Tuesday, June 21, 2011

June 21, 1776: New Jersey Authorizes Vote for Independence

The New Jersey Provincial Congress, meeting in Burlington, elected Richard Stockton, Abraham Clark, John Hart, and Francis Hopkinson, Esqs., and Dr. John Witherspoon as the colony's Delegates to the Continental Congress.

The Provincial Congress empowered the New Jersey Delegates "to join with the Delegates of the other Colonies in Continental Congress, in the most vigorous measures for supporting the just rights and liberties of America...." The Provincial Congress even empowered the Delegates, if they deemed it necessary, "to join with them in declaring the United Colonies independent of Great Britain..." (emphasis added).

Thanks the Northern Illinois University Libraries for making the document available online.

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