SPEAKER: Our first order of business…

SIMMS: And our last if we vote a levy…

SPEAKER: Order! Order! Mr. Simms, you do not have the floor. Our first order of business will be an address by Colonel Harry Burwell of the Continental Army. Colonel Harry Burwell.

BURWELL: You all know why I am here. I am not an orator and I will not try to convince you of the worthiness of our cause. I am a soldier and we are at war. From Philadelphia we expect the declaration of independence. Eight of the thirteen colonies have levied money in support of a Continental Army. I ask South Carolina to be the ninth.

SIMMS: Massachusetts and Virginia may be at war, but South Carolina is not.

CROWD: Here!

BURWELL: It is not a war for the independence of one or two colonies but for the independence of one nation.

WITHINGTON: And now yes, what nation is that?

HOWARD: An American nation.

WITHINGTON: There is no such a nation, and if you speak of one, that is treason.

HOWARD: We are citizens of the American nation and our rights are being threatened by a tyrant three thousand miles away.

MARTIN: Would you tell me, please, Mr. Howard, why should I trade one tyrant three thousand miles away for three thousand tyrants one mile away? An elected legislature can trample a man’s rights as easily as a King can.

BURWELL: Captain Martin, I understood you to be a Patriot.

MARTIN: If you mean by Patriot, am I angry about the taxation without representation? Yes I’m. Should the American colonies govern themselves independently? I believe they can and they should. But if you’re asking me am I willing to go to war with England, then the answer is most definitely no.