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Patrick Henry rose to prominence in Virginia during a period when conflicts between the American colonies and Great Britain were growing increasingly heated. Almost always championing the cause of the common man, Henry insisted both that government owed a duty to its citizens and that excessive government threatened individual liberty. With his unparalleled oratorical skills, Henry became a key defender of religious liberty, freedom of speech, and government responsiveness to citizen interests and violently opposed anything that he saw as governmental tyranny; as such, many contemporaries credited Henry as being among the key instigators of revolution.