born Nov. 8, 1732, Talbot county, Md.
died Feb. 14, 1808, Wilmington, Del., U.S.
American statesman.
He represented Pennsylvania at the 1765 Stamp Act Congress and drafted the Congress's declaration of rights and grievances. He won fame in 1767–68 as the author of the Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania, to the Inhabitants of the British Colonies , which influenced opinion against the Townshend Acts . A delegate to the Continental Congress , he helped draft the Articles of Confederation . Hoping for conciliation with the British, he voted against the Declaration of Independence . As a Delaware delegate to the Constitutional Convention , he signed the U.S. Constitution and urged its adoption in a series of letters signed "Fabius." He is sometimes called the "penman of the Revolution."