THE CONTEST OVER PARLIAMENTARY TAXATION, 1763-1773
The Prime Minister responsible for the new colonial policy was George
Grenville, who assumed his position in May, 1763, shortly after the
final treaty of Paris. Every other member of his Cabinet was a
nobleman, Grenville himself was brother of an earl, and most of them
had had places in preceding Ministries. It was a typical
administration of the period, completely aristocratic in membership and
spirit, quite indifferent to colonial views, and incapable of
comprehending colonial ideals even if they had known them. To them the
business in hand was a purely practical one; and with confident energy
Grenville pushed through a series of measures, which had been carefully
worked out, of course, by minor officials unknown to fame, during the
preceding months, {29} but which were destined to produce results
undreamed of by any one in England.
In the first place, there were a number of measures to strengthen and
revivify the Acts of Trade. Colonists were given new privileges in the
whale fishery, hides and skins were "enumerated," and steps were taken
to secure a more rigorous execution of the Acts by the employment of
naval vessels against smuggling. A new Sugar Act reduced the tariff on
foreign sugar to such a point that it would be heavily protective
without being prohibitive, and at the same time imposed special duties
on Portuguese wines, while providing additional machinery for
collecting customs. This was clearly aimed at the weak point in the
existing navigation system; but it introduced a new feature, for the
sugar duties, unlike previous ones, were intended to raise a revenue,
and this, it was provided in the Act, should be used to pay for the
defence of America.
A second new policy was inaugurated in a proclamation of October, 1763,
which made Florida and Canada despotically governed provinces, and set
off all the land west of the head-waters of the rivers running into the
Atlantic as an Indian reservation. No further land grants were to be
made in that region, nor was any trade to be permitted with the Indians
save by royal licence. The {30} Imperial government thus assumed
control of Indian policy, and endeavoured to check any further growth
of the existing communities to the West. Such a scheme necessitated
the creation of a royal standing army in America on a larger scale than
the previous garrisons; and this plan led to the third branch of the
new policy, which contemplated the positive interposition of Parliament
to remedy the shortcomings of colonial assemblies. An Act of 1764
prohibited the future issue of any paper money by any colony, thus
terminating one of the chief grievances of British governors and
merchants. But still more striking was an Act of 1765, which provided
with great elaboration for the collection of a stamp tax in the
colonies upon all legal documents, newspapers, and pamphlets. The
proceeds were to be used to pay about one-third of the cost of the new
standing army, which was to consist of ten thousand men. Taken in
connection with the announced intention of using the revenue from the
Sugar Act for the same purpose, it is obvious that Grenville's measures
were meant to relieve the Imperial government from the necessity of
depending in future upon the erratic and unmanageable colonial
legislatures. They were parts of a general political and financial
programme. There is not the slightest evidence that Grenville or his
associates dreamed {31} that they were in any way affecting the
colonists' rights or restricting their liberties. Grenville did
consult the colonial agents--individuals authorized to represent the
colonial assemblies in England--but simply with a view to meeting
practical objections. The various proclamations or orders were issued
without opposition, and the bills passed Parliament almost unnoticed.
The British governing class was but slightly concerned with colonial
reform: the Board of Trade, the colonial officials, and the responsible
Ministers were the only people interested.
To the astonishment of the Cabinet and of the English public, the new
measures, especially the Sugar Act and the Stamp Act, raised a storm of
opposition in the colonies unlike anything in their history. The
reasons are obvious. If the new Sugar Act was to be enforced, it meant
the end of the flourishing French West India intercourse and the death
of the "triangular" trade. Every distiller, shipowner, and exporter of
fish, timber, or grain, felt himself threatened with ruin. If the
Stamp Act were enforced, it meant the collection of a tax from
communities already in debt from the French wars, which were in future
to be denied the facile escape from heavy taxes hitherto afforded by
bills of credit. But the economic burdens threatened were almost lost
sight of in the political {32} dangers. If England meant to impose
taxes by parliamentary vote for military purposes, instead of calling
upon the colonists to furnish money and men, it meant a deadly blow to
the importance of the assemblies. They could no longer exercise
complete control over their property and their finances. They would
sink to the status of mere municipal bodies. So far as the Americans
of 1765 were concerned, the feeling was universal that such a change
was intolerable, that if they ceased to have the full power to give or
withhold taxes at their discretion they were practically slaves.
In every colony there sprang to the front leaders who voiced these
sentiments in impassioned speeches and pamphlets; for the most part
young men, many of them lawyers accustomed to look for popular approval
in resisting royal governors. Such men as James Otis and Samuel Adams
in Massachusetts, William Livingston in New York, Patrick Henry in
Virginia, Christopher Gadsden in South Carolina denounced the Stamp Act
as tyrannous, unconstitutional, and an infringement of the liberties of
the colonists. Popular anger rose steadily until, in the autumn, when
the stamps arrived, the people of the thirteen colonies had nerved
themselves to the pitch of refusing to obey the Act. Under pressure
from crowds of angry men, {33} every distributor was compelled to
resign, the stamps were in some cases destroyed, and in Boston the
houses of unpopular officials were mobbed and sacked. Before the
excitement, the governors stood utterly helpless. They could do
nothing to carry out the Act.
In October, delegates representing nearly all the colonies met at New
York, and drafted resolutions expressing their firm belief that no tax
could legally be levied upon them but by their own consent, given
through their legislatures. It was the right of Englishmen not to be
taxed without their consent. Petitions in respectful but determined
language were sent to the King and to Parliament, praying for the
repeal of the Stamp Act and the Sugar Act. For the first time in their
history, the colonies stood together in full harmony to denounce and
reject an Act passed by Parliament. As a social and political fact,
this unanimous demonstration of colonial feeling was of profound
significance. The ease and ability with which the lawyers, planters,
farmers, or merchants directed the popular excitement into effective
channels showed the widespread political education of the Americans. A
not dissimilar excitement in London in the same years found no other
means of expressing itself than bloody rioting. It was American {34}
republicanism showing its strongest aspect in political resistance.
The issue thus presented to the British government was one demanding
the most careful consideration and far-seeing wisdom in its treatment.
Grenville's measures, however admirable and reasonable in themselves,
had stirred the bitter opposition of all the colonists, and the
enforcement or modification of them called for steadiness and courage.
Were the English governing noblemen of the day ready to persist in the
new policy? If so, it meant violent controversy and possibly colonial
insurrection; but the exertion of British authority, if coupled with
strong naval pressure, ought to prevail. Angry as the colonists were,
their language indicates that revolution was not in their thoughts;
and, if there was one quality beyond all others in which the British
aristocracy excelled, it was an inflexible tenacity when once a policy
was definitely embraced. Unfortunately for both sides, the clear-cut
issue thus raised was obscured and distorted by the presence on the
throne of an ambitious young prince with a policy which threw British
domestic affairs into unexampled confusion.
George III, obstinate, narrow-minded, and determined to make his own
will felt in the choice of Ministers and the direction of affairs, had
succeeded his grandfather in 1760. Too {35} astute to violate the
fast-bound tradition of the British constitution that he must govern
only through Ministers, he saw that to have his own way he must secure
political servants who, while acting as Cabinet Ministers, should take
their orders from him. He also saw that to destroy the hold of the
Whig family cliques he must enter politics himself and buy, intimidate,
and cajole in order to win a following for his Ministers in parliament.
With this ideal in view, he subordinated all other considerations to
the single one of getting subservient Ministers, and fought or
intrigued against any Cabinet which did not accept his direction,
until, in 1770, he finally triumphed. In the meantime he had kept
England under a fluctuating succession of Ministries which forbade the
maintenance of any coherent or authoritative colonial policy such as
alone could have prevented disaster.
In 1761 George III tried to induce Parliament to accept the leadership
of the Earl of Bute, his former tutor, who had never held public
office; but his rapid rise to the Premiership aroused such jealousy
among the nobility and such unpopularity among the people that the
unfortunate Scot quailed before the storm of ridicule and abuse. He
resigned in 1763, and was succeeded by Grenville, who instantly showed
George III that he would take no dictation. On the contrary, {36} he
drove the King to the point of fury by his masterfulness. In
desperation, George then turned to the Marquis of Rockingham who, if
equally determined to decline royal dictation, was personally less
offensive to him; and there came in a Ministry of the usual type, all
noblemen but two minor members, and all belonging to "connections"
different from those of the Grenville Ministry. Thus it was that, when
the unanimous defiance of the Americans reached England, the Ministers
responsible for the colonial reforms were out of office, and the
Rockingham Whigs had assumed control, feeling no obligation to continue
anything begun by their predecessors. George III's interposition was
responsible for this situation.
When Parliament met in January, 1766, the colonists received powerful
allies, first in the British merchants, who petitioned against the Act
as causing the practical stoppage of American purchases, and second in
William Pitt, who, in a burning speech, embraced in full the colonists'
position, and declared that a parliamentary tax upon the plantations
was absolutely contrary to the rights of Englishmen. He "rejoiced that
America has resisted." This radical position found few followers; but
the Whig Ministry, after some hesitation, decided to grant the colonial
demands while insisting {37} on the imperial rights of Parliament.
This characteristically English action was highly distasteful to the
majority in the House of Lords, who voted to execute the law, and to
George III, who disliked to yield to mutinous subjects; but they were
forced to give way. The Stamp Act was repealed, and the sugar duties
were reduced to a low figure. At the same time a Declaratory Act was
passed, asserting that Parliament had full power to bind the colonies
"in all cases whatsoever." Thus the Americans had their way in part,
while submitting to seeing their arguments rejected.
The consequences of this unfortunate affair were to bring into sharp
contrast the British and the American views of the status of the
colonies. The former considered them as parts of the realm, subject
like any other part to the legislative authority of King, Lords, and
Commons. The contention of the colonists, arising naturally from the
true situation in each colonial government, that the rights of
Englishmen guaranteed their freedom from taxation without
representation, was answered by the perfectly sound legal assertion
that the colonists, like all the people of England, were "virtually"
represented in the House of Commons. The words, in short, meant one
thing in England, another thing in America. English speakers {38} and
writers pointed to the scores of statutes affecting the colonies,
calling attention especially to the export duties of the Navigation Act
of 1672, and the import duties of the Act of 1733, not to mention its
revision of 1764. Further, Parliament had regulated provincial coinage
and money, had set up a postal service, and established rates.
Although Parliament had not imposed any such tax as the Stamp Act, it
had, so far as precedent showed, exercised financial powers on many
occasions.
To meet the British appeal to history, the colonists developed the
theory that commercial regulation, including the imposition of customs
duties, was "external" and hence lay naturally within the scope of
imperial legislation, but that "internal" taxation was necessarily in
the hands of the colonial assemblies. There was sufficient
plausibility in this claim to commend it to Pitt, who adopted it in his
speeches, and to Benjamin Franklin, the agent for Pennsylvania, already
well known as a "philosopher," who expounded it confidently when he was
examined as an expert on American affairs at the bar of the Commons.
It was, however, without any clear legal justification, and, as English
speakers kept pointing out, it was wholly incompatible with the
existence of a genuine imperial government. That it was {39} a
perfectly practical distinction, in keeping with English customs, was
also true; but that was not to be realized until three-quarters of a
century later.
With the repeal of the objectionable law the uproar in America ceased,
and, amid profuse expressions of gratitude to Pitt, the Ministry, and
the King, the colonists returned to their normal activities. The other
parts of the Grenville programme were not altered, and it was now
possible for English Ministers, by a wise and steady policy, to improve
the weak spots in the colonial system without giving undue offence to a
population whose sensitiveness and obstinate devotion to entire
self-government had been so powerfully shown. Unfortunately, the King
again interposed his influence in such wise as to prevent any rational
colonial policy. In the summer of 1766, tiring of the Rockingham
Ministry, he managed to bring together an odd coalition of political
groups under the nominal headship of the Duke of Grafton. Pitt, who
disliked the family cliques, accepted office and the title of Earl of
Chatham, hoping to lead a national Ministry. The other elements were
in part Whig, and in part representatives of the so-called "King's
Friends"--a growing body of more or less venal politicians who clung to
George's support for the sake of the patronage to be {40} gained--and
several genuine Tories who looked to a revived royal power to end the
Whig monopoly. From such a Cabinet no consistent policy was to be
expected, save under leadership of a man like Pitt. Unfortunately the
latter was immediately taken with an illness which kept him out of
public life for two years; and Grafton, the nominal Prime Minister, was
utterly unable to hold his own against the influence and intrigues of
the King. From the start, accordingly, the Ministry proved weak and
unstable, and it allowed a new set of colonial quarrels to develop.
Charles Townshend, Chancellor of the Exchequer, one of the originators
of the new colonial policy under the Bute Ministry, was so ill-advised
as to renew the attempt to raise a colonial revenue by parliamentary
taxation. His manner of proposing the measure gave the impression that
it was a piece of sheer bravado on his part, intended to regain the
prestige which he had lost by failing to carry all of his first budget;
but the nature of the scheme indicates its close connection with the
Grenville ideals. Avoiding the appearance of a direct internal tax, he
caused the imposition of duties on glass, painters' colours, paper, and
tea, without any pretence of regulating commerce, but for the announced
purpose of defraying the expenses {41} of governors and judges in the
colonies. Another measure established an American Board of
Commissioners for customs. Still another punished the province of New
York for failing to comply with an Act of 1765 authorizing quartering
of troops in the colonies. The assembly was forbidden to pass any law
until it should make provision for the soldiers in question.
Ex-governor Pownall of Massachusetts, now in Parliament, did not fail
to warn the House of the danger into which it was running; but his
words were unheeded, and the Bills passed promptly.
The result of these measures was inevitable. Every political leader in
the colonies--nay, every voter--saw that the Townshend duties, while in
form "external," were pure revenue measures, unconnected with the Acts
of Trade, and intended to strike at colonial independence in a vital
point. If Great Britain undertook henceforward to pay the salaries of
royal officials, one of the principal sources of power would be taken
away from the assemblies. Instantly the distinction of "external" and
"internal" taxation was abandoned; and from end to end of the Atlantic
seaboard a cry went up that the duties were an insidious attack on the
liberties of the Americans, an outrageous taking of their property
without their consent, and a wanton interference with their {42}
governments. Not merely agitators such as the shrewd Samuel Adams and
the eloquent Patrick Henry uttered these views, but men of far more
considerable property and station--such as John Jay and New York
landowners and importers, John Dickinson and the Philadelphia
merchants, George Washington and the Virginia planters. While no
general Congress was summoned, the legislatures of the colonies adopted
elaborate resolutions, pamphleteers issued a stream of denunciations,
and, most important of all, a concerted effort was made to break down
the Acts by abstaining from any importations, not only of the taxed
commodities, but, so far as possible, of any British products.
Commercial boycott, it was hoped, would have the same effect as at the
time of the Stamp Act.
By this time the colonial argument had come to assume a much broader
character, for, in order to deny the validity of the New York Assembly
Act and the Townshend duties, it became necessary to assert that
Parliament, according to "natural rights," had no legislative authority
over the internal affairs of a colony. This was vested, by the
constitution of each province or chartered colony, in the Crown and the
colonial legislature. Such a theory reduced the imperial tie to little
more than a personal union through the monarch, coupled with the {43}
admitted power of Parliament to regulate commerce and navigation.
Evidently, as in all such cases, the theory was framed to justify a
particular desire, namely, to keep things where they had been prior to
1763. The sole question at issue was, in reality, one of power, not of
abstract or legal right. Once more it was clear to men of penetrating
vision that the American colonies needed extremely careful handling.
Whether their arguments were sound or fallacious, loyal or seditious,
it was significant that the whole continent spoke with one voice and
felt but one desire--to be allowed to exercise complete financial
discretion and to retain full control over governors and judges.
Unfortunately the condition of things in England was such that a cool
or steady treatment of the question was becoming impossible. In the
first place, the Grafton Ministry was reconstituted in 1768, the
"Pittite" elements withdrawing, and being replaced by more King's
Friends and Tories, while George III's influence grew predominant.
Townshend died in September, 1767, but his place was taken by Lord
North, a Tory and especially subservient to the King. A new
secretaryship for the colonies was given to Lord Hillsborough, who had
been in the Board of Trade in the Grenville Ministry, and represented
his views. Neither of these {44} men was inclined to consider colonial
clamour in any other light than as unpardonable impudence and sedition.
In the second place, the old Whig family groups were fast assuming an
attitude of bitter opposition to the new Tories, and by 1768 were
prepared to use the American question as a convenient weapon to
discredit the Ministry. They were quite as aristocratic in temper as
the ministerial party, but advocated forbearance, conciliation, and
calmness in dealing with the Americans, in speeches as remarkable for
their political good sense as for their ferocity toward North,
Hillsborough, and the rest. While the Ministry drew its views of the
American situation from royal governors and officials, the Whigs
habitually consulted with Franklin and the other colonial agents, who
occupied a quasi-diplomatic position. Thus the American question
became a partisan battleground. The Tories, attacked by the Whigs,
developed a stubborn obstinacy in holding to a "firm" colonial policy,
and exhibited a steady contempt and anger toward their American
adversaries which was in no small degree due to the English party
antagonism.
Still further to confuse the situation, there occurred at this time the
contest of John Wilkes, backed by the London mob, against the Grafton
Ministry. This demagogue, able {45} and profligate, had already come
into conflict with the Grenville Ministry in 1765, and had been driven
into exile. Now, in 1768, he returned and was repeatedly elected to
the Commons, and as often unseated by the vindictive ministerial
majority. Riots and bloodshed accompanied the agitation; and Wilkes
and his supporters, backed by the parliamentary Whigs, habitually
proclaimed the same doctrines of natural rights which were universally
asserted in America. To the King and his Cabinet, Wilkes and the
American leaders appeared indistinguishable. They were all brawling,
disorderly, and dangerous demagogues, deserving of no consideration.
Under these circumstances, the complaints of the colonists, although
supported by the Whigs and by Chatham, received scant courtesy in
England. The Grafton Ministry showed nothing but an irritated
intention to maintain imperial supremacy by insisting on the taxes and
demanding submissiveness on the part of the assemblies. A series of
"firm" instructions was sent out by Hillsborough, typical of which was
an order that the Massachusetts legislature must rescind its circular
letter of protest under threat of dissolution, and that the other
assemblies must repudiate the letter under a similar menace. The sole
result was a series of embittered wrangles, dissolutions, protests,
{46} and quarrels which left the colonists still more inflamed. Then,
at the suggestion of the Commissioners of Customs, two regiments of
troops were sent to Boston to over-awe that particularly defiant
colony. There being no legislature in session, the Massachusetts towns
sent delegates to a voluntary convention which drafted a protest.
Immediately, this action was denounced by Hillsborough as seditious and
was censured by Parliament; while the Duke of Bedford moved that an old
statute of Henry VIII, by which offenders outside the realm could be
brought to England for trial, should be put into operation against the
colonial agitators. When the Virginia legislature protested against
this step, it was dissolved. Hillsborough and North acted as though
they believed that a policy of scolding and nagging, if made
sufficiently disagreeable, would bring the colonists to their senses.
That the Whigs did not cease to pour contempt and ridicule on the folly
of such behaviour was probably one reason why the government persisted
in its course. The American question was coming to be beyond the reach
of reason.
Yet in 1769 the Ministry could not avoid recognizing that as financial
measures the Townshend duties were a hopeless failure, since their net
proceeds were less than 300 pounds and the increased military expenses
were {47} declared by Pownall to be over 170,000 pounds. On May 1,
1769, the Cabinet voted to repeal the taxes on glass, colours, and
paper, but by a majority of one determined to keep the tea duty. This
decision was due to the complaisance of Lord North, who saw the
unwisdom of the step, but yielded to the King's wish to retain one tax
in order to assert the principle of parliamentary supremacy. A year
later, the Grafton Ministry finally broke up; and Lord North assumed
control, with a Cabinet composed wholly of Tories and supported by
George III to the full extent of his power, through patronage, bribes,
social pressure, and political proscription. North himself was
inclined to moderation in colonial matters. He carried the promised
repeal of all the duties but the tea tax, and in 1772 replaced the
arrogant and quarrelsome Hillsborough with the more amiable Lord
Dartmouth. It looked for a while as though the political skies might
clear, for the American merchants, tired of their self-imposed
hardships, began to weaken in opposition. In 1769 the New York
assembly voted to accept the parliamentary terms; and in 1770 the
merchants of that colony voted to abandon general non-importation,
keeping only the boycott on tea. This led to the general collapse of
the non-importation agreements; but the colonial temper continued to be
defiant and {48} suspicious, and wrangling with governors was incessant.
Occasional cases of violence confirmed the English Tories in their low
view of the Americans. In March, 1770, a riot in Boston between town
rowdies and the soldiers brought on a shooting affray in which five
citizens were killed. This created intense indignation throughout the
colonies, regardless of the provocation received by the soldiers, and
led to an annual commemoration of the "Boston Massacre," marked by
inflammatory speeches. The soldiers, however, when tried for murder in
the local courts, were defended by prominent counsel, notably John
Adams, and were acquitted. Two years later, on June 9, 1772, the
_Gaspee_, a naval schooner, which had been very active in chasing
smugglers in Rhode Island waters, was burned by a mob, and its captain
taken prisoner. The utmost efforts of the home government failed to
secure the detection or punishment of any one of the perpetrators.
Finally, in December, 1773, a still more serious explosion occurred.
The North Ministry, desirous of assisting the East India Company, which
was burdened with debt, removed practically all restrictions on the
exportation of tea to America in hopes of increasing the sale by
reducing the price. To the colonial leaders, now in a state of {49}
chronic irritation, this measure seemed an insulting and insidious
attempt to induce the Americans to forget their principles and buy the
tea because it was cheap. It was denounced from end to end of the
country in burning rhetoric; and when the cargoes of tea arrived their
sale was completely prevented by the overwhelming pressure of public
opinion. Consignees, waited on by great crowds, hastened to resign;
and the tea was either seized for nonpayment of duties and allowed to
spoil, or was sent back. In Boston, however, the Governor, Hutchinson,
stiffly refused to let the tea ships depart without landing the tea,
whereat the exasperated citizens watched an organized mob of disguised
men board the ships and throw the tea into the harbour. Once more the
unanimous voice of the colonies defied a parliamentary Act.
Such was the situation in 1773. Thirteen groups of British colonists,
obstinately local in their interests, narrowly insistent on
self-government, habituated to an antagonistic attitude toward royal
governors, but, after all has been said, unquestionably loyal to the
Crown and the home country, had been transformed into communities on
the verge of permanent insubordination. Incapable of changing all
their political habits, they could see in the British policy only a
purpose {50} to deprive them of that self-government which was
inseparable from liberty. The Crown Ministers, on the other hand,
unable to discover anything illegal, oppressive, or unreasonable in any
of their measures, found no explanation of the extravagant
denunciations of the colonial radicals other than a determination to
foment every possible difficulty with a view to throwing off all
obedience. While Adams, Dickinson, Henry, Gadsden and the rest
demanded their "rights," and protested against "incroachments" on their
liberties, Bedford, Hillsborough, North, and Dartmouth insisted on the
"indecency," "insolence," and "disloyalty" shown by the Americans. The
colonial republicans and the British noblemen were unable to speak the
same language. Yet the time had come to face the situation, and it was
the duty of the Ministers to assume the task with something more
serious than reproofs and legal formulae. The contest for power now
begun must lead, unless terminated, straight to a disruption of the
Empire.
{51}