The "Parson's Cause" was an important legal and political dispute in the Colony of Virginia often viewed as an important event leading up to the American Revolution. Colonel John Henry, father of Patrick Henry, was the judge that presided over the court case that decided the issue, and the relatively unknown Patrick Henry advocated in favor of colonial rights in the case.
The case arose with regard to the Two Penny Act, an act of the Virginia colonial legislature passed in 1758. According to legislation passed in 1748, Virginia's Anglican clergy were to be paid 16,000 pounds of tobacco, one of the colony's major crops, per year. Following a poor harvest in 1758, the price of tobacco rose from two to six pennies per pound, effectively inflating clerical salaries. The House of Burgesses responded by passing legislation allowing debts in tobacco to be paid to in currency at a rate of two pennies per pound. King George III of Great Britain vetoed the law, causing an uproar. Many Virginia legislators saw the king's veto as a breach of their legislative authority.
The Reverend James Maury, a clergyman, responded to the veto by suing in Hanover County Court (April 1, 1762) for back wages on behalf of all the ministers involved, effectively becoming a representative of the British cause. The court ruled (Nov. 5, 1763) that Maury's claim was valid, but that the amount of damages had to be determined by a jury, which was called for Dec. 1763. Patrick Henry, then relatively unknown, rose to prominence by defending Hanover County against Maury's claims. Henry argued in favor of the Two Penny Act. As reported by the plaintiff Maury in a letter (Dec. 12, 1763) to fellow Anglican minister John Camm shortly after the trial, Henry argued in substance "that a King, by disallowing Acts of this salutary nature, from being the father of his people, degenerated into a Tyrant and forfeits all right to his subjects' obedience." (Ann Maury, "Memoirs of a Huguenot Family," G.P. Putnam & Sons, 1872, letter at pages 418-424, quote at page 421).
The jury awarded Maury only one penny in damages. The award effectively nullified the veto and no other clergy sued.
The Hanover County Courthouse where Patrick Henry argued the Parson's Cause still remains an active courthouse; located along historic U.S. Route 301, the courthouse sits adjacent Hanover Tavern, rebuilt in 1791 after burning, where Patrick Henry lodged amid arguing the Parson's Cause. The courthouse is the third oldest courthouse still in use in the United States. This courthouse is often cited as having been built in 1735, although it is dated by the state register as having been built between 1737 and 1742.[1]
British law and the American Revolution
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