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Galloway's Plan of Union was a plan to politically unite Great Britain and its North American colonies. The plan was put forward by Loyalist Joseph Galloway in the First Continental Congress of 1774 but was rejected. Galloway was a Pennsylvania delegate who wanted to keep the Thirteen Colonies in the British Empire.
Galloway suggested the creation of an American colonial parliament to act together with the Parliament of Great Britain. The Grand Council would have to give formal consent to the latter's decisions, particularly on trade and taxation, thus giving it a veto. [1]
The Colonial Parliament would consist of a President-General appointed by the Crown and delegates appointed by the colonial assemblies for three-year terms. [2] The plan would have kept the British Empire together and allowed the colonies to have some say over their own affairs, including the inflammatory issue of taxation. [3]
Galloway's Plan of Union was narrowly defeated by a vote of six to five on October 22, 1774. The appearance of the Suffolk Resolves at the Congress led to a polarization of discussion, with the radicals swiftly gaining the upper hand. [3]
The proposed Galloway Plan bore striking resemblance to the Albany Plan, [4] a proposal by Galloway's fellow Pennsylvania delegate (and active correspondent) Benjamin Franklin at the Albany Congress in July 1754 to create a unified government for the Thirteen Colonies. The Albany Plan went beyond the original scope of the Albany Congress, which was to develop a plan of defense for the French and Indian War.
Although as a delegate to the Continental Congress Galloway was a moderate, when his Plan of Union (despite its removal of British Parliamentary sovereignty) [1] was rejected, Galloway moved increasingly towards Loyalism. After 1778, he lived in Britain, where he acted as a leader of the Loyalist movement and an advisor to the government. Once Britain's Parliament accepted American independence as part of the Peace of Paris (1783), many Loyalists went into forced exile, [5] and Galloway permanently settled in Britain.
However, Galloway's Union can be considered a primitive Commonwealth realm, the style of personal union that Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, The Bahamas, Belize, Canada, Grenada, Jamaica, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Solomon Islands, and Tuvalu have with the United Kingdom today, with the President-General becoming the modern-day Governor-General.
The American Revolution was a rebellion and political movement in the Thirteen Colonies which peaked when colonists initiated an ultimately successful war for independence against the Kingdom of Great Britain. Leaders of the American Revolution were colonial separatist leaders who originally sought more autonomy as British subjects, but later assembled to support the Revolutionary War, which ended British colonial rule over the colonies, establishing their independence as the United States of America in July 1776.
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Joseph Galloway was an American attorney and a leading political figure in the events immediately preceding the founding of the United States in the late 18th-century. As a staunch opponent of American independence, he would become one of the most prominent Loyalists in North America during the early part of the Revolutionary War.
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The plan was considered very attractive to most of the members, as it proposed a popularly elected Grand Council which would represent the interests of the colonies as a whole, and would be a continental equivalent to the English Parliament. After a sincere debate, it was rejected by a six to five vote on October 22, 1774. It may have been the arrival of the Suffolk County (Boston) resolutions that killed it.