Congregations of the Three Denominations of Dissenters, chaired by Russell himself. The committee, with Russell's financial backing, undertook the publication and distribution of a number of works on religious liberty, including two volumes of Extracts, substantially edited by Russell. Uniting Protestant dissenters Russell now sought a union of Protestant Dissenters throughout the land, proposing a four tier Plan of Union, by which Congregations in towns and counties would send deputies to Town and County Meetings of Deputies. These in turn would unite in Provincial Meetings, which would send deputies to a National Meeting in London. The Protestant Dissenting Deputies in London, initially rejected Russell's suggestion of a National Meeting. However, countrywide support, prompted by Russell's vigorous canvassing, led the London Deputies to meet with country delegates, to discuss the issue. As a result, on 13 May 1790 the London Dissenting Deputies passed a resolution that a Standing Committee of 'delegates from different parts of the kingdom be appointed to meet in London.' The Birmingham Committee had consistently gone further than the London Dissenting Deputies in calling for the repeal of all penal legislation against Dissenters, including the act against non-Trinitarians. Now, Russell called together on 13 January 1790, a meeting in Leicester of 'Deputies of Protestant Dissenters of the Three Denominations within the Midland District.' Echoing the resolutions of the Birmingham Committee, the Midland District meeting issued a sweeping condemnation of all penal statutes against Dissenters. Russell was appointed secretary and treasurer of the executive committee. Following the failure of the third application for the repeal of the Test Acts, Russell and Priestley sought parliamentary reform as the most effectual means of achieving equal citizenship. Towards this end, Russell developed plans for a Warwickshire Constitutional Society. The society was to have been launched at a dinner in Birmingham on 14 July 1791, but the hostility that developed in Birmingham in the days leading up to the dinner caused the abandonment of the plan. The dinner itself was followed by the infamous riots, in which Russell's house was destroyed along with Priestley's. Russell sought temporary refuge in London where he had an interview with Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger. He returned to Birmingham a few weeks later, but found the town so divided by sectarian disputes that by 1794 he decided to take his three children to America. Russell's zest for controversy never left him. In 1800, defending Priestley's publication