Shays’ Rebellion: Insurrection at the courthouse

Feb. 1 marked National Freedom Day. While the observance was created to commemorate the day in 1865 when President Lincoln affirmed the congressional legislation that went on to become the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery, in this year of 2022, as we recently passed the anniversary of the attack on the U.S. Capitol, it seems appropriate to take a look at another chapter in American history that tested our pretext of equality and freedom as well.

After eight years of war to gain independence from the tyranny of the King of England, the fledgling Congress of the united colonies, then known as the Continental Congress, was struggling to survive as a coherent federation.

The Constitution hadn’t yet been drafted, there was no federal bank or economic system and each state asserted their individual rights and trade policies over others. The primary reason the states deferred to a federal, or central, system of power during the era, was so that, collectively, sufficient funds and supplies could be found to provide weapons and soldiers to overthrow what the colonists saw as an occupation of their land by British armed forces.

This was resolved with the surrender of Gen. Cornwallis to George Washington at Yorktown in 1781 and the signing of the Treaty of Paris two years later, but a revolution within the colonies was beginning to brew.

Most of the soldiers of the Continental Army were farmers who returned to their modest properties after the war. They had been promised pay from the Continental Congress for their service, but the legislation lacked proper authorization to emplace taxes, so much of the “chits” the former soldiers had been given to exchange for later pay, brought little to no income.

At the same time, each state, having the authority by its legislatures to impose and enforce the collection of taxes, increased what its citizens were to pay. This was particularly the case in Massachusetts.

Farmers were seeing their land taken away by creditors and even jailed as debtors for failure to pay their commercial debts or taxes. This, it was believed, was part of a conspiracy against them in which the government was guilty of fraud and not acting in the best interest of the people.

Daniel Shays, a retired soldier of the 5th Massachusetts Regiment in the Continental Army, had gone back to his farm after serving in the Battle of Bunker Hill, and was threatened with foreclosure. Unable to get satisfactory results from the state Legislature, he organized a band of several hundred protesters in 1786, and stormed the county courthouse in Springfield, surrounding the judges and court officials, successfully shutting down governmental operations and suspending, temporarily, the prosecution against his fellow farmers.

The Governor of Massachusetts, James Bowdoin, called the incident an act of “insurrection” and a bill was passed by the state Legislature exonerating any law enforcement official, civilian or military, if they were to harm or kill anyone involved in the uprising.

This only enraged the activists, who then moved on to the arsenal in Springfield where the guns and ammunition of the state’s militia were made and stored. The militia (equivalent of today’s National Guard) was finally called in to respond and led a chase of the mob, including Shays, until they were ultimately captured on Feb. 4, 1787.

Shays, and those who followed him, were formally charged with treason. John Hancock, though, had just been elected governor, and with his reputation, having been the first signer of the Declaration of Independence, was able to reach a compromise wherein the accused would be banned from serving on juries, voting, or holding public office, but not subject to prolonged prison sentences or death.

Subsequently, Hancock also introduced codes to the legislature that would place a moratorium on evictions and reduce taxes on the rural population. All defendants were pardoned later that summer and allowed to leave detention peacefully.

These incidents, known as Shays’ Rebellion, were symptomatic of deep economic and philosophic divisions within our country at the time, which threatened to shake the foundations of democracy, for which both sides had fought, to the ground. Thankfully, they were able to be resolved, to the benefit of all, and liberty, instead of anarchy, prevailed.

Let us remember this as we recognize Freedom Day in 2022 and the 235th anniversary of Shays’ Rebellion.

David V. Wendell is a Marion historian, author and special events coordinator specializing in American history.