Evans made several attempts to establish a militia, but the Assembly refused any sanction, and the voluntary organizations were failures.
Lewis Morris, a colonial official in New Jersey and New York, noted that Quakers outside of Pennsylvania at this time, who were being subjected to military taxes, were refusing to pay and having their property seized by tax collectors — “generally above ten times the value, which, when they came to expose to sale, nobody would buy, so that there is or lately was a house at Burlington, filled with demonstrations of the obstinacy of the Quakers, there was boots, hats, shoes, clothes, dishes, plows, knives, earthenware, with many other things and these distresses amount, as is said, to above 1,000£ a year, almost enough to defray the charges of the government without any other way.”
Sharpless again:
The military question came up in in a more serious form.
An order came from the Queen to the various colonies to furnish quotas of men at their own expense towards an army to invade Canada.
New York was to supply 800, Connecticut 350, Jersey 200, and Pennsylvania 150. In transmitting the order Governor Gookin, who evidently anticipated difficulty, suggested that the total charge would be about £4,000. He says, “Perhaps it may seem difficult to raise such a number of men in a country where most of the inhabitants are of such principles as will not allow them the use of arms; but if you will raise the sum for the support of government, I don’t doubt getting the number of men desired whose principles will allow the use of arms.”
This was too manifest an evasion for the Assembly to adopt.
Its first answer was to send in a bill of grievances.
The opportunity was too good to be lost, and David Lloyd, then Speaker, made the most of it.
In the meantime the Quaker members of the Council met some of their co-religionists of the Assembly “and there debated their opinions freely and unanimously to those of the House, that notwithstanding their profession and principles would not by any means allow them to bear arms, yet it was their duty to support the government of their sovereign, the Queen, and to contribute out of their estates according to the exigencies of her public affairs, and therefore they might and ought to present the Queen with a proper sum of money.”
The Assembly the next day sent an address to the Governor which said, “Though we cannot for conscience’ sake comply with the furnishing a supply for such a defense as thou proposest, yet in point of gratitude of the Queen for her great and many favors to us we have resolved to raise a present of £500 which we humbly hope she will be pleased to accept, etc., etc.”
To this the Governor replied that he would not sign the bill.
If the Assembly would not hire men to fight, there was no scruple which would prevent a more liberal subscription to the Queen’s needs.
The Assembly was immovable, and asked to be allowed to adjourn, as harvest time was approaching.
The Governor refused consent, when the House abruptly terminated the whole matter.
Resolved, N.C.D., That this House cannot agree to the Governor’s proposal, directly or indirectly, for the expedition to Canada, for the reasons formerly given.
Resolved, N.C.D., That the House do continue their resolution of raising £500 as a present for the Queen, and do intend to prepare a bill for that purpose at their next meeting on , and not before.
The House then adjourned without waiting for the Governor’s consent.
The Governor sadly admitted that nothing could be done with such an Assembly, and gave a rather facetious but truthful account in a letter to London, two months later.
“The Queen having honored me with her commands that this Province should furnish out 150 men for its expedition against Canada, I called an Assembly and demanded £4,000; they being all Quakers, after much delay resolved, N.C, that it was contrary to their religious principles to hire men to kill one another.
I told some of them the Queen did not hire men to kill one another, but to destroy her enemies.
One of them answered the Assembly understood English.
After I had tried all ways to bring them to reason they again resolved, N.C, that they could not directly or indirectly raise money for an expedition to Canada, but they had voted the Queen £500 as a token of their respect, etc., and that the money should be put into a safe hand till they were satisfied from England it should not be employed for the use of war.
I told them the Queen did not want such a sum, but being a pious and good woman perhaps she might give it to the clergy sent hither for the propagation of the Gospel; one of them answered that was worse than the other, on which arose a debate in the Assembly whether they should give money or not, since it might be employed for the use of war, or against their future establishment, and after much wise debate it was carried in the affirmative by one voice only.
Their number is 26 [Eight from each county and two from Philadelphia].
They are entirely governed by their speaker, one David Lloyd.”
The service performed by “one David Lloyd” to the integrity of the Quaker testimony against war is strikingly revealed in this letter.
The Assembly, more emphatically than the official records show, took effective measures to maintain their position with perfect consistency.
The issue came up again :
In a… request was made by the government, and in response £2,000 was voted for the Queen’s use.
This money never aided any military expedition, but was appropriated by a succeeding Governor to his own use, and the fact was used as an argument in against similar grants.
“We did not see it,” Isaac Norris says, in , “to be inconsistent with our principles to give the Queen money notwithstanding any use she might put it to, that not being our part but hers.”
This dodge of granting money “for the Queen’s use” when military requisitions were requested, as a way of avoiding making direct military expenditures, became a habit, but its dodgy nature was pretty clear.
This would come back to bite Quakers later, when they would be reminded how flexible their principles could be.
[B]eginning with , the gradual alienation of the Indian tribes made a disturbed frontier ready to be dangerous at the first outbreak of war, and new conditions prevailed.
Hitherto the relation of the Friends to these inevitable military solicitations had been largely that of passivity.
They would not interfere with the movements of those who desired to form military companies.
If the Governor chose to engage in the arming and drilling of voluntary militia, he had his commission from the Proprietors, and they from the Charter of Charles Ⅱ.
It was no matter for the Assembly.
The meeting organizations would endeavor to keep all Quakers from any participation in these un-Friendly proceedings, and the Quaker Assemblymen had their own consciences to answer to, as well as their ecclesiastical authorities, if they violated pacific principles.
When it came to voting money in lieu of personal service, the legislators had a difficult road to follow.
If the government needed aid, it was their duty, in common with the other colonies, to supply it.
Even though the need was the direct result of war, as nearly all national taxes are, they were ready to assume their share of the burden.
Caesar must have his dues as well as God, and a call for money, except when coupled directly with a proposition to use it for military attack or defense, was generally responded to, after its potency as an agent in procuring a little more liberty was exhausted.
They would not vote money for an expedition to Canada or to erect forts, but they would for “the King’s use,” using all possible securities to have it appropriated to something else than war expenses.
The responsibility of expenditure rested on the King.
There were legitimate expenses of government, and if these were so inextricably mingled with warlike outlay that the Assembly could not separate them, they would still support the Government.
It is easy to accuse them of inconsistency in the proceedings which follow.
It was a most unpleasant alternative thrust before honest men.
The responsibility of government was upon them as the honorable recipients of the popular votes.
Great principles, the greatest of all in their minds being freedom of conscience, were at stake.
Each call for troops or supplies they fondly hoped would be the last.
Their predecessors’ actions had secured the blessings of peace and liberty to Pennsylvania for sixty years, and if they were unreasonably stringent, their English enemies held over their heads the threat to drive them from power by the imposition of an oath.
Then the persecutions of themselves and their friends, which their forefathers had left England to avoid, might be meted out to them, and the Holy Experiment brought to an end.
Nor is it necessary to assume that their motives were entirely unselfish.
They had ruled the Province well, and were proficients in government.
Their leaders doubtless loved the power and influence they legitimately possessed, and they did not care to give it away unnecessarily.
They tried to find a middle ground between shutting their eyes to all questions of defense on the one side, and direct participation in war on the other.
This they sought by a refusal for themselves and their friends to do any service personally, and a further refusal to vote money except in a general way for the use of the government.
If any one comes to the conclusion that during the latter part of the period of sixteen years now under consideration the evasion was rather a bald one, it is exactly the conclusion the Quakers themselves came to, and they resigned their places as a consequence.
The iniquities of others over whom they had no control brought about a condition where Quaker principles would not work, and they refused to modify them in the vain attempt.
For a time rather weakly halting, when the crucial nature of the question became clear, and either place or principle had to be sacrificed, their decision was in favor of the sanctity of principles.
Entwined in the debates over military requisitions were power struggles and political battles between the Governor and the Assembly, between England and its colonies, and between poorer rural Pennsylvanians on the western frontier (who were more threatened both by hostile Indians and by taxes) and wealthier urban Quakers in the east (who held political power).
A voluntary company was… organized and supplied by private subscriptions.
This took away from their masters a number of indentured servants, whose time was thus lost, and in voting £3,000 for the King’s use the Assembly made it a condition that such servants such be discharged from the militia and no more enlisted.
The Governor refused to accept it, and in wrath wrote a letter to the Board of Trade not intended for home reading, berating the Quakers for disobedience, stating how they had neglected following his advice to withdraw themselves from the Assembly, but had rather increased their majority there.
He advised that they be refused permission to sit there in the future.
A copy of this letter was secured by the Assembly’s agent in England, and great was their indignation.
The disturbances culminated in an election riot in Philadelphia in in which both sides used force, the Quaker party having the best of it and electing Isaac Norris.
They re-elected their ticket, with the aid of the Germans, and controlled the Assembly by an overwhelming majority.
To show their loyalty they voted a considerable sum for the King’s use, but refused Governor Thomas any salary till he had given up his pretentious show of power and signed a number of bills to which he had objected.
After this he worked very harmoniously with them till .
the Governor asked them to aid New England in an attack on Cape Breton.
They told him they had no interest in the matter.
He called them together again in harvest time to ask them to join in an expedition against Louisburg.
A week later came word that Louisburg had surrendered, and the request was transferred to a call for aid in garrisoning the place, and in supplying provisions and powder.
The Assembly replied that the “peaceable principles professed by divers members of the present Assembly do not permit them to join in raising of men or providing arms and ammunition, yet we have ever held it our duty to render tribute to Cæsar.”
They therefore appropriated £4,000 for “bread, beef, pork, flour, wheat or other grain.”
The Governor was advised not to accept the grant, as provisions were not needed.
He replied that the “other grain” meant gunpowder, and so expended a large portion of the money, There is probably no evidence that the Assembly sanctioned this construction, though they never so far as appears made any protest.
Again in aid was asked of the Assembly towards an expedition against Canada.
After forcing the Governor to yield the point as to how the money should be raised, they appropriated £5,000 “for the King’s use.”
This “or other grain” anecdote comes from Benjamin Franklin’s autobiography, which makes much of the flexible principles of Quaker politicians.
There seems to have been quite a folklore of Quaker hypocrisy at the time, frequently showing Quakers relying on the letter-of-the-law of their principles or the spirit-of-the-law depending on which would be most materially advantageous.
Again and again did successive Governors call for military appropriations.
As often did the Quaker Assembly express a willingness to comply provided the money was obtained by loans to be repaid in a term of years rather than by a tax.
The governors said their instructions prevented their sanction to this proceeding, and except when the necessity was urgent refused to permit the bill to be enacted into a law.
The Assembly frequently reminded the Governor that they were unable to vote any money for warlike purposes, and personally would contribute nothing in the way of service, but that they were loyal subjects of the King and acknowledged their obligations to aid in his government.
Had they granted regular aid, war or no war, their position would have been greatly strengthened, but being given “for the King’s use” in direct response to a call for military assistance, knowing perfectly how the money was to be expended, they cannot be excused from the charge of a certain amount of shiftiness.
The effect, however, was to save their fellow-members in the Province from compulsory military service, and from direct war taxes.
They thus shielded the consciences of sensitive Friends, preserved their charter from Court attack, broke down the worst evils of proprietary pretensions, and secured large additions of liberty.
Whether or not the partial sacrifice of principle, if so it was, was too high a price for these advantages, was differently decided in those days, and will be today.
An unbending course would but have hastened the inevitable crisis.
That they paid these taxes unwillingly and were generally recognized as true to their principles is evidenced by many statements of their opponents.
In the Council writes to the Governors of New York and Massachusetts asking for cannon for the voluntary military companies then forming through Benjamin Franklin’s influence, and says, “As our Assembly consists for the most part of Quakers principled against defense the inhabitants despair of their doing anything for our protection.”
Again later Thomas Penn writes on the same subject: “I observe the Assembly broke up without giving any assistance, which is what you must have expected.”
This belief that the Quakers in the Assembly would not do anything for the armed defense of the Province was general both in England and America.
Then came the French-and-Indian War:
In the Governor, at the instance of the Proprietors, who anticipated the French and Indian troubles on the western frontier, endeavored to induce the Assembly to pass a bill for compulsory military service for those not conscientious about bearing arms. He evidently did not expect much.
“As I am well acquainted with their religious scruples I never expected they would appropriate money for the purpose of war or warlike preparation, but thought they might have been brought to make a handsome grant for the King’s use, and have left the disposition of it to me, as they have done on other occasions of like nature,” he wrote to Governor Dinwiddie of Virginia.
“But,” he added, “I can see nothing to prevent this very fine Province, owing to the absurdity of its constitution and the principles of the governing part of its inhabitants, from being an easy prey to the attempts of the common enemy.”
This was after the Assembly had voted £10,000, but coupled the grant with conditions the Governor would not accept.
While they were debating the question Braddock came into the country as commander of the combined forces in an expedition against Fort DuQuesne.
Pressure came down strong and heavy on the Quaker Assembly.
Their own frontier was invaded.
Their own Indians, as a result of the wicked and foolish policy of their executive, were in league with the invaders.
All classes were excited.
To aid the great expedition which at one stroke was to break the French power and close the troubles was felt to be a duty.
Franklin diligently fanned the warlike spirit, procuring wagons for the transfer of army stores, and was extremely valuable to the expedition at some cost to himself.
The Governor wrote to Braddock telling him they had a Province of 300,000 people, provisions enough to supply an army of 100,000, and exports enough to keep 500 vessels employed.
They had no taxes, a revenue of £7,000 a year and £15,000 in bank, yet would neither establish a militia nor vote men money or provisions, notwithstanding he had earnestly labored with the Assembly, and he was ashamed of them.
He does not explain that they had repeatedly offered sums of money, but that he would not accept the conditions.
As Braddock himself admitted, Pennsylvania had supported him quite as liberally as Virginia.
This was partly done by private enterprise and partly by appropriations of the Assembly, to reward friendly Indians, to open a road to Ohio, and to provision the troops.
Braddock was defeated.
The Indians were let loose on the frontiers.
Daily accounts of harrowing scenes came up to the Council and Assembly.
Settlers moved into the towns and many districts were depopulated.
Strong were the expressions of wrath against the Quakers, who were held responsible for the defenseless state of the Province.
[“The people exclaim against the Quakers, and some are scarce restrained from burning the houses of those few who are in this town (Reading).”
— Letter of Edmund Biddle]
This was hardly a just charge, even from the standpoint of those who favored military defense, for the Assembly had signified its willingness to vote £50,000, an unprecedented amount, to be provided by “a tax on all the real and personal estates within the Province,” which the Governor refused to accept.
While the matter was in abeyance the time for the new election of Assemblymen came around, and both parties, except the stricter Quakers, who were becoming alarmed, put forth their greatest exertions.
The old Assembly was sustained, the Friends, with those closely associated with them, having twenty-six out of the thirty-six members.
The new House went on with the work of the old.
They adopted a militia law for those “willing and desirous” of joining companies for the defense of the Province.
This is prefaced by the usual declaration: “Whereas this Province was settled (and a majority of the Assembly have ever since been) of the people called Quakers, who though they do not as the world is now circumstanced condemn the use of arms in others, yet are principled against bearing arms themselves,” explaining also that they are representatives of the Province and not of a denomination, they proceed to lay down rules for the organization of the volunteers.
After the Proprietors had given their £5,000 the Assembly also voted £55,000 for the relief of friendly Indians and distressed frontiersmen, “and other purposes,” without any disguise to the fact that much of it was intended for military defense, though it was not so stated in the bill.
Before this was done, while they were still insisting on taxing the Penn estates, in answer to the charge that they were neglectful of public interests, secure in the confidence of their constituents just most liberally given, they say: “In fine we have the most sensible concern for the poor distressed inhabitants of the frontiers.
We have taken every step in our power, consistent with the just rights of the freemen of Pennsylvania, for their relief, and we have reason to believe that in the midst of their distresses they themselves do not wish to go further.
Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
Their position definitely was, We will vote money liberally for defensive purposes, but we will take care to secure our rights as freemen, and we will not require any one to give personal service against his conscience.
The money was largely spent in erecting and garrisoning a chain of forts extending along the Kittatinny hills from the Delaware River to the Maryland frontier.
“Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
— Benjamin Franklin
So now I know the context of that frequently-quoted maxim!
Interesting!
Now we’re in the midst of the time when the tension between Quaker principles and political compromises was reaching the breaking point.
John Woolman’s journal reflects that individual Quakers were beginning to adopt war tax resistance against the taxes of the Quaker legislature.
The Friends Quarterly Meeting at Philadelphia tried to hold things together:
[I]t is remarkable that for sixteen years successively, more than half of which was a time of war, a set of men conscientiously principled against warlike measures have been chosen by those, of whom the majority were not in that particular of the same principle; and this we apprehend may be chiefly attributed to the repeated testimonies we have constantly given of our sincere and ready disposition to provide for the exigencies of the Government, and to demonstrate our gratitude for the favors we enjoy under it by cheerfully contributing towards the support of it according to our circumstances in such manner as we can do with peace and satisfaction of mind.
That this has been the constant practice of our assemblies, the records of their proceedings will evidently show.
We consider that in the present situation of public affairs, the exigencies being great, the supplies must be proportioned thereto; and we only desire that as we cannot be concerned in preparations for war, we may be permitted to serve the government by raising money and contributing towards the Public Exegencies by such methods and in such manner as past experience has assured us are least burdensome to the industrious poor, and most consistent with our religious and civil rights and liberties, and which our present Proprietaries, when one of them was personally present, consented to and approved, and to which no reasonable or just objection has ever since been made.
And a number of Quakers petitioned the Assembly, saying that they would be unable to willingly pay the proposed war taxes.
Sharpless again:
In twenty Friends, including Anthony Morris, Israel and John Pemberton, Anthony Benezet, John Churchman, and others, representing the most influential and “weighty” members of the Yearly Meeting, addressed the Assembly.
They say they are very willing to contribute taxes to cultivate friendship with Indians, to relieve distress, or other benevolent purposes, but to expect them to be taxed for funds which are placed in the hands of committees to be expended for war, is inconsistent with their peaceable testimony, and an infringement of their religious liberties.
Many Friends will have to refuse to pay such a tax and suffer distraint of goods, [this afterwards happened in numerous cases] and thus “that free enjoyment of liberty of conscience for the sake of which our forefathers left their native country and settled this then a wilderness by degrees be violated.”
“We sincerely assure you we have no temporal motives for thus addressing you, and could we have preserved peace in our own minds and with each other we should have declined it, being unwilling to give you any unnecessary trouble and deeply sensible of your difficulty in discharging the trust committed to you irreproachably in these perilous times, which hath engaged our fervent desires that the immediate instruction of supreme wisdom may influence your minds, and that being preserved in a steady attention thereto you may be enabled to secure peace and tranquility to yourselves and those you represent by pursuing measures consistent with our peaceable principles, and then we trust we may continue humbly to confide in the protection of that Almighty Power whose providence has hitherto been as walls and bulwarks round about us.”
As the Assembly was composed, this was an earnest plea from the responsible Friends to their fellow religionists to stand uncompromisingly by their principles.
It was not very kindly received.
The reply indicated that the signers had no right to speak for others than themselves, that they had not duly considered the customs of the past, particularly the grant of £2,000 in , and the address “is therefore an unadvised and indiscreet application to the House at this time.”
Four members of the Assembly dissent from this reply.
On the other hand we have a strong petition sent to the King, signed by numerous influential men in Philadelphia, stating that the Province was entirely bare to the attack of enemies, “not a single armed man, nor, at the public expense, a single fortification to shelter the unhappy inhabitants.”
… “We have no hopes of seeing the grievances redressed here while a great majority of men whose avowed principles are against bearing arms find means continually to thrust themselves into the Assembly of this Province.”
They ask the interposition of royal authority to insist on proper defense being provided.
The attorneys for the petitioners before the Board of Trade made the most sweeping and unfounded charges, full of errors of fact and unconcealed animus, and ending with the recommendation “that the King be advised to recommend it to his Parliament that no Quaker be permitted to sit in any Assembly in Pennsylvania or any part of America,” and that this result should be produced by the imposition of an oath.
In the minds of the Friends the crisis was reached when the Governor and Council (William Logan, son of James Logan, only dissenting) in declared war against the Delaware Indians, the old allies and friends of William Penn, but now in league with the French and killing and plundering on the frontiers.
They were quite sure that peaceful and just measures would detach the Indians from their alliance, and that war was unnecessary.
The lines were becoming more closely drawn, and the middle ground was narrowing, so that it was impossible to stand upon it.
Either the principle of the iniquity of war must be maintained in its entirety, or war must be vigorously upheld and prosecuted.
Some Friends with Franklin took the latter position, but the great majority closed up their ranks around the principle of peace in its integrity.
In six of the old members of the house, James Pemberton, Joshua Morris, William Callender, William Peters, Peter Worral and Francis Parvin, resigned their seats, giving as their reason, “As many of our constituents seem of opinion that the present situation of public affairs calls upon us for services in a military way, which from a conviction of judgment after mature deliberation we cannot comply with, we conclude it most conducive to the peace of our minds, and the reputation of our religious profession to persist in our resolution of resigning our seats, which we now accordingly do, and request these our reasons may be entered on the minutes of the house.”
In several other Friends declined re-election, and after the next House assembled four others, Mahlon Kirkbride, William Hoyl, Peter Dicks and Nathaniel Pennock, also resigned.
“Understanding that the ministry have requested the Quakers, who from the first settlement of the Colony have been the majority of the Assemblies of this Province, to suffer their seats during the difficult situation of the affairs of the Colonies to be filled by members of other denominations in such manner as to perform without any scruples all such laws as may be necessary to be enacted for the defense of the Province in whatever manner they may judge best suited to the circumstances of it; and notwithstanding we think this has been pretty fully complied with at the last election, yet at the request of our friends, being willing to take off all possible objection, we who have (without any solicitation on our part) been returned as representatives in this Assembly, request we may be excused, and suffered to withdraw ourselves and vacate our seats in such manner as may be attended with the least trouble and most satisfactory to this honorable House.”
The places of all these Friends were filled by members of other religious denominations, and Quaker control over and responsibility for the Pennsylvania Assembly closed with and was never resumed.
It was that a number of Quakers composed an “epistle of tender love and caution” to their fellow-Friends recommending war tax resistance.
Sharpless again:
was one of difference and perplexity among Philadelphia Friends.
On the one side were the men of spiritual power, whose voices exercised the prevailing influence in the meetings for business.
On the other were the disciples of Logan, who being manifestly out of sympathy with well-established Quaker views, urged the necessity of vigorous defense, caught the surrounding warlike spirit, and with personal service and money aided Franklin and the militia.
Between the two stood the “Quaker governing class,” who controlled the Assembly, who, while admitting and commending the peaceable doctrines of Friends, considered their own duty accomplished when they kept aloof from personal participation and supplied the means by which others carried on the war.
This third section was the product of long experience in political activity.
To these men and their predecessors was owing the successful administration for decades of the best governed colony in America.
They were slow to admit any weakness in their position, but it was becoming increasingly evident that it was untenable.
There was actual war, and they were, while not personally responsible for it, indeed while opposing vigorously the policy which had produced it, now a component part of the government which was carrying it on.
Would they join their brethren in staunch adherence to peace principles, and thus give up their places in the state as John Bright did afterwards when Alexandria was bombarded?
Would they join Franklin, their associate in resisting proprietary power, and throw aside their allegiance to the principles of William Penn, whom they professed greatly to honor?
The question was answered differently by different ones as the winter and spring passed away.
Pressure was strong on both sides.
The Governor writing to London says: “The Quaker preachers and others of great weight were employed to show in their public sermons, and by going from house to house through the Province, the sin of taking up arms, and to persuade the people to be easy and adhere to their principles and privileges.”
This was an enemy’s view of a conservative reaction which was going on within the Society, which was tired of compromises, was willing to suffer, and could not longer support the doubtful expediency of voting measures for others to carry out, of which they could not themselves approve.
We have seen how in the early winter the Assembly rebuked what they considered the impertinence of the protest of a number of important members of the Meeting against a war tax.
The Meeting mildly emphasized the same difference in their London epistle of :
The scene of our affairs is in many respects changed since we wrote to you, and our late peaceful land involved in the desolations and calamities of war.
Had all under our profession faithfully discharged their duty and maintained our peaceable testimony inviolate we have abundant sense to believe that divine counsel would have been afforded in a time of so great difficulty; by attending to which, great part of the present calamities might have been obviated.
But it has been manifest that human contrivances and policy have been too much depended on, and such measures pursued as have ministered cause of real sorrow to the faithful; so that we think it necessary that the same distinction may be made among you as is and ought to be here between the Acts and Resolutions of the Assembly of this Province, though the majority of them are our Brethren in profession, and our acts as a religious Society.
We have nevertheless cause to admire and acknowledge the gracious condescension of infinite goodness towards us, by which a large number is preserved in a steady dependence on the dispensations of divine Providence; and we trust the faith and confidence of such will be supported through every difficulty which may be permitted to attend them, and their sincerity appear by freely resigning or parting with those temporal advantages and privileges we have heretofore enjoyed, if they cannot be preserved without violation of that testimony on the faithful maintaining of which our true peace and unity depends.
The Friends who refused to pay the tax thought it peculiarly hard that they were forced to suffer heavy losses through the action of their fellow-members of the Assembly.
These Assemblymen and their friends pointed out on the other hand that these taxes had been paid in the past, and that it was ultra-conscientiousness which prevented the willing support of the government in this hour of peril.
The question was a difficult one.
Quakers had hitherto refused a direct war tax and paid everything else, even when war expenditures were mingled with others.
The stricter Friends considered that this tax, though disguised, was of the objectionable sort, while others did not so place it.
The difference accentuated itself by condemnatory criticisms, and in the Yearly Meeting appointed a committee of thirty, who reported that it was a matter for individual consciences to determine, and not for the Meeting’s decision.
“We are unanimously of the judgment that it is not proper to enter into a public discussion of the matter; and we are one in judgment that it is highly necessary for the Yearly Meeting to recommend that Friends everywhere endeavor to have their minds covered with frequent charity towards one another.”
The Meeting unanimously adopted this report.
This appeal seems to have been successful, and we hear no more of the difference.
John Fothergill wrote of a lack of faith in the practicality of pacifist government at the time:
That the majority of the present Assembly were of our Profession who from their known principles could not contribute to the defense of the Country now grievously harassed by the Indians under French Influence in a manner that most people here and even many in Pennsylvania thought necessary it seemed but common justice in our Friends to decline accepting a trust which under the present Circumstances they could not discharge, and therefore advised that we should use our utmost endeavors to prevail upon them neither to offer themselves as candidates nor to accept of seats in the Assembly during the present commotions in America.
For should any disaster befall the Province and our Friends continue to fill the Assembly, it would redound to the prejudice of the Society in general, and be the means perhaps of subverting a constitution under which the province had so happily flourished.
And James Pemberton wrote:
Our situation is indeed such as affords cause of melancholy reflection that the first commencement of persecution in this Province should arise from our brethren in profession, and that such darkness should prevail as that they should be instruments of oppressing tender consciences which hath been the case.
The tax in this country being pretty generally collected and many in this city particularly suffered by distraint of their goods and some being near cast into jail.
The House has been sitting most of the time since the election, and have as yet done little business; they have had under their consideration a militia law, which hath been long in the hands of a committee, and is likely to take up a great deal more of their time; also a bill for raising £100,000 by a land tax of the same kind as yours in England; if these pass it is likely Friends will be subjected to great inconvenience.
As the former now stands, as I am told, the great patriot Franklin, who hath the principal direction of forming the bills, has discovered very little regard to tender consciences, which perhaps may partly arise from the observations he must have made since he has been in that House of the inconsistent conduct of many of our Friends.
That it seems to me he has almost persuaded himself there are few if any that are in earnest relating to their religious principles, and that he seems exceedingly studious of propagating a martial spirit all he can.
Later, he wrote: “The number of us who could not be free to pay the tax is small compared with those who not only comply with it but censure those who do not.”
Once the pacifist Quakers were out of the Assembly, they could try to apply their principles outside of the existing formal political structure.
Sharpless:
The French were busy in the north, and could not do more to aid the Pennsylvania Indians than furnish them with supplies.
Hence it seemed possible to detach the Delawares and Shawnese from the hostile alliance.
For this purpose the “Friendly Association” was formed.
This was composed of Quakers, now out of the government, but anxious to terminate the unfortunate warfare.
They refused to pay war taxes, but pledged themselves to contribute in the interests of peace “more than the heaviest taxes of a war can be expected to require.”
While this Association was objected to by the State authorities as an unofficial and to some extent an impertinent body, and charged with political motives, it succeeded in a remarkable way in bringing together the Indians and the Government in a succession of treaties, which finally resulted in the termination of the war and the payment to the Indians of an amount which satisfied them for the land taken by the Walking Purchase and other dubious processes.
Representatives of the Association, either by invitation of the Indians or of the Governor, were invariably present, and their largesses to the Indians much smoothed the way to pacific relations.
In addition to extra-governmental activism of this sort, there was a tendency to react in repulsion to the compromises of politics by retreating from public life:
There was growing up in the Society a belief, which was vastly strengthened by the military experiences of , that public life was unfavorable to the quiet Divine communion which called for inwardness, not outwardness, and which was the basic principle of Quakerism.… [T]he Yearly Meeting was strenuously engaged for several years after in pressing on its members the desirability of abstaining from civic business.
This was done under the plea that, as matters were, it was impossible to hold most official positions without administering oaths or voting war taxes.
The former violated Quaker principles directly, and the latter enjoined on their brethren a service against which their consciences rebelled.
In the interests, therefore, of liberty of conscience, the meetings urged on the members not to allow themselves to be candidates for judicial or legislative positions, and in time were largely successful.
In a report came in to the Yearly Meeting from a large and influential committee advising against furnishing wagons for the transport of military stores, and warning against allowing “the examples and injunctions of some members of our Society who are employed in offices and stations in civil government” [The distinction between the ecclesiastical and political Quakers is further indicated in the following: “Thou knows that we could not in every case vindicate our Assembly who had so greatly deviated from our known principles and the testimony of our forefathers.”
— Israel Pemberton to Samuel Fothergill, .] to influence anyone against a steady support of the truth.
They also recommend that the Yearly Meeting should “advise and caution against any Friends accepting of or continuing in offices or stations whereby they are subjected to the necessity of enjoining or enforcing the compliance of their brethren or others with any act which they may conscientiously scruple to perform.”
In any case, Quakers would never again regain political power to the extent that it would present these same sort of controversies and opportunities for compromise.
Gérard de Reyneval worked as a diplomatic intermediary between the Continental Congress and the French government, which was delighting in the colonial rebellion within its European rival.
In one of the intelligence reports he sent back to France in , he painted an unflattering picture of Quaker war tax resistance:
The following details in regard to the Quakers, which I have the honor to transmit to you, are of a mixed character.
At the beginning of the troubles, when the colonies rebelled against the (English) project of deriving a revenue from America, the Quakers had the most influence in the government of Pennsylvania.
With one exception, all agreed to defend by force of arms the exemption from every tax.
Previous to this they had voted for the war against the Indians, and when the question of independence came up, the Quakers opposed it with all their might.
Steps were then taken to excite the English and German population of the remoter sections of the colony, and Pennsylvania fell in with the sentiments of the other colonies.
Upon this the Quakers made an outcry against war taxes, which placed them in such contradiction with themselves as to increase their discredit.
, proofs were obtained of the services rendered to them by the Quakers; some of these were caught acting as spies, and, as it has been thus far the mistaken policy of the fraternity to support all individuals belonging to it, the odium and blame of this have reacted against the whole body.
This devotedness did not preserve them from the exactions of the English, who disposed of whatever suited them, even of the furniture inside their houses.
The Quakers furnished General Howe with money to redeem themselves, notwithstanding which their houses and gardens in Philadelphia were destroyed; a prominent man among them, who had given a considerable sum to Lord Howe, publicly reproached him, and declared that he would follow him wherever he went to recover the value of his dwelling.
These barbarous proceedings, which have made more Whigs in America than there are Tories now, have not had the same effects on the Quakers.
You will remember, Monseigneur, a document full of a kind of arrogance which they had circulated in the State of Pennsylvania, where they no longer are representatives.
The only result was the indignation and contempt of the Whigs: but real or affected sentiment has no shame, and they rather borrowed glory from this on the ground of persecution.
The feeling, however, did not last, and when the news came of the evacuation of New York (taken by the British), it was believed that, through secret intelligence, they were aware of it, and, afterward, that they would try to make up with the actual Government.
The President of Congress notified me that they would confer with me.
They sounded him before hand, and several deputations waited upon him, who confined themselves to recommending private matters.
They went further with me.
I will relate, Monseigneur, how this embassy was prepared and carried out.
Only the Quakers possessed any merchandise; they had bought it at low prices of the English, at , and re-sold it very dear.
This furnished me with opportunities to have relations with many of them, and the desire to judge for myself of the actual state of such a celebrated sect led me into conversations with them, which turned only on general matters relating to their sect and principles.
One day, one of them bluntly said to me: “You have a good deal of trouble in finding furniture.
Come into our houses and select what you like; you will then address yourself to Congress, and Congress will take from us to give to you at any price you please.”
I felt the full force of this rejoinder.
I asked him why he did not pay voluntarily.
“Our religion forbids us,” he replied.
“I fear then,” said I in return, “that, as people accuse you, you have an easy conscience when called upon to pay money and to concern yourselves for things not to your taste; and that a religion which has no other public influence in society than to produce avarice and an inordinate love of ease and indolence must strike enlightened people as a mask for hypocrisy.”
I manifested a desire to have this doubt cleared up.
This led to a discussion, which ended by the Quaker telling me that he would bring me a person who knew more than himself, able to solve my doubts, and with whom I could explain myself in French.
The name of this person is Benezet, son of a French refugee, who has turned Quaker, and who is a man of intelligence and learning.
He prepared me for the mission by sending me one of the brethren, who praised highly the merit and virtues of this sort of patriarch.
Finally he came, and we had several conversations on the history, principles, and career of his sect.
It was only at our last interview, , that he at last declared, yielding to my arguments, that, agreeing with most of the fraternity, he thought that the Quakers ought to submit to the actual government and pay taxes, without questioning the use to which these might be put; but that they had weak brethren among them, whose scruples they were obliged to respect.
I made him sensible of the dangers of this mistaken policy, one which involved a loss of public esteem universally, and warranted the distrust and rigorous measures of the government.
I remarked to him that since they had been able to secure the confidence of the English administration, the principles of which differed so much from their own, it would be easy to come to terms with a government tolerant in principles and which would not persecute them when once combined with it.
Sieur Benezet seemed to have resolved to expound these truths; he ended by begging me to favor the fraternity, and especially to exercise my good offices in behalf of some Mennonites affiliated with them, who had been imprisoned and fined for not taking up arms. I replied that it was not in my mission to arrest the energies of the American government, and that when the Quakers had performed their duties they would no longer be in fear of persecution.
The President of Congress expressed his best thanks to me for the way in which I had conducted this affair, and begged me to treat the ulterior demands of the Quakers in the same fashion.
Wendy McElroy shares her frustration about friends and family members who think her deliberately frugal lifestyle is an affliction rather than a blessing:
They value money and prestige above happiness — indeed, above all else.
They judge a person as successful or a failure based on bank accounts, cars, bling… whatever costs a bundle to have means you are a success; if you don’t have it, you’re a failure.
I honestly don’t think it occurs to them that someone would deliberately reject what they consider to be success.
A family member called specifically to tell us an old friend was now a millionaire and urge us to “get in touch with him!”
I don’t know what he expected would happen… perhaps he thinks being rich is a communicable condition or we could hit the friend up for a loan and, so, finally replace the 16-year-old car that I love.
I don’t know.
But the message of the phone call was clear.
People in our family think we are failures because we are not as wealthy as we should be… however wealthy that is.
It doesn’t occur to them that wealth is a trade-off and, beyond a certain point, it becomes a terrible deal for us.
After making their disappointment clear, such family members always say “just as long as you’re happy”… but they don’t mean it.
They would vastly prefer us to be rich and miserable.
For one thing, we could then leave mattresses full of money to nieces and nephews… thus living a miserable but successful life for the sake of others’ happiness.
I’ve been reading some of the writings of Anthony Benezet over the last few days and I came across many passages that are harmonious with what Wendy McElroy wrote.
Benezet was a proponent of voluntary simplicity in the Quaker style — plain dress, avoidance of unnecessary ornament, disdain of riches, and an eagerness to do good to others instead of to do well for himself.
But whereas McElroy’s motives are for true satisfaction in this life, over the false and frequently-advertised promise of satisfaction mediated by wealth and bling, Benezet took for granted that riches could provide satisfaction in this world but denied that this world was where the action was — his sights were set on heaven and he didn’t want anything earthly (and therefore ultimately worthless) getting in the way.
Still, the similarities are striking.
I think it’s satisfaction in this life, and not merely anticipation of reward in the next, that Benezet is thinking of when, in a letter to Benjamin Franklin, he notes that “I have solicited & obtained the office of teacher of the Black children & others of that people, an employment which tho’ not attended with so great pecuniary advantages as others might be, yet affords me much satisfaction, I know no station of life I should prefer before it.”
Anthony Benezet is one of the giants of 18th century American Quakerism, particularly well-known for his efforts towards the abolition of slavery.
He was one of the signers of the “epistle of tender love and caution” that can be considered the founding document of American war tax resistance.
I’ve tried to find some additional information about Benezet’s attitudes toward tax resistance, but have so far only been able to find a fragmentary record that hints at more extensive writings that either no longer exist or that I haven’t managed to locate yet.
I found some good information in George S. Brookes’s Friend Anthony Benezet ().
From a letter to John Smith, :
Some time last week we understood a meeting was proposed by William Brown and John Churchman [two other “epistle” signers] to be held with all those who had refused to pay the Last Year’s Tax, to which we understood our English Friends intended to attend; as this proposal begat some uneasiness in some of us O.J. [“Very likely Owen Jones” — George S. Brookes] and myself went up to William Brown and told the Friends there that we must declare our disunity with said meeting, and on our own and the behalf of many of our Friends who we were assured could not approve of it as it will have a tendency to prejudice the mind of many young people and induce them to come to hasty conclusions.
Howsoever we were told the time was too short to contradict the meeting, which was held.
Where after a pretty deal of conversation it was concluded that the matter was now grown to such a height as to make it necessary to carry it to the Yearly Meeting.
The only matter in debate seemed how it should be introduced there, which I understand to be concluded to be done by the channel of the Meeting of Suffering, and as the matter will be probably debated at that Meeting next Fifth day, thought it necessary to acquaint ffd. of Burlington of it.
I hope they will with me think it their duty to attend.
We are also to have a Meeting of Suffering next Seventh day morning, before the meeting of ministers.
I need not expatiate on the matter as it speaks for itself: but remain in great haste as the boat is just going.
We have professed to be called & redeemed from the spirit of the world, from that prevalent pride & indulgence so contrary to the low, humble, self-denying life of Christ & his immediate followers; but have we indeed been such, has not our conformity to the world, our engagements of life, in order to please ourselves & gain wealth, with little regard to the danger to the better part, been productive to all the evils pointed out in the Gospel, has it not naturally led us & begot a desire in our children to live in conformity to other people; hence the sumptuousness of our dwellings, our equipage, our dress; furniture & the luxury of our tables have become a snare to us & a matter of offence to the thinking part of mankind; and the mind has been raised in our children & often in ourselves from the meekness & self-denial of the Gospel, into resentment in defence of what is become as our Gods; and the meek humble & poor self-denying life of Christ is become of no repute, or rather as a Shepherd was to the Egyptians.
The suffering providence which now is displayed over us seems particularly calculated to bring us to our selves, in some respects, as the trials & devastation is greater upon those whose possessions are most expensive, & have been at the greatest pains & expenses in adorning their pleasant pictures.
I trust this, at least, will teach us, in future, to live more agreeable to our profession; whereby our wants being made less, the perplexing, dangerous snares & engagements which attend the amassing & use of wealth would be much lessened.
If this afflictive providence does induce us to begin anew upon the true foundation of our principles, in that low & humble state of mind & conduct which becomes & indeed constitutes the real followers of Christ, it will have done much for us.
In , French diplomat Gérard de Reyneval, who was stationed in America, reported back to his government on the troubles caused to the revolutionary war effort by Quaker pacifism.
He said he had interviewed Benezet and that Benezet “at last declared, yielding to my arguments, that, agreeing with most of the fraternity, he thought that the Quakers ought to submit to the actual government and pay taxes, without questioning the use to which these might be put; but that they had weak brethren among them, whose scruples they were obliged to respect.”
Perhaps so, but I hear tell that there’s a letter co-authored by Benezet and a “B. Mason” under the title “Some Brief remarks offered as Reasons why we ought not to pay Taxes to support War.”
Alas, I haven’t yet been able to find a copy of this.
(See The Picket Line for for the text of that letter.)
I have to acknowledge the receipt of your several favors… except your thoughts on the payments of taxes for war, which by some mistake I conclude was left out in closing the packet.
As that is a subject much under the consideration of Friends [it] would have been particularly satisfactory to have seen your thoughts upon it.
Inclosed I send a few of mine of that subject on the occasion therein mentioned as they are the first I have communicated to any friend in writing.
If there be anything too strongly suggested I shall take it kindly if you’ll note it, as I have a care on me that we do not, in furthering this testimony which I have faith to believe is founded in the truth, do anything to support it in a wrong zeal and not according to knowledge.
As it is a step in the reformation that crosses a received testimony in Society more than perhaps any other, we had need to step wisely in it.
The want of your thoughts on paying taxes has hitherto prevented my sending Timothy Davis an account of your care and concern for him, hoping they would before long come to hand.
I have not seen him for some time but often hear from him; he is doubtless too much in the love of, and conformity to the world, and not enough the meekness and simplicity becoming his profession, as, indeed is the case with too many others.
Our friend Abraham Griffith had a large opportunity with him and his adherents who stand out against the body, please to be referred to him for his state and that of the shattered meeting where he lives.
He has been writing against Friends under the character of vindicating of himself, with which I was grieved and sent him word by his and my friend, who had seen his performance, my prospects of such a procedure.
He has not fit yet to publish it.
Davis eventually did publish it, in , under the title “An Address to the People called Quakers, concerning the manner in which they treated Timothy Davis, for writing and publishing a Piece on Taxation.”
I haven’t seen this leaflet yet, but hope to get a peek at it through interlibrary loan.
(See The Picket Line for ) One of these days maybe I’ll have a chance to scavenge through the various Quaker archives back in Pennsylvania.
Brown continues:
I have several times felt much for Timothy and longed for his restoration, and though I have several times begun to write to him I have felt a cautious fear, and though when I saw him while under dealing, the way to freedom seemed open between us, yet it is not to write.
Perhaps you may not be so restrained.
His letter to Abraham upon the subject of taxes shows him to be in the reasoning.
Benezet wrote to George Dillwyn about Moses Brown’s letter (unmatched left-quote in the original):
What I mentioned to Sister Peggy was the desire I had to communicate parts of Moses Brown’s letter relating to the payment of taxes for the purposes of war.
This testimony he appears fully convinced is founded on truth, and sends me a copy of a letter he had purposed to send to friends in England on that head, but at the same time he appears very desirous friends should not do anything in a wrong zeal, not according to knowledge more especially as he says it is a step in the reformation that crosses a received testimony in society more than perhaps any other, we had need to step wisely in it.
He adds: “It is apprehended the many difficulties friends were under at their first appearance and the manner of the English collecting their taxes, being such that a refusal must have greatly encreased them, the first reformers were excused from that burden, and permitted to pay them, that by so doing they might (as George Fox said in an epistle on the subject in ) better claim their liberty.
The trials (he further says) of those who may refuse the payments of taxes will be increased at this time by their conduct being construed into a disaffection to their country; and we hope will be a bar to any’s running in a forward spirit to become reformers without feeling the meek & humbling evidence of truth.
“we fear some take up the testimony more on account of the authority that demands the taxes than because they are used for war”
Another letter to Benezet from Moses Brown, dated , touches on Timothy Davis again:
Having had a concern for some time for Timothy Davis I took an opportunity with our friend John Lloyd and paid him a visit, and while there introduced your concern for him and read your observations concerning him and his state, which he seemed to take well, and said they would be of service if attended to, and on the whole I believe Timothy sees he has missed it but can’t get down enough to submit to the cross and acknowledge his mistake whereby he might be reconciled to his brethren.
He seems to think friends have been too hard with him, but yet said he thought at times Friends were as near or nearer than ever.
He continues to have Meetings by himself and goes some in the neighborhood round and preaches to his adherents.
As to taxes, he told us he expected one account that he could not pay, which I have since to mention to others who have paid all, even some who had been on appointment to treat with Timothy.
I think if he could be prevailed on to drop his Meetings at home and not go abroad preaching to others he would very soon apply to be restored, which I mention believing if you attend to your concern on his account it may be useful to him.
Your notes on taxes are satisfactory.
We having for some time an apology for those who refuse the payment of taxes, our meeting for sufferings have of late appointed a committee to examine it, which has been done, and alterations & additions made, and it has been proposed to send it to your meeting for sufferings for your approbation before it is printed, and I expect it will be forwarded soon after our next Meeting for Sufferings.
It is pretty extensive on the subject, containing near 60 quarto pages.
Should friends think it suitable at this time to publish it, I have thought it might come in as an appendix although it has been written by one friend, diverse others having assisted in collecting material and suggesting their prospects, it is at present undetermined whether it will be best for one or more to sign it, which occasioned the proposal of sending it to you.
The subject is weighty and should be well considered, those friends in our meeting who pay the taxes of whom there are a number of concerned friends and leading members seem to be much more cordially consenting to the publication than could be expected.
The principle difficulty with some of them and those of us who decline is we fear some take up the testimony more on account of the authority that demands the taxes than because they are used for war.
Such we fear instead of forwarding will eventually retard the testimony, and as some Friends refuse all taxes, even those for civil uses as well as those clear for war and others that are mixed, and thereby dropping our testimony of supporting civil government by readily contributing thereto, it has been a fear whether this variety of conduct won’t mar rather than promote the work.
Could we be more united in the ground of our testimony and in our practice in it, I should have more hopes of its speedy obtaining in society.
A time will doubtless come when a smaller proportion will be for war than at present when the greater part being for civil uses, friends may pay as there is and ought to be according to the apostle, a conscientiousness in paying to the support of civil government as well as refuse that for war, to refuse the payment of such when even a lesser part be mixed for war before we applied to the authority to separate them would not at present be my place, but probably before that time come when the lesser part will be for war friends may be agreed to ask a separation which, if it should be refused, we might be united in refusing even those the greater part of which may be for civil uses.
I understand some Friends have fallen in with or been overpowered by the common argument that civil government is upheld by the sword, and therefore they decline paying to its support, which appears to me a great weakness, for I see a material distinction between civil government and military, or a state of war, and on this distinction our ancient testimonies was and remain to be supportable of paying tribute & customs for the support of the civil, and yet to refuse to pay trophy money and other expenses solely for war.
Civil government is in the restoring & supporting power, yet there is a separation, as of the precious from the vile, in respect of this subject, through the lusts and fallen ages under the specious claim of being the disciples and followers of the Prince of Peace, have greatly contributed to cloud and obscure it.
The thoughts on paying taxes of Samuel Allinson is well thought of even by those who yet pay them, and as he has got diverse arguments not in the piece now sent to the clerk of your Meeting for Sufferings, I have suggested to him if Friends with you should agree to the publication of anything, I thought some Friend might, out of them all, make the apology much more complete, which I could wish as done in preference to publishing this now sent.
On , Benezet wrote to Robert Pleasants, saying:
The consistency of paying tax for war is becoming so interesting a subject to the Society that I trust it will be agreeable to you to see some note which we have made on that weighty subject and which by a copy or other I request you will communicate to our dear Friend Edward Stabler with whom we much sympathize in the loss of his dear companion; but cannot write to him as I could wish, I have not even time to read over the copy so that you must help omission we have a care that is furthering this testimony which we have faith to believe is founded on truth not to do any thing to forward or support it in a wrong zeal and not according to knowledge.
As it is a step in the reformation that so directly crosses a received testimony in Society more than any other we had need to step carefully and wisely in it.
He that believes makes not haste.
And that’s the last word I’ve been able to uncover.
Benezet died in .
Timothy Davis rejoined the orthodox Meeting in .
It seems from these excerpts that a number of war tax resisting Quakers were working to assemble a major argument or statement of doctrine on the subject that could be published by the Society under the imprimatur of their Meeting — probably incorporating Allinson’s work.
I haven’t been able to find any drafts of this, though, if any exist.
I’ve been digging through the archives looking for more information on
American Quaker war tax resistance, and found this interesting aside in Susan
Martha Reed’s Church and State in Massachusetts,
():
While the Quakers insisted strongly upon resistance to the payment of taxes
in certain cases, they were, on the whole, law-abiding citizens, the various
meetings using their influence to accomplish this result. The Rhode Island
Quarterly Meeting was in much distressed by
complaint that certain Friends “Eastward” refused to pay any public taxes to
the government on the ground that a great part of the money was used for war.
A paper was drawn up on the subject and travelling Friends were asked to urge
Hampton and Dover people to pay the rates.
Reed sources this to the records of the Rhode Island Quarterly Meeting pages
38–9 and says “Another case appears in” the records of Dartmouth Monthly
Meeting, pages 47–8. I have not been able to check these original sources.
For the most part, American Quakers who resisted war taxes were very careful
to distinguish “war taxes” from ordinary and “mixed” taxes, believing
themselves to be forbidden from paying the former, but required by just as
much of a holy duty to pay the latter. But there is some indirect evidence
that some groups of Quakers went to the radical extreme of refusing to pay any
tax that went even in part to pay for war. This note in Reed’s book is one
example; another comes from a letter from Moses Brown to Anthony Benezet in
:
[W]e fear some take up the [war tax resistance] testimony more on account of
the authority that demands the taxes than because they are used for war. Such
we fear instead of forwarding will eventually retard the testimony, and as
some Friends refuse all taxes, even those for civil uses as well as those
clear for war and others that are mixed, and thereby dropping our testimony
of supporting civil government by readily contributing thereto, it has been a
fear whether this variety of conduct won’t mar rather than promote the work.
Could we be more united in the ground of our testimony and in our practice in
it, I should have more hopes of its speedy obtaining in society. A time will
doubtless come when a smaller proportion will be for war than at present when
the greater part being for civil uses, friends may pay as there is and ought
to be according to the apostle, a conscientiousness in paying to the support
of civil government as well as refuse that for war. To refuse the payment of
such when even a lesser part be mixed for war before we applied to the
authority to separate them would not at present be my place, but probably
before that time come when the lesser part will be for war friends may be
agreed to ask a separation which, if it should be refused, we might be united
in refusing even those the greater part of which may be for civil uses.
I understand some Friends have fallen in with or been overpowered by the
common argument that civil government is upheld by the sword, and therefore
they decline paying to its support, which appears to me a great weakness, for
I see a material distinction between civil government and military, or a
state of war, and on this distinction our ancient testimonies was and remain
to be supportable of paying tribute and customs for the support of the civil,
and yet to refuse to pay trophy money and other expenses solely for war.
Civil government is in the restoring and supporting power, yet there is a
separation, as of the precious from the vile, in respect of this subject,
through the lusts and fallen ages under the specious claim of being the
disciples and followers of the Prince of Peace, have greatly contributed to
cloud and obscure it.
What I mentioned to Sister Peggy was the desire I had to communicate parts of Moses Brown’s letter relating to the payment of taxes for the purpose of war.
This Testimony he appears fully convinced is founded on truth & sends me a copy of a letter he had purposed to send to friends in England on that head, but at the same time he appears very desirous friends should not do any thing in a wrong zeal, not according to knowledgeand especially as he says is in a step in the reformation that cross a received testimony in society more than perhaps any other, we had need to step wisely in it.
He adds “It is apprehended the many difficulties friends were under at their first appearance & the manner of the English collecting their taxes, being such that a refusal must have greatly encreased them, the first reformers were excused from that burden, and permitted to pay them, that by so doing they might (as Geo. Fox said in an Epistle on this subject ) better claim their liberty. The Tryal (he farther says) of those [who?] may refuse the payment of taxes will be imagined at this time by their conduct being construed into a dis-affection to their country; and we hope will be a bar to any’s runing in a forward spirit to become reformers without feeling the Meek & humbling evidence of truth.
But God in his Mercy is providing, I trust, a means to deliver us from this greatest of snares, in calling us to bear, indeed, a faithful Testimony against Wars, in the case of Taxes, which will not be like a passing storm, but an abiding tryal, which as it will come heavier upon those who are most loaded & incumbered with the clay of this world will have I trust a blessed effect, to every one who will willingly receive it, to keep us low & humble, intitule us to ye divine regard, according to ye promises.
I have been long waiting for an opportunity to write, in answer to thine of the & and expected to have had one by Willm Turpin, but his departure was so unexpected that I had but just time to give him a packet for thee, containing the Thoughts I had collected on the payment of taxes, which thou desired to see; which thou wilt find mostly coincide with thy own; also a number of pamphlets both in French & English which have been lately published, by direction of Friends of the Mg of Suffering, after they had been received & corrected by them; It’s a matter I had long had in prospect, & is chiefly intended for the information of my country people, but may also we hope be of service in removing mistakes & prejudices from others.
The perusal of thy remarkes, in thy letter, on the payment of Taxes for war, & those thou proposed to communicate to Friends in England, both afforded me much satisfaction.
I am much concerned with thee that nothing be done in a wrong zeal, & I have been particularly desirous, as well for my self as others, that we don’t undertake to become reformers without feeling the meek & humbling evidence to attend, more especially, as thou observes, “this is a step in the reformation that crosses a received testimony”, so long & strongly established by the practice & the writings of several Friends of note, which will remain as a standing plea to cavillers & such as are inclined with Naaman, to say, “Pardon thy servant in this thing;” who tho thy may receive as quieting an answer as he did, may swerve from the most excellent way.
However, I believe in the consistency of such a testimony, & that if it is of the truth, it will make its way in the love & patience; and that great care should be exercised that no censure, or even slight should be cast upon an honest hearted brother in that and all other cases, that cannot see as I do.
To make our union to consist in a conformity of sentiments & practices in matters in which faithful men are not agreed from their different apprehensions of what the Gospel requires, is a great mistake; & has a greater tendency to beget hypocrisy, than true fellowship.
It cannot be expected that children in the Truth will have the same prospect as young men, & these may not see things in the same light as elders; here the necessity & advantage of meekness, patience & charity is experienced.
Our Friends so freely paying taxes, the greatest part of which they knew was appropriated for military purposes, has from my first coming amongst them, which is near 50 years; as well as their being so active in government, even when military matters were mixed with civil always appeared to me inconsistent, & was what I have frequently expressed, even in the Yearly Meeting, more than 20 years past.
I have observed that foreigners with whom I have conversed upon this weighty subject, have looked on the payment of these taxes to be inconsistent with a clear testimony against war: Nay the very thoughtful Indian has reproached us on this head.
I trust, if such who apprehend themselves called to bear a testimony of this kind, do it with meekness & consistency, it may bring some to deeper considerations of Truth’s Testimony against War.
The love of the world & the deceitfulness of riches, the desire of amassing wealth, of living a life of ease, delicacy & shew, is the great rock against which our Society has dashed, & Many not to rise again; from this mighty snare, I trust, the Almighty will, in a measure, deliver us by means of this testimony.
Here it is the minds of the young people are carried away in the air & the world; and the parents, as in the case of Eli, give way: hence we are, generally, more like those clothed in purple & fine linen, — in soft raiment in kings’ houses, than conformable to our Saviour’s example & imitation of his followers, (ie) that cloud of witnesses, of whom the Apostle bears record, of whom the earth was not worthy; far opposite to the state of Pilgrims & Strangers, followers of him, who, tho Lord of all, claimed not so much in the world, as, even where to lay his head.
— Now when this is the case of the young & unexperienced, it’s not to be wondered at, considering how strongly the bent of the human heart flows towards the world, its pleasures, honors & friendships; but to see those who have apprehended themselves peculiarly called to follow Christ in the regeneration; gifted ministers, well qualified elders, engaged in laying up riches, even sometimes by means of business, such as disputed titles, distillations, &c. doubtful as to their moral rectitude; as well as of a contentious nature & dangerous in themselves; others endeavouring to advance themselves by marriage with persons, on account of their wealth, who are unacquainted with the truth: Nay, I have in several, I may say in many instances, with sorrow of heart, seen preachers both young & old, whom the Almighty had called to his service in a low situation, so far insinuate themselves in the farms of the rich, by means of the esteem & respect gained thro the jewels God had adorned them with, for the carrying on his spiritual work, as to get advanced in the world & even join hands in marriage with people, which, had they not been rich, they would, as Job expressed it, not even “have put with the dogs of their flock”; making public declaration that they took one another in the presence of God; whence a query may arise, What God?
Why the God of this world.
Moreover, this terrible deviation from the path of truth, has been generally approved & even vindicated by professors, under the specious pretense, that, by means of the wealth thus attained, they would have more leisure to attend upon their ministry; forgetting that the Gospel has been predominantly dispensed to, & by, the poor, rich in faith, whom God has especially called, & will enable to perfect the work to which they are called, without going to Egypt & Babylon for help.
Many who have too much given way to a self seeking, worldly spirit, have nevertheless retained in a great measure their prospects of many Gospel Truths, by means of which, & their wealth, they have become as leaders in their several Meetings; from hence our church has suffered much.
People have been pleased they had the example of active members who seemed to have so good a prospect of things relating to the kingdom of God; not considering the many instances recorded in Scripture, where it appears, God did not withdraw a prospect of the truth, as an ability for service, from those he had once called, notwithstanding their deviation from the narrow way of the cross, as, in the case of Balaam, who so clearly prophesied to the rising of the Star of Jacob, even when he was seeking occasion to curse Israel, for the wages of covetousness.
Well, if a faithful testimony prevails in the matter of taxes for war in those who are favored with the prospect, who, I am inclined to think, are many, I trust it will have a great tendency to wean such from the world, teach us to bring our wants & desires into a much narrower compass than they are at present; hence those corrupt propensities which are thereby so much fed in ourselves & our children, may more easily be kept under.
I would judge the state of no man, with respect to God & him, but I cannot look upon the love of the world & giving way to a desire of riches, as many do, as a pardonable frailty; but rather esteem it a departure from the divine life, which must either gradually kill all religion in the Soul, or be itself killed, by it.
If one tittle of the law was not to fail but all be fulfilled, can we believe we may act with impunity in so diametric opposition to solemn truths so agreeable to the nature of the Gospel, & so plainly verified to be so in their effects, particularly on the offspring of those who deviate from them, & yet retain the favor of God?
Love not the world &c. Lay not up for yourselves treasure on earth, &c. How hardly shall those that have riches enter, &c. Wo unto you that are rich, &c &c. They that will be rich fall into snares &c. These are certainly fruits of the flesh; & the watch word still is, That ye cannot serve two masters, — Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also, — If ye live after the flesh, ye shall die; but if thro the Spirit, ye mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.
But, putting Christianity out of the question, let me say that there is a certain proportion of wealth in the world, which should be applied, & circulate for the general benefit & comfort of mankind; according to each’s particular circumstances, this is the duty & will be the concern of every feeling heart; Now that one more knowing or crafty than the rest, should, by buying cheap & selling dear, get possessed of such an heap, which might answer the sober wants of hundreds, who are actually under great discouragements & difficulties for want of their share thereof: to see this person make use of his abundance, principally to increase his heap, &, finally, leave it solely or even principally to his heir or heirs, to the gratifying their idleness & pride, & every other noxious passion of the human mind, this appears to me to be an atrocious degree of Vanity.
I fully believe that a people will arise, whether Friends or others, who will absolutely refuse wealth, will make it one article of their fellowship that none suffer more wealth to accumulate than may be necessary to enable them to follow their several callings, & thereby remove from themselves & their children that grievous snare, which has arisen from the Society’s being so fond of amassing & enjoying wealth, in opposition to our Saviour’s positive injunction, indeed to the whole nature of the Gospel.
The situation of our Friend Timothy Davis is a matter of great importance to himself, & may in its consequences be so to many others.
If the innocent childlike nature of the Gospel was suffered to prevail, how easily would matters of this nature subside; our very steps & mistakes would become an occasion of instruction to us, & rather tend to strengthen our union & mutual charity than otherwise.
Ah! the strong will of man, the corruption of the human heart; nowhere more manifest than in the support of our own missteps, which we have, often, some distant prospect we were mistaken or too hasty in, & yet what havoc it has made, & nowhere more than under an apprehension (I would rather say, than pretense,) of zeal for the truth.
I do not know that it is safe for me, at this time, to say anything to Timothy, not having yet seen Abraham Griffith; perhaps thou mayst think well of communicating to him these or part of the thoughts I now express, with the Thoughts on Taxes for war.
Timothy is a friend & held in much estimation & whom I still love.
I earnestly wish for him, as for myself, that in any contention of this kind, [self?], that enemy of all good, may be held in no estimation, but that the honor of God & the good of our fellowman may be the only object of our desires; & then I have no doubt but things between Timothy & his Friends, will soon settle right.
“I will be more vile than thus & will be base in mine own sight,” saith king David; & when reproached for his humiliation, gives this weighty reason, It was before the Lord, — who chose me.
Oh that this may likewise be Timothy’s situation.
It is recorded of our Lord, That in his humiliation his judgment was taken away.
I take it to be the reasoning part, which so strongly asserts, I am right.
When we are favored to pierce thro the mists & crowds that surround us, as well arising from our own passions & wrong pursuits, as the incumbrances of the world, & are favored with a sight of that which is of an eternal duration, that which soon will be all in all to us, — even a communication with a state & with beings of as different nature from humanity, as exalted above it, — all Contention & Striving will subside, & we shall feel the truth of [Edward] Young’s assertion, —
Th’ Almighty from his Throne, on Earth surveys Nought greater, than an honest, humble Heart, — An humble Heart, His residence; pronounc’d His Second Seat.
Well, it is time to conclude, by saying that I am persuaded the testimony to the peaceable, suffering spirit of the Gospel will prevail, in opposition to the cruel & corrupting spirit of war, & that it will be attended with blessed effects to individuals, who will be thought worthy, thro suffering, in innocent simplicity to be the promulgators of it.
—
I have expressed myself with great freedom, but I fear without sufficient guard, tho I trust in great good will; nevertheless if thou apprehends me under any misapprehension, be so kind to mention it to him, who is indeed, with much sincerity thy affectionate friend Anthony Benezet.
[P.S.] I find there was a considerable debate amongst Friends in the year , on account of a tax laid for to assist queen Ann’s troops in an attack upon Canada.
I have a pamphlet published at that time, by a Friend Jos. Rakestraw, grandfather to Isaac Zane, wherein he tells us he was disowned, in consequence of the debate which arose amongst Friends on that account.
The context is the early years of the United States.
Graydon had been in the American army during the Revolution, was enrolled in the milita, but declined to serve.
For this, he was fined “a sum, which I do not now recollect, but which, when reduced to specie, was far from inconsiderable.”
He thought this was unfair to do to a military veteran like himself, and got Joseph Reed, who was president of the “Supreme Executive Council” of Pennsylvania at the time, to intercede on his behalf.
He also became interested in the case of “a Mr. Thomas Parvin, of the society of Friends, [who] was an object of much wanton oppression.”
[Parvin] resided at Maiden creek, about six miles from Reading, and was nearly broken up by the levies on his property for taxes and militia fines.
A cow or a horse, for instance, was often taken and sold for some trifling demand, and no surplus returned.
Having sons grown up, and enrolled in the militia, he was the more exposed to rapacity.
…[T]alking with him, one day, on the subject of his grievances, I was drawn into a discussion of the non-resisting principles of his sect; and urging their impracticability in the present state of the world, in a manner that discovered sympathy for his sufferings, he was not displeased, and proposed lending me a treatise in defence of their tenets, which he begged I would read and give him my opinion of.
In a few days, he accordingly sent it, accompanied with a very long letter, so accurately written in all respects as to convince me that Mr. Parvin was a well educated man and no mean polemic.
Graydon answered with a letter of his own, and then received a surprise package of additional tracts with a cover letter from Anthony Benezet.
He doesn’t go into much detail about any of this, though, and quickly moves on to other subjects.
Thomas Parvin (–) was the son of Francis Parvin.
Francis was a member of the Pennsylvania Assembly, and one of those Quaker legislators who resigned in because, as they put it: “many of our constituents seem of opinion that the present situation of public affairs [attacks by the French-allied Delaware Indians] calls upon us for services in a military way, which from a conviction of judgment after mature deliberation we cannot comply with.”
Isaac Zane and Anthony Benezet had this to say about the pledge of allegiance that the rebellious British colonists in America were trying to force Quakers to make (on ):
After deliberate and weighty consideration of the subject, unity was expressed with the following minute of caution and advices, issued by our Meeting for Sufferings, on .
The committee appointed on the consideration of what is necessary to be proposed to Friends in general, on the subject of the Declaration of Allegiance and Abjuration, required by some late laws passed by the Legislatures who now preside in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, having several times met, and deliberated thereon, we have the satisfaction to find we are united in judgment, that consistent with our religious principles we cannot comply with the requisition of those laws, as we cannot be instrumental in setting up or pulling down of any government; but it becomes us to show forth a peaceable and meek behavior to all men, seeking their good, and to live a useful, sober, and religious life, without joining ourselves with any parties in war, or with the spirit of strife and contention now prevailing; and we believe that if our conduct is thus uniform and steady, and our hope fixed on the omnipotent arm, for relief, in time he will amply reward us with lasting peace, which hath been the experience of our Friends in time past, and we hope it is of some, who are now under suffering.… And in order that true union and Christian fellowship may be maintained amongst us, it is now earnestly advised that Friends may dwell in that fervent love and charity, which desires the restoration of such who have deviated and erred in this matter, and labor therein for their recovery; but where any continue to oppose the judgment of the meeting now expressed, Monthly Meetings should make it manifest that such do not regard the unity of the body.
And as in some places fines and taxes are and have been imposed on those who, from conscientious scruples refuse or decline making such declarations of allegiance and abjuration, it is the united sense and judgment of this meeting that no Friend should pay any such fine or tax.
For some time I have been hoping to get my hands on a defense of Quaker war tax resistance that I’ve seen alluded to in some letters.
For instance, in , Anthony Benezet wrote to Moses Brown, saying:
The thoughts on paying taxes of Samuel Allinson is well thought of even by those who yet pay them, and as he has got diverse arguments not in the piece now sent to the clerk of your Meeting for Sufferings, I have suggested to him if Friends with you should agree to the publication of anything, I thought some Friend might, out of them all, make the apology much more complete, which I could wish as done in preference to publishing this now sent.
I was able to track down Allinson’s piece, but the other one eluded me.
Benezet also refers, in another letter that year, to “a packet… containing the thoughts I had collected on the payment of taxes…” The following year, he forwards to Robert Pleasants “some note which we have made on that weighty subject,” asking for help, and saying cautiously that “As it is a step in the reformation that so directly crosses a received testimony in Society more than any other we had need to step carefully and wisely in it.
He that believes makes not haste.”
It seems that Benezet never managed to get his thoughts on paper in a form he thought was suitable for publication.
Either he ceded to what he felt was an adequately-worded statement published by some other author or by the Society, or he gave up on the project, or he died (in 1784) before he could finish it.
But there is a draft that he co-wrote with B[enjamin?]
Mason in 1779 in the archives of the Friends Historical Library at Swarthmore College.
They sent me a photocopy, which I’ve transcribed below.
It is a little difficult to determine which parts are Mason’s and which parts Benezet’s. They sign the document in a few places, but the handwriting can sometimes switch in the middle of a section.
I’ve tried to make the punctuation more sensible and have corrected some odd spelling decisions (“Cannady” for Canada, “Ceasar” for Caesar, “angle” for angel, “porposes” for purposes, and so on).
I’ve also added quotation marks to direct quotes from which they were missing.
Some Brief remarks offered as Reasons why we ought not to pay Taxes to support War
The design of the following remarks is not to feed the curious or to enter into a field of controversy; but first to demonstrate that our testimony against paying taxes to support war proceeds from & coincides with the gospel spirit, & is consistent with what has been revealed and discovered to the faithful of many generations, being agreeable to scripture & reason.
And secondly that those who may be wavering or in doubt & have not sufficiently attended to the nature & design of our peaceable testimony and principles (which would lead all the families of the earth into the possession of peace) may be strengthened & encouraged hereby, for as we profess to be led & guided by the Spirit of Truth, which leadeth into all truth and out of all error I feel a desire that we may carefully examine whether we have so attended to this infallible guide as to be redeemed from every connection with those impure channels which convey life & vigor to the devouring spirit of war.
In which scrutiny the succeeding sheets may serve as a touchstone.
With respect to the question put to our savior by the Pharisees and Herodians (which those who advocate the payment of taxes for military uses build much upon) it appears from Matthew, Mark, & Luke (who differ very little in stating the case) that their design was to ensnare him; Luke says “that they might take hold of his words, that so they might deliver him unto the power of the governor” &c. But “he perceived their craftiness and said… ‘show me a penny, whose image & superscription hath it?’
They answered, ‘Caesar’s;’… he said unto them, ‘Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesars, & unto God the things which be God’s:’ And they could not take hold of his words.”
Now it appears from the inscription Pilate wrote on the cross, & other passages, that they had conceived an idea that he had a design of usurping the kingdom, & doubtless they thought his views at that time would lead him to forbid paying tribute unto Caesar, which would have been construed as treason; the likeliest accusation to have place with the governor, but if he had said it is lawful to give, they would have represented him to the people as having done despite to the Mosaic Law, so that his answer is much better adapted to defeat their purpose than to determine their question; in that respect it is altogether ambiguous.
He perceived their wickedness, bid them render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s (which they certainly ought to do) but he did not say that money was Caesar’s nor command them to give it to him, neither was it his because it bore his image & superscription, more than if it had the impression &c. of Alexander the Great on it, or more than the money in Europe, which has the image &c. of the reigning princes on it can be said to be theirs.
So that I apprehend that our Lord’s will with respect to that question cannot be understood by his answer, & it is plain that his adversaries did not look upon his answer as decisive, but being frustrated, marveled.
Now to distinguish between what are the things of God & what are Caesar’s: Whatever infringes upon or operates against the law of God written in the heart or commanded through his Son in the New Testament cannot be Caesar’s due.
And since we are commanded not to resist evil, not to love our friends only but our enemies also, if any ruler under the character of Caesar require us to resist evil or to give him money to promote violence or the destruction of enemies (which is a certain token of hatred) he hath invaded God’s prerogative, who is sovereign of the conscience, king of kings & lord of lords whom we are bound by the first & great commandment to love above all, without rival or competitor, which is manifest by obedience; therefore if we contribute one mite, knowingly to promote violence on earth, we shall violate his divine law “Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them,” shall bring guilt on our consciences & not stand acquitted in the sight of him who will in no wise acquit the guilty.
B[enjamin?].
Mason
With respect to the tribute paid by our savior at Capernaum, Thomas Stackhouse in his History of the Bible, page 1357, says every Jew of twenty years old or upwards was obliged to pay “an Attic dram or half a shekel, about 15 pence our money, for the use of the sanctuary, to pay for sacrifices, &c. and was the tribute which the collectors demanded; and not a tax payable to the Roman Emperor, as some imagine; which appears not only from our Saviour’s argument, viz. that he was the Son of the Heavenly King to whom it was paid & consequently had a right to plead his exemption, but also from the Greek word, which according to Josephus the most noted of the Jewish writers was the proper word for the capitation tax &c.”1 Bishop [Jeremy] Taylor in his life of Christ, page 307, fully confirms the above assertion.
Also Berkit [?], Samuel Smith & Daniel Whitby in their several commentaries on the scriptures.
And Caidence in his concordance declares the same: with relation to the advice given by the apostles to the believers, to submit themselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake as unto them that are set by Him for the punishment of evildoers & for the praise of them that do well, for this cause, says he, pay your tribute, for what cause?
1 Timothy 2 2nd “that we may lead a quiet & peaceable life, in all godliness and honesty.” Now it is plain from the text & the reason of things, that this injunction to the believers only related to that civil authority which was established for the peace of the community, & by no means refer to taxes for the support of wars, so destructive of all order & good government.
And even if it could be supposed that in those early times, under the government of heathen emperors, the believers thought themselves excused in their complience to such requisitions; yet now that the powers under which we live profess with us to be the followers of Christ, in doctrine & practice, it seems very strange that we should freely pay taxes for the prosecution of those bloody wars which have been carried on both in Europe & America, not only in defense of their own territories but for the purposes of crushing those they esteem enemies & of enriching themselves through devastation & destruction in other lands.
Read the history of late times & see what horrible destruction of human beings, many by means of wicked laws, dragged against their wills to slay or be slain; what corruption of manners; what waste of substance has been made by means of the many years war carried on in Germany what expence has occurred in order to get possession of the territories & wealth of the East Indies by every murdering art of war whereby thousands & hundreds of thousands have by sword & famine been brought to an untimely end.
In Africa also a military power, forts &c. is maintained the better to enable the heathen, in conjunction with professed Christians, to make war on & merchandize of their brethren.
And in America, how often during a long course of years, have the Indians been instigated to acts of violence & murder; Christians (so called) against Christians mixed with scalping Indians have stained the earth with human blood for a miserable share in the spoil of a plundered world.
A world, as a late pious author well remarks, [that] should have seen, heard, or felt nothing from the followers of Christ but a divine love which had forced them to visit mangers with the glad tidings of peace and salvation.
Now if we deal truly with ourselves; if we desire to act up to the purity, sincerity, & plainness of our profession; can we with truth assert that taxes for these purposes are such as the Apostle had in view when he required of the believers that they should submit to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake?
Will they fit us for every good work?
Will they enable us to live a quiet & peaceable life in all godliness & honesty?
Can the use of these taxes be said with truth to be for the punishment of evildoers & for the praise of them that do well?
Are not the uses they are put to in direct opposition to our principles?
Will our pretense of being ignorant of the use excuse us when we know they are put to some of the worst of uses, shall not we be justly reproached as acting in opposition to the plainness & sincerity of our profession?
There has long been a growing concern in the Society with regard to the paying taxes for the purpose of war.
It is now between 60 & 70 years when it first appeared in this City, on occasion of a tax then laid on the people for raising a sum of money for the purpose of war which was carrying on, for the taking of Canada, which some friends refused to pay.
And in the year 1756 the like concern was renewed in the payment of tax for carrying on a war against the Indians when a number of friends remonstrated to the Assembly on that head, as is particularly related in our Friends John Churchman & John Woolman’s journals.
We also find by what is mentioned in our ancient friend John Richardson’s journal, page 119, that there was a growing concern amongst friends in England, when required of him by friends, of their Yearly Meeting in Rhode Island, what Friends of England did in the case of paying taxes for carrying on the war with France &c., he replied that he had heard the matter debated both in inferior & superior meetings in England, that many Friends there were not easy in the payment of these taxes, but did it on account of the difficulty which attended a separation from those taxes for a civil use.
A[nthony]. Benezet
As I have unity with our testimony against military services, as pointed out in the foregoing hints [glints?], & believing there is room to add & that the subject is important, therefore I am free to say that I fully believe we are called to lift up a standard (in the sight of the nations) for the Prince of Peace, more separated from the mixtures than has hitherto been by our Society in an embodied capacity.
And insomuch as we have, in any wise heretofore, complied with military requisitions, we have fell short of the noble profession we have made, and rendered ourselves unable to answer that part of the 6th Query2 with clearness which requires us to bear a faithful testimony in that respect, for how can we faithfully testify against that which we freely support; We cannot consistent with our profession pay any taxes appropriated to support war, or the spirit of strife, or without doing a military service, in so doing we shall deny him before men, who commanded us to love our enemies (and declared he came not to destroy men’s lives but to save them) by supporting these in breaking his commandments, & empowering them to destroy those lives whom he came to save.
In the next place, I shall endeavor to obviate such common objections as may occur, which are advanced to justify the payment of such taxes as are under notice, some of whom are treated of in the preceding pages, but not altogether cleared to my satisfaction.
With respect to the tribute paid by Peter at Capernaum for himself & his master, in order to avert the force of a necessary reason why it may not be a precedent for us (viz.) its being done under the legal dispensation, it is objected that it was paid to a heathen & that no payment was ever directed by the Law of Moses, but it may be answered that the use of the sword was commanded & the manner of a king described by Moses, which could not be supported without tribute or something of a similar nature; and if every thing which our Lord did in his outward appearance be obligatory on us, then we must be circumcised & wash one anothers’ feet (which amounts to a command) and pass through the whole ceremonial train of the Jewish rites; but if he only passed through these these to fulfill the righteousness thereof and if by that one offering, these type of services were abolished, then consequently the outward warfare, as more particularly appears by his command to Peter.
And as he is not the author of confusion, he cannot will that his professed followers shall support what he has forbid them to use; Which the apostle Paul well understood when he said, “the weapons of our warfare are not carnal” &c.
Another objection is advanced to oppose & limit the progress of our testimony in regard to taxes for military uses, by charging those who profess a scruple against compliance therewith with a pretense to new revelation & further discoveries not warranted by scripture, reason, or the practice of the faithful, adding that new revelation requires new guidance.
To which I am free to observe that our Lord said to his disciples, when near to be separated from them, John 16 12th “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.” I do not take this to be only applicable to them, but to the church in its infant state, & to His followers in every age, which undeniably contains a promise of further discoveries of His will.
Now although the church increased mightily in the apostles’ days, yet it was soon after eclipsed, with a long night of apostacy, in which she retired into the wilderness, there to abide during her appointed time, & now in these latter ages in the reformation & coming forth of our ancestors, it pleased Infinite Wisdom to call her forth, through the revelation of His will anew to her, in which she made some glorious advances towards the day of Christ, as spoken of by the apostle saying ([2] Thessns 2d 2–3) be “not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand; let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, & that man of sin be revealed” &c. Also in Revelations 10th 7: “But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished as he hath declared to his servants the prophets.”“And the seventh angel sounded & there were great voices in heaven saying the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of Our Lord & of his Christ, and He shall reign for ever & ever.” These wonderful predictions represent the church in its greatest splendor; fully come out of the wilderness, by which we may clearly see that the day of Christ there spoken of is only coming; and that she is but yet on the way as it were, leaning on the breast of her beloved, and since revelation is the rock & foundation whereon he promised to build his church & that every degree of true advancement she has made has been on that basis.
Why then do we shrink thereat & marvel that things should be discovered to her that have been hid from ages; that is this dependence on the revelation of the divine will, which is her preservation from the prevalence of the gates of hell.
I fully believe as she attends to her holy head & advances towards this thrice happy day, that many things will be revealed to her that we are not yet able to bear, even that the work & foundation of many generations will be manifested & “the wicked be revealed whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth” &c. [2] Thessns 2. 8th.
Yea & things which the faithful in past ages have not seen, which may stand for a reason why we may be led out of some things which our predecessors practiced.
In the days of the apostles the spirit of unbelief was foreseen which hath made its appearance & spread desolation in the Christian churches (viz.) “Where is the promise of His coming, for since the fathers are fell asleep all things remain as they were from the beginning.” And in process of time the existence of revelation was denied, but in the days of our predecessors it was fully believed in & experimentally witnessed, which blessing continues to this day; yet such is the declension amongs us, that some (who believe our forefathers to be influenced thereby) are in effect uttering this language again, since the fathers are fell asleep &c. and ready to scoff at those who believe in immediate revelation.
Nevertheless it is evident from the following prophecies that the testimony of truth will overcome every thing of a military nature.
We do not, neither did our ancestors, refuse to support civil government simply considered, but we cannot countermand the end of Christ’s coming by paying for taking men’s lives, which He came to save; & outward war is no more necessary to support a righteous civil government, than to uphold the church of Christ.
If I see a man going headlong to destruction & premeditating the pain of others, & furnish him with money to bear his expences in his design, I shall certainly cooperate with him in his enterprise & be accessory in part to the consequences; and what sort of a testimony shall I bear against his conduct; it will not alleviate my guilt to say he commanded me to aid him in that way, because I have power to refuse doing it actively; or that I did not wish my quota to be misapplied since I assuredly know what use it is for; yea if I do not warn him of his danger as well as refuse to further his evil design, he may fall in the event & perish in his sins, but his blood will be required at my hands.
The tax demanded to carry on war & the people employed therein, with the consequences, are exactly parallel to the above remark, which is a sufficient reason why we ought not to comply.
Will the name of a tax, because often applied to civil uses, sanctify a military requisition, or any epithet that can be given to it?
Why is a fine more obnoxious to our testimony?
In order to reconcile the payment of taxes therewith it is objected that we cannot pay a fine because it is in lieu of personal service, but I answer, were that service requires to do something in peaceable way [sic.] consistent with a follower of Christ we could not conscientiously refuse; so that our refusal is not because it is personal, but because it is for a purpose that we as Christians cannot own; because it is to destroy those whom Christ commanded us to love.
Seeing then that our testimony is not against personal service, merely because it is personal, or against fines because they are fines, but because of the purpose they are for, how then can we do that by proxy under the character of a tax which we cannot do in person or under the character of a fine?
How can we actively pay men for doing that which we say we cannot do for conscience sake?
Let us take heed that we be not like the foolish woman, pulling down the house with her own hands & thereby adding cause of stumbling to the weak & to the discerning enquirers.
We believe we are called to bear an unsullied testimony against outward war, in every sense of the word; then let us not be willingly blind through fear of suffering, let us not through fear of suffering give our money for the worst of purposes.
Let us be exhorted to try all things, & hold fast that which is good; and labor to be clothed with that invincible armor which will enable us to stand in the evil day with that magnanimity which becomes soldiers of him who overcame through meekness & patient suffering; but if we account ourselves unworthy by withstanding & diverting his cause, we shall be rejected & have the reward of the unfaithful & others who may be comparatively as stones will be raised up & qualified to be faithful standard-bearers, to lift up an ensign to the nations of them that sit in darkness, that they may see & flow together and that the abundance of the sea may be converted unto him who is king over all the earth the increase of whose government & peace there shall be no end.
B[enjamin].
Mason
In the edition of this book that I was able to find, the quote reads: “Every Jew that was twenty years old, was obliged to pay annually two Attic drams, or half a shekel, (about fifteen pence of our money), for the use of the sanctuary, Exod. ⅹⅹⅹ. 13. 16. or to buy sacrifices, and other things necessary for the service of the temple: And that this was the tribute which the collectors here demanded, and not any tax, payable to the Roman emperors, (as some imagine), is evident, not only from our Saviour’s argument, viz. that he was the Son of that heavenly king to whom it was paid, and, consequently, had a right to plead his exemption; but from the word διδραχμα, which, according to Josephus, [Antiq. lib.
18. c. 12.], was the proper word for this capitation-tax that was paid to the temple at Jerusalem; whereas the Cæsarean tribute money was the denarius, a Roman coin, and would have been gathered by the usual officers, the publicans, and not by the persons who are here styled (as by a known title) they that received the διδραχμα; Hammond’s and Whitby’s Annotations.”
This would have been something like: “Do you maintain a faithful testimony against oaths; an hireling ministry; bearing arms, training, and other military services; being concerned in any fraudulent or clandestine trade; buying or vending goods so imported, or prize goods; and against encouraging lotteries of any kind?” (that’s the 1843-era version of the query, anyway).
When trying to bring new tax resisters into a movement, there are lots of hopeful short-cuts, but sometimes there is no substitute for addressing potential resisters individually: whether that be through letters, petitions, or face-to-face meetings.
When the United States approved a billion-dollar military aid package to the government of Colombia in , the president of the Mennonite Church of Colombia, Peter Stucky, and Ricardo Esquivia, the director of that church’s Justapaz organization and the coordinator of the Evangelical Council of Colombia’s Human Rights and Peace Commission, wrote a letter to their sister churches in the U.S..
In that letter, they explained the disastrous consequences of fueling the civil war and the military wing of the war on drugs there, explained how the church there was trying to respond more productively to the crisis, and called on churches in the U.S. to do their part:
In reality, the government of the United States, using the tax-payers money, is supporting the Colombian government in what we consider to be a negative form.
This means that the message arriving from the North to the Colombian people becomes a message of death and destruction.
For that reason we are calling the churches in the North to redeem their taxes, on one hand by demanding that the U.S. government invests this money in life-producing projects, and on the other hand by redirecting part of their taxes toward a different project in your community or the world that promotes abundant and dignified life, as our Lord Jesus Christ has commanded us.
The American Mennonite Central Committee responded by urging taxpayers to redirect their taxes from the U.S. government to the Mennonite-run “Taxes for Peace” fund, which in turn would be dedicated that year to peace-building efforts in Colombia.
This sort of advocacy can be dangerous, as this next example will show.
In , R.W. Benner, a Mennonite minister, got worried reports from members of his congregation who were being told in no uncertain terms that they would buy so-called “Liberty Bonds” to support the U.S. war effort, or they would answer for their refusal.
Benner wrote to his bishop, L.J. Heatwole, who responded with a letter in which he reiterated the position of the church that Mennonite brethren “Do not aid or abet war in any form… [and] Contribute nothing to a fund that is used to run the war machine.”
He noted:
In a number of places where brethren have refused to contribute to the different war funds, outlandish threats have been made and in a few cases have been put into execution — such as, tar and feathering, painting houses yellow, decorating autos and buildings with flags to test them out on their principles of nonresistance.
But he urged his fellow-Mennonites to keep the faith and to embrace this sort of martyrdom like good Christians.
Benner conveyed this message to his flock.
For this, both of them were charged under the Espionage Act and convicted.
(To give you some idea of the railroading involved, Heatwole did not learn that a guilty plea had been entered on his behalf by his court-appointed attorney until after he appeared for the trial!)
Letters, or “epistles,” from war tax resisting Quakers to their fellow-Friends were an important way of spreading and maintaining the practice in the Society.
American war tax resistance can be said to have begun on , when John Woolman, Anthony Benezet, and several other Quakers addressed a letter in which they explained to other Friends why
as we cannot be concerned in wars and fightings, so neither ought we to contribute thereto by paying the tax directed by the [recent] Act, though suffering be the consequence of our refusal, which we hope to be enabled to bear with patience.
David Cooper reflected on how thoughtful letters like these helped him maintain his war tax resistance in times of doubt:
I read with singular satisfaction the piece which you lent me respecting taxes, as it was very strengthening to my mind, which before was somewhat encompassed with weakness on this account.… I have since felt much weakness, and had come to no solid conclusion of mind, until I read your little manuscript, which caused my heart to rejoice, under a feeling sense that it is the truth which leads those who walk and abide in it to hold forth this testimony unto the world.
And oh, says my soul, that I may yield faithful obedience to its monitions, let what will be the consequence.
Yearly Meetings would sometimes send letters to Quarterly or Monthly Meetings to reiterate the Quaker position on war tax resistance and give instructions as to how it should be enforced.
For instance, this is from an letter from the North Carolina Yearly Meeting:
…all our members should stand firm, and be faithful in bearing their testimony against war and military operations; taxes and fines appertaining thereunto, either directly or indirectly; or any way conniving or compromising with the specious and plausible offers of the legislature, by the tax proposed in the late act, to screen us from muster fines or military services.
And in order that all our members may be clearly informed on this subject, and be fully prepared to meet the trial likely to come upon us by this law, we have thought it best to send it down in this epistle.
An organizer of the Dublin water charge strike recalls:
…months of work had been done in local areas convincing people of the primacy of [non-payment].
This was done through local public meetings, door-to-door leaflets and even knocking on doors and talking to people… The building of the campaign in this way was crucial.
Local campaign groups were built and then came together and federated, rather than a central committee being formed first and then coming along to organise people.
…it became clear that while people might not have come out to the meeting, they had kept the information about the campaign and the campaign contact numbers had their place on a lot of fridge doors.
American women’s suffrage activist Anna Howard Shaw wrote a letter to women in the movement in , urging them to refuse to fill out income tax returns.
“In this manner we can show our loyalty to those who struggled to make this a free republic and who laid down their lives in defense of the equal rights of all free citizens to a voice in their own Government.
… Let our protest be universal, and let every believer in justice unite in this mode of passive resistance and steadfastly refuse to assist the Government in its unjust and tyrannical violation of its fundamental principle that ‘taxation and representation are one and inseparable,’ and thus prove ourselves worthy descendants of noble ancestors, who counted no price too dear to pay in defense of liberty and equality and justice.”
She told a reporter: “Since my letter was sent all over the country, I have received letters of encouragement and support from all directions,” and she soon thereafter won support for her stand from the Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage.
Only some of the women’s suffrage activists in Britain were responsible for paying taxes, so although tax resistance was an important part of the campaign there, it was a part not everybody could participate in.
The movement made a special effort to find women who had taxes they could resist.
For example, at one meeting in , Margaret Kineton Parkes “asked anyone present who knew women who paid taxes to send in their names, that they might be approached by her society.”
In , Marie Lawson launched what she called a “snowball” protest: a sort of chain letter in which she sent out letters that advocated tax resistance (and protested on behalf of an imprisoned resister) and that asked the recipients to join her and to in turn send the same letter “to at least three friends.”
Public burnings of poll tax notices were good excuses for people to join in festive resistance activities.
The campaign to resist Thatcher’s Poll Tax used some creative outreach techniques (quotes from Danny Burns’s history of the movement):
“The Aberdeen Anti-Poll Tax group was formed when people from the radical bookshop came together with a community arts group:
“…The local community arts group had a theatre group called “Wise Up” and they got a show together about the Poll Tax.
They took this show around the estates with information for people about registration and how to fight it, to encourage them to set up local groups and support networks.
The plays were performed in local community centres.
Attendance for the plays varied from about 10 to 40 or more.
The meetings which followed were encouraging because people gave their names as contacts or asked people to set up future meetings.”
“In my local group… the union was built up through a door-to-door campaign.
A group of five or six people (mostly friends) formed the core.
They advertised a public meeting on the Poll Tax and about 50 people turned up.
Out of these some joined the organising group.
This small group then mass-produced a window poster which said ‘No Poll Tax Here.’
The poster was dropped through the letter-boxes of 2000 households and the group waited to see who put them up.
Posters appeared in about 100 windows.
Activists then went round and spoke to these people individually, inviting them to attend the next organising meeting; about fifteen did — enough to form the core of a group.”
“[Our] network was strengthened by a door-to-door survey of over 500 households.
The survey was not intended to be scientifically accurate.
Its purpose was to give the APTU a fairly accurate picture of what was happening on the ground, and, perhaps more significantly, it was a pretext for engaging people in conversation about the Poll Tax, informing them of the non-payment campaign and encouraging them to join their local APTU.… Over a third of the people canvassed became paid up members of the union.
By the end of the exercise Easton had over 300 members and street reps for almost every street.
The canvass was not left there.
The key to its success was the second visit.
The group compiled all the statistics on a street by street basis and many of the reps then went back, door-to-door, and told people the results of the survey in their street and the neighbouring streets.
A newsletter was delivered to everyone telling them what the overall results were for Easton.
This meant that people knew how few of their neighbours were going to pay and it gave them confidence not to pay themselves.
They had spoken to the canvassers personally, so they knew that the survey was genuine.”
“An independent television company approached the Easton group in order to work with us on a film about the Poll Tax.
The film was never shown, but the way the community was engaged in the process of making it is instructive.
The film producers wanted a shot of all the doors in the street, opening one by one as the occupants came out of their houses with banners and signs.
Charles, the local street rep, went round to people’s houses every evening for a week and explained to them what was wanted.
Out of 30 houses in the street (a cul-de-sac) 28 agreed to participate.
The street is multi-racial with a fairly wide class mix.
It was inspiring to see white working class men standing shoulder to shoulder with Asian women and their kids, holding the same banners and engrossed in conversation.
Some of them had never spoken to each other before.
The film was made, but more importantly, as [a] result of making it, virtually every one of those households joined the Union, and most still had posters in their windows a year later.
People were brought into the campaign, not through a leaflet or a canvasser, but through an interesting activity.
They didn’t have to go to the campaign, it came to them.”
At the upcoming national gathering of NWTRCC at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana, I’m going to be presenting a summary of the history of war tax resistance in the Society of Friends (Quakers).
Today I’m going to try to coalesce some of the notes I’ve assembled about the second, and possibly most important, period of Quaker war tax resistance — between the establishment of the Quaker colony in Pennsylvania and the relinquishment of political control there by Quakers during the French and Indian War.
The Pennsylvania experiment ()
The advance of war tax resistance among English Quakers had ground to a halt.
Quakers in England still would not pay certain explicit war taxes like “trophy money,” nor pay for substitutes to serve in their places in the military, nor buy goods stolen at sea from enemy nations by government-sanctioned pirates, but attempts failed to extend this testimony to other taxes that were clearly designed to pay for war.
For example, Elizabeth Redford tried to convince Quakers to refuse a new tax in on the grounds that it was obviously meant to fund the Seven Years War (the act that enacted the tax was entitled “For granting to his majesty certain rates and duties upon marriages, births, and burials, and upon bachelors and widowers, for the term of five years, for carrying on the war against France with vigour”).
Her meeting brought her up on charges of violating the discipline and declared that whatever the purpose of the tax, it was being raised by the crown for expenses of its choosing and Quakers should not inquire further into what those expenses were but should pay the tax without question.
Several years later, during the War of the Spanish Succession, this got thrown back in Quaker faces.
William Ray, in a letter to Quaker Samuel Bownas, argued that Quakers should stop resisting tithes because they had stopped resisting war taxes: “though the title of the act of parliament did plainly show that the tax was for carrying on a war against France with vigour” he wrote, “since the war against France began your Friends have given the same active obedience to the laws for payment of taxes as their fellow subjects have done.”
Bownas did not deny this, but instead he tried to argue that tithes were different.
Meanwhile, Quaker William Penn was granted a royal charter for a large North American colony, to which many Quakers emigrated and established a colonial government that would be run, to some extent, on Quaker pacifist principles.
I say “to some extent” because it was still a royal colony, under the military protection of the crown, and with an explicit colonial mandate to engage in military battles against enemies of the home country.
The Quaker Assembly of the colony was also subservient in many ways to the crown-appointed governors and to the British government itself.
Occasionally during wartime, that government would appeal to the Pennsylvania Assembly to raise some funds to help out the war effort — to help defend Pennsylvania against pirates, Frenchmen, hostile Indians, and the like.
The Assembly would sometimes respond to such requests with noble-sounding statements of Quaker principle, like this one by Assembly Speaker David Lloyd in : “the raising money to hire men to fight or kill one another is matter of conscience to us and against our religious principles.”
But most commentators on the period, even those who are sympathetic to the Quaker pacifist position, tend to read these statements cynically.
The Assembly used these requests for money as opportunities to try to wrest more control from the governor and from London.
These statements of conscience seemed often not to be principles so much as gambits in the negotiation process.
The Assembly would usually, in the end, grant the requested money, or some amount anyway, but would thinly veil its nature by eliminating any wording about the money being intended for the military and instead would simply decree that it was intended as a gift to the crown from its grateful subjects, “for the Queen’s [or King’s] use.”
This was such a transparent dodge that it became hard for anyone to take seriously the part of the Quaker peace testimony represented in Lloyd’s quote.
On one occasion, according to colonial legislator Benjamin Franklin, the Assembly refused to vote war money, but instead granted funds “for the purchasing of bread, flour, wheat, or other grain” knowing that the governor would interpret “other grain” to include gunpowder.
The Assembly were able to get away with this, in a colony full of ostensibly conscientious Quakers, because the orthodox point of view about war tax resistance in the Society held that only explicit war taxes were to be resisted, while generic taxes that only happened to be for war were to be paid willingly.
So long as the government kept the name of the tax neutral and didn’t detail how it would be spent, a Quaker could pay it without having to worry about it.
But some Quakers were unable to remain blind to the Assembly’s sleight-of-hand.
In , the Rhode Island Quarterly Meeting sent emissaries to some of its rebellious Monthly Meetings who were beginning to refuse to pay state taxes on these grounds.
In , William Rakestraw published a pamphlet in which he agreed that “we ought not to ask Cæsar what he does with his dues or tribute, but pay it freely,” but added: “if he tells me it is for no other use but war and destruction, I’ll beg his pardon and say ‘my Master forbids it.’ ” He argued that the latest “for the Queen’s use” grant, in spite of its generic name, should fool nobody: it was meant to fund war, and no Quaker should pay a tax for it.
Thomas Story, who visited the colony from England, defended the orthodox position, and had traveled Pennsylvania encouraging Quakers to pay their war taxes.
During the French & Indian War, Pennsylvania was invaded from the west.
The westernmost European settlers in Pennsylvania were largely non-Quaker, and were impatient for a military defense — they felt that the Quaker pacifists in Philadelphia were using them as a shield.
The Pennsylvania Assembly eventually gave in to their demands.
It organized a volunteer militia and appropriated money for fortifications.
This time it did not use the “for the King’s use” dodge by giving the money to the crown and letting it allocate the funds to war expenses, but instead the Assembly appointed its own commissioners to spend the money, and so became responsible itself for the war spending.
(The legislation itself still tried to put a happy face on things, saying the grant was “for supplying our friendly Indians, holding of treaties, relieving the distressed settlers who have been driven from their lands, and other purposes for the King’s service,” but it was that last clause — “other purposes” — that hid where most of the spending would actually happen: largely building and supplying military forts.)
This compromise pleased few.
Back in London there were calls to ban Quakers from colonial government entirely for their refusal to support the military defense of the colonies.
London Quakers were urging pacifist Quakers to resign from the Pennsylvania Assembly as a way of forestalling complete disenfranchisement.
At the same time, a set of American Quakers felt that this was the last straw and if Quaker legislators were going to abandon their pacifist principles and enact a war spending bill, it would be up to Quaker taxpayers to refuse and resist.
Several of them, including Anthony Benezet, sent a letter to the Assembly announcing that “as the raising sums of money, and putting them into the hands of committees who may apply them to purposes inconsistent with the peaceable testimony we profess and have borne to the world, appears to us in its consequences to be destructive of our religious liberties; we apprehend many among us will be under the necessity of suffering rather than consenting thereto by the payment of a tax for such purposes.”
That petition was not viewed sympathetically by the Assembly.
They reminded everyone that nobody had had any problem paying those “for the Queen’s use” taxes in the past, and that this new tax was really not very different, even though the fig leaf had been removed.
Meanwhile, the anti-Quakers in London got word of the petition which further inflamed them and gave them ammunition in their fight to get Quakers disenfranchised.
The London Yearly Meeting was furious about the petition and it sent two emissaries to the colonies with orders to “explain and enforce our known principles and practice respecting the payment of taxes for the support of civil government.”
The Philadelphia Yearly Meeting held a conference in to try to come up with some guidance for Friends on whether or not to pay the new war taxes.
They were unable to reach consensus.
A group of them, including Benezet & John Woolman, sent a letter to quarterly and monthly meetings that set out the reasons why they were choosing to resist.
The Assembly’s attempt to hide its war tax as a “mixed” tax with beneficial spending in the mix did not impress them.
They wrote:
[T]hough some part of the money to be raised by the said Act is said to be for such benevolent purposes as supporting our friendship with our Indian neighbors and relieving the distresses of our fellow subjects who have suffered in the present calamities, for whom our hearts are deeply pained; and we affectionately and with bowels of tenderness sympathize with them therein; and we could most cheerfully contribute to those purposes if they were not so mixed that we cannot in the manner proposed show our hearty concurrence therewith without at the same time assenting to, or allowing ourselves in, practices which we apprehend contrary to the testimony which the Lord has given us to bear for his name and Truth’s sake.
This is one answer to the dilemma many Quakers find themselves in today.
The U.S. government is in a constant state of war and threatens the whole world with its vast nuclear arsenal and its drone assassins.
But it pays for this out of the same budget and with the same taxes as it pays for everything else it buys — including today’s equivalents of “such benevolent purposes as supporting our friendship with our Indian neighbors and relieving the distresses of our fellow subjects who have suffered in the present calamities” — so what is a good Quaker to do?
Benezet, Woolman, and the rest took the position that mixing good spending and bad doesn’t erase the stain from the bad, but stains the good.
The capitulation by the Quakers in the Pennsylvania Assembly was not a compromise that satisfied either the militant Pennsylvanians, the anti-Quaker antagonists in London, or the prominent pacifists in the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting.
In , under pressure from all sides, most Quaker legislators resigned from the Assembly, and the experiment in Quaker government in Pennsylvania came to an end.
Meanwhile, what had become of those London Quaker enforcers who had come across the pond to knock some sense into the war tax resisting faction?
Something unexpected happened: they met with representatives from both the taxpaying and tax-resisting factions, held a two-day meeting on the subject, and ended up agreeing to disagree.
The London representatives, rather than chastizing the resisters, instead recommended that Quakers “endeavor earnestly to have their minds covered with fervent charity towards one another” on the subject without taking a position one way or the other.
That’s not what the London Yearly Meeting had in mind.
But the logic of the war tax resisters’ position, and the sincerity with which they presented it, had an infectious tendency.
Not long after the emissaries returned home, the London Yearly Meeting had been expected to issue a strong condemnation of the resisters who had signed the letter urging Quakers to consider refusing to pay the war tax.
Instead, the topic was dropped from the agenda entirely.
Why?
Because the more Quakers in England heard about the war tax resistance in Pennsylvania, the more sympathetic they became.
The Yearly Meeting authorities decided it was better not to discuss the matter at all rather than risk facing the sort of enthusiasm for war tax resistance that had rocked the Philadelphia meeting.
At the upcoming national gathering of NWTRCC at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana, I’m going to be presenting a summary of the history of war tax resistance in the Society of Friends (Quakers).
Today I’m going to try to coalesce some of the notes I’ve assembled about how the Quaker practice of war tax resistance evolved, particularly in America, during the period of time surrounding and including the American Revolution.
The American Revolution and Aftermath ()
When Quakers resisted tithes, militia exemption taxes, explicit war taxes, and things of that nature, the government would usually respond by seizing the resister’s property and selling it at auction in order to recover the tax.
(In the earliest years of the Society of Friends, many such resisters were imprisoned, but this practice later became uncommon.)
Quaker meetings developed a protocol that good Quakers were supposed to follow when such property seizures took place.
They were not supposed to cooperate in any way, but neither were they supposed to resist.
They were not supposed to suggest which property the tax collector might seize, and they certainly were not supposed to leave the amount of the tax lying out on the table in plain view (some Quakers evidently tried this way of getting out of resisting).
Instead, when the collector came and said he was going to seize property for unpaid taxes, the Quaker was supposed to step aside and say something along the lines of “do as you think you must,” perhaps explaining the reason for his refusal to pay, but not otherwise interfering.
If the collector seized property worth more than the amount of tax, and was able to auction it off for more than the amount owed, the collector (if honest) might try to return the surplus to the resister.
A Quaker was not supposed to accept such money, it having been tainted by the process.
(However, if the collector seized too many items, and only auctioned off some of them, the Quaker could accept the return of the additional items themselves.)
This part of the protocol made Quakers especially vulnerable to particularly unscrupulous tax collectors.
Such a collector could seize the most valuable thing he could get his hands on, sell it, apply some of the proceeds to the tax, and then pocket the rest.
Many other collectors were also accused of selling property at cut-rate prices to themselves, to their friends, or in exchange for kick-backs.
The result of all of this meant that tax resisting Quakers were often setting themselves up for considerable financial losses.
These “sufferings” were part of the glory of being a Quaker, and, as such, were well worth the price to some Friends, but to others they were just an unwelcome financial hardship.
Meetings had to be diligent to keep wavering Friends from trying to sneak out from under the requirements to refuse to pay certain taxes, to refuse the return of surplus money, and to not cooperate with the tax collector as a way of trying to ameliorate the burden of the seizure process.
If a Friend failed in any of these ways, someone at their meeting might “produce a testification” against them.
The meeting would then investigate the charges and would send out a delegation to talk to the wayward Quaker and try to bring them back into compliance.
This often would include the Quaker standing up at a future meeting to read an acknowledgment of their error and promise never to do it again.
If the Quaker refused to get with the program, the meeting could “disown” them — basically kick them out of the meeting.
Simply not reporting any “sufferings” to the meeting for failure to pay war tax might be enough to start this process.
(“We notice thou hastn’t had any property seized this year for failure to pay the bounty tax, Friend Johnson.
Care to tell us how thou hast been so lucky?”)
American Quakers during the American Revolution were, in many places, pillaged ruthlessly by the authorities by this process of property seizure.
Several things contributed to this:
The Society of Friends was not united.
Dissident Quakers promoted paying taxes to the rebel government, and some “Free Quakers” even abandoned the peace testimony entirely to enlist in the rebel army.
This made it even harder for resisting Quakers to appeal to Quaker beliefs and practices as an explanation for their stand.
Quakers had wavered in their war tax resistance stand in the recent past, for instance when the Quaker-led Pennsylvania Assembly voted to tax the colony to pay for fortifications during the French & Indian War.
This was deployed as a precedent to argue that Quakers only have scruples against war tax paying at convenient times or depending on their sympathy with the particular war or government.
The Quaker peace testimony was often publicly expressed with an eye to being reassuring to the authorities.
So often it would include phrasing like this:
[T]he setting up and putting down kings and governments is God’s peculiar prerogative; for causes best known to himself: And that it is not our business to have any hand or contrivance therein; nor to be busy bodies above our station, much less to plot and contrive the ruin, or overturn of any of them, but to pray for the king, and safety of our nation, and good of all men, that we may live a quiet and peaceable life, in all godliness and honesty, under the government which God is pleased to set over us.
For this reason, some Quakers felt that to adhere to this testimony they could not cooperate in any way with the rebel government, as to do so would be to contribute “to plot and contrive” against the king (others disagreed, feeling that the rebel government had become the one “which God is pleased to set over us”).
Such absolutist resisters were easy targets for patriotic anger.
Both armies were authorized to take any property they needed during the course of their campaigns.
They were usually supposed to pay for what they took, but Quakers, being under an obligation not to supply goods to belligerents, could not accept money in such cases.
This made their farms and stores particularly tempting targets for thrifty officers.
Quakers who would neither serve in the military, pay war taxes, nor take oaths of allegiance to the rebel government (Quakers generally would not take oaths of any kind) were suspected of using their conscientious scruples as a cover for loyalist sympathies.
Speaking of oaths, Quakers could be fined for refusing to take an oath of allegiance to the new American government.
They were forbidden by Quaker discipline from paying such fines.
So this became another opportunity for plunder and to me it looks like this was used deliberately as a revenue-raiser or as a way of punishing Quakers for their lack of enthusiasm for the rebel cause.
An additional complication for Quakers at this time was the fuzziness over what counted as a “war tax.”
For example, one of the ways the Continental Congress funded its military campaign was to issue its own paper currency and make the acceptance of this currency as legal tender mandatory.
This was certainly easier than trying to raise the money through an explicit tax, but it amounted to just as much of an imposition: as the Congress issued more and more currency to finance the war, the value of the currency plummeted, taking resources away from people who were forced to use it.
Some Quakers refused to handle the continentals, and some were imprisoned and others were threatened with execution.
In other cases, such refusers were declared outlaws and boycotts were enforced against them — in one example “it was publicly proclaimed that there was no protection for him [John Cowgill], that all persons were forewarned at their peril to have no dealings with him.
Even the miller was threatened with the destruction of his mill if he ground for his family, and the school-master forbid receiving his children at school.”
The official stand of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting was neutral on the currency question, and asked Friends to come to their own decisions and not to chastise one-another about it.
The Virginia Yearly Meeting, on the other hand, formally forbade Friends from using continentals.
The official Philadelphia Yearly Meeting position on war taxes, as put forth in , was much as it had long been: “It is the judgment of this meeting that a tax levied for the purchasing of drums, colors, or for other warlike uses, cannot be paid consistently with our Christian testimony.”
Timothy Davis published a tract in laying out the case for why American Quakers should pay most of the taxes being demanded by the rebel congressional government.
He was disowned by his Monthly Meeting, both for the content of the tract and for publishing it without the Meeting’s approval.
He left and took a few other Quakers with him to found a rival Meeting.
This conflict was still dividing the Society a decade later, when the Revolution was over and American Quakers had pretty much all adjusted to the new government God was pleased to have set over them.
The tract was well argued.
Those Quakers who were trying to strengthen and broaden the practice of war tax resistance beyond what the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting was willing to advocate tried to come up with an authoritative and thoroughly scripturally-backed response.
Benjamin Mason, Anthony Benezet, Moses Brown, and Samuel Allinson all pursued efforts in this direction.
I’ve seen some drafts of their work and their correspondence, and Allinson’s draft, at least, seems to have been widely-distributed in manuscript form, but as far as I know, no official version ended up being published.
Benezet believed that because the stronger position they were advocating would demand more from Quakers than before, and would subject them to more persecution than before, it would make the Society of Friends stronger and less-corrupted by worldly riches:
[It] will not be like a passing storm but an abiding trial, which, as it will come heavier upon those who are most loaded & encumbered with the clay of this world, will have I trust a blessed effect to every one who will willingly receive it to keep us low & humble.
Part of what may have restrained them from publishing was caution about introducing new doctrinal innovations at a time when the Society of Friends was already beginning to show signs of fracturing on party lines.
Part also may be that the Meetings that would have to authorize the publication of such a pamphlet were probably hoping to quiet such debate rather than stir up a new hornet’s nest.
But there was also the emerging trouble of an ultra-radical war tax resistance position that was beginning to develop.
Moses Brown wrote to Anthony Benezet about this concern, saying:
[S]ome Friends refuse all taxes, even those for civil uses as well as those clear for war and others that are mixed, and thereby dropping our testimony of supporting civil government by readily contributing thereto, [and] it has been a fear whether this variety of conduct won’t mar rather than promote the work… I understand some Friends have fallen in with or been overpowered by the common argument that civil government is upheld by the sword, and therefore they decline paying to its support, which appears to me a great weakness…
Around this time, you start to see meetings supplementing their discipline about not paying explicit war taxes (“for drums, colors, and military attire”) with advice that Friends not criticize one another over their positions on whether or not to pay “mixed” taxes.
Apparently the arguments in Meetings had become troublesome and did not seem to be near a resolution.
The way Quaker Meetings recorded “sufferings” went something like this: When a Quaker was subjected to persecution of some sort for taking a conscientious stand required by Quaker discipline, that Quaker would report this to his or her Monthly Meeting.
That Meeting would periodically forward on a list of such reports to its Quarterly Meeting, which in turn would compile these into a report that it would submit to the Yearly Meeting.
At each stage, a Meeting might decide that some particular report wasn’t worth recording for some reason.
During this period, for instance, some Monthly Meetings were recording the sufferings of Quakers who were persecuted for resisting mixed taxes, as well as for explicit war taxes.
Some Quarterly Meetings dropped these reports from their submissions to the Yearly Meetings.
This could lead to debate in the Meetings, which would bring the issue of war tax resistance back on to the front burner.
The Rhode Island Yearly Meeting, for instance, decided to begin accepting such reports in .
The Salem Yearly Meeting debated the issue and eventually followed suit.
The war tax question didn’t end with the end of the fighting.
The war still needed to be paid for, and the continental currency that funded it needed to be redeemed, and the government used a variety of taxes to do this.
Among these were a new set of import duties instituted in to pay war debts.
A few Quakers took note of this and decided they could not pay.
For example, Joshua Evans stopped using imported goods.
Isaac Martin, who ran a drug store, stopped stocking and selling imported products.
The new government was also working on a unified militia law, which, though it enabled Quakers to be exempt from service, required any such conscientious objectors to pay a fine in lieu of service.
A representative of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting addressed Congress, telling them that Quakers would feel obligated to refuse to pay such a fine and to suffer the consequences.
Many Quakers did refuse to pay and were fined (and, as usual, the tax collectors took far more from them in property than the amount of the fines).
In one area, a law was passed exempting members of the volunteer fire department from militia service without necessity of paying a fine, and this led many Quakers to sign up.
Meanwhile, what was happening in England?
Quakers there were much more restrained than their American counterparts on the war tax question.
When they reprinted John Woolman’s Journal in , they omitted the parts where he talked about his war tax resistance.
There were some exceptions to this relative conservatism.
John Payne, for example, boarded up a third of the windows of his home to avoid a property tax, put his coach up on blocks to avoid a vehicle tax, and rode miles out of his way to avoid toll gates, all to avoid paying for the war to suppress the American rebellion.
He also wrote a tract chastising the Society of Friends for investing in government bonds, on the same grounds.
In the years before his death he gave away his property to members of his family so that he would not be liable for any estate tax.
The War of 1812 was largely funded, on the American side, by debt spending, and so explicit war taxes did not become such an acute issue, though the issue of “mixed” taxes again became a heated topic.
The military would again requisition supplies from Quakers, which Quakers felt obligated to refuse to voluntarily give them or to accept money for.
And Quakers were frequently fined (and then plundered for their refusal to pay) when they would not join the militia.
Influential Quaker Elias Hicks reported in (before the Hicksite/Orthodox split) that he had addressed his Meeting’s “meeting for discipline” to ask “whether while we were actively paying taxes to civil government, for the purpose of promoting war or warlike purposes in any degree, we were not balking our testimony in that respect and pulling down with one hand what we are pretending to build with the other.”
He compared this to abolitionist Quakers who nonetheless supported slavery by buying slave-produced goods.
In , several young Quaker men were imprisoned in Baltimore for their refusal to pay militia exemption fines.
The state court would not interfere, as they were imprisoned under a federal regulation at the pleasure of the military, and the judge recommended that they instead apply to President Madison for help.
They did, and the president said that he wouldn’t do anything about it, as the law was clear on the point.
But as the Quaker delegation was leaving the president’s makeshift office (the White House had been put to the torch by the British the year before), the president’s wife, Dolley Madison, called them aside and asked to speak with them.
She had been raised a Quaker.
When she heard what had happened, and what the president’s response had been, she told them “I am determined that the President shall never close his eyes in sleep until these children are liberated from confinement.”
It took the delegation two days to return to Baltimore, and when they got there they learned that the Quaker conscientious objectors had been released on the President’s orders.
I end this period, somewhat artificially, at .
This doesn’t represent a firm boundary in the evolution of the practice of war tax resistance in the Society of Friends, but it does mark a significant milestone in the Society itself.
By that year, the society had fractured into irreconcilable Orthodox and Hicksite factions that would each form their own structures of Meetings and would evolve separately in parallel for decades.
This was caused in part by a passion for strengthened religious purity among American protestant Christians that peaked in .
This striving probably both contributed to a strengthening of war tax resistance (among other traditional Quaker practices) and distracted from it by making other issues more central.
