Sitting as a committee of the whole Congress considered the printed draft of John Dickinson’s “Articles of Confederation,” which he had submitted on July 12, 1776.
John Dickinson (November 8, 1732– February 14, 1808)
The son of Samuel and Mary Cadwalader Dickinson, John was native to Trappe, Maryland. Mary was Samuel’s second wife. His first, Judith Troth, had passed away in 1729 after bearing nine children. He would marry Mary Cadwalader in 1731, with whom he would have three sons, of which John was the eldest. Primarily educated at home by his parents and tutors, John read law under John Moland in Philadelphia, beginning in 1750. He would travel to London, England in 1753 to study law at The Honorable Society of the Middle Temple. The Middle Temple is one of the four Inns of Court to which all English barristers must belong to one. He returned to Pennsylvania and gained admittance to the colony’s bar in 1757. He would marry Mary (Polly) Norris, in 1770. The couple would have five children, only two of whom would survive until adulthood. Continue reading John Dickinson Submits the Articles of Confederation