none of whom are represented in parliament. Gentlemen cannot be serious when they insist even on their being virtually represented. Will any man in this house get up and say he is one of the representatives of the colonies?" 1765. Feb. "The commons," said Gilbert Elliot, "have maintained against the crown and against the lords their right of solely voting money without the control of either, any otherwise than by a negative; and will you suffer your colonies to impede the exercise of those rights, untouched as they now are by the other branches of the legis lature ?" "Can there be a more declared avowal of your power," retorted Conway, "than a petition submitting this case to your wisdom, and praying to be heard before your tribunal against a tax that will affect them in their privileges, which you at least have suffered, and in their property, which they have acquired under your protection? From a principle of lenity, of policy, and of justice, I am for receiving the petition of a people from whom this country derives its greatest commerce, wealth, and consideration." In reply, Charles Yorke entered into a very long and most elaborate defence of the bill, resting his argument on the supreme and sovereign authority of parliament. With a vast display of legal erudition, he insisted that the colonies were but corporations; their power of legislation was but the power of making by-laws, subject to parliamentary control. Their charters could not convey the legislative power of Great Britain, because the prerogative could not grant that power. The charters of the proprietary governments were but the king's standing commissions; the propri etaries were but his hereditary governors. The people of America could not be taken out of the general and supreme jurisdiction of parliament. The authority of Yorke was decisive: less than forty were willing to receive the petition of Virginia. A third from South Carolina; a fourth from Connecticut, though expressed in the most moderate language; a fifth from Massachusetts, though silent about the question of "right,”"--shared the same refusal. That from New York no one could be pre vailed upon to present. That from Rhode Island, offered by Sherwood, its faithful agent, claimed by their charter, under a royal promise, equal rights with their fellow-subjects in Great Britain, and insisted that the colony had faithfully kept their part of the compact; but it was as little heeded as the rest. The house of commons would neither receive petitions nor hear counsel. All the efforts of the agents of the colonies were fruitless. "We might," said Franklin, "as well have hindered the sun's setting." The tide against the Americans was irresistible. "We have power to tax them," said one of the ministry," and we will tax them." "The nation was provoked by American claims of legislative independence, and all parties joined in resolving by this act to settle the point." Within doors, less resistance was made to the act than to a common turnpike bill. "The affair passed with so very little noise that in town they scarcely knew the nature of what was doing." On the twenty-seventh, the house of commons sent up the stamp act to the house of lords. In that body, Rockingham was silent; Temple and Lyttelton both approved the principle of the measure, and the right asserted in it. Had there existed any doubt concerning that right, they were of opinion it should then be debated, before the honor of the legislature was engaged to its support. On the eighth of March, the bill was agreed to by the lords, without having encountered an amendment, debate, protest, division, or single dissentient vote. 1765. Mar. 8. The king was too ill to ratify the act in person. To a few only was the nature of his affliction known. At the moment of passing the stamp act, George III. was crazed; so, on the twenty-second of March, it received the royal assent by a commission. The sovereign of Great Britain, whose soul was wholly bent on exalting the prerogative, taught the world that a bit of parchment bearing the sign. of his hand, scrawled in the flickering light of clouded reason, could, under the British constitution, do the full legislative office of the king. Had he been a private man, his commission could have given validity to no instrument whatever. It was thought "prudent to begin with small duties and taxes, and to advance in proportion as it should be found the colonies would bear." For the present, Grenville attempted nothing more than to increase the revenue from the colonial post-office by reducing the rate of postage in America. His colleagues desired to extend the mutiny act to America, with power to billet troops on private houses. Clauses for that purpose had been strongly recommended by Gage. They had neither the entire conviction nor the cordial support of Grenville; so that they were introduced and carried through, by the secretary at war, as a separate measure. In their progress, provincial barracks, inns, alehouses, barns, and empty houses were substituted by the merchants and agents for private houses; but there remained a clause to compel the colonies to furnish the troops with various articles; and the sums needed for the purpose were "required to be raised in such manner as the public charges for the province are raised." Thus the billeting act contained, what had never before been heard of, a parliamentary requi sition on the colonies. 1765. April. Bounties were at the same time granted on the importation of deals, planks, boards, and timber from the plantations. Coffee of their growth was exempted from an additional duty; their iron might be borne to Ireland; their lumber to Ireland, Madeira, the Azores, and Europe south of Cape Finisterre; the prohibition on exporting their bar iron from England was removed; the rice of North Carolina was as much liberated as that of South Carolina; and rice might be warehoused in England for reexportation without advancing the duties. It was further provided that the revenue to be derived from the stamp act should not be remitted to England, but constitute a part of the sum to be expended in America. Grenville also resolved to select the stamp officers for America from among the Americans themselves. The friends and agents of the colonies were invited to make the nominations; and they did so, Franklin among the rest. "You tell me," said the minister, "you are poor, and unable to bear the tax; others tell me you are able. Now take the business into your own hands; you will see how and where it pinches, and will certainly let us know it, in which case it shall be eased." Not one of the American agents in England "imagined the colonies would think of disputing the stamp-tax with parliament at the point of the sword." "It is our duty to submit," had been the words of Otis. "We yield obedience to the act granting duties," had been uttered by the legislature of Massachusetts. "If parliament, in their superior wisdom, shall pass the act, we must submit," wrote Fitch, the governor of Connecticut, elected by the people, to Jack"It can be of no purpose to claim a right of exemption," thought Hutchinson. "It will fall particularly hard on us lawyers and printers," wrote Franklin to a friend in Philadelphia, never doubting it would go into effect, and looking for relief to the rapid increase of the people of America. The agent for Massachusetts had recommended it. Knox, the agent for Georgia, wrote publicly in its favor. son. 1765. April. Still less did the statesmen of England doubt the result. Thomas Pownall, who had been so much in the colonies, and really had an affection for them, congratulated Grenville in advance "on the good effects he would see derived to Great Britain and to the colonies from his firmness and candor in conducting the American business." No tax was ever laid with more general approbation. The act seemed sure to enforce itself. Unless stamps were used, marriages would be null, notes of hand valueless, ships at sea prizes to the first captors, suits at law impossible, transfers of real estate invalid, inheritances irreclaimable. Of all who acted with Grenville in the government, he never heard one prophesy that the measure would be resisted. "He did not foresee the opposition to it, and would have staked his life for obedience." CHAPTER XII. THE MINISTRY OFFEND THE KING AS WELL AS THE COLO- April. APRIL-MAY, 1765. EVENTS within the palace delayed the conflict with America. The king, in his zeal to give the law to 1765. his ministers and to govern as well as reign, lost his opportunity of enforcing the stamp act. No sooner had he recovered from the illness, of which the true nature was kept secret even from the members of his cabinet, than, bearing in mind that the heir to the throne was an infant of but two years old, he fearlessly contemplated the contingency of his own incapacity or death; and, though his nerves were still tremulous from mental disease, he, with the aid of Lord Holland, framed a plan for a regency. The manifest want of confidence in his ministers roused their jealousy; and, when they received his orders to prepare a bill for carrying his design into effect, they thought to fix in the public mind their hostility to Bute and win popularity by disqualifying the princess dowager. To this end, in the choice of the regent, the king was to be "restrained to the queen or any other person of the royal family." He approved the minute entirely, not knowing that, in the opinion of Bedford, Grenville, Halifax, and Sandwich, his own family did not include his mother. At the request of the Duke of Cumberland, the king, again without consulting his four ministers, gave directions that his uncle and his brothers, five in all, should be specially designated as fixed members of the council. This they at first declined to approve, and yielded only on condition that he should renounce the privilege which he had reserved of appointing four others. To Grenville he refused |