Preface. Prologue: What Is Dissent? About the Documents. Acknowledgements. I. Pre-Revolutionary Roots 1607-1760. Introduction: The Long Roots of Modern Dissent.
Roger Williams (c.1603-1683),
The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution, 1644.
Anne Hutchinson (1591-1643), Excerpt from the Trial of Anne Hutchinson, 1637.
Alice Tilly (1594-c.1660), Petitions for the Release of Alice Tilly, 1649.
William Dyer (1609-1672) and Mary Dyer (c.1611-1660), Petitions and Letters, 1660.
Nathaniel Bacon (1647-1676), Declaration in the Name of the People, July 30, 1676, 1676.
Slave Letter, Releese us out of this Cruell Bondegg, 1723.
Native American Voices (1609-1752): Powhatan, Speech to John Smith, 1609; Garangula, Speech to Governor Le Barre of New France, 1684; Stung Serpent, Reply to Antoine Simon Le Page du Pratz, 1723; Loron Sauguaarum, Negotations for the Casco Bay Treaty, 1727; Leni Lenape, Grievance Against the Walking Purchase, 1747; Atiwaneto, Remarks to Phineas Stevens, 1756; Mashpee, Petition to the Massachusetts General Court, 1752.
John Peter Zenger (1697-1746), articles from
The New York Weekly Journal, 1733.
Eighteenth-Century Runaway Women, Advertisements from the Pennsylvania Gazette, 1742-1748.
Web Resources for Part One.
II. Revolution and a New Nation 1760-1820. Introduction: The Republic Takes Shape.
John Woolman (1720-1772), Consideration on Keeping Negroes, Part Second, 1762.
John Killbuck, Speech to Governors of Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia, December 4, 1771.
Samuel Adams (1722-1803),
The Rights of the Colonists, 1772.Revolutionary Women: Hannag Griffiths, Poem, 1768; Ladies of Edenton, North Carolina, Agreement, 1774-1775.
Second Continental Congress, Declaration by the Representatives of the United Colonies, 1775.
Thomas Paine (1737-1809),
Common Sense, 1776.
Abigail Adams (1744-1818) and John Adams (1735-1826), Letters, 1776.
Thomas Hutchinson (1711-1780), A Loyalist Critique of the Declaration of Independence, 1776.
Slave Petition, Petition for Gradual Emancipation, 1777.
Joseph Brant (1742-1807), Speech to Governor Haldimand at Quebec, May 21, 1783.
Alexander McGillivray (1759
?-1793), Speech to the Governor of Florida, 1785.
United Indian Nations, Protest to the United States Congress, 1786.
Shays' Rebellion, Statement of the Grievances, 1786.
George Mason (1725-1792), Objections to This Constitution of Government, 1787.
Judith Sargent Murray (1751-1820), On the Equality of the Sexes, 1790.
Shawnee, Miami, Ottawa and Seneca Proposal to Maintain Indian Lands, 1793.
Protest Against the Alien and Sedition Acts, 1798.The Virginia Revolutions, 1798.The Kentucky Revolutions, 1799.
Tecumseh (1768-1813), Letter to Governor William Henry Harrison, 1810; Speech to the Southern Tribes, 1811.
Congressmen Protest the War of 1812. Federalist Protest, 1812.
Hartford Convention, Proposals: 1814-1815.
Free Blacks of Philadelphia Protest Against Colonization Policy, 1817.
Web Resources for Part Two.
III. Questioning the Nation 1820-1860. Introduction: The Reforming Impulse.
Theodore Frelinghuysen (1787-1862), Speech Protesting the Indian Removal Bill, April 9, 1830.
Cherokee Chief John Ross (1790-1866), Letter Protesting the Treaty of New Echota, 1836.
Sylvia Dubois (1788
?-1889), Reminiscences from Sylvia Dubois: A Biografy of the Slave Who Whipt Her Mistress And Gand Her Fredom, 1883.
David Walker (1785-1830), Appeal to the Coloured Citizens of the World, 1830.
William Lloyd Garrison (1805-1879),
The Liberator, Vol. I, no. I, January 1, 1831.
William Apess (1798-1839
?), An Indian's Looking-Glass for the White Man, 1833.
Laborers of Boston, Ten-Hour Circular, 1835.
Angelina Grimke (1805-1879) and Sarah Grimke (1792-1873),
Appeal to the Christian Women of the South, 1836.
Sarah Grimke, The Original Equality of Woman, 1837.
Wendell Philips (1811-1884), On the Murder of Lovejoy, December 8, 1837.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), Self Reliance, 1841; Address to the Citizens of Concord, 1851.
Margaret Fuller (1810-1850), from
Woman in the Nineteenth Century, Part III., 1844.
Lowell Mill Girls, Preamble and Constitution of the Lowell Female Reform Association, 1846.The Lowell Female Industrial Reform and Mutual Aid Society, 1847.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815-1902), Speech at Seneca Falls, July 19, 1848; Declaration of Sentiments, 1848.
Sojourner Truth (1797-1883), Ain't I a Woman? 1851.
Frederick Douglass (1818-1895),
The North Star, July 28, 1848; What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? 1852.
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862), On Resistence to Civil Government, 1849.
Lucy Stone (1818-1893), Statement on Marriage, 1855.
The Know-Nothings, American Party Platform, Philadelphia, February 21, 1856.
John Brown (1800-1859), Address to the Virginia Court at Charlestown, Virginia, November 2, 1859.
Web Resources for Part Three.
IV. Civil War and Reconstruction 1860-1877. Introduction: A Divided Nation.
Clement L. Vallandigham (1820-1871), Response to Lincoln's Address to Congress, July 10, 1861.
William Brownlow (1805-1877), Knoxville Whig Anti-Secession Letters and Editorial, May 1861.
The Arkansas Peace Society, 1861.The Arkansas Peace Society Documents, 1861.
Joseph E. Brown (1821-1894), Letter to Alexander H. Stephens, 1862; Message to the Legislature, March 10, 1864.
Cyrus Pringle (1838-1911), The Record of a Quaker Conscience, 1863.
African American Soldiers of the Union Army, Correspondence Protesting Unequal Pay, 1863-1864.
Frederick Douglass (1818-1895), What the Black Man Wants, 1865.
Zion Presbyterian Church, Petition to United States Congress, November 24, 1865.
American Equal Rights Association, National Convention Resolutions, New York, May 1867.
Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906), From the Trial of Susan B. Anthony, July 3, 1873; Is It a Crime for a U.S. Citizen to Vote?, 1873.
Robert B. Elliott (1842-1884), Speech in Congress on the Civil Rights Bill, January 6, 1874.
Web Resources for Part Four.