Patrick Henry

Patrick Henry
Patrick Henry was an American patriot lawyer of Virginia. He was educated in a country school and in a school kept by his father. Henry tried merchandising and farming, but lost money at both. He then turned his mind to the study of law, and was admitted to practice in 1760. Three years later he won reputation by the management of a famous law case, known as the Parson's Cause.
At that day the clergymen of Virginia, were entitled to salaries from public funds. Their salaries were reckoned in part, at least, in the currency of the day, mostly tobacco. In 1758 the Virginian House of Burgesses passed an act granting the planters permission to discharge their obligations to the ministers by a cash payment of two pence for each pound of tobacco raised. The income of the clergy was diminished. The clergymen carried the matter to the king, with the result that the two pence act was repealed.
The people were stirred up, because the...