Page "James Sullivan (governor)" Paragraph 3

Sullivan was elected to the provincial assembly in 1774.

Under the terms of the Massachusetts Government Act, Governor Thomas Gage dissolved the assembly, whose members promptly met anyway, establishing the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, which exercise de facto control over Massachusetts during the early years of the American Revolutionary War.

Sullivan was an early and outspoken advocate in opposition to British colonial policies leading to the revolution, and was a leading proponent in the body of the meeting of a Continental Congress.

In addition to sitting in the provincial congress, Sullivan was a leading organizer of colonial defenses in York County, sitting on its committee of correspondence and other bodies.

He was sent in 1775 as part of a commission to inspect the troops and facilities at Fort Ticonderoga in upstate New York, which was nominally under the control of Benedict Arnold, who had been issued a Massachusetts colonel's commission for the purpose of capturing it.