My temper does not incline to enthusiasm.”
– Lieutenant Governor Thomas Hutchinson
”More than any other official in Boston, Thomas Hutchinson came to personify unpopular British policies.
- Massachusetts State House Arts Collection
Thomas Hutchinson hoped to suppress dissent.
His mind ran toward “firmness not subtlety” wrote Bernard Bailyn. “He didn’t understand people who were sensitive to what power was because they had never been able to share in it.”
A Talent for Making Enemies
When Hutchinson, who was not a lawyer, accepted the position of Chief Justice, he angered the Otis family. Th e position had been promised to James Otis, Senior, father of “patriots” James Otis and Mercy Otis Warren
Samuel Adams by John Singleton Copley.
- Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The Adams Family
Samuel Adams father, Deacon Samuel Adams, was active in establishing a “land bank.” Farmers could borrow paper money against the value of their land. Hutchinson favored “hard money,” gold and silver. He campaigned to destroy the bank and Deacon Adams was ruined fi nancially. His son Samuel inherited debts and lawsuits.
Thomas Hutchinson
At the time of the Stamp Act Thomas Hutchinson served simultaneously as lieutenant governor and chief justice. His brother-in -law Andrew Oliver was designated as Stamp Tax agent. Privately, Hutchinson counseled against the Stamp Act but publicly defended Parliament’s authority to tax the colonies. Out of step with a growing democratic spirit, Hutchinson became a lightening rod. “He was never able to empathize with people who were not, as he was, part of the establishment,” wrote his biographer Bernard Bailyn.
Mercy Otis Warren
Mercy Otis Warren later wrote “melodramas” satirizing the role of Thomas Hutchinson.
- Museum of Fine Arts
James Otis
James Otis reportedly pledged to “set the whole province in a fl ame” aft er Hutchinson’s appointment as Chief Justice.
- Library of Congress
Arguing before Chief Justice . . .
Arguing before Chief Justice Thomas Hutchinson, whom he resented personally, James Otis rallied opinion against the “writs of assistance,” broad search warrants issued to restrict smuggling during the French and Indian War. Later he protested “taxation without representation.” Brilliant but unstable, Otis eventually withdrew from public life.
- Massachusetts State House Arts Collection