been fully recognized; but an exemption | pursued; and by directing the duties on from duties on all articles of commerce the articles necessary for that commerce which we import from Great Britain, Ire- to be paid only at the above ports, which land, and the British plantations, or on are so very remote from this and the other commodities which do not interfere with colonies, that the importation of them by their products or manufactures, we can those places will be attended with such a justly claim; and always expect that our heavy expence as to amount to a total commerce will be charged with no other prohibition: these Acts, in our opinion, than a necessary regard to the trade and bear with peculiar hardship on the people interest of Great Britain and her colonies of this colony, when we reflect on the vast evidently demands; at the same time we sums of money which have been expended humbly conceive, that the money arising by our legislatures in conciliating the from all duties raised in this colony should friendship of the savages, and the essential be paid into the colony treasury, to be services which were derived to the Bridrawn by requisitions of the crown to the tish arms during the last war from our algeneral assembly, for the security and de-liance with and influence over them, fence of the whole empire. founded on free and unrestrained commerce. We are at a loss to account why articles imported from the continental co Quebec, should be loaded with heavier duties than those brought from the West India islands, by which, while we are deprived of a most lucrative branch of commerce, we behold a discrimination made between us and the sugar colonies to our prejudice, equally injurious and unmerited. "Nor can we forbear mentioning the jealousies which have been excited in the colonies by the extension of the limits of the province of Quebec, in which the Roman Catholic religion has received such ample supports. "We cannot avoid mentioning among our grievances the Act for prohibiting the legislature of this colony from pass-lonies, and imported into the province of ing any law for the emission of a paper currency to be a legal tender in the colony: our commerce affords so small a return of specie, that without a paper currency, supported on the credit of the colony, our trade and the change of the property must necessarily decrease; with out this expedient we never should have been able to comply with the requisitions of the crown during the last war, or to grant ready aids on any sudden emergencies. The credit of our bills has ever been secured from depreciation by the short periods limited for their duration, and sinking them by taxes raised on the people; and the want of this power may, in future, prevent his Majesty's faithful subjects here from testifying their loyalty and affection to our gracious sovereign, and from granting such aids as may be necessary for the general weal and safety of the British empire: nor can we avoid remonstrating against this Act, as an abridgment of the royal prerogative, and a violation of our legislative rights. "We must also complain of the Act of the last session of parliament, imposing duties on certain articles imported into the province of Quebec, and restricting the importation of them to the ports of Quebec and St. John's on the river Sorel, by which the commerce formerly carried on by this colony with the Indians is in a great measure diverted into another channel; as by the extension of the bounds of that province from Hudson's Bay to the Ohio, by a statute of the same sessions, a great extent of country is cut off from this colony, in which hitherto the most lucrative branches of the Indian trade were Interested as we must consider ourselves in whatever may affect our sister colonies, we cannot help feeling for the distresses of our brethren in the Massachuset's Bay, from the operation of the several acts of parliament passed relative to that province, and of earnestly remonstrating in their behalf. At the same time we also must express our disapprobation of the violent measures that have been pursued in some of the colonies, which can only tend to increase our misfortunes, and to prevent our obtaining redress. "We claim but a restoration of those rights which we enjoyed by general consent before the close of the last war; we desire no more than a continuation of that ancient government to which we are entitled by the principles of the British constitution, and by which alone can be secured to us the rights of Englishmen. Attached by every tie of interest and regard to the British nation, and accus tomed to behold with reverence and respect its excellent form of government, we harbour not an idea of diminishing the power and grandeur of the mother coun and has already deeply wounded the credit of the country, and confined our views in trade to very narrow limits.-In this cruel state of apprehension and uncertainty, we humbly implore your lordships' favourable interposition, as the hereditary guardians of the rights of the people, that the said Act may be repealed or amended, and that your humble petitioners may enjoy their constitutional rights, privileges, and franchises heretofore granted to all his Majesty's dutiful subjects. And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. mostQuebec, 12th Nov. 1774." try, or lessening the lustre and dignity of parliament; our object is the happiness which we are convinced can only arise from the union of both countries. To render this union permanent and solid, we esteem it the undoubted right of the colonies to participate of that constitution whose direct end and aim is the liberty of the subject; fully trusting that this honourable House will listen with attention to our complaints, and redress our grievances, by adopting such measures as shall be found most conducive to the general welfare of the whole empire, and likely to restore union and harmony amongst all its different branches. 66 By order of the General Assembly, "JOHN CRUGER, Speaker." "Assembly Chamber, City of New York, "the 25th day of March 1775." Debate in the Lords on Lord Camden's Bill to repeal the Quebec Government Act.] May 17. Lord Camden presented the following Petition. "To the Right Honourable the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Parliament assembled. "The PETITION of his Majesty's loyal and dutiful subjects settled in the province of Quebec, "Humbly sheweth, "That since the commencement of eivil government in this province, your lordships' humble petitioners, under the protection of English laws granted us by his sacred Majesty's royal proclamation, bearing date the 7th day of October, which was in the year of our Lord 1763, have been encouraged to adventure their properties in trade, estates, and agriculture, to a very considerable amount, thereby rendering the province a valuable acquisition to Great Britain: that, to their inexpressible grief, they find, by an act of parliament intitled, An Act for making more effectual provision for the government of the province of Quebec in North America,' they are deprived of the Habeas Corpus Act and trial by juries, are subjected to arbitrary fines and imprisonment, and liable to be tried, both in civil cases and matters of a criminal nature, not by known and permanent laws, but by ordinances and edicts which the governor and council are empowered to make void at their will and pleasure, which must render our persons and properties insecure, Before the Clerk read the Petition, Earl Gower said, he should be glad to be informed through what channel the Petition came into the noble lord's hands, as he understood that such a petition had been in town for some months; but not coming in a manner in which his Majesty's ministers could take the desired notice of it, he did not see how the House could entertain it, without it came accompanied with the necessary forms. He heard, he said, that a gentleman, no way connected with the province, had such a petition in his possession; but how the House could be satisfied, that the Petition now prewhom it was attributed, was not in his sented, was the Petition of the persons to power to determine. Lord Camden replied, it mattered very little how the Petition came into his hands; this, however, he would venture to assure the House, that it was genuine; and if their lordships conceived any suspicion that it was unfairly or surreptitiously obtained, the agent of the colony (Mr. Maseres) would give them the fullest satisfaction on that head. The Clerk having read the Petition, Lord Camden acquainted the House, that the Petition having been previously offered to every peer in administration, had at last been delivered to himself to present to that House, a task which he had undertaken, not having those reasons that might have influenced the lords in office to decline it; because he had uniformly, from principle and conviction, op posed the Act which they had planned, and by their persuasive powers carried through the House. His lordship then observed, that after the fullest examination of the Act in ques tion, he found it so thoroughly impolitic, pernicious, and incompatible with the religion and constitution of our country, that no amendment, nor any thing short of a total repeal of it, would be sufficient. He remarked on the provisions of the Act as being wholly inconsistent with the reasons recited in it; and he concluded that they were not the true reasons on which it was founded, that there must be other secret motives and designs which had produced the measure, and which could be best discovered by attending to the purposes the Act was calculated to answer, which, from the provisions made therein, appeared to be no other than to prevent the farther progress of freedom and the Protestant religion in America, and to secure a Popish Canadian army to subdue and oppress the Protestant British colonies of America. His lordship arranged his objections to the Act under the three following heads: 1, The extension of the limits of Quebec. 2, The establishment of Popery there; and 3, The civil despotism in which the inhabitants of that immensely extended province are to be perpetually bound, by being deprived of all share in the legislative power, and subjected in life, freedom, and property, to the arbitrary ordinances of a governor and council appointed by, and dependent on the crown. proved, that the Popish religion, though not in express terms, is in effect really and fully established in the province of Quebec. By confirming not only the laity in a free exercise of their religion, but the Romish clergy, in the enjoyment of all their former tythes and ecclesiastical dues, rights, &c. and the bishop, (the Pope's representative) in the exercise of all his spiritual powers and functions, and in the disposal of 180 ecclesiastical benefices; and also by dispensing with the Oath of Supremacy, whereby every officer of government in that province, both civil and military, even the governor himself, may be of the Romish religion. And here his lordship particularly referred to the Act of the 1st Eliz. which for ever excludes the Pope from all jurisdictions within the kingdom of England, and the dominions thereunto belonging, or which may, at any future time, be acquired; and prescribes an oath of supremacy to be taken through this kingdom and all its dominions. This Act his lordship represented as the great support and barrier of the Protestant religion; and, as being in its nature as sacred and fundamental as the Act of Settlement, or even as Magna Charta itself;-and yet, said his lordship, this has been unnecessarily and wantonly Under the first of these heads his lordship proved, that there could be no good reason for so extending the limits of Que-violated by the Quebec Act, whereby the bec, as to make them comprehend a vast oath which it prescribes is wholly dispensextent of country, 2,000 miles in length ed with in that province. His lordship from north to south, and bounded on the observed, that the capitulation with sir west only by the South Sea. That this Jeffery Amherst promised the people of enlargement could only be intended to Canada only a toleration in the exercise extend the shackles of arbitrary power and of their religion, and that by the definite of Popery over all the future settlements treaty of peace, they were only to be aland colonies of America. That by draw-lowed to "profess the worship of their ing the limits of that province close along religion, according to the rights of the the interior settlements of all the old Eng- Romish church, as far as the laws lish colonies, so as to prevent their further of Great Britain permit," that the utmost progress, an eternal barrier was intended which the inhabitants of Canada had exto be placed, like the Chinese wall, against pected, in consequence of this, was a relithe further extension of civil liberty and gious toleration, such as is allowed to Prothe Protestant religion. His lordship testant dissenters in England, whose then animadverted particularly on the in- clergy not only receive no tythes, but are structions lately transmitted to general exposed to a train of penalties from which Carleton, whereby the regulation of all they have in vain solicited relief. And the Indian trade of North America is put that the Popish clergy of Quebec were so into the hands of the governor and coun- far from expecting any grant of tythes, cil of Quebec, and the other colonies are that they had not even asked for them in obliged, in their intercourse with the In- the course of more than ten years, which dians, to submit to the laws, not of the had since elapsed. That they were unexBritish parliament, but of a despotic un-pected-unreasonable bounties, " quod constitutional legislature in Canada; a nemo Divûm promittere auserat." measure calculated to produce endless contentions and animosities. Under the second head his lordship [VOL. XVIII.] His lordship farther observed, that by thus clothing the Popish clergy with wealth and power, and the rites of the Romish [2U] religion, with that alluring splendor, magnificence and pomp, which are its chief supports, an impolitic insuperable bar was placed against the conversion of the people of Canada, from their present attachment to the Popish religion, and their desire of returning again to the dominion of France. Under the third and last head, his lordship took an extensive review of the history and constitution of England, as well as of the royal prerogative, in respect to new dominions and conquered countries; he animadverted on the doctrine said, to have been delivered by lord Mansfield in the cause respecting the duty of 44 per cent. levied by the crown in Grenada, and clearly proved, that in all accessions of territory to the crown, the king is constitutionally entrusted, and required to extend to his new subjects, the laws of Eng. land, and the benefit of a constitution similar to that of our own country-that he can give no less than those rights and privileges which by the common law, as well as by the Act of Settlement, are declared to be the birthright of every British subject"-that, accordingly, this had been invariably done in every acquisition of territory and dominion, particularly in the case of Ireland, of the counties palatine (Chester and Durham) of Wales, of Berwick upon Tweed, of Calais, of Jamaica, of New-York, of St. Christopher's, of Grenada, &c.—that the same was also promised to be done in the province of Quebec; and that by the proclamation of 1763, the faith of the crown was solemnly plighted to the settlers in that and the other new colonies, that their respective governors" shall summon and call general assemblies within the said governments respectively, in such manner and form as is used and directed in those colonies and provinces in America, which are under our immediate government;" and, continues the proclamation, "we have also given power to the said governors, with the consent of our said councils, and the representatives of the people, so to be summoned as aforesaid, to make, constitute, and ordain laws, statutes, and ordinances, for the public peace, welfare, and good government of our said colonies, and the people and inhabitants thereof, as near as may be agreeable to the laws of Eng. land, &c. and in the mean time, and until such assemblies can be called as aforesaid, all persons inhabiting in, or resorting to our said colonies, may confide in our royal protection for the enjoyment of the benefit of the laws of our realm of England," for which purpose courts of justice were to be erected, &c. all which, lord Camden observed, had been done and fulfilled in every other province, excepting that of Quebec, to which many settlers had been allured by this proclamation, who, by a most disgraceful violation of the royal faith, were since, with the rest of that province, subjected to the civil laws of France, and to the des potism of a governor and a dependent council, instead of being allowed an assembly, and laws made by the representa tives of the people, as they were solemnly promised. His lordship also represented, that the tyrannical government thus esta blished, is considered as the most op. pressive act of injustice by all the Protestant, and even by all the Popish inhabitants of Quebec, except the Romish clergy and French noblesse, who are will ing to submit to a despotic government, for the sake of tyrannizing over the pea santry of Canada. He likewise observed, that the slavery imposed by the Act in question is so repugnant to the success of commerce, and abhorrent to the feelings of native British subjects, that if it be not soon repealed, both the former and latter will abandon that province. His lordship having by these, and many other facts and arguments, proved the im policy, injustice, tyranny, and iniquity of the Act in question, declared, that it deserved to be reprobated by the unanimous voice of parliament, and that it would necessarily receive the censure of their lordships, if there remained the smallest regard for liberty and the consti tution in one part of the House, or for the Protestant religion in the other. His lordship concluded with offering the fol lowing Bill: A BILL to repeal an Act made in the last session of the last Parliament, intituled, An Act for making more 'effectual provision for the govern'ment of the province of Quebec, in North America.' issued in the year 1763, has established an arbitrary government in the said province; "And whereas the said Act, by permitting both the clergy and laity there to hold offices and benefices, without taking the oath of supremacy, and by granting to the Popish clergy in the said province, the enjoyment of their accustomed dues and rights, has entirely stopped the growth and propagation of the Protestant religion, and in the room thereof has established the religion of the church of Rome in the said province for ever; "And whereas the said Act, by enlarging the boundaries of the said province, and making the legislature thereof co-extensive with the same, may put the Indian trade, among other things, under the sole management of that legislature, as in truth appears to be already done, by the instructions lately given to governor Carleton, by which that trade, which had before been freely carried on by all his Majesty's subjects in North America without restriction, is now to be confined to such regulations as the said legislature may think fit to impose upon it, and thereby the rights of his Majesty's other colonies unwarrantably abridged and invaded; and by a like extension of the said legislature, the said other colonies may come to be excluded from having any intercourse or correspondence whatsoever with the Indian nations of that vast continent, without the leave or permission of the said legislature, which would naturally give rise to unnatural divisions, and endless controversies between his Majesty's subjects of the old colonies, and the inhabitants of the new province of Quebec; "May it therefore please your most excellent Majesty, That it may be enacted, and be it enacted by the King's most excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords spiritual and temporal and the Cominons in this present parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, that from and after the first day of May, 1776, the above mentioned Act, and the several matters and things therein contained, shall be, and is, and are, hereby repealed and made void to all intents and purposes whatsoever." This Bill being read, lord Camden acquainted the House, that he had delayed the proposed repeal until the 1st of May next, to the end that time might be obtained in the interval to provide a better plan of government for the province of Quebec. The Earl of Dartmouth said, he should decline entering into a detailed view of the vast mass of matter which had been travelled over by the noble lord. He made the same objection to the mode of obtaining the petition, and the manner of presenting it, as earl Gower had done. He said, that the petition had been offered to be delivered to him so early as the 23rd or 24th of January; but, besides that his sentiments were clearly in favour of the Act, he could not with propriety receive any paper, importing to be a petition from the inhabitants of that province, unless it came through the channel of the governor and council. But, said his lordship, supposing that the petition had been fairly obtained, what does it literally or substantially import? Does it desire a repeal? Does it even hint at any such thing? İow, then, can the noble and learned lord come upon the ground of this petition to parliament to desire a repeal, when the very utmost the petitioners themselves look for is, that they may have the benefit of the Habeas Corpus law, and the trial by jury? The former of which it is evident they are entitled to, by the laws of England, and the latter they now enjoy in all criminal matters. His lordship then read the address presented to governor Carleton from the French inhabitants on his arrival, and their address to the King, wherein they express their gratitude to his Majesty, for restoring them to their ancient rights and privileges. These, he insisted, were the most indubitable proofs, that the French Canadians were made happy by the change, and that by no one rule of good policy, justice, or a regard to public faith,, could it be expected that nearly 100,000 peaceable loyal subjects should be rendered unhappy and miserable, purely to gratify the unreasonable request of two or three thousand persons, who wished for what was impracticable, and looked upon themselves deprived of what they were actually in possession of. On these grounds he moved for the rejection of the Bill. The Duke of Richmond said, the present motion of repeal was not supported solely on the contents of the petition now presented, but on the idea that every noble lord had a right to propose an amendment, and move for a repeal of any law which they deemed impolitic or oppressive. His grace observed, that great industry had been used on a former occasion, and he made no doubt would be |