Chicago, Ill.
What was the seat of government during the revolutionary war? Who took the place of President, as head of the government?
Jane Evans.
Answer..—There was no permanent seat of government. The articles of confederation provided that “Congress shall have power to adjourn at any time within the year and to any place within the United States, so that no period of adjournment be for a longer duration than the space of six months.” When suffered to have its own way Congress sat, during the war, in Philadelphia, but the “red coats” were as keen to go to Congress as the average modern politician, and the patriots, to avoid a row over contested seats, adopted a sort of methodistic itinerancy, minus the method. Congress was in session at Philadelphia in December, 1776, when, seeing that the British were likely to force themselves upon the hospitality of that city, it adjourned to Baltimore. It returned to Philadelphia, but after the American defeat at Brandywine, Sept. 11, 1777, it adjourned to Lancaster, and then to York, Pa. From the first session to the last the Continental Congress met as follows: At Philadelphia, Sept. 5, 1774, and May 10, 1775; at Baltimore, Dec. 20, 1776; at Philadelphia, March 4, 1777; at Lancaster, Pa., Sept. 27, 1777; at York, Pa., Sept. 30, 1777; at Philadelphia, July 2, 1778; at Princeton, N. J., June 30, 1783; at Annapolis, Md., Nov. 26, 1783; at Trenton, N. J., Nov. 1, 1784; at New York, Jan. 11, 1785, which continued to be the seat of Congress until the adoption of the Constitution of the United States. There was no executive head of the United States under the articles of confederation. These provided that Congress should have authority to appoint a “Committee of the States,” to consist of one delegate from each State, to sit in the recess of Congress. The President of Congress came the nearest to being an executive chief, but he and the above committee, the “Board of War,” and certain other special committees or boards were each charged with the execution of law according to specific provisions in the act itself. Of these Presidents of the Continental Congress the following shows the names and the time of their election:
Payton Randolph, of Virginia, elected Sept. 5, 1774.
Henry Middleton, of South Carolina, Oct. 22, 1774.
Peyton Randolph, of Virginia, May 10, 1775.
John Hancock, of Massachusetts, May 24, 1775.
Henry Laurens, of South Carolina, Nov. 1, 1777.
John Jay, of New York, Dec. 10, 1778.