A Letter to a Member of Parliament, wherein the Power of the British Legiflature, and the Cafe of the Colonifts, are briefly and impartially confidered. (Entire, price 15.)

Dear Sir,

THE

HE behaviour of the North American Colonists upon the fubject of the ftamp duty, ftill continues to be the general topick of political difcuffion; many people concurring with them in their ideas of the oppreffion, and the wifer many (in my opinion) infitting with the mother country on it's right of prefcribing fuch laws, and raising fuch fupplies amongst them, as the exigence of our own, or their, internal fituation may fuggeft. For my part, I really think the matter in difpute to be of much greater confequence to this country, than many, whom I have converted with, affect to confider it: A few regiments, fay they, well appointed and properly distributed amongit them, will foon bring them to a juft fenfe of their duty, and the ftamp act be as familiar there, as the land tax is here: but I take it to be a matter of more ferious attention, and to be reconciled by a much nicer conduct, than any of thofe tumultuous affemblies and murmurings which the Cyder act has occafioned in many counties, may require: perhaps, at the fame time, I may not be very much mistaken in my conjecture that this little fpecimen of difobedience to legiflative authority at home, may have encouraged our brethren to an imitation of the fame lawlefs and undutiful Carriage abroad: I will not, however, at prefent, labour the comparison which would prove the above affertion, as it would lead me into the argument of a subject which ought only to be revolved in a man's most fecret thoughts, or agitated in his majesty's mott fecret councils; for I think that this question, "Whether an impatience of parliamentary authority by the inhabitants of this island, or a "general revolting and difobedience to it by our Colonifts, be of the moft dangerous tendency;" would, if critically confidered furnith our enemies with too circumftantial a knowledge of our domeltic and most interesting derange

ments.

I have read all the remonftrances and

refolutions of the feveral Colonies, with the letters that have appeared in fopport of, and alfo moft of thofe publications that The weakness and impropriety of this have been defigned as answers to them :—

tax fecm now to be confeffed on all hands, but the legality or illegality of the meafure, neither clearly afferted by the one, nor irrefragably refuted by the other; You therefore, my dear fir, flatter me too much, in defiring my thoughts in a matter that would do credit to the most able pens of government; but to fhew my readiness in complying with your request, and at the fame time my defire of information, and to have my own doubts in this bu finefs cleared up, I fhall proceed to lay before you my fentiments, fuch as they are, with refpect to the jurifdiction of the parliament of Great Britain over the Colonies.

In this question I conceive, that neither the policy or object of an act of parliament, are to be confidered as the means for determining the legality of the duty it enjoins, or the tax it impofes: I could with, therefore, to have had all fuch confiderations thrown out of the question, and that thofe, who have severally attempted legally to arraign and juftify this proceeding of the late miniftry, had stuck clofely and honeftly to this point; "Whe. "ther the parliament of Great Britain

hath, or hath not, an inherent right of "including in one general act, (let the

purport of that act be what it will) All

his majefty's fubjects, as well thofe in"habiting the most diftant dominions of "this realm, as thofe refiding in it, and

more immediately the objects of it's "tatutes in general:" Every man in the leaft converfant in the nature of our conftitution will, I believe, readily admit and subscribe to this fupreme and difcretionary right; a right which never hath or can be impeached, but when it is unconftitutionally exerted, and tends manifeftly to the fubversion and annihilation of our liberties, as established upon principles of natural juftice and fociety. I would yet inform thefe ufurpers, thefe afpirers to a co-jurisdiction with that body which is able, at any time, to crush their exitence, as a public, that the statutes of Great Britain may, by fpecial words, bind even the people of Ireland to an obedience of them; notwithstanding as to its private internal policy, it is a diftin&t king

dom

befpeak them poffeffed of the two heterogeneous functions of lawgiver and sub ject, and is to be accounted for in no other

manner.

From the general principles of govern ment, as well as from a long practice and uninterrupted courfe of proceedings amongst ourselves, may this jurifdiction of the parliament be clearly afcertained; the conftant immemorial ufage of all nations fanctifies and approves it's title to it; and if the Colonists ever really thought themfelves independent of this great council of the nation, how comes it that they have fo long fubmitted to the prefcription of thofe many acts of parliament, whofe influence hath, for fuch a length of time, been extended over them? And yet the foundation of their plea of non-fubmiffion to the late act, would have obtained and been just as good an one, for the fame reasons, against all thofe former ones. It is to the highest degree, therefore, abfurd to confider this question in the light they have put it; it being to be determined, in my humble opinion, upon a confideration of the relation between the British parliament and the Colonifts, as between it and the fubjects of Great Britain at large, as I cannot find by what law they have been emancipated from this state of fubordination, in common with the reft of their fellow-fubjects.

The liberties of the Colonists, I apprehend, can receive no diminution from being thus held in the fame point of view and degree of eftimation, with thofe of the mother-country: on the contrary, I don't know but I may be told I have been too liberal in the conceffion, which I have thus made them; and indeed, strictly fpeaking, it may perhaps upon enquiry appear unwarrantable; for, was it within the compafs of my prefent defign to enter into a progreffive recapitulation of the different modes, by which the feveral Colonies have become parcel of, and annexed to the dominions of this crown, whether by discovery, conqueft or treaties; I fear the law of nations would point fo ftrongly to the prevailing diftinction, between the nature of municipal laws, and thofe of a newly acquired appendage to any empire, as muft exclude them from the advantageous and honourable fellowship I have af figned them: I chufe, however, for the purpose of coming more speedily and di

ly to the point in iflue, to wave this

piece of history, and that their own arguments may be received in the fullest scope and latitude they can poffibly bear, am willing to admit their pretenfions to be coequal with thofe of the people of England in general.

It is one of the fundamental maxims ' of our conftitution, and that of every civilized ftate, that "Nemo Patriam exwere poteft;" by which I would not be thought to understand a personal emigration or withdrawing from the country; but that no fubject can ever shake off or releafe himself from that indiffoluble bond of relation and natural allegiance he bears to the laws of his country, let him be at ever fo great distance from its feat of government; fo far from it, his country hath a right to expect that he always entertains thofe fentiments of attachment and duty as a subject, which she, as his natural fovereign, hath an unquestionable right to call forth into action in any fhape, and whenever the necefiities of her fituation may demand it; and which he cannot refufe, without expofing himself to the higheft cenfures, and a forfeiture of that protection under her government which is the return for fidelity and obedience to it.

The Colonifts, by their actions, feem to be impressed with no such ideas at the bottom, notwithstanding their confident appeals to the English conftitution; which rather feem fo many infults upon, than modeft well-founded references to its principles, for the rectitude or illegality of their proceedings: It will ever cherish and redrefs them as members of it, while they conduct themselves as fuch, but it will be too tenacious of its own authority and the refpect due to it, not to diftinguish betwixt an arrogant competition for power and independency, and a fpecious fuggeftion of grievances and oppreffion.

The fubjects of Great Britain refiding in our Colonies, are not content with the fruition, as individuals, of every immunity and privilege of native Englishmen, but they would attempt to prove themfelves entitled to more: As a body, or aggregate community of people, they certainly are poffeffed of none, that can retrench or check the powers and pre-eminence of the parliament: They derive and enjoy the bleffings of the former, in common with us all, from the English conftitution founded upon principles of common law and natural justice; but they

owe

fication and authority? I can find nothing in Magna Charta that will bear a contrary interpretation to this inference. That great charter, or rather peremptory affertion and conformation of the primitive natural rights and liberties of the people of England, was introductory of no new laws, but in oppofition to the then dangerous and increasing advances of the prerogative and kingly power, only declaratory of the ancient pure and peerlefs authority of the common law ;- -the parent and guarantee of all ftatute-law -But with fuch blindness of enthusiasm do the Colonists worship their feeble charters, thefe divinities of their own forming, that by them they not only look upon themselves fecured in the common rights of the mother-country, but promoted to fuch tranfcendantly fuperior ones, as will eclipfe and difparage their luftre and excellence; in fact, that because they have been induced, for their own perfonal emolument, voluntarily to tranfport and affociate themselves under the king's letters patent, they not only have carried with them all the rights and immunities of their native country, but are become releafed from the common obligation of obedience to the laws: fuch, however, is the peculiarly happy nature of the English conftitution, that as the king by no act of his, can abridge his fubjects of any of it's benefits, fo cannot he ever elevate them into a condition to difpenfe with, or mutilate the authority of it's fupremacy.

The wisdom of that reign fo confpicuous in the annals of our history for, and the bafis of whofe renown was founded upon it's accurate knowledge and prefervation of the rights of humam liberty, feems prophetically to have anticipated the neceffity of recognizing the power now difputed by the North Americans: It was with a view to refcue the British legiflature from all objection to it's jurifdiction, and to repress a frowardness which hath fince broke out almoft into actual rebellion, that the act of the 7 and 8 W. 3 C. 22. hath fo exprefly declared and referved the power of the parliament over all the Colonies; for by that ftatute, it is enacted, "That all laws, bye-laws, ufages and "customs which fhall be in practice in

any of the plantations repugnant to "any law made or to be made in this "kingdom relative to the faid plantations, fhall be void and of none effect:

This clause alone, abstracted from all other confiderations, ought furely to be a fufficient refutation of the very fingular claim of the Colonifts :-But to follow them in their own reasonings.

The exemption from obedience to the British parliament infifted on by the Colonifts, refts (if I understand them) upon this fingle Reafon," that they are not reprefented in it;" as I have faid before, I wonder that this plea hath fo long lain dormant amongst them, as it might have been urged, with as much propriety, against all thofe acts of parliament which have been fo long in force in the Colonies. But it really is of fo noval a caft, that I am at a lofs to guefs from what practical principles or fyftem of government they have borrowed it; fure I am tho' that the English constitution could never have fuggefted it to them. It must be confeffed that acts of parliament are binding and conclufive upon the fubjects of this ifland, because, by the prefumption of law, they are all fuppofed by their reprefentatives, to have had a fhare in the framing of them; but this is only one of thofe fictions, thofe nicer principia of the laws of fociety, which it is utterly impracticable to fee literally and minutely adher'd to in the mechanifm and adminiftration of great and populous governments; so far as they are capable of being carried into execution, thofe fyftems will fooneft be adopted, and bid faireft for duration, that are established upon the most equitable arrangements of the common rights and relations of mankind: upon the wildom and equity of this maxim is the foundation of our conftitution laid, and it was to obviate and affift the above hypothefis of law, that the legislature hath fo perfpicuously prefcribed the only feasible means of attending to it, by regulating the rights of reprefenting, and being reprefented, in this great council of the nation: and yet ideal and theoretical as this particular poftulatum (if I may call it one) certainly is in itself, fuch is it's recommendation, that the only poffible method of reducing it into practice, depends entirely upon the honeft emulation and industry of the people; and confequently, that as the attainment of thofe qualifications which are to beget in them a right of admission into this hare of the legiflature must be the fruit of their own endeavours, fo is the fubject hereby rationally foreclofed of all

objection