1816.132: Address to the People of the Commonwealth, June 1, 1816.
Published: 1816
Full Title: Winchester. June 1, 1816. To the people of the Commonwealth ... Fellow citizens ...
Author: Delegates from Berkeley, Frederick, Harrison, Wood, Monongalia, Fauquier, Fairfax, Loudoun, Hampshire, Jefferson and Brooke Counties.
Place Issued: Virginia
Issuing Press: Uncertain
Description: 1 sheet [1 pg.]; 41 cm. x 33 cm. (broadside).
Notes
Sheet lacks colophon; date-line suggests a Winchester origin for this title, but initial signers (Elisha Boyd & Philip C. Pendleton) were delegates from Berkeley County, so suggesting a Martinsburg origin; geographic breadth of other signatories suggests other locations as well, so the indeterminacy reported here. Title was considered the formal call to a meeting at Staunton on August 19, 1816, to draft resolutions calling for a constitutional convention to address inequalities in representation and taxation embodied in Virginia's 1776 constitution; that "Staunton Convention" led to minor changes in statute law at the November 1816 Assembly, but substantial constitutional alterations were stymied until a constitutional convention was called for winter 1829-30.