" This
statesmanlike "Albany Plan of Union," however, came to nothing.
"Its fate was singular," says Franklin; "the assemblies did not
adopt it, as they all thought there was too much PREROGATIVE in
it and in England it was judg'd to have too much of the
DEMOCRATIC."
How to raise funds for defense was always a grave problem in the
colonies, for the assemblies controlled the purse-strings and
released them with a grudging hand. In face of the French menace,
this was Governor Shirley's problem in Massachusetts, Governor
Dinwiddie's in Virginia, and Franklin's in the Quaker and
proprietary province of Pennsylvania. Franklin opposed Shirley's
suggestion of a general tax to be levied on the colonies by
Parliament, on the ground of no taxation without representation,
but used all his arts to bring the Quaker Assembly to vote money
for defense, and succeeded. When General Braddock arrived in
Virginia Franklin was sent by the Assembly to confer with him in
the hope of allaying any prejudice against Quakers that the
general might have conceived. If that blustering and dull-witted
soldier had any such prejudice, it melted away when the envoy of
the Quakers promised to procure wagons for the army. The story of
Braddock's disaster does not belong here, but Franklin formed a
shrewd estimate of the man which proved accurate.
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