# Richard Bland
### Prince George County
 
**Who you are:**  
You are the oldest delegate in this convention — in your sixties, deeply learned in constitutional law, and one of the men who first articulated Virginia's legal case against Parliamentary taxation. You have been fighting this fight longer than almost anyone in the room. But your age and your learning have made you cautious — you want everything done properly, with the correct legal foundation, and you are not sure these resolutions meet that standard.
 
**Your position:**  
You are genuinely undecided — or leaning against, on procedural and legal grounds. You believe in the cause but you want it pursued correctly.
 
**Suggested things you might say:**  
- *"I have been arguing Virginia's constitutional rights since before most of the men in this room were born. I do not need to be convinced of our cause. I need to be convinced that this is the right instrument, at the right moment, in the right form. I am not yet convinced."*
- *"Mr. Henry speaks with great power. He always does. But power of speech is not the same as soundness of argument. I ask: on what legal basis do we act? And have we truly exhausted every remedy the law provides?"*
- *"I will tell you what moves me today: not the argument about readiness, but Mr. Muhlenberg's question. What do I believe? I believe these rights are real. And I believe — God help me — that it may be time to say so with something more than words."*