From One Signer to Another

George Read presided over Delaware’s constitutional convention in 1776, where he was the highest ranking official and acted as governor. Then his service as speaker of the Legislative Council (the upper house of the Delaware legislature) made him, in effect, the assistant governor of the state. In November 1777, after narrowly escaping capture by British troops while en route from Philadelphia to Dover, he assumed the presidency (governorship) of Delaware, a post he held until March 1778. Back in the Legislative Council in 1779, he drafted the act authorizing Delaware’s ratification of the Articles of Confederation. Reflecting the views of the smaller states, Read argued that taxes levied by Congress should be based on the population of the states, rather than on the value of lands and improvements, and that the title to western lands should be held jointly with specific limits placed on the claims of individual states to them.  Caesar Rodney was another signer from Delaware and a colleague of Read in the Continental Congress.  Rodney succeeded Read as Governor and was in this position when, in late February, Delaware became the second to last state to ratify the Articles. The states then looked to Maryland, the final state yet to ratify.  Rodney and Read throughout the Revolutionary period were in constant communication, with each updating the other on matters of import.

An uncommon war-date Autograph Letter Signed, Newcastle, March 23, 1779, to Rodney. “Dawson, your express, will deliver you a canister of Tea which Mrs. Read procured for you some time since, no opportunity having offered for sending it to you previous to this – the cannister is borrowed and I am charged with the return of it in my next visit to Dover.  We have nothing new I have not seen Saturday’s paper and I learn from Dawson that you have had Thursday’s. Mrs. desires her complements to Miss Sally and you. Geo: Read.”  This letter is docketed by Rodney.