John Witherspoon came to America in 1768 to run a struggling college in New Jersey. By 1776 he was preaching that Providence was on the side of the Revolution. Six weeks later he signed the Declaration of Independence. He was a Scottish Presbyterian minister, a college president, and the only ordained clergyman among the 56 signers. The documents begin with the sermon.
On May 17, 1776, the Second Continental Congress called a General Fast Day for the Colonies. John Witherspoon preached at Princeton. The sermon — "The Dominion of Providence Over the Passions of Men" — was published in Philadelphia the same month. It was his first political sermon from the pulpit. The 1776 printed edition is at the University of Michigan Evans Early American Imprint Collection. The full text is at the Online Library of Liberty.
There is not a single instance in history, in which civil liberty was lost, and religious liberty preserved entire. If therefore we yield up our temporal property, we at the same time deliver the conscience into bondage.
He is the best friend to American liberty, who is most sincere and active in promoting true and undefiled religion, and who sets himself with the greatest firmness to bear down profanity and immorality of every kind. Whoever is an avowed enemy of God, I scruple not to call him an enemy of his country.
The sermon was preached on a congressional fast day — before Witherspoon was a member of Congress, before independence was declared. It was published and circulated widely. Six weeks later he was elected to the Continental Congress from New Jersey on June 22, 1776.
Witherspoon arrived in Philadelphia just in time for the final debates on independence. When objections arose that the country was not ready for such a step, he replied — according to contemporaneous accounts — that it was "not only ripe for the measure, but in danger of rotting for the want of it." On August 2, 1776, he signed the engrossed parchment of the Declaration of Independence.
He was the only active clergyman and the only sitting college president among the 56 signers. John Adams had met him two years earlier on the road to the First Continental Congress and recorded his assessment in his diary on September 25, 1774.
Dr. Witherspoon enters with great spirit into the American Cause. He seems as good a Friend as any of the natives — an animated Son of Liberty.
Witherspoon served in the Continental Congress from 1776 to 1782, with a brief return in 1782. He was assigned to more than 100 committees — among the most prolific committee members in the Congress. He helped draft the Articles of Confederation in 1777 and signed them when they were ratified. The Journals of the Continental Congress at the Library of Congress record his service throughout. The House History biographical directory documents his full record.
Witherspoon became president of the College of New Jersey in 1768 and held the position until blindness forced his retirement in 1792. He introduced the Scottish Common Sense philosophy of Thomas Reid into American intellectual life — a philosophical tradition that shaped American political thought for a century. His students went on to positions throughout the new republic.
After the Revolution, Witherspoon traveled to London in early 1784 on behalf of the College of New Jersey — attempting to raise funds for an institution that had suffered significantly during the war. British troops had used Nassau Hall as a barracks and hospital. He wrote to Benjamin Franklin from London on March 27, 1784. The letter is at Founders Online.
I am here on a commission from the Trustees of the College of New Jersey to solicit benefactions for that Seminary which suffered considerably during the war.
The fundraising mission produced less than £6. Witherspoon returned to Princeton. He continued as college president until 1792, when he lost his sight entirely. He died November 15, 1794 — three years after the Bill of Rights was ratified. He is buried at the Princeton Cemetery.