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What Is The Primary Source In Joseph Galloway Speech To The Continental Congress

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Before talking about Joseph Galloway’s Speech to the Continental Congress, it is necessary for me to explain in a simpler way what a primary source is. A primary source is a document, an image or an artifact that provides a direct or firsthand evidence about an event, a person, an object or a work of art. Hence, historical documents, speeches, published works, autobiographies and so on, are primary sources.
The Speech to the Continental Congress of 1744 is a discourse made by Joseph Galloway during the Continental Congress on the 28th September 1744. It is possible to read it on the Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789: 1774.
After the end of the French and Indian War (1754-1763), Britain saw itself with enormous debts to pay and …show more content…

Galloway argued that the Colonies had to take in consideration that every time something had threaten them, see the French and Indian War or the Canadian and Indians incursions, Britain had always been there to send support. But, despite Britain’s assistance, most of the Colonies in return, had given back only in portion to the approach or remoteness of the danger. So, when the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act in 1765, it was a legitimate operate according to Galloway. Moreover, when in response to the Stamp Act the Colonies had petitioned the British Parliament denying its authority, it was always appropriate for the British Parliament to pass other laws as the Declaratory Acts (1766) in order to maintain its supremacy over their possessions in the Americas. Galloway was visibly pro-Britain and, with the effort to make clear that a pacific solution was possible, he brought at the debate the supporters of the British Parliament’s ideas. One of it was that the discovery of the Colonies had been made by Britain, and therefore, Britain had the authority to rule over them. Furthermore, the Parliamentary jurisdiction had been constantly exercised over the Colonies from their first settlement, and so they had to be …show more content…

If historians were to only use primary sources from one perspective, they would lose the chance to know different point of views. Take into consideration Joseph Galloway’s Speech to the Continental Congress. It is clear that he is trying to persuade the colonists not to go against Britain. Now, this speech is a primary source because is a document that provides explicit information about an event. But, a couple of years later, Thomas Paine writes the pamphlet “Common Sense”, where he advocates the country to be independent from Britain. If historians were only to use Joseph Galloway’s primary source, they would never be able to know that not everyone was thinking the same way of him. In order to fully understand what is the cause or the causes that lead to different events in history, it is important to be familiar to every kind of document regarding that period. Read and analyze every prime source of that period to have a complete and neat vision of the

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