Can any position appear more ridiculous to those who maintain the doctrines of virtual representation, than, that a borough should send two members to parliament, without house or inhabitant? And yet there are many who hear me, strenuous advocates against American charters, that hold their seats in this House under such a curious representation. At the same time, I confess the basis of the constitution depends on preserving their privileges entire, since no man can say how far the reform would reach; and the whole art of government consists in preserving to every one his established rights. The most certain science we know, is mathematics; yet, if I was to say to many men, that two lines might approach nearer and nearer to all eternity, and never could meet, they would think the assertion ridiculous and absurd. Nevertheless, there is nothing so certain as the truth of that theorem. It is equally true, that legislation may exist without the power of taxation. The kingdom of Ireland, within our own dominions, is a proof of what these learned gentlemen assert to be so impossible. A worthy member, in my eye (Mr. Rigby) being pressed with this argument in the last session of parliament, from the fairness of his mind, he avowed, as his opinion, that we could tax Ireland.' I remember there were some gentlemen in the gallery when this declaration was made, whom I immediately perceived, by the contorsions in their countenance, to be Irish members. Next day the worthy member chose to make some apology to his friends. He said, no parallel could be drawn between Ireland and the colonies; for Ireland had a paraphernalia; and this satisfied both the English and Irish members. For my part, I do not see what difficulty can occur, in leaving the different colonies on the same footing of raising money by requisition, as from the people of Ireland. If it is thought this manner of raising supplies might throw too much power into the hands of the crown, that power might be limited, so as not to be exerted, except upon the address of both Houses of Parliament, such as has been lately adopted respecting the prerogative in regulating the coin. I am still hopeful, that the tense chord, on which our American creed has been said and sung, will be relaxed. I think I perceive the tone of the noble lord is not so loud, or so lofty, as on some former debates on this subject. I hope it does not proceed from want of health, in which case, no man could feel more sorrow for his lordship than myself; but, I hope, it arises from a more serious and deep reflection on the subject, where his own good sense has had room to operate, free from those violent associates, who seem to have precipitated his lordship into such harsh and cruel measures, contrary to his own natural good temper. Here, then, I shall conclude, as I set out, hoping, that generous, just, pacific measures will be adopted; but still insisting, that no man can determine properly on the number of forces to be employed, until we know the measures that are to be pursued respecting America. Mr. Fox said, it was proper to include Ireland in all the debates upon American taxation, in order to ascertain the parliamentary right of taxation over every part of the British dominions. Lord Clare jocularly complimented Mr. Rigby highly on the exceeding popularity, reverence, and esteem, that gentleman was held in by the whole Irish nation; that there was no man in England or Ireland more loved or revered. Mr. Rigby said, he acted in that country as secretary to the lord lieutenant; which, on many accounts, was rather an invidious and critical station; that the sentiments now alluded to, he maintained upon general principles; that his opinion was not singular, for he was supported in it by a statute, passed in the reign of George the first; that he begged to be understood, according to the obvious construction of that statute; and that, according to that sense of it, he still continued to be of opinion, that the legislature of Great Britain had a right to make laws to bind Ireland, and all the other members and dependencies of the British empire. Mr. Cruger, the new member for Bristol, an American by birth, spoke next. I rise, Sir, to say a few words on this important subject, with all the diffidence and awe which must strike the mind, on a first attempt to speak before so august an assembly. Had I remained silent on this occasion, I must have condemned myself for seeming to desert a cause which I think it my duty to espouse. I cannot but be heard with candour by Englishmen, when what I offer is dictated by a love to my country. I am far from approving all the proceedings in America. Many of their measures have been a dishonour to their cause. Their rights might have been asserted without violence, and their claims stated with temper as well as firmness. But permit me to say, Sir, that if they have erred, it may be considered as a failing of human nature. A people animated with a love of liberty, and alarmed with apprehensions of its being in danger, will unavoidably run into excesses: the history of mankind declares it in every page; and Britons ought to view, with an eye of ten derness, acts of imprudence, to which their fellow-subjects in America may have been hurried; not as has been unkindly said, by a rebellious spirit, but by that ge. nerous spirit of freedom, which has often led their own ancestors into indiscretions. Acts of severity are far from having a tendency to eradicate jealousies: on the contrary, they must produce new fears, and endanger that attachment and obedience, which kindness and gentleness might have insured. No country has been more happy in its colonies than Great Britain. Connected by mutual interests (till the æra of the fatal Stamp Act) they flourished in an intercourse of amity, protection and obedience, supporting and supported by each other. Before that hated period, we meet with no instances of disobedience to your laws; no denial of the jurisdiction of parliament; no marks of jealousy and discontent. They ever loved liberty; their zeal for it is coeval with their first emigration to America. They were persecuted for it in this country; they sought a sanctuary in the unexplored regions of that. They cleared their inhospitable wilds, cultivated their lands, and poured the wealth which they derived from agriculture and commerce into the bosom of the mother country. interrupted. If the parental trunk is injured, the branches must suffer with it. A subordination on the part of the colonies is essential to this union. I acknowledge, Sir, that there must exist a power somewhere to superintend and regulate the movements of the whole, for the attainment and preservation of our common happiness this supreme power can be justly and adequately exercised only by the legislature of Great Britain. In this doctrine the colonies tacitly acquiesced, and were happy: England enjoyed by it all the advantages of an exclusive trade. Why, then, strain this authority so much, as to render a submission to it impossible, without a surrender of those libertieswhich are most valuable in civil society, and were ever acknowledged the birthright of Englishmen? When Great Britain derives from her colonies the most ample supplies of wealth by her commerce, is it not absurd to close up those channels, for the sake of a claim of imposing taxes, which (though a young member) I will dare to say, never have, and probably never will, defray the expence of collecting them? The expediency of coercive measures is much insisted on by some, who, I am sorry to say, seem to consider more the distress into which they will involve the Americans, than the benefits they can procure from such vindictive conduct to this country. Humanity, however, will prompt the generous mind to weep over severities, though they may be even necessary; and a prudent statesman will reflect, that the colonies cannot suffer without injury to Great Britain. They are your customers; they consume your manufactures :-by distressing them, if you do not drive them to foreign markets, you will most assuredly disable them from taking your commodities, and from making you returns for what they have taken. You protected them in their infant state, and they returned it, by confining to you the benefits of their trade. You Should coercive measures reduce them regulated their commerce for the advan- to an acknowledgment of the equity of tage of this country, and they never disco- parliamentary taxation, what are the advered an opposition, either to the autho-vantages which will result from it? Can it rity or the exercise of it. Are these evi- be thought that the Americans will be dences of a spirit of disaffection to Great dragooned into a conviction of this right? Britain, or ingratitude for its protection? Will severities increase their affection, and Are they not rather proofs, that if the make them more desirous of a connection same line of mild and lenient government with, and dependence on Great Britain? had been pursued, the same cordiality and Is it not, on the contrary, reasonable to submission would have been continued. conclude, that the effect will be an increase Every American, who loves his country, of jealousy and discontent; that they will must wish the prosperity of Great Britain, seek all occasions of evading laws imposed and that their union may ever subsist un- on them by violence; that they will be [VOL. XVIII.] [F] restless under the yoke, and think themselves happy under an opportunity of flying to the protection of any other power, from the subjection of a mother, whom they consider cruel and vindictive? I would not be understood, Sir, to deny the good intentions of administration. The abilities of the minister, it seems, are universally acknowledged; but I must add, humanum est errare. Though an American, I applaud his jealousy for the dignity of parliament, and think the impolicy and inexpediency of the late measures may reasonably be imputed to the difficulty of the occasion, and the unsettled and undefined nature of the dependence of the colonies on the mother country; and vice versa, candour must admit the same apology for the violences and mistakes of America. But since these measures have been found, by sad experience, totally inadequate; since they have widened the breach, instead of closing it; diminished the obedience of the colonies, instead of confirming it; increased the turbulence and opposition, instead of allaying them; it may be hoped, that a different plan of conduct may be pursued, and some firm and liberal constitution adopted, by the wisdom of this House, which may secure the colonists in their liberties, while it maintains the just supremacy of parliament. Sir William Mayne drew a melancholy picture of the sufferings of the Irish; said that all promises had been shamefully broken with them; that pensions to the amount of 10,000%. per annum, had been lately granted on that miserable, ruined, and undone country; and that the Castle was an asylum to every needy, servile, cringing apostate, that would bow the knee, and barter every thing which should | be dear to him, for emolument and court | favour. Lord North took notice, that an hon. gentleman (governor Johnstone) had alluded to something he had said on a former occasion relative to Great Britain never receding or relaxing, till America was at her feet; his lordship observed, that it was hardly fair to quote what a man had said seven years before, and what he had explained on the spot before he left the House; this explanation then, and now was, he said, that by being at the feet of Great Britain, he meant obedience to the mother country: such as, if they thought themselves aggrieved, to apply by petitions and dutiful remonstrances to th parliament or the throne. He said, h thought it the duty of every member, a well in the House as out of it, to interpre what might fall in the heat of debate, o warm discussion, in the manner it was ex plained by the speaker; that if he ha been thus candidly dealt with, the autho of a late pamphlet, written in America could never have asserted, that he insiste that Britain should never recede, till the law and liberties of America were at her feet for as he never meant one, so he neve said the other. And he wished, that o the present occasion he should be under stood according to his present explana tion, and no other. Mr. Hartley was for making the Ame ricans contribute to the general defenc of the empire, by way of a requisition. and read one or two passages in som American proceedings, to shew their wil lingness to comply with such a measure. The Resolution was then agreed to. Debate in the Commons on continuing the Land Tax at only Three Shillings in the Pound.] December 19. The House went into a Committee of Ways and Means for raising a supply to be granted to his Majesty. Lord North stated from a paper which he held in his hand, in detail, the amount of the grants and services. He said, the former amounted hitherto but to 75,000. the duty on malt; that the services to be incurred were navy and ordnance for sea | service 830,000. guards, garrisons, &c. 627,000l. military establishment in America, West Indies, and Africa, 386,000. difference of pay between British and Irish establishment, 2,800. staff-officers, 11,000. Chelsea, 122,000. ordnance for land service, 228,000. services incurred and not provided for ditto the present year, 32,000l. in all amounting to, with the fractions, 2,244,000l. He observed, that the land tax continued at 3s. would produce 1,500,000l. which added to the malt, would amount to no more than 2,250,000l. making a surplus of 6,000. He acquainted the Committee further, that the militia money and the general de|ficiencies amounted last year to 580,000. and would for the present be at least 400,000. And that for these reasons he should move, That the land tax for the ensuing year be 3s. in the pound, which was agreed to. | December 20. The Report from the Committee of Ways and Means was brought up. On the question for agreeing to the land-tax of 3s. in the pound being put, information first had, were taken up on mature deliberation, and discussed with coolness, in order in the end to come to a wise, deliberate, and rational decision. Mr. T. Townshend said, that whatever that decision might be, the conduct of ad Mr. Hartley rose, and in a mild, sensible speech, enlarged upon the very extra-ministration was for the present extremely ordinary conduct of administration con- reprehensible; for while we were informed cerning American affairs. He said, the from administration that America was alaccounts from that country were truly most in a state of rebellion, the land, the alarming; that the resolutions of the con- malt, the navy, and the army, were voted tinental congress evidently proved, that with as much ease, and without a single the people were determined not to submit syllable, as if that country was in a state to the late Acts passed in relation to of the most perfect tranquillity and obediAmerica, nor to any other of a like com- ence: for, concluded he, either the infor plexion; that the troops now stationed at mation we have had is false, which I can Boston, and the inhabitants of that town, hardly suppose, or the estimates on the had no means of procuring subsistence but table are by no means proportioned to the by sea, or from the country; that either objects which are recommended from the method was now equally difficult, as the throne: for instance, if the army now in harbour would be frozen up, and the land America be to be augmented, or the carriage, even if subsistence was to be had, ships stationed there reinforced, the 3s. rendered impracticable, as the country land-tax now voted will certainly be insufwould be covered with snow; and that ficient; and the deficiencies must be made under such circumstances, the situation of up without the knowledge of parliament, the troops would be no less deplorable by a vote of credit to defray expences inthan that of the niserable inhabitants.- curred in the support of measures, with He continued to say, that he was not well which at present it is evident we are toversed in sieges, but if he understood tally unacquainted. right, he took it, that the town of Boston was surrounded by general Gage with lines of circumvallation; and that such being the very critical state of things, respecting both the situation, the temper, and disposition, of the military and the natives, he submitted it to the gentlemen on the other side, how they could reconcile it to the duty they owed to the nation in their public, or to their constituents in their private capacity, to agree to a long adjournment, while things remained in so dangerous and alarming a state, without taking any one step to avert the numerous and fatal mischiefs which they portended. For his part, he affirmed solemnly, he would much rather sit on Christmas-day, and continue to do so, de die in diem, than go to the country in so critical a season, without, at least, agreeing to some measures, though they should extend no further than prevention. Mr. Rose Fuller said, that we were too precipitate in our last measures, and that was the chief reason why they miscarried; that he foresaw at the time they would answer no end, but to inflame; nor ever would, while they were continued to be directed to the same end; on which account he would be much better pleased that the affairs of America, the necessary Mr. Rigby facetiously replied, Would the hon. gentleman have a war establishment in time of peace? Would he have us embrue our hands in the blood of our countrymen on the other side of the water? I dare say no man in this House is ignorant of my sentiments, and yet I should shudder at the thought. The hon. gentleman complains that the land, the malt, &c. is voted without a syllable being said: pray whose fault is that? He would not have, I presume, the gentleman who presented the navy estimates, rise and condemn them; he would not desire the noble lord, I suppose, who laid the army estimates before you, to tell the House that the number of troops to be employed in America was insufficient, considering the state of that country; nor the noble lord who proposed the tax of 3s. in the pound, to inform us in the same breath that it ought to be four. Who, then, is to blame? Those who are convinced that the estimates and grants are too low, and will not speak, or those who think them sufficient, and declare their opinions? For my part, I do not think myself capable of defending the gentleman now alluded to; nor have I, nor do I pretend to speak from any information of my own; but as the establishment is a peace establishment, | as I always thought that the present is a destructive to any country where it is kept very proper one, till I am informed that a up. I remember very well too, that I, war establishment is become necessary; among others on these benches, have been and as I voted for taking off the other long dinning this doctrine in the ears of shilling, I shall give my vote that the land the minister. I remember likewise, that tax be 3s. for the ensuing year. The for so doing we were called factious and other hon. gentleman says, the port of | discontented. And I am now happy in Boston is frozen up this season of the the flattering idea, that factious and disyear; I have conversed with many on the contented as we are, we happened for subject, who have assured me of the con- once to be right; for the great man who trary: whether it be, or be not, I cannot conducts the public affairs of this country, see how our sitting here on Christmas- has given ample testimony to our wisdom, day, or the whole holidays, can be the by adopting what he and his friends for means of relieving the army, or the inha- three successive sessions charitably imbitants, or of preventing the mischiefs he puted to ignorance or disappointed amseems so much to dread. bition. Nor am I less happy in another instance of the same kind. The noble lord below me on the floor (lord Beauchamp) being requested to learn from the minister, if he had any information to lay before us, or measures to propose, came posting to the House with the halcyon tidings, that all was peace and tranquillity; and that he had none. Here again the same factious spirit obtruded, and broke the calm enjoyments which might be derived from such a happy state of things; for some of us, who are never to be satisfied, relapsed into our former turbulence and discontent. What was the consequence? Why, it seems turbulence and discontent once more had reason on their side, and the minister came forward and assured us himself, that he had information to lay before the House, and measures to propose. Mr. Edmund Burke. I should not have risen in this debate, if I had not heard the moderation of one gentleman, (Mr. Fuller) and the precipitation of another, (Mr. Hartley), stated as if militating against | each other. Now, Sir, I, who see matters in another light from the right hon. gentlemen on the floor, can easily perceive them to be exactly correspondent. The former, from his experience of what has been already done, is cautious and willing to avoid repeating our former blunders, or adopting others of a similar nature but is for having matters coolly considered, fully investigated, and wisely and effectually determined; the latter, aiming at the same point, considering the circumstances in the most urgent and pressing light, is more eager to arrive at the completion of his wishes, not perhaps contemplating or foreseeing the obstructions that may retard him in his progress. The right hon. gentleman's confessed ignorance of what is proper to be done, or the measures his friends mean to adopt, I am extremely ready to believe; and have no reason to doubt but their present knowledge and foresight are nearly on a par. He certainly mistakes the matter, if he supposes that we on this side of the House, wish for a war establishment in time of peace: no, Sir, what we object to is, that a speech which breathed nothing but war, and accompanied with the motives of such a declaration, should, without any cause whatever assigned, at once sink into a tranquil silence; a peace establishment formed on the lowest scale. I am not now contending what the establishment ought to be; but I contend, that the one already voted by no means corresponds with the intimations given to this House from authority. I know that a heavy peace establishment is ruinous and | I cannot sit down, Sir, without first saying a word or two on the solicitude the hon. member on my left hand (Mr. Hartley) has expressed for the situation of general Gage, and the troops under his command. It is, I confess, most humiliating and mortifying; and it is difficult to say, whether those who have put them into it deserve most our compassion or our ridicule. It is, indeed, an absurdity without parallel; a warlike parliament, and a patient forbearing general. I would not be understood to reflect on the gentleman, who I understand is a very worthy, intelligent, deserving man; no, Sir, it is those who have sent him on such an errand that are to blame. The order of things is reversed in this new system. The rule of government now is to determine hastily, violently, and without consideration, and to execute indecisively, or rather not execute at all. And have not the consequences exactly corresponded with such a mode of proceeding? They |