upon a branch of commerce, which has already yielded us fuch undoubted advantages, and promifed us much larger. To juftify this complaint, and make the public judges of our grievances, permit me to offer a short recital of facts, which, it is prefumed, are too notorious to be contefted. As the merchant and factor are moft nearly connected with North America, they will with moft propriety ftand firft in the lift of fufferers; and they have had juft occafion to be fo called, as long ago, at least, as the year 1764, when their commissions from thence began very fenfibly to decine by reafon of certain restrictions the traders there were fubjected to from carrying their goods to the best markets. From the fame time, and owing to the fame caufe, may be dated a confiderable failure in the returns due upon merchandize fent to that country; and which returns (it is not doubted) would otherwife have been made. But the measures of the prefent year have produced effects the most of all fatal to us. Such a flame has burit out in the feveral provinces of North America, as the best difpofitions to peace and moderation amongst them have not had it in their power to allay. Some (it can hardly be queftioned) have availed themselves of this confufion, fo as to retain what they ought, and were able, to have paid; whilft others, who were really defirous of acquitting themfelves with honour, found it impoffible to collect their outstanding debts: the obvious refult of which is, that their corres pondents at home feem now to be cut off from even a probability of receiving their remittances from thence. And, if the delay of remittances has been extremely inconvenient to them, the lofs of expectation itself (by which they fee themselves incapa citated from difcharging their own obfigations) must of courfe be very galhing to ingenuous ninds, a great embaraiment to all their concerns, and excite very uneafy apprehenfions as to the very fecurity of a capital lying at to great a distance, and at fo diftracted a juncture. The Merchant's and factor's dif appointment could not fail (as ha been intimated) feverely to anect the mafter-manufacturer, who, for want of his payments, is deprived of many advantages in going to market with his ready money. The difficulty which fame have had to contract their bufinefs in proportion to the fmall demands there have been for feveral months paft, and the too fond prefumption alfo of fome, that times would foon be more favourable, have contributed fo fuch large ftocks of goods in many perfons hands, as cannot poffibly be fupported any longer. Others ftill there are, whofe few orders which they have had from their old mafters here, and they have been with great affiduity compleating, are now on a fudden conntermanded and with this aggravating circumftance, that the goods are not any where elfe fo faleable as in the colonies, if at all. Added to which the feclufion of all hope of their trade's reviving in our fituation, both from the inabilty of the Americans to fulfil their contracts, and the folemn engagements lately entered into (fome by choice, and more perhaps by compulfion) not to receive and fell any of the manufactures of Great Britain that shall be shipped after the first of January next. But the greatest evil centers, after all, among the labouring poor. Of thofe, who may have appearance of employment, great numbers have for fome time had fcarce half the work they were used to for the fuftenance of their families. Others have been neceffitated to accept of what work they could procure on the condition of reduced wages. And thousands, it is believed, on the whole have either been obliged (greatly to their prejudice) to abandon their former occupations, or are now starving under an abfolute want of employment. If this is the deplorable cafe of our people already, what are we to expect when the total op we have mentioned fhall take place, as to the forwarding any more of our manufactures to America? Such an event, at this feafon of the year, joined with the prefent high price of provifions, foggefts STRICTURES 32 But has this been univerfal? Be: fides, have we either encouraged or vindicated their extravagancies? Shall this then be of fufficient weight to exclude our remonstrances? Refentments like thefe belong not to no ́ble minds. In fhort, the grievances we have exhibited are already the grievances of the whole community; and felf prefervation, the firft law of nature, calls on every member to lend a helping hand for their removal. Nay, the man who can be a cool fpectator of the miferies impending on his country, is guilty of as ftrange a folecifm in his actions, as he, that, when his neighbours houfes are burning around him, can look on with an indifference, for which he has no other reason, than that the devouring flames have not yet reached his own. Stimulated, then, by the many motives which crowd in upon us, especially by the afpect of our affairs, which is daily becoming more ferious, would repeat our entreaties for the good offices of all our fellow fubjects, and moft of all thofe of the first rank in our happy conftitution. Permit us to fay, that many thoufands are at this time fixing their anxious eyes upon you, amongst whom are numbers in the helplefs ftages of life, who are peculiarly entitled to your pity they requeft our being bearers to you of their wants and their defpair; and their countenances alone have an eloquence in them not to be we Jan. refifted. They all humbly follicit To the AUTHOR &c. BY a ftatute 34 Ed. I. intituled de tallagio non concedendo, it is declared and enacted-that no tallage or aid fhall be taken or levied without the good will and assent of the earls, barons, knights, burgeffes, and other freemen of the commonality of the realm. This ftatute being a declara. tion of the common law, was therefore only a reftitution to the subjects of their ancient liberties and free cuftoms. The fame declaration had fre quently been made, in former reigns, in the way of charter; was afterwards repeated by ftatute 14 Ed. III, and, ftill more recently, very emphatically recited, and allotted to the precedency or place of eminence, in the memorial petition of right, which also paffed into a ftatute 3 Car. I, in order, as was faid, by a patriotic member at that time, to reinforce the ancient laws made by our ancestors, by fetting fuch a kamp upon them, that no licentious fpirit fhould in future dare to invade themSir Edward Coke, in an introductory fpeech, thus gloriously opened the fubject of common grievances, then under the contemplation of parlia ment; "I'll begin with a noble record: It chears my heart to think of it: It is worthy to be written in letters of gold. Loans aguinft the will of the fubject are against reafon and the franchises of the land. What a word is that franchises? The lord may tax his villain high or low: But it is against the franchises of the land for freemen to be taxed but by their confent in parliament." * Near twenty thousand people are supposed to have been for many years employed in manufacturing of nails only, in this neigbourhood, and, on a moderate computation, more than a fourth part have gone to North America. + Befides the burden which a large number of unemployed poor must be to a nation in general, the very value of lands, which rife aud fall with the fate of trade, aburdantly evinces this truth. By 1766. On American Affairs. By the charters of the antient colonies, the crown expressly grants to all its fubjects and their children inhabiting, or to inhabit within the fame all liberties and immunities of free and natural fubjects, to all intents, conftructions and purposes whatsoever, as if they and every of them were born within the realm of England. And by ftatutes 13th and 20th Geo. 2d, even foreign proteftants, upon particular conditions and qualifications therein specified, are to be deemed as natural-born subjects, and to enjoy the fame privileges, &c. Now although the legiflatures of the colonies were established in purfuance of royal charters, yet the setlers, as English fubjects, were certainly entitled by the above recited principles of our conftitution and their civil rights, either to thofe local legiflatures, or to a representation in the English parliament; in order to induce a legal obligation of their obedience to its internal affeffiments of them or to their being taxed there according to their franchises as freemen. And this being the cafe, I am at a lofs to know how the colonists could by the operation of a scire facias or a quo warranto, be deprived of their legislative privileges, whenever it fhould be thought proper, as has been too peremptorily afferted. Viewing them in their artificial character, as bodies politic conftituted by the royal charters, they cannot commit treafon, rebellion, or other crimes, although in their diftin&t individual capacities they certainly may: It should therefore ill become the juftice of a British parliament to diffolve their charters, as forfeited, on pretence of any crimes which the law fays they tannot corporately be guilty of. And confidering them in their diftinct or individual capacities, I never heard that a Scire Facias or a Quo Warranto could be iffued against the civil liberties or franchifes of freemen. 33 "that all laws, by-laws, ufages or cuftoms, which fhall be in practice in the plantations, repugnant to the before-mentioned laws, or to this act, or any other laws to be made in this kingdom, fo far as fuch laws fhall relate to the plantation, are void." Now it is plain that this fection was no more than executive of the conditional claufe, inferted in the colony charters, which provide-" that their laws to be enacted, in pursuance of the the legislative jurifdiction thereby granted them, fhould not be repugnant to thofe of Great Britain." A condition confefedly reasonable, that has accordingly been always attended to by the colonies in the conftruction of their legiflative acts, and which confidered in its relation to laws of political or civil juftice to be enacted there, was in a former letter fufficiently explained; though in a way quite contrary to the application and use above made of it. But with refpect to the commercial fenfe and relation in which it must be understood as it stands executively in the abovementioned ftatute of king William, it fhould be previously remarked,— that all the pre-exifting ftatutes concerning the colonies, as well as the preceding fections of this act (to both which an exprefs and conductive reference is made) being wholly relative to matters of, or incidental to their trade and commerce; it is obvious from this relation, that the words "repugnant to the before-mentioned laws or to this act"only make a repugnancy in the plantation-laws, ufages, &c.tothofe of Great Britain in commercial cafes. That retrospective and prefent reference, and this neceffary conftruction refulting from it, do alfo lead and connectively confine the general sense and relation of the fubfequent words "or to any other laws to be made in this kingdom."-and thus make them to fignify only any other laws, to be made here, of the fame tendency, or But it has been further afferted, operative on like commercial fubjects;" "that it was with a view to rescue for were they to be understood at large the British legislature from all objec- as meaning any other laws to be made tion to jurifdiction, (particularly as it in this kingdom of what kind or tenwould feem regarding the legality of dency foever, fuch a refulting refervathe late ftamp act) that the ftatute of the tion of power would, from the univer thand 8th of king William 3d, fec.gth, fality of its nature, be unapplicable bath fo exprefsly declared and referv-in its extent, be illimitable; and ed the power of parliament over all perhaps might, in execution, prove the colonies; it being thereby enacted unconftitutional, contradictory, or Jan. 1766. F abfurd: The Stamp-Act in America 34 abfurd and therefore this licentioufnes of construction would prove too much, that is to faya legal nothing. Further, in order to bring the ftamp act within the legality of the jurifdic tion of parliament, and to justify the enactment thereof by the refervation of its power over all the colonies above fuppofed to be implied in these words of the act,, viz, or any other law to be made in this kingdom," it muft for this purpose be previously taken for granted that any law to be made at any future time, fooner or later by the British parliament relating to the colonies, although fubverfive of their former conftitutions, laws or ulages, however thefe had been authoritatively and immemorially established, confirmed, or fanctified would hence be good and valid. : And the ftamp act is undoubtedly fo fubverfive, as intercepting their legiative power of regulating their own internal affairs?But fuch a conftruction is neither refulting from any affinity with the premifles, or other objets of the act itfelf, nor to be juftified by any auxiliary rules of confitutional juftice, or legal interpretation and therefore must not be fuppofed to have been within the intent or meaning of the legislators, who fo generally made it. Lally, It ought alfo to be oblerved - that the abovementioned proof of the legality of the parliamentary power in queftion is drawn from an implicit avowal of its own juridiction made by the parliament itfelf; which is in fact to be both party and judge in the fame queftion. An heterogeneous conjunction, that would be abhorrent to all rules and maxims of law. But in a free government the reafons of an affumed power must be always founded on the principles and genius of the conftitution, and not be made to ftand on its own acts or declarations only: Otherwife it might be doubted whether the authority of thefe would prove any farther decitive than its means could go—for carrying them into execution. An umpire, that in all cafes may not be altogether fafe or political to truft to! But alas! from what motives is all this keennefs, induftry, and ingenuity ufed, to argue the Americans out of Jan. their internal privileges, which can never properly interfere with the external fuperiority of the mother state, nor at all affect her enjoyment of all the real advantages that the can reafonably wish to derive from their fubferviency to her in every other respect? It seems to favour too much of a puerility, that, because we cannot have the fame things in our own manner, we fhould put to the hazard our not having them at all; or that what we might take, obliquely as it were, with their own good will and fubmiffion, will not be acceptable, unless it be offensively extorted, and directly furrendered per force. Is this frowardnefs like the temper of a great nation, or compatible with the justice, equity, and generofity of Englishmen ? Surely it would tend to foften our prejudices, were we to confider, that the American is apparelled from head to foot in our manufactures: that he fcarcely drinks, fits, moves, labours, or recreates himself, without mediately or immediately contributing to the einolument of the mother country. For even thefe reafons, fo pat to the minds of all mercenary people, one would think the fupport of the colomies here fhould have been more general and hearty on this occafion. But were the nature of their caufe, and the true queftion, rightly contemplated, what advocates might not have been expected in a land, wherein liberty is fuppofed to have fixed her favourite refidence? Even in a cause that in confequence may affect every English citizen and freeman? A ftretch of power fuffered to be fuccefsfully exerted over any fellow fubjects, however remotely fituated from the mother-country, might afterwards by the fame defpotic fpirit, fhould opportunity serve, be turned upon themfelves: For encroachments upon li berty are, like the preparatory approaches to a fiege, always commenced at a diftance, and first directed against the outworks; which if difregarded, or left undifputed by the citizens, it will be afterwards too late to take an alarm any where. -jam proximus ardet Ucalegon: Further, it thould ever be kept in memory throughout the whole courie of this argument, that the question is of 1766. RATIONALLY CONDEMNED. of a conftitutional, in oppofition to an arbitrary dependency in the colonies on the mother-country, and not whether they shall be independent of her? Which has been demonftrated could not poffibly follow, fhould all the privileges they claim a right to, be justly confirmed to them. An independency, which themselves by no means affect, nor would prove their true intereft, were it even in their power to attain it. On the other hand, it would not be unufeful to reflect, whether even the mother-country itfelf would be bettered in her fovereignty over the colonies, were their rights thrown out of the queftion, or their claim of English franchifes to be regarded as a fantastic illufion. And as fuch this claim muft certainly be confidered by thofe, who maintain the abfolute jurifdiction of a limited government, and talk of a neceffity for ufing military force to drive the nail -that would not go.In all governments not founded upon liberty, the inftrument of an established force is neceffary to fecure the fubmiffion of the commonalty, and to maintain internal order. And in fuch governments the few by this rod may indeed rule the many. But then this force should be at hand, and even cantoned upon the spot, and at the leaft must have the appearance of being adequate to the end. The conftituent of this force muft alfo be actuated by fome principle, like the honour of the French military, quite diftin&t from and even adverfary to the concerns of those flaves they are destined to bridle, and in no respect have an inter-commmunion or fellowship of franchifes with them: otherwife it would not be a force to be depended on, and chance might pull down the edifice to day, which yefterday fhe had as capriciouily erected. But in a government founded upon liberty, even the appearance of force is not only unneceffary to this end, but always ungrateful; unneceflary, because liberty, a more fure principle than that of fear, infures the obedience of the fabject, by making him a party as it were in the government of himself, and by giving him a common ftake to the fubfiftence and welfare of the commonwealth; which thus is equally his 35 duty and intereft to maintain: Ungrate ful, becaufe to a willing mind nothing is fo indicate and difguftful as the face of compulfion. So that, whether the colonists are, or are not, generally intitled to the liberties and franchife's of English fubjects, or in particular to legiflative privileges, as granted by their charters, for the conclufive regulation of their internal affairs; it would affuredly be the trueft policy in the mother-ftate, as exerciting the powers of a free government, even formally to confirm the fame to them, fince fuch a policy only can intimately connect them to her deminion, acquire their confidence, conciliate their affections, and infure their filial fupport of her on any critical occafions. It is obferved in a fubtile pamphlet relative to the late tax on the colonies, "that the very oppreflive and repugnant manner in which that was propofed to be levied, thewed how fatally the juftice of parliament might be impofed upon, by a furreptitious acquifition of its fanction to the views of an ignorant or infidious miniftry." And may I hope that, fince the publication of the American charters, and a more attentive enquiry into the conftitutional rights of the colonists, their fundamental dependancy on the mother-country, and the expediency of a juft conduct towards them, has been made, even the power itfelf of laying internal taxes on the colonies will neither appear confiftent to the wisdom and equity of an auguft affembly, nor at all neceflary to the maintenance of its fovereign jurifdiction over them, nor even any ways contributory to the advancement of the folid views or itability of the mother-itate! And now, fir, I take leave of this argument; awaiting in anxious fatpenfe that decifion, which must aftertain the fate of a queftion I have fo unequally attempted to difcufs. And yet, fo alarming feems to me the prefent crifis, fo perilous the confequences to be apprehended from any untoward iffue; that I would fain hazard a notion; it is-that nothing less than an actual and generous repeal of the act in question, can, on the one hand either totally extinguith all parks of civil fire, animofity, difguft," and fu picion, and effectuate a thorough, F 2 tha |
