37. The Parson's Opinion of "the Parson's Cause"
(1763)
BY REVEREND JAMES MAURY
(TRANSLATED BY ANN MAURY, 1853)
This celebrated case illustrates the relation of church and state in the colonies, and is also the beginning of the public career of Patrick Henry. Maury was an estimable minister of Huguenot ancestry.—Bibliography: Winsor, Narrative and Critical History, VI, 24; Maury, Memoirs of a Huguenot Family; Channing and Hart, Guide, § 134.
December 12th, 1763.
DEAR SIR:—Now that I am somewhat more at leisure, than when I wrote to you by Major Winston, from Hanover, some few days ago, I have sat down to give you the best account I can of the most material passages in the trial of my cause against the Collectors in that Court, both to satisfy your own curiosity, and to enable the lawyer, by whom it is to be managed in the General Court, to form some judgment of its merits. I believe, sir, you were advised from Novr Court, that the Bench had adjudged the twopenny act to be no law ; and that, at the next, a jury, on a writ of inquiry, were to examine whether the Plaintiff had sustained any damages, and what. Accordingly, at December Court, a select jury was ordered to be summoned; but, how far they who gave the order, wished or intended it to be regarded, you may judge from the sequel. The Sheriff went into a public room, full of gentlemen, and told his errand. One excused himself (Peter Robinson of King William) as having already given his opinion in a similar case. On this, as a person then present told me, he immediately left the room, without summoning any one person there. He afterwards met another gentleman (Richard Sq. Taylor) on the green, and, on his saying he was not fit to serve, being a churchwarden, he took upon himself to excuse him, too, and, as far as I can learn, made no further attempts to summon gentlemen. These, you'll say, were but feeble endeavors to comply with the directions of the Court in that particular. Hence, he went among the vulgar herd. After he had selected and set down upon his list about eight or ten of these, I met him with it in his hand, and on looking over it, observed to him that they were not such jurors as the Court had directed him to get, being people of whom I had never heard before, except one, whom, I told him, he knew to be a party in the cause, as one of the Collector's Securities, and, therefore, not fit for a juror on that occasion. Yet this
