Committee of safety (American Revolution)

[1] In the Province of Massachusetts Bay, as affairs drew toward a crisis, it became usual for towns to appoint three committees: of correspondence, of inspection, and of safety.

In February 1776 these were regularly legalized by the Massachusetts General Court but consolidated into one called the "Committee of Correspondence, Inspection, and Safety" to be elected annually by the towns.

Committees of correspondence were public functionaries, and first existed in England, created by the parliamentary party of the 17th century in their struggles with the Stuarts.

After the Boston Port Bill came into effect the Boston committee invited those of eight other towns to meet in Faneuil Hall, and the meeting sent circulars to the other colonies recommending suspension of trade with Great Britain, while the legislative committee was directed by the House to send copies of the Port Bill to other colonies, and call attention to it as an attempt to suppress American liberty.

The focus of the committees was initially on enforcing the Non-importation Agreements, which aimed to hinder the import of British manufactured goods.

The Committees of safety were emergency panels of leading citizens, who passed laws, handed down regulations, enacted statutes, and did other fundamental business prior to the Declaration of Independence in July 1776 and the passage of individual state constitutions.

[6] As they assumed power to govern, however, they generally chose to observe rough legal procedures, warning and shaming enemies rather than killing them.

"[1] The network of committees were also vital for reinforcing "a shared sense of purpose," speaking to "an imagined collectivity—a country of the mind" of Americans.

By demanding that enemies receive "civil excommunication" – the chilling words of a North Carolina committee – these groups silenced critics without sparking the kind of bloodbath that has characterized so many other insurgencies throughout the world.

[8] For example, William Henry Drayton, the prominent South Carolina planter who had studied at Oxford University, complained about the participation of cobblers and butchers, stating that "Nature never intended that such men should be profound politicians, or able statesmen.

[8] In 1775, the royal governor of Georgia "noted in astonishment that the committee in control of Savannah consisted of 'a Parcel of the Lowest People, chiefly carpenters, shoemakers, Blacksmiths etc with a Jew at their head.