[Intolerable Acts]

The Following Extraordinary Bills, Pending before the British Parliament, Arrived Last Night in Capt. Williamson, in 36 Days from Bristol. Boston, June 3, 1774 [caption title]. Salem: Printed by S. and E. Hall, [1774]

Broadsheet (14 7/8m x 9 3/4 in.; 380 x 250 mm). Browned, several tears at folds with some minor loss of text, loss to upper right corner not affecting text, hinged to a mat. Red cloth chemise and slipcase, red morocco spine lettered gilt.

Acquisition: William Reese

Evans 13305; Ford, Massachusetts Broadsides 1736

Broadside (14 7/8m x 9 3/4 in.;380 x 250 mm). Browned, several tears at folds with some minor loss of text, loss to upper right corner not affecting text. hinged to a mat. Red cloth chemise and slipcase, red morocco spine lettered gilt.
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One of the first two American printings of two of the Intolerable, or Coercive Acts, introduced in Parliament in retaliation for the Boston Tea Party, and to staunch the rise of open rebellion in Massachusetts by shoring up royal authority at the expense of the liberty of its inhabitants. The broadsheet prints the two bills, the Massachusetts Government Act and the Administration of Justice Act, in their proposed forms (they were passed in May 1774).

The two bills were printed in Boston, by Edes and Gill, and in Salem by S. and E. Hall. The North American Imprint Program, Evans, and Ford locate four copies in the following institutions: American Antiquarian Society, the Massachusetts Historical Society, Essex Institute, Salem, and the Library of Congress. A fifth copy was purchased by the  Scheide Library, Princeton, in 1989. NAIP locates only six copies of the Boston imprint.