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 pass, biennially in Ireland, or annually in the colonies, are in a 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 £200,000 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 vigour 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 3rd 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 vigour. 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. 22nd 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 honourable
to them and to you, will indeed be mortal to all the
miserable stories, by which the passions of the mis-
guided people have been engaged in an unhappy
system. The people heard, indeed, from the be-
ginning of these disputes, one thing continually
dinned in their ears, that reason and justice demanded
that the Americans, who paid no taxes, should de
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 un-
taxed 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 con-
tinued 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 none of the many skiiful 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 mor 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,"