driving the colonies and the mother country into war, the English government showed the same blind, self-interest which had driven the thousands of Ulster Scots from Ireland at the beginning of the century. Bassett comments: "Those who directed English colonial affairs in 1763 knew little of the better art of government by which the mind of the governed is as much respected as the interests of the governing class." 2

Law was on the side of the crown and reason on the side of the colonies. Through lack of statesmanship, the British lost their richest dominion and drove the colonies to establish a nation that was to rival, surpass and largely supersede the British Empire.

In the growing conflict, some of the Houstons served in the assemblies of the various colonies, or in newly organized conventions after the royal governors dissolved most of the assemblies. The Houstons, like most of the rest of the Scotch-Irish were Whigs, that is members of the political faction that was most bitter against British oppression. They had been Whigs in Scotland and Ireland where the party opposed arbitrary power of the king and the state church. When war came in America, the people were sharply divided between the Whigs on one hand, those supporting the Revolution, and the Tories on the other side, supporting the British establishment. Family historians of the Houstons often refer to their ancestors as being "Whig to the bone."

When the First Continental Congress met in 1774, Georgia was the only one of the 13 colonies not represented. Delegates from Georgia had been elected but decided not to attend due to the wide divergence of sentiment in the colony at that time. John Houstoun was one of these delegates-elect. By the time of the Second Continental Congress in 1775 the sentiment of revolt had grown to the extent that Georgia dispatched a delegation composed of John Houstoun, Archibald Bulloch and Rev. Dr. John Joachim Zubly. Arriving at Philadelphia while Congress was in recess, Houstoun and Bulloch struck up a friendship with John Adams and his fire-eating second-cousin, Samuel Adams, before taking their seats.

Dr. Zubly created a quick uproar on the floor of Congress when, in a heated debate, he revealed his Tory leanings. Following the incident, he departed for Georgia. The historian,

2 John Spencer Bassett, A Short History of the United States (The Macniillan Co., New York, 1914), p. 161.