It first met in 1775 with representatives from all New Jersey's then-thirteen counties, to supersede the Royal Governor.
All state officials, including the governor, were to be appointed by the Legislature under this constitution.
[1][2] The Provincial Congress ceased to function when the first session of the new Legislature convened on August 27, 1776, under the New Jersey State Constitution it had prepared.
During their sessions in the first week, they elected from their members: Hendrick Fisher as the body's President, Jonathan D. Sergeant as secretary, and William Paterson and Frederick Frelinghuysen as assistants.
[3] At Independence Hall in Philadelphia in 1776, three Provincial Congress deputies, Abraham Clark, John Hart, and Reverend John Witherspoon, signed the Declaration of Independence, becoming of the nation's 53 Founding Fathers.