Petitions have a special place in the history of the United States of America. As a last-ditch effort to avert a war with England, in July of 1775 The Second Continental Congress made a final effort to seek reconciliation with Britain. The chief advocate of this effort was John Dickinson, a conservative delegate from Pennsylvania, who authored the Olive Branch Petition. King George III refused to receive the petition when it reached him in August of 1775. [source][source]

One year later, Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence and on July 4, 1776, many of those who had signed the petition George III ignored, signed the Declaration of Independence.[source]

The founders of this country relied on events in English history when they created these documents. Over one hundred years before the American Revolution, members of the British parliament were trying to get the crown to acknowledge legal rights they believed the laws of Britain already granted to free male Britons.[source] In 1628, the upper and lower houses of the British Parliament agreed on the Petition of Right and presented it to King Charles I.[source] Charles was forced to accept the Petition of Right by the fact that he needed money, and Parliament would not agree to subsidize Charles' expenditures unless he accepted the Petition.[source]

As readers of this space may recall, one of the major motivations for the American Revolution was the problem of taxation without representation. That is, American colonists refused to subsidize the later British monarch George III, just as the the British Parliament refused to subsidize Charles I. In both cases, the petitioners of their time sought to hold the relevant executive power to democratic principles and processes as they were understood in the 17th and 18th centuries; moreover, they used their petitions to make it clear that without appropriate response from the recipient they would withhold funds needed and requested by the recipient.

Today, people committed to democracy continue to use petitions to hold leaders accountable. My own favorite example of the moment can be found here.