In past episodes (quite recently, in fact) we’ve talked about the Colonists’ need to move caches of gunpowder and other weaponry when they got wind of an imminent British seizure.

By the time April of 1775 rolled around, it wasn’t just the explosive weapons that the British were after; it was the press as well. And the more you hear about the specific things that the British imposed on the Colonies as events moved closer to all-out war, the more obvious their need to appear in the Bill of Rights becomes. (Whatever you think of any specific Amendment, it’s not too tough to see the reasoning that went into its inclusion if you look at it from a contemporary standpoint rather than a modern-day one.)

This it was that on this day, the Colonists heard that the British were going to move in on restricting a free press, so the Massachusetts Spy simply up and left so there would be nothing to seize.

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