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A highly important manuscript document relating to the long-standing dispute regarding the Pennsylvania-Virginia boundary. This document, undated but written in June 1776, shows the divisiveness that existed between two of the most important American colonies on the eve of the Declaration of Independence, and the efforts being made to resolve it by some of the leading supporters of independence. By the summer of 1776 the Pennsylvania-Virginia boundary had been in dispute for nearly a century. In fact, the issue was not definitively settled until the Civil War and the creation of the state of West Virginia. The issue originated in the ambiguous terms of the 1681 grant to William Penn, which conflicted with Virginia's claim to lands "from sea to sea, west and northwest," over any territory not covered by royal grants. Prior to the French and Indian War of the 1750s, Virginia claimed most of what is now southwestern Pennsylvania, and attempted to settle it. The surveying of the Mason-Dixon line the following decade did little to alleviate the dispute, as it indicated that Pennsylvania extended some distance west of the Allegheny Mountains. In 1773, Pennsylvania established Westmoreland County in the disputed territory, and the following year Virginia took possession of Fort Pitt and the Westmoreland County seat, arresting the justices who refused to recognize the jurisdiction of Virginia. The dispute almost boiled into open warfare in 1774 75, as the last colonial governor, Lord Dunmore, sought to bring the Virginia frontier under control. In 1776, Pennsylvania proposed that a temporary boundary, "as nearly correspondent to the true one as possible such as will 'do no injury to either party,'" should be established. The present document is the response of three of the Virginia delegates to the Continental Congress, who received the proposal. The document is in the hand of Richard Henry Lee, who has signed it himself, and has added the signatures of two of his fellow Virginia delegates, Thomas Nelson, Jr., and his brother, Francis Lightfoot Lee. The text reads: "The Virginia Delegates have received the proposal for establishing a temporary boundary between the States of Virginia and Pennsylvania and for answer, say, their power is ended; having been expressly limited to the line already proposed to the honorable Convention of the State of Pennsylvania as a temporary boundary. That they will without delay transmit the proposal of the honorable Committee to the Governor and Council of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in order to its being laid before the General Assembly that meets early in October next; and in the mean time they wish that the influence of both governments may be exerted to preserve friendship and peace between the people of both States on the controverted Boundary." At the time this proposal was considered, Richard Henry Lee, Francis Lightfoot Lee, and Thomas Nelson, Jr., were all representing Virginia in the Second Continental Congress, and all three men would affix their signatures to the Declaration of Independence the following month. Richard Henry Lee, in fact, formally put forth the motion on June 7, calling on the Congress to declare independence. A highly important step on the road to independence, suspending a dramatic conflict between two of the leading colonies about to become the United States. Sheet inlaid. Several tape repairs on verso, mostly to repair closed tears along folds. A few small chips in the right margin, touching a letter of text. Faint dampstains. Good. In a half morocco and cloth folding case, spine gilt.
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