planetlines: crossings

The Olive Branch Petition

To the King’s Most Excellent Majesty.

MOST GRACIOUS SOVEREIGN: We, your Majesty’s faithful subjects of the Colonies of New-Hampshire, Massachusetts-Bay, Rhode-Island, New-Jersey, Pennsylvania, the Counties of Newcastle, Kent, and Sussex, on Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina, in behalf of ourselves and the inhabitants of these Colonies, who have deputed us to represent them in General Congress, entreat your Majesty’s gracious attention to this our humble petition.

The union between our Mother Country and these Colonies, and the energy of mild and just Government, produce benefits so remarkably important, and afforded such an assurance of their permanency and increase, that the wonder and envy of other nations were excited, while they beheld Great Britain rising to a power the most extra-ordinary the world had ever known.

Her rivals, observing that there was no probability of this happy connexion being broken by civil dissensions, and apprehending its future effects if left any longer undisturbed, resolved to prevent her receiving such continual and formidable accessions of wealth and strength, by checking the growth of those settlements from which they were to be derived.

In the prosecution of this attempt, events so unfavourable to the design took place, that every friend to the interests of Great Britain and these Colonies, entertained pleasing and reasonable expectations of seeing an additional force and exertion immediately given to the operations of the union hitherto experienced, by an enlargement of the dominions of the Crown, and the removal of ancient and warlike enemies to a greater distance.

At the conclusion, therefore, of the late war, the most glorious and advantageous that ever had been carried on by British arms, your loyal Colonists having contributed to its success by such repeated and strenuous exertions as frequently procured them the distinguished approbation of your Majesty, of the late King, and of Parliament, doubted not but that they should be permitted, with the rest of the Empire, to share in the blessings of peace, and the emoluments of victory and conquest.

While these recent and honourable acknowledgements of their merits remained on record in the Journals and acts of that august Legislature, the Parliament, undefaced by the imputation or even the suspicion of any offence, they were alarmed by a new system of statutes and regulations adopted for the administration of the Colonies, that filled their minds with the most painful fears and jealousies; and, to their inexpressible astonishment, perceived the danger of a foreign quarrel quickly succeeded by domestick danger, in their judgment of a more dreadful kind.

Nor were these anxieties alleviated by any tendency in this system to promote the welfare of their Mother Country. For though its effects were more immediately felt by them, yet its influence appeared to be injurious to the commerce and prosperity of Great Britain.

We shall decline the ungrateful task of describing the irksome variety of artifices practised by many of your Majesty’s Ministers, the delusive pretences, fruitless terrours, and unavailing severities, that have, from time to time, been dealt out by them, in their attempts to execute this impolitick plan, or of tracing through a series of years past the progress of the unhappy differences between Great Britain and these Colonies, that have flowed from this fatal source.

Your Majesty’s Ministers, persevering in their measures, and proceeding to open hostilities for enforcing them, have compelled us to arm in our own defence, and have engaged us in a controversy so peculiarly abhorrent to the affections of your still faithful Colonists, that when we consider whom we must oppose in this contest, and if it continues, what may be the consequences, our own particular misfortunes are accounted by us only as parts of our distress.

Knowing to what violent resentments and incurable animosities civil discords are apt to exasperate and inflame the contending parties, we think ourselves required by indispensable obligations to Almighty God, to your Majesty, to our fellow-subjects, and to ourselves, immediately to use all the means in our power, not incompatible with our safety, for stopping the further effusion of blood, and for averting the impending calamities that threaten the British Empire.

Thus called upon to address your Majesty on affairs of such moment to America, and probably to all your Dominions, we are earnestly desirous of performing this office with the utmost deference for your Majesty; and we therefore pray, that your Majesty’s royal magnanimity and benevolence may make the most favourable constructions of our expressions on so uncommon an occasion. Could we represent in their full force the sentiments that agitate the minds of us your dutiful subjects, we are persuaded your Majesty would ascribe any seeming deviation from reverence in our language, and even in our conduct, not to any reprehensible intention, but to the impossibility of reconciling the usual appearance of respect with a just attention to our own preservation against those artful and cruel enemies who abuse your royal confidence and authority, for the purpose of effecting our destruction.

Attached to your Majesty’s person, family, and Government, with all devotion that principle and affection can inspire; connected with Great Britain by the strongest ties that can unite societies, and deploring every event that tends in any degree to weaken them, we solemnly assure your Majesty, that we not only most ardently desire the former harmony between her and these Colonies may be restored, but that a concord may be established between them upon so firm a basis as to perpetuate its blessings, uninterrupted by any future dissensions, to succeeding generations in both countries, and to transmit your Majesty’s name to posterity, adorned with that signal and lasting glory that has attended the memory of those illustrious personages, whose virtues and abilities have extricated states from dangerous convulsions, and by securing the happiness to others, have erected the most noble and durable monuments to their own fame.

We beg further leave to assure your Majesty, that notwithstanding the sufferings of your loyal Colonists during the course of this present controversy, our breasts retain too tender a regard for the kingdom from which we derive our origin, to request such a reconciliation as might, in any manner, be inconsistent with her dignity or welfare. These, related as we are to her, honour and duty, as well as inclination, induce us to support and advance; and the apprehensions that now oppress our hearts with unspeakable grief, being once removed, your Majesty will find our faithful subject on this Continent ready and willing at all times, as they have ever been with their lives and fortunes, to assert and maintain the rights and interests of your Majesty, and of our Mother Country.

We therefore beseech your Majesty, that your royal authority and influence may be graciously interposed to procure us relief from our afflicting fears and jealousies, occasioned by the system before-mentioned, and to settle peace through every part of our Dominions, with all humility submitting to your Majesty’s wise consideration, whether it may not be expedient, for facilitating those important purposes, that your Majesty be pleased to direct some mode, by which the united applications of your faithful Colonists to the Throne, in pursuance of their common counsels, may be improved into a happy and permanent reconciliation; and that, in the mean time, measures may be taken for preventing the further destruction of the lives of your Majesty’s subjects; and that such statutes as more immediately distress any of your Majesty’s Colonies may be repealed.

For such arrangements as your Majesty’s wisdom can form for collecting the united sense of your American people, we are convinced your Majesty would receive such satisfactory proofs of the disposition of the Colonists towards their Sovereign and Parent State, that the wished for opportunity would soon be restored to them, of evincing the sincerity of their professions, by every testimony of devotion becoming the most dutiful subjects, and the most affectionate Colonists.

That your Majesty may enjoy long and prosperous reign, and that your descendants may govern your Dominions with honour to themselves and happiness to their subjects, is our sincere prayer.

The 1775 Declaration

A declaration by the representatives of the united colonies of North America, now met in Congress at Philadelphia, setting forth the causes and necessity of their taking up arms.

If it was possible for men, who exercise their reason to believe, that the divine Author of our existence intended a part of the human race to hold an absolute property in, and an unbounded power over others, marked out by his infinite goodness and wisdom, as the objects of a legal domination never rightfully resistible, however severe and oppressive, the inhabitants of these colonies might at least require from the parliament of Great-Britain some evidence, that this dreadful authority over them, has been granted to that body. But a reverance for our Creator, principles of humanity, and the dictates of common sense, must convince all those who reflect upon the subject, that government was instituted to promote the welfare of mankind, and ought to be administered for the attainment of that end. The legislature of Great-Britain, however, stimulated by an inordinate passion for a power not only unjustifiable, but which they know to be peculiarly reprobated by the very constitution of that kingdom, and desparate of success in any mode of contest, where regard should be had to truth, law, or right, have at length, deserting those, attempted to effect their cruel and impolitic purpose of enslaving these colonies by violence, and have thereby rendered it necessary for us to close with their last appeal from reason to arms. Yet, however blinded that assembly may be, by their intemperate rage for unlimited domination, so to sight justice and the opinion of mankind, we esteem ourselves bound by obligations of respect to the rest of the world, to make known the justice of our cause.Our forefathers, inhabitants of the island of Great-Britain, left their native land, to seek on these shores a residence for civil and religious freedom. At the expense of their blood, at the hazard of their fortunes, without the least charge to the country from which they removed, by unceasing labour, and an unconquerable spirit, they effected settlements in the distant and unhospitable wilds of America, then filled with numerous and warlike barbarians. — Societies or governments, vested with perfect legislatures, were formed under charters from the crown, and an harmonious intercourse was established between the colonies and the kingdom from which they derived their origin. The mutual benefits of this union became in a short time so extraordinary, as to excite astonishment. It is universally confessed, that the amazing increase of the wealth, strength, and navigation of the realm, arose from this source; and the minister, who so wisely and successfully directed the measures of Great-Britain in the late war, publicly declared, that these colonies enabled her to triumph over her enemies. —Towards the conclusion of that war, it pleased our sovereign to make a change in his counsels. — From that fatal movement, the affairs of the British empire began to fall into confusion, and gradually sliding from the summit of glorious prosperity, to which they had been advanced by the virtues and abilities of one man, are at length distracted by the convulsions, that now shake it to its deepest foundations. — The new ministry finding the brave foes of Britain, though frequently defeated, yet still contending, took up the unfortunate idea of granting them a hasty peace, and then subduing her faithful friends.

These colonies were judged to be in such a state, as to present victories without bloodshed, and all the easy emoluments of statuteable plunder. — The uninterrupted tenor of their peaceable and respectful behaviour from the beginning of colonization, their dutiful, zealous, and useful services during the war, though so recently and amply acknowledged in the most honourable manner by his majesty, by the late king, and by parliament, could not save them from the meditated innovations. — Parliament was influenced to adopt the pernicious project, and assuming a new power over them, have in the course of eleven years, given such decisive specimens of the spirit and consequences attending this power, as to leave no doubt concerning the effects of acquiescence under it. They have undertaken to give and grant our money without our consent, though we have ever exercised an exclusive right to dispose of our own property; statutes have been passed for extending the jurisdiction of courts of admiralty and vice-admiralty beyond their ancient limits; for depriving us of the accustomed and inestimable privilege of trial by jury, in cases affecting both life and property; for suspending the legislature of one of the colonies; for interdicting all commerce to the capital of another; and for altering fundamentally the form of government established by charter, and secured by acts of its own legislature solemnly confirmed by the crown; for exempting the “murderers” of colonists from legal trial, and in effect, from punishment; for erecting in a neighbouring province, acquired by the joint arms of Great-Britain and America, a despotism dangerous to our very existence; and for quartering soldiers upon the colonists in time of profound peace. It has also been resolved in parliament, that colonists charged with committing certain offences, shall be transported to England to be tried.But why should we enumerate our injuries in detail? By one statute it is declared, that parliament can “of right make laws to bind us in all cases whatsoever.” What is to defend us against so enormous, so unlimited a power? Not a single man of those who assume it, is chosen by us; or is subject to our control or influence; but, on the contrary, they are all of them exempt from the operation of such laws, and an American revenue, if not diverted from the ostensible purposes for which it is raised, would actually lighten their own burdens in proportion, as they increase ours. We saw the misery to which such despotism would reduce us. We for ten years incessantly and ineffectually besieged the throne as supplicants; we reasoned, we remonstrated with parliament, in the most mild and decent language.

Administration sensible that we should regard these oppressive measures as freemen ought to do, sent over fleets and armies to enforce them. The indignation of the Americans was roused, it is true; but it was the indignation of a virtuous, loyal, and affectionate people. A Congress of delegates from the United Colonies was assembled at Philadelphia, on the fifth day of last September. We resolved again to offer an humble and dutiful petition to the King, and also addressed our fellow-subjects of Great-Britain. We have pursued every temperate, every respectful measure; we have even proceeded to break off our commercial intercourse with our fellow-subjects, as the last peaceable admonition, that our attachment to no nation upon earth should supplant our attachment to liberty. — This, we flattered ourselves, was the ultimate step of the controversy: but subsequent events have shewn, how vain was this hope of finding moderation in our enemies.

Several threatening expressions against the colonies were inserted in his majesty's speech; our petition, tho' we were told it was a decent one, and that his majesty had been pleased to receive it graciously, and to promise laying it before his parliament, was huddled into both houses among a bundle of American papers, and there neglected. The lords and commons in their address, in the month of February, said, that “a rebellion at that time actually existed within the province of Massachusetts-Bay; and that those concerned with it, had been countenanced and encouraged by unlawful combinations and engagements, entered into by his majesty's subjects in several of the other colonies; and therefore they besought his majesty, that he would take the most effectual measures to inforce due obediance to the laws and authority of the supreme legislature.” — Soon after, the commercial intercourse of whole colonies, with foreign countries, and with each other, was cut off by an act of parliament; by another several of them were intirely prohibited from the fisheries in the seas near their coasts, on which they always depended for their sustenance; and large reinforcements of ships and troops were immediately sent over to general Gage.

Fruitless were all the entreaties, arguments, and eloquence of an illustrious band of the most distinguished peers, and commoners, who nobly and strenuously asserted the justice of our cause, to stay, or even to mitigate the heedless fury with which these accumulated and unexampled outrages were hurried on. — equally fruitless was the interference of the city of London, of Bristol, and many other respectable towns in our favor. Parliament adopted an insidious manoeuvre calculated to divide us, to establish a perpetual auction of taxations where colony should bid against colony, all of them uninformed what ransom would redeem their lives; and thus to extort from us, at the point of the bayonet, the unknown sums that should be sufficient to gratify, if possible to gratify, ministerial rapacity, with the miserable indulgence left to us of raising, in our own mode, the prescribed tribute. What terms more rigid and humiliating could have been dictated by remorseless victors to conquered enemies? in our circumstances to accept them, would be to deserve them.

Soon after the intelligence of these proceedings arrived on this continent, general Gage, who in the course of the last year had taken possession of the town of Boston, in the province of Massachusetts-Bay, and still occupied it a garrison, on the 19th day of April, sent out from that place a large detachment of his army, who made an unprovoked assault on the inhabitants of the said province, at the town of Lexington, as appears by the affidavits of a great number of persons, some of whom were officers and soldiers of that detachment, murdered eight of the inhabitants, and wounded many others. From thence the troops proceeded in warlike array to the town of Concord, where they set upon another party of the inhabitants of the same province, killing several and wounding more, until compelled to retreat by the country people suddenly assembled to repel this cruel aggression. Hostilities, thus commenced by the British troops, have been since prosecuted by them without regard to faith or reputation. — The inhabitants of Boston being confined within that town by the general their governor, and having, in order to procure their dismission, entered into a treaty with him, it was stipulated that the said inhabitants having deposited their arms with their own magistrate, should have liberty to depart, taking with them their other effects. They accordingly delivered up their arms, but in open violation of honour, in defiance of the obligation of treaties, which even savage nations esteemed sacred, the governor ordered the arms deposited as aforesaid, that they might be preserved for their owners, to be seized by a body of soldiers; detained the greatest part of the inhabitants in the town, and compelled the few who were permitted to retire, to leave their most valuable effects behind.

By this perfidy wives are separated from their husbands, children from their parents, the aged and the sick from their relations and friends, who wish to attend and comfort them; and those who have been used to live in plenty and even elegance, are reduced to deplorable distress.

The general, further emulating his ministerial masters, by a proclamation bearing date on the 12th day of June, after venting the grossest falsehoods and calumnies against the good people of these colonies, proceeds to “declare them all, either by name or description, to be rebels and traitors, to supercede the course of the common law, and instead thereof to publish and order the use and exercise of the law martial.” — His troops have butchered our countrymen, have wantonly burnt Charlestown, besides a considerable number of houses in other places; our ships and vessels are seized; the necessary supplies of provisions are intercepted, and he is exerting his utmost power to spread destruction and devastation around him.

We have rceived certain intelligence, that general Carleton, the governor of Canada, is instigating the people of that province and the Indians to fall upon us; and we have but too much reason to apprehend, that schemes have been formed to excite domestic enemies against us. In brief, a part of these colonies now feel, and all of them are sure of feeling, as far as the vengeance of administration can inflict them, the complicated calamities of fire, sword and famine. [1] We are reduced to the alternative of chusing an unconditional submission to the tyranny of irritated ministers, or resistance by force. — The latter is our choice. — We have counted the cost of this contest, and find nothing so dreadful as voluntary slavery. — Honour, justice, and humanity, forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us. We cannot endure the infamy and guilt of resigning succeeding generations to that wretchedness which inevitably awaits them, if we basely entail hereditary bondage upon them.

Our cause is just. Our union is perfect. Our internal resources are great, and, if necessary, foreign assistance is undoubtedly attainable. — We gratefully acknowledge, as signal instances of the Divine favour towards us, that his Providence would not permit us to be called into this severe controversy, until we were grown up to our present strength, had been previously exercised in warlike operation, and possessed of the means of defending ourselves. With hearts fortified with these animating reflections, we most solemnly, before God and the world, declare, that, exerting the utmost energy of those powers, which our beneficent Creator hath graciously bestowed upon us, the arms we have been compelled by our enemies to assume, we will, in defiance of every hazard, with unabating firmness and perseverence, employ for the preservation of our liberties; being with one mind resolved to die freemen rather than to live slaves.

Lest this declaration should disquiet the minds of our friends and fellow-subjects in any part of the empire, we assure them that we mean not to dissolve that union which has so long and so happily subsisted between us, and which we sincerely wish to see restored. — Necessity has not yet driven us into that desperate measure, or induced us to excite any other nation to war against them. — We have not raised armies with ambitious designs of separating from Great-Britain, and establishing independent states. We fight not for glory or for conquest. We exhibit to mankind the remarkable spectacle of a people attacked by unprovoked enemies, without any imputation or even suspicion of offence. They boast of their privileges and civilization, and yet proffer no milder conditions than servitude or death.

In our own native land, in defence of the freedom that is our birthright, and which we ever enjoyed till the late violation of it — for the protection of our property, acquired solely by the honest industry of our fore-fathers and ourselves, against violence actually offered, we have taken up arms. We shall lay them down when hostilities shall cease on the part of the aggressors, and all danger of their being renewed shall be removed, and not before.

With an humble confidence in the mercies of the supreme and impartial Judge and Ruler of the Universe, we most devoutly implore his divine goodness to protect us happily through this great conflict, to dispose our adversaries to reconciliation on reasonable terms, and thereby to relieve the empire from the calamities of civil war.

Further Noel Comments on the Boyd Chart

More from Gary Noel:

Astrology of the Boyd Chart

FOR THOSE interested in a look at the original Boyd chart's predictive track record, Juan Antonio Revilla has posted a very thorough article on this at his site Astrology of the New Centaurs

New Research Questions Helen Boyd's U.S. Chart

NOT LONG AGO, Gary Noel dropped me a line about some new research he had done on the version of the U.S. proposed some time ago by Helen M. Boyd. Boyd's book, The True Horoscope of the United States, is one of astrology's unknown classics, as it not only represents an example of comprehensive library research, but also is very thorough in regard to the astrology underlying the U.S. chart she proposes. The chart itself could perhaps be put in the same category, an unknown classic, as oftentimes when you see astrologers debating the subject of the U.S. chart in print or online, you will not see the Boyd chart mentioned at all. The chart did, however, occupy some space in The Psychology of Astro*Carto*Graphy, much of which was based on a tandem lecture Jim Lewis and I did at a conference of the National Astrological Society back in 1978, about three years after the publication of Boyd's book.This is because Jim considered it to be an important one.

For myself, at the time I found it to be much clearer than any of the viable July 4, 1776 contenders in its indications for key events in U.S. history, and in a variety of ways, i.e., through progressions and through transits, as well as through sidereal return charts. Based on my early explorations of it (aided by the fact that those rare old ephemerides were easily available to me in the American Astrology offices in Tucson where I worked), I asked Jim to do a map on it, as he had not long before started Astro*Carto*Graphy. He was unaware of Boyd's book, and I think all I told him was that it was a proposed U.S. chart. After doing the map, he called me up, quite excited at what he saw in the map, particularly the fact that a grouping of Mars, Saturn, and Neptune prominent on the chart's Ascendant fell on areas across the world where the U.S. had been involved many of its important wars.

According to her book, Helen Boyd's proposed chart was based on her research into The Journals of the Second Continental Congress, as well as the so-called “secret journals” of the Continental Congress published in 1821. When Boyd was doing her work, these journals were available in many libraries, but they are now available on the Internet at the Library of Congress site, along with correspondence and diary entries from the many of the principals. This was the resource used by Noel to check Boyd out, and I suspect that not only the wealth of material available there, but also the way it was presented made it possible for him to spot some obvious problems in Boyd's research.

In adopting the 1775 chart as the “true horoscope” of the U.S., Boyd advanced two main arguments. The first of these was the often overlooked document agreed to on July 6, 1775, styled “A Declaration by the Representatives of the United Colonies of North America at Philadelphia, setting forth the Cause and Necessity of their taking up arms.” This declaration was one of a number of documents produced in the days around that date, though the one most cited in history books is the “Olive Branch Petition” agreed to and signed two days later, on July 8th. Boyd refers to the July 6th declaration as a “Declaration of War,” though I can't find it referred to in that way in any of the contemporary journals, diaries, or correspondence online. In fact, in the Journal record for that date , it is referred to as “the address to the Inhabitants of G-B” (i.e., Great Britain). It was, however, central to a watershed period during which an armed conflict already in progress was given focus and direction. In the journals, it is mentioned both as an address to the people of Great Britain and as something to be read to the troops by General Washington. In reading it, one gets the feeling that both in its content and in its intent, it served as a model for the Declaration of Independence a year later.

The second of Boyd's arguments was directed at the use of July 4, 1776 as an important date in American history, and as the date for the U.S. chart. Her main contention here was that the Declaration of Independence was not in fact signed on that famous date, but rather on August 2, 1776. This point is simply wrong, as in fact the same case could be made in regard to the July 6, 1775 declaration if the journals are not read correctly. In both cases, it appears that the final form of the document was agreed to (and signed by the delegates) on the given dates, and it then was ordered to be “engrossed” in a final parchment copy. In both cases, the final form of the document was approved on the date of the record, and the later signing was of a cleanly lettered parchment copy made from the approved working copy. The deed was already done and public by the time the parchment copy was produced.

Thus, Boyd's “August 2nd” argument about the July 4th chart really doesn't wash. However, she seems to have missed a chance to point out that July 2nd should be a reasonable contender, as it was on that date that the actual resolution of independence was formally agreed to by the delegates to the 2nd Continental Congress: “Resolved, That these United Colonies are, and, of right, ought to be, Free and Independent States; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown, and that all political connexion between them, and the state of Great Britain, is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.” The July 4th document is the public declaration and justification of this resolution, which is included in it in the last paragraph.

In fact, John Adams, writing to Abigail Adams on July 3rd said: “The Second Day of July 1776, will be the most memorable Epocha [sic], in the History of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.”

But enough of rearguing arguments on 1776 that likely have been made before. Boyd's fundamental mistake on the July 6, 1775 chart is about the time when it could have been signed. The problem is clear when you look at the material as it is presented on the Library of Congress site, because it is possible to read the record chronologically, with all of the pertinent material for a given period (whether from journals, secret journals, diaries, or delegate correspondence) grouped together. Boyd states that there was no debate on the declaration before it was approved on July 6th. Thus, she estimated that with a start time of 9:30 A.M. it would take an hour or so to deal with the day's other business and then get on to approval. Because of this, she approximated the approval time as 10:30 A.M. and Brigadier Firebrace (who contributed most of the astrological material to the book) refined this to 11:00 A.M. LMT.

However, as Gary Noel points out, the record shown on the Library of Congress site (both the journal of the Congress and a letter written on that day by John Adams to William Tudor) says clearly that the day's normal business was dispensed with so that the declaration could be debated paragraph by paragraph, and that the process took “this whole day,” to use Adams' words. Thus, 11:00 A.M. would seem to be out of the running. Since there is nothing in the record itself in regard to the timing of the end of the session (which of course would have coincided somewhat with approval of the declaration) that allows us to fix a starting point for working out a more reasonable time, Noel opts for a time of 5:25 P.M. LMT, which leaves most of the same planets angular. Noel's version also seems to track events in much the same way as the Boyd chart, especially in regard to transits to local angles.

Ken Irving

Gary's original comments on his research follow:

After taking a closer look at the history books, I can no longer take Helen Boyd's horoscope of America seriously. I believe she got the day right (July 6, 1775) but the Declaration on Taking Arms could not have been approved at 11 a.m. In her book The True Horoscope of the United States, she avers “It is interesting to note the Journals make no mention of argument or controversy on July 6, 1775, before ratification of the Declaration of War.” (p.ii) This is not true. The Journal of the Continental Congress says that each paragraph was debated.

The debate appears to have lasted for several hours because the Journal indicates that the order of the day was cancelled. There would have been no need to do this if the Declaration had been ratified late in the morning. In a letter dated July 6, 1775, John Adams told William Tudor, “We have spent this whole day (emphasis mine) in debating paragraph by paragraph, a Manifesto as some call it, or a Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of our taking up Arms.”

I have abandoned the 11 a.m. ratification time and now use 5:25 p.m. This time places Mars in a Gauquelin plus zone and Venus in a Gauquelin minus zone, a planetary pattern indicative of a war resolution. Strangely enough, precession corrected solar returns based on the latter time will yield results similar to the former time. The difference is that planets once near Ascendant are now closer to MC and planets once near Descendant are closer to IC.

If you calculate a precession-corrected solar return for the election of 2000, you will see what I mean. The solar return based on the Boyd chart puts Saturn and Jupiter in house 12, a major Gauquelin power zone. The return based on 5:25 p.m. puts Saturn and Jupiter in house 9, also a major plus zone. If Saturn represents Democrats and Jupiter Republicans, either return would seem to indicate that the election of 2000 would be a virtual tie. Jupiter, however, is closer to an angle in both returns.

This doesn't mean that a method for picking winners of presidential elections I described in an article in the January 2004 issue of American Astrology Your Daily Horoscope is invalid. Using the 5:25 p.m. time, the same planets are still in a major power zone except for Jupiter and Uranus now in a zone of moderate power.

The Journals of the Continental Congress and Letters of Delegates to Congress are invaluable resources for astrologers who need to determine the approximate time a resolution was ratified. They are both available on the Internet. Just put “Journals of the Continental Congress” in your search engine.

Gary Noel

[Note: See links in my text above - KI]