Joseph Hawley III[1] (October 8, 1723 – March 10, 1788) was a political leader from Massachusetts during the era of the American Revolution.
[3] Joseph Hawley III graduated from Yale College in 1742 (he studied theology), and served as a Captain in a Massachusetts regiment during the 1745 Louisbourg expedition.
[4] During the Stamp Act crisis he emerged, with Samuel Adams and James Otis Jr., as a leader of the popular (or Whig) party.
He urged Massachusetts's delegates to the Second Continental Congress to issue the United States Declaration of Independence.
He suffered a nervous breakdown in 1776 and never again served in the legislature, but he continued to write important political essays.