Tell us more about John Dickinson.

I'm going to read my remarks because I don't trust myself to keep everything in mind.

John Dickinson was a lawyer, statesman, planter, and philanthropist.

Born in Maryland to Quaker parents, he was raised in Kent County, Pennsylvania, which is now Delaware, and worked his whole life in Delaware and Pennsylvania.

With the publication of his Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania in 1768, he became America's first celebrity, known around the Atlantic world and as far away as Poland as the spokesman for the American cause And yes, he was more famous than Benjamin Franklin and George Washington.

He was the only leading figure active in America from the beginning of the conflict with Britain into the next century.

He wrote more for the founding than any other figure, around 800 public works, and he held more high offices, serving in every national body the Stamp Act Congress, First and Second Continental Congresses, the Annapolis Convention, and the Federal Convention.

for audience questions, but let's talk about slavery now.

And how did it become possible that this accomplished lawyer ended up being the most celebrated voice of revolution?

Well, Dickinson was born in Talbot County, Maryland in 1732.

When he was about seven, his family moved to Kent County, Pennsylvania, which we now call Delaware, the three lower counties of Pennsylvania.

And he was educated by his parents and by tutors, and he then went and read law in Philadelphia.

and passed the bar when he was 20.

And then he wanted further legal training, so he went to England and trained in the law at the Middle Temple, which was something only a handful of Americans were wealthy and privileged enough to do.

And there he really, really blossomed.

So how is it that he was such a defender of free speech in the passage you're going to tell us about, and also was similarly devoted to free speech at the Constitutional Convention?

How would this country be different if he hadn't existed?

So it's funny you should ask that question because, you know, historians typically don't like to engage in counterfactual speculations.

But that's kind of a fun one.

And I've kind of dabbled in thinking about that.

And, you know, so just just to sort of play this out a little bit.

So I think, you know, the big criticism of Dickinson is that, you know, he didn't he was allegedly kind of a naysayer about the revolution and he didn't have enough patriotism to vote on or sign the Declaration of Independence.

And, you know, he was really not a patriotic figure because of that.

Would you tell us exactly what that means? And if you lived in those days, how did you buy your stamps and why?