attempted to subdue the fierce spirit of the Welsh by all sorts of
rigorous laws. They prohibited by statute the sending all sorts of arms
into Wales, as you prohibit by proclamation (with something more of
doubt on the legality) the sending arms to America. They disarmed the
Welsh by statute, as you attempted (but still with more question on the
legality) to disarm New England by an instruction. They made an Act to
drag offenders from Wales into England for trial, as you have done (but
with more hardship) with regard to America. By another Act, where one
of the parties was an Englishman, they ordained that his trial should be
always by English. They made Acts to restrain trade, as you do; and they
prevented the Welsh from the use of fairs and markets, as you do the
Americans from fisheries and foreign ports. In short, when the Statute
Book was not quite so much swelled as it is now, you find no less than
fifteen acts of penal regulation on the subject of Wales.
Here we rub our hands.--A fine body of precedents for the authority of
Parliament and the use of it!--I admit it fully; and pray add likewise
to these precedents that all the while Wales rid this Kingdom like an
incubus, that it was an unprofitable and oppressive burthen, and that
an Englishman travelling in that country could not go six yards from the
high road without being murdered.
The march of the human mind is slow. Sir, it was not until after two
hundred years discovered that, by an eternal law, providence had decreed
vexation to violence, and poverty to rapine. Your ancestors did however
at length open their eyes to the ill-husbandry of injustice. They found
that the tyranny of a free people could of all tyrannies the least be
endured, and that laws made against a whole nation were not the most
effectual methods of securing its obedience. Accordingly, in the
twenty-seventh year of Henry the Eighth the course was entirely altered.
With a preamble stating the entire and perfect rights of the Crown of
England, it gave to the Welsh all the rights and privileges of English
subjects. A political order was established; the military power gave way
to the civil; the Marches were turned into Counties. But that a nation
should have a right to English liberties, and yet no share at all in
the fundamental security of these liberties--the grant of their own
property--seemed a thing so incongruous that, eight years after,
that is, in the thirty-fifth of that reign, a complete and not
ill-proportioned representation by counties and boroughs was bestowed
upon Wales by Act of Parliament. From that moment, as by a charm, the
tumults subsided; obedience was restored; peace, order, and civilization
followed in the train of liberty. When the day-star of the English
Constitution had arisen in their hearts, all was harmony within and
without--
"--simul alba nautis
Stella refulsit,
Defluit saxis agitatus humor;
Concidunt venti, fugiuntque nubes,
Et minax (quod sic voluere) ponto
Unda recumbit."
[Footnote: 49]
The very same year the County Palatine of Chester received the same
relief from its oppressions and the same remedy to its disorders.
Before this time Chester was little less distempered than Wales. The
inhabitants, without rights themselves, were the fittest to destroy the
rights of others; and from thence Richard the Second drew the standing
army of archers with which for a time he oppressed England. The people
of Chester applied to Parliament in a petition penned as I shall read to
you:
"To the King, our Sovereign Lord, in most hunible wise
shewen unto your excellent Majesty the inhabitants of
your Grace's County Palatine of Chester: (1) That where
the said County Palatine of Chester is and hath been always
hitherto exempt, excluded, and separated out and
from your High Court of Parliament, to have any Knights
and Burgesses within the said Court; by reason whereof
the said inhabitants have hitherto sustained manifold
disherisons, losses, and damages, as well in their lands,
goods, and bodies, as in the good, civil, and politic governance
and maintenance of the commonwealth of their said
county; (2) And forasmuch as the said inhabitants have
always hitherto been bound by the Acts and Statutes
made and ordained by your said Highness and your most
noble progenitors, by authority of the said Court, as far
forth as other counties, cities, and boroughs have been,
that have had their Knights and Burgesses within your
said Court of Parliament, and yet have had neither Knight
ne Burgess there for the said County Palatine, the said
inhabitants, for lack thereof, have been oftentime touched
and grieved with Acts and Statutes made within the said
Court, as well derogatory unto the most ancient jurisdictions,
liberties, and privileges of your said County Palatine,
as prejudicial unto the commonwealth, quietness,
rest, and peace of your Grace's most bounden subjects
inhabiting within the same."
What did Parliament with this audacious address?--Reject it as a libel?
Treat it as an affront to Government? Spurn it as a derogation from the
rights of legislature? Did they toss it over the table? Did they burn
it by the hands of the common hangman?--They took the petition of
grievance, all rugged as it was, without softening or temperament,
unpurged of the original bitterness and indignation of complaint--they
made it the very preamble to their Act of redress, and consecrated its
principle to all ages in the sanctuary of legislation.
Here is my third example. It was attended with the success of the two
former. Chester, civilized as well as Wales, has demonstrated that
freedom, and not servitude, is the cure of anarchy; as religion, and
not atheism, is the true remedy for superstition. Sir, this pattern of
Chester was followed in the reign of Charles the Second with regard to
the County Palatine of Durham, which is my fourth example. This county
had long lain out of the pale of free legislation. So scrupulously was
the example of Chester followed that the style of the preamble is
nearly the same with that of the Chester Act, and, without affecting the
abstract extent of the authority of Parliament, it recognizes the equity
of not suffering any considerable district in which the British subjects
may act as a body, to be taxed without their own voice in the grant.
Now if the doctrines of policy contained in these preambles, and the
force of these examples in the Acts of Parliaments, avail anything, what
can be said against applying them with regard to America? Are not the
people of America as much Englishmen as the Welsh? The preamble of
the Act of Henry the Eighth says the Welsh speak a language no way
resembling that of his Majesty's English subjects. Are the Americans not
as numerous? If we may trust the learned and accurate Judge Barrington's
account of North Wales, and take that as a standard to measure the rest,
there is no comparison. The people cannot amount to above 200,000; not a
tenth part of the number in the Colonies. Is America in rebellion? Wales
was hardly ever free from it. Have you attempted to govern America
by penal statutes? You made fifteen for Wales. But your legislative
authority is perfect with regard to America. Was it less perfect in
Wales, Chester, and Durham? But America is virtually represented. What!
does the electric force of virtual representation more easily pass over
the Atlantic than pervade Wales,--which lies in your neighborhood--or
than Chester and Durham, surrounded by abundance of representation that
is actual and palpable? But, Sir, your ancestors thought this sort of
virtual representation, however ample, to be totally insufficient for
the freedom of the inhabitants of territories that are so near, and
comparatively so inconsiderable. How then can I think it sufficient for
those which are infinitely greater, and infinitely more remote?
You will now, Sir, perhaps imagine that I am on the point of proposing
to you a scheme for a representation of the Colonies in Parliament.
Perhaps I might be inclined to entertain some such thought; but a great
flood stops me in my course. Opposuit natura. [Footnote: 50 ]--I cannot
remove the eternal barriers of the creation. The thing, in that mode, I
do not know to be possible. As I meddle with no theory,[Footnote: 51] I
do not absolutely assert the impracticability of such a representation;
but I do not see my way to it, and those who have been more confident
have not been more successful. However, the arm of public benevolence is
not shortened, and there are often several means to the same end. What
nature has disjoined in one way, wisdom may unite in another. When
we cannot give the benefit as we would wish, let us not refuse it
altogether. If we cannot give the principal, let us find a substitute.
But how? Where? What substitute?
Fortunately I am not obliged, for the ways and means of this substitute,
to tax my own unproductive invention. I am not even obliged to go to the
rich treasury of the fertile framers of imaginary commonwealths--not
to the Republic of Plato, [Footnote: 52] not to the Utopia of More,
[Footnote: 52] not to the Oceana of Harrington. It is before me--it is
at my feet,
"And the rude swain Treads daily on it with his clouted shoon."
[Footnote: 53]
I only wish you to recognize, for the theory, the ancient constitutional
policy of this kingdom with regard to representation, as that policy has
been declared in Acts of Parliament; and as to the practice, to return
to that mode which a uniform experience has marked out to you as best,
and in which you walked with security, advantage, and honor, until the
year 1763. [Footnote: 54]
My Resolutions therefore mean to establish the equity and justice of a
taxation of America by GRANT, and not by IMPOSITION; to mark the LEGAL
COMPETENCY [Footnote: 55] of the Colony Assemblies for the support
of their government in peace, and for public aids in time of war; to
acknowledge that this legal competency has had a DUTIFUL AND BENEFICIAL
EXERCISE; and that experience has shown the BENEFIT OF THEIR GRANTS and
the FUTILITY OF PARLIAMENTARY TAXATION as a method of supply.
These solid truths compose six fundamental propositions. There are three
more Resolutions corollary to these. If you admit the first set, you
can hardly reject the others. But if you admit the first, I shall be far
from solicitous whether you accept or refuse the last. I think these six
massive pillars will be of strength sufficient to support the temple of
British concord. I have no more doubt than I entertain of my existence
that, if you admitted these, you would command an immediate peace, and,
with but tolerable future management, a lasting obedience in America.
I am not arrogant in this confident assurance. The propositions are all
mere matters of fact, and if they are such facts as draw irresistible
conclusions even in the stating, this is the power of truth, and not any
management of mine.
Sir, I shall open the whole plan to you, together with such observations
on the motions as may tend to illustrate them where they may want
explanation. The first is a Resolution--
"That the Colonies and Plantations of Great Britain in North America,
consisting of fourteen separate Governments, and containing two millions
and upwards of free inhabitants, have not had the liberty and privilege
of electing and sending any Knights and Burgesses, or others, to
represent them in the High Court of Parliament."
This is a plain matter of fact, necessary to be laid down, and,
excepting the description, it is laid down in the language of the
Constitution; it is taken nearly verbatim from Acts of Parliament.
The second is like unto the first--
"That the said Colonies and Plantations have been liable to, and bounden
by, several subsidies, payments, rates, and taxes given and granted
by Parliament, though the said Colonies and Plantations have not their
Knights and Burgesses in the said High Court of Parliament, of their own
election, to represent the condition of their country; by lack whereof
they have been oftentimes touched and grieved by subsidies given,
granted, and assented to, in the said Court, in a manner prejudicial to
the commonwealth, quietness, rest, and peace of the subjects inhabiting
within the same."
Is this description too hot, or too cold; too strong, or too weak? Does
it arrogate too much to the supreme legislature? Does it lean too much
to the claims of the people? If it runs into any of these errors,
the fault is not mine. It is the language of your own ancient Acts of
Parliament.
"Non meus hic sermo, sed quae praecepit Ofellus,
Rusticus, abnormis sapiens."
[Footnote: 56]
It is the genuine produce of the ancient, rustic, manly, homebred sense
of this country.--I did not dare to rub off a particle of the venerable
rust that rather adorns and preserves, than destroys, the metal. It
would be a profanation to touch with a tool the stones which construct
the sacred altar of peace. I would not violate with modern polish the
ingenuous and noble roughness of these truly Constitutional materials.
Above all things, I was resolved not to be guilty of tampering, the
odious vice of restless and unstable minds. I put my foot in the tracks
of our forefathers, where I can neither wander nor stumble. Determining
to fix articles of peace, I was resolved not to be wise beyond what
was written; I was resolved to use nothing else than the form of sound
words, to let others abound in their own sense, and carefully to abstain
from all expressions of my own. What the law has said, I say. In all
things else I am silent. I have no organ but for her words. This, if it
be not ingenious, I am sure is safe. [Footnote: 57]
There are indeed words expressive of grievance in this second
Resolution, which those who are resolved always to be in the right will
deny to contain matter of fact, as applied to the present case, although
Parliament thought them true with regard to the counties of Chester
and Durham. They will deny that the Americans were ever "touched and
grieved" with the taxes. If they consider nothing in taxes but their
weight as pecuniary impositions, there might be some pretence for
this denial; but men may be sorely touched and deeply grieved in their
privileges, as well as in their purses. Men may lose little in property
by the act which takes away all their freedom. When a man is robbed of a
trifle on the highway, it is not the twopence lost that constitutes
the capital outrage. This is not confined to privileges. Even ancient
indulgences, withdrawn without offence on the part of those who enjoyed
such favors, operate as grievances. But were the Americans then not
touched and grieved by the taxes, in some measure, merely as taxes?
If so, why were they almost all either wholly repealed, or exceedingly
reduced? Were they not touched and grieved even by the regulating duties
of the sixth of George the Second? Else, why were the duties first
reduced to one third in 1764, and afterwards to a third of that third
in the year 1766? Were they not touched and grieved by the Stamp Act?
I shall say they were, until that tax is revived. Were they not touched
and grieved by the duties of 1767, which were likewise repealed, and
which Lord Hillsborough tells you, for the Ministry, were laid contrary
to the true principle of commerce? Is not the assurance given by that
noble person to the Colonies of a resolution to lay no more taxes on
them an admission that taxes would touch and grieve them? Is not the
Resolution of the noble lord in the blue ribbon, now standing on your
Journals, the strongest of all proofs that Parliamentary subsidies
really touched and grieved them? Else why all these changes,
modifications, repeals, assurances, and resolutions?
The next proposition is--
"That, from the distance of the said Colonies, and from other
circumstances, no method hath hitherto been devised for procuring a
representation in Parliament for the said Colonies."
This is an assertion of a fact, I go no further on the paper, though, in
my private judgment, a useful representation is impossible--I am sure it
is not desired by them, nor ought it perhaps by us--but I abstain from
opinions.
The fourth Resolution is--
"That each of the said Colonies hath within itself a body, chosen in
part, or in the whole, by the freemen, free-holders, or other free
inhabitants thereof, commonly called the General Assembly, or General
Court, with powers legally to raise, levy, and assess, according to the
several usage of such Colonies duties and taxes towards defraying all
sorts of public services."
This competence in the Colony Assemblies is certain. It is proved by the
whole tenor of their Acts of Supply in all the Assemblies, in which
the constant style of granting is, "an aid to his Majesty", and Acts
granting to the Crown have regularly for near a century passed
the public offices without dispute. Those who have been pleased
paradoxically to deny this right, holding that none but the British
Parliament can grant to the Crown, are wished to look to what is done,
not only in the Colonies, but in Ireland, in one uniform unbroken tenor
every session. Sir, I am surprised that this doctrine should come from
some of the law servants of the Crown. I say that if the Crown could be
responsible, his Majesty--but certainly the Ministers,--and even these
law officers themselves through whose hands the Acts passed, biennially
in Ireland, or annually in the Colonies--are in an habitual course of
committing impeachable offences. What habitual offenders have been all
Presidents of the Council, all Secretaries of State, all First Lords of
Trade, all Attorneys and all Solicitors General! However, they are safe,
as no one impeaches them; and there is no ground of charge against them
except in their own unfounded theories.
The fifth Resolution is also a resolution of fact--
"That the said General Assemblies, General Courts, or other
bodies legally qualified as aforesaid, have at sundry times
freely granted several large subsidies and public aids for
his Majesty's service, according to their abilities, when
required thereto by letter from one of his Majesty's
principal Secretaries of State; and that their right to grant the
same, and their cheerfulness and sufficiency in the said
grants, have been at sundry times acknowledged by Parliament."
To say nothing of their great expenses in the Indian wars, and not to
take their exertion in foreign ones so high as the supplies in the year
1695--not to go back to their public contributions in the year 1710--I
shall begin to travel only where the journals give me light, resolving
to deal in nothing but fact, authenticated by Parliamentary record, and
to build myself wholly on that solid basis.
On the 4th of April, 1748, a Committee of this House came to the
following resolution:
"Resolved: That it is the opinion of this Committee that it is
just and reasonable that the several Provinces and Colonies
of Massachusetts Bay, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and
Rhode Island, be reimbursed the expenses they have been
at in taking and securing to the Crown of Great Britain,
the Island of Cape Breton and its dependencies."
The expenses were immense for such Colonies. They were above L200,000
sterling; money first raised and advanced on their public credit.
On the 28th of January, 1756, a message from the King came to us, to
this effect:
"His Majesty, being sensible of the zeal and vigor with which
his faithful subjects of certain Colonies in North America
have exerted themselves in defence of his Majesty's just
rights and possessions, recommends it to this House to
take the same into their consideration, and to enable his
Majesty to give them such assistance as may be a proper
reward and encouragement."
On the 3d of February, 1756, the House came to a suitable Resolution,
expressed in words nearly the same as those of the message, but with the
further addition, that the money then voted was as an encouragement to
the Colonies to exert themselves with vigor. It will not be necessary to
go through all the testimonies which your own records have given to
the truth of my Resolutions. I will only refer you to the places in the
Journals:
Vol. xxvii.--16th and 19th May, 1757.
Vol. xxviii.--June 1st, 1758; April 26th and 30th, 1759;
March 26th and 31st, and April 28th, 1760;
Jan. 9th and 20th, 1761.
Vol. xxix.--Jan. 22d and 26th, 1762; March 14th and 17th,
1763.
Sir, here is the repeated acknowledgment of Parliament that the
Colonies not only gave, but gave to satiety. This nation has formally
acknowledged two things: first, that the Colonies had gone beyond their
abilities, Parliament having thought it necessary to reimburse them;
secondly, that they had acted legally and laudably in their grants
of money, and their maintenance of troops, since the compensation is
expressly given as reward and encouragement. Reward is not bestowed for
acts that are unlawful; and encouragement is not held out to things that
deserve reprehension. My Resolution therefore does nothing more than
collect into one proposition what is scattered through your Journals. I
give you nothing but your own; and you cannot refuse in the gross what
you have so often acknowledged in detail. The admission of this, which
will be so honorable to them and to you, will, indeed, be mortal to
all the miserable stories by which the passions of the misguided people
[Footnote: 58] have been engaged in an unhappy system. The people heard,
indeed, from the beginning of these disputes, one thing continually
dinned in their ears, that reason and justice demanded that the
Americans, who paid no taxes, should be compelled to contribute. How did
that fact of their paying nothing stand when the taxing system began?
When Mr. Grenville began to form his system of American revenue, he
stated in this House that the Colonies were then in debt two millions
six hundred thousand pounds sterling money, and was of opinion they
would discharge that debt in four years. On this state, those untaxed
people were actually subject to the payment of taxes to the amount of
six hundred and fifty thousand a year. In fact, however, Mr. Grenville
was mistaken. The funds given for sinking the debt did not prove quite
so ample as both the Colonies and he expected. The calculation was too
sanguine; the reduction was not completed till some years after, and at
different times in different Colonies. However, the taxes after the war
continued too great to bear any addition, with prudence or propriety;
and when the burthens imposed in consequence of former requisitions were
discharged, our tone became too high to resort again to requisition. No
Colony, since that time, ever has had any requisition whatsoever made to
it.
We see the sense of the Crown, and the sense of Parliament, on the
productive nature of a REVENUE BY GRANT. Now search the same Journals
for the produce of the REVENUE BY IMPOSITION. Where is it? Let us know
the volume and the page. What is the gross, what is the net produce? To
what service is it applied? How have you appropriated its surplus? What!
Can none of the many skilful index-makers that we are now employing find
any trace of it?--Well, let them and that rest together. But are the
Journals, which say nothing of the revenue, as silent on the discontent?
Oh no! a child may find it. It is the melancholy burthen and blot of
every page.
I think, then, I am, from those Journals, justified in the sixth and
last Resolution, which is---
"That it hath been found by experience that the manner of granting the
said supplies and aids, by the said General Assemblies, hath been more
agreeable to the said Colonies, and more beneficial and conducive to the
public service, than the mode of giving and granting aids in Parliament,
to be raised and paid in the said Colonies."
This makes the whole of the fundamental part of the plan. The conclusion
is irresistible. You cannot say that you were driven by any necessity to
an exercise of the utmost rights of legislature. You cannot assert that
you took on yourselves the task of imposing Colony taxes from the want
of another legal body that is competent to the purpose of supplying the
exigencies of the state without wounding the prejudices of the
people. Neither is it true that the body so qualified, and having that
competence, had neglected the duty.
The question now, on all this accumulated matter, is: whether you will
choose to abide by a profitable experience, or a mischievous theory;
whether you choose to build on imagination, or fact; whether you prefer
enjoyment, or hope; satisfaction in your subjects, or discontent?