JUNE 23, 1773.

[MS., Samuel Adams Papers, Lenox Library.]

Province of Massachusetts Bay June 23 17731

To the Kings most Excellent Majesty

Most Gracious Sovereign

We your Majestys most loyal Subjects the Representatives of your
ancient Colony, in General court legally assembled, by Virtue of
your Majestys Writ under the Hand and Seal of the Governor beg
leave to lay this our humble Petition before your Majesty;
earnestly beseeching that in your Royal Clemency, your Majesty
would . . .

Nothing but a Sense of the Duty we owe to our Sovereign, and the
Obligation we are under to consult the Peace and Safety of the
Province, could induce us to remonstrate to your Majesty, the
MalConduct of those, who, having been born & educated and
constantly resident in the Province and who formerly have had ye
Confidence & were loaded with ye honours of this People, your
Majesty, we conceive, from the purest Motives of rendering the
People most happy, was graciously pleasd to advance to the
highest places of Trust and Authority in the province.

It has been with the greatest Concern and Anxiety, that your
Majestys humble Petitioners have seen Discords & Animositites too
long subsisting between your Subjects of the Parent State & those