Later Johnson

In late 1774, the first American Continental Congress passed a series of Resolves which declared unconstitutional the so-called Intolerable Acts, a punitive response to the Boston Tea Party, and instituted a boycott of British goods. Seeking to make a forceful response, Lord North's government turned to Johnson, who replied to the colonists' slogan "No taxation without representation" with the pamphlet Taxation No Tyranny.As a fierce opponent of slavery, Johnson lashed out at the hypocrisy of the colonists, asking "How is it we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes?" North's ministers let that stand, but much to Johnson's dissatisfaction instructed him to strike several passages they considered excessive. One is shown here, in which he suggests that if the colonists need a new king, they should choose William Pitt, leader of the Parliamentary opposition. John Wesley, founder of Methodism, apparently thought Johnson's arguments so persuasive that he plagiarized much of Taxation No Tyranny in his own pamphlet, A Calm Address to Our American Colonies, published the same year. In 1778, Boswell chanced to find this scrap of the original proof while staying with Johnson at the Thrales' home at Streatham Park, and recorded the moment on the blank verso of p. 82.