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pelled to yield. They disavowed the seizure and restored the islands, on condition that this restoration should not affect any claim of right on the part of Spain. Three years after, they

were abandoned by the English; and it is now understood that Lord North secretly agreed to do this, when the arrangement was made for the restoration of the islands by the Spanish.

SPEECH

OF LORD CHATHAM ON THE BILL AUTHORIZING THE QUARTERING OF BRITISH SOLDIERS ON THE INHABITANTS OF BOSTON, DELIVERED IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS, MAY 27, 1774.

INTRODUCTION.

THE health of Lord Chatham had for some time prevented him from taking any active part in public affairs. During two years he had rarely made his appearance in the House of Lords, and nothing but the rash and headlong measures of Lord North in regard to America, could have drawn him again from his retirement.

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In speaking of those measures, it may be proper briefly to remind the reader of some of the preceding events. When Charles Townsend was left at the head of affairs, by Lord Chatham's unfortunate illness during the winter of 1766–7, he was continually goaded by Mr. Grenville on the subject of American taxation.1 You are cowards! You are afraid of the Americans. You dare not tax America!" The rash spirit of Townsend was roused by these attacks. "Fear?" said be. "Cowards? Dare not tax America? I dare tax America!" Grenville stood silent for a moment, and then said, "Dare you tax America? I wish to God you would do it." Townsend replied, "I will, I will." This hasty declaration could not be evaded or withdrawn, and in June, 1767, Townsend brought in a bill imposing duties on glass, paper, pasteboard, white and red lead, painters' colors, and tea, imported into the colonies. The preamble declared that it was "expedient to raise a revenue in America." A spirit of decided resistance to these taxes was at once manifested throughout all the colonies, and Lord North, on coming into power about two years after, introduced a bill repealing all the duties imposed by the act of 1767, except that on tea. But this was unsatisfactory, for it put the repeal on "commercial grounds" alone, and expressly reserved the right of taxation. At the close of 1773, the East India Company, encouraged by the ministry, sent large quantities of tea to Boston and some other American ports. The people resolved that the tea should not be landed, but should be sent back to England in the ships that brought it. As this was forbidden by the Custom-house, all the tea on board the ships lying in Boston harbor was thrown into the water by men disguised as Indians, on the evening of December 18th, 1773. This daring act awakened the keenest resentment of the British ministry. In March, 1774, laws were passed depriving Massachusetts of her charter, closing the port of Boston, and allowing persons charged with capital offenses to be carried to England for trial. As a means of farther enforcement, a bill was introduced in the month of May, 1774, for quartering troops on the inhabitants of the town of Boston, and other parts of the American colonies. This state of things gave rise to a number of Lord Chatham's most celebrated speeches, of which the following was the first in order.

SPEECH, &c.

MY LORDS, The unfavorable state of health, my Lords, if the descendants of such illustrious under which I have long labored, could not prevent me from laying before your Lordships my thoughts on the bill now upon the table, and on the American affairs in general.

If we take a transient view of those motives which induced the ancestors of our fellow-subjects in America to leave their native country, to encounter the innumerable difficulties of the unexplored regions of the Western World, our astonishment at the present conduct of their descendants will naturally subside. There was no corner of the world into which men of their free and enterprising spirit would not fly with alacrity, rather than submit to the slavish and tyrannical principles which prevailed at that period in their native country. And shall we wonder,

See Burke's admirable sketches of Grenville, Townsend, and Lord Chatham's third ministry, in nis Speech on American Taxation.

characters spurn with contempt the hand of unconstitutional power, that would snatch from them such dear-bought privileges as they now contend for? Had the British colonies been planted by any other kingdom than our own, the inhabitants would have carried with them the chains of slavery and spirit of despotism; but as they are, they ought to be remembered as great instances to instruct the world what great exertions mankind will naturally make, when they are left to the free exercise of their own powers. And, my Lords, notwithstanding my intention to give my hearty negative to the question now before you, I can not help condemning in the severest manner the late turbulent and unwarrantable conduct of the Americans in some instances, particularly in the late riots of Boston. But, my Lords, the mode which has been pursued to bring them back to a sense of their duty to their parent state, has been so diametrically

opposite to the fundamental principles of sound | ble Lords who are now in office; and, consepolicy, that individuals possessed of common un- quently, they will have a watchful eye over their derstanding must be astonished at such proceed- liberties, to prevent the least encroachment on ings. By blocking up the harbor of Boston, you their hereditary rights. have involved the innocent trader in the same punishment with the guilty profligates who destroyed your merchandise; and instead of making a well-concerted effort to secure the real offenders, you clap a naval and military extinguisher over their harbor, and visit the crime of a few lawless depredators and their abettors upon the whole body of the inhabitants.

My Lords, this country is little obliged to the framers and promoters of this tea tax. The Americans had almost forgot, in their excess of gratitude for the repeal of the Stamp Act, any interest but that of the mother country; there seemed an emulation among the different provinces who should be most dutiful and forward in their expressions of loyalty to their real benefactor, as you will readily perceive by the following letter from Governor Bernard to a noble Lord then in office.

"The House of Representatives," says he, “from the time of opening the session to this day, has shown a disposition to avoid all dispute with me, every thing having passed with as much good humor as I could desire. They have acted in all things with temper and moderation; they have avoided some subjects of dispute, and have laid a foundation for removing some causes of former altercation."

This, my Lords, was the temper of the Americans, and would have continued so, had it not been interrupted by your fruitless endeavors to tax them without their consent. But the moment they perceived your intention was renewed to tax them, under a pretense of serving the East India Company, their resentment got the ascendant of their moderation, and hurried them into actions contrary to law, which, in their cooler hours, they would have thought on with horror; for I sincerely believe the destroying of the tea was the effect of despair.

But, my Lords, from the complexion of the whole of the proceedings, I think that administration has purposely irritated them into those late violent acts, for which they now so severely smart, purposely to be revenged on them for the victory they gained by the repeal of the Stamp Act; a measure in which they seemingly acquiesced, but at the bottom they were its real enemies. For what other motive could induce them to dress taxation, that father of American sedition, in the robes of an East India director, but to break in upon that mutual peace and harmony which then so happily subsisted between them and the mother country?

My Lords, I am an old man, and would advise the noble Lords in office to adopt a more gentle mode of governing America; for the day is not far distant when America may vie with these kingdoms, not only in arms, but in arts also. It is an established fact that the principal towns in America are learned and polite, and understand the Constitution of the empire as well as the no

This observation is so recently exemplified in an excellent pamphlet, which comes from the pen of an American gentleman, that I shall take the liberty of reading to your Lordships his thoughts on the competency of the British Parliament to tax America, which, in my opinion, puts this interesting matter in the clearest view.

The high court of Parliament," says he, “is the supreme legislative power over the whole empire; in all free states the Constitution is fixed; and as the supreme Legislature derives its power and authority from the Constitution, it can not overleap the bounds of it without destroying its own foundation. The Constitution ascertains and limits both sovereignty and allegiance; and therefore his Majesty's American subjects, who acknowledged themselves bound by the ties of allegiance, have an equitable claim to the full enjoyment of the fundamental rules of the English Constitution; and that it is an essential, unalterable right in nature, ingrafted into the British Constitution as a fundamental law, and ever held sacred and irrevocable by the subjects within this realm, that what a man has honestly acquired is absolutely his own; which he may freely give, but which can not be taken from him without his consent."

This, my Lords, though no new doctrine, has always been my received and unalterable opinion, and I will carry it to my grave, that this country had no right under heaven to tax America. It is contrary to all the principles of justice and civil polity, which neither the exigencies of the state, nor even an acquiescence in the taxes, could justify upon any occasion whatever. Such proceedings will never meet their wishedfor success. Instead of adding to their miseries, as the bill now before you most undoubtedly does, adopt some lenient measures, which may lure them to their duty. Proceed like a kind and affectionate parent over a child whom he tenderly loves, and, instead of those harsh and severe proceedings, pass an amnesty on all their youthful errors, clasp them once more in your fond and affectionate arms, and I will venture to affirm you will find them children worthy of their sire. But, should their turbulence exist after your proffered terms of forgiveness, which I hope and expect this House will immediately adopt, I will be among the foremost of your Lordships to move for such measures as will effectually prevent a future relapse, and make them feel what it is to provoke a fond and forgiving parent! a parent, my Lords, whose welfare has ever been my greatest and most pleasing consolation. This declaration may seem unnecessary; but I will venture to declare, the period is not far distant when she will want the assistance of her most distant friends; but should the all-disposing hand of Providence prevent me from affording her my poor assistance, my prayers shall be ever for her welfare-Length of

days be in her right hand, and in her left riches and honor; may her ways be the ways of pleasantness, and all her paths be peace!

Notwithstanding these warnings and remonstrances, the bill was passed by a majority of 57 to 16.

SPEECH

OF LORD CHATHAM ON A MOTION FOR AN ADDRESS TO HIS MAJESTY, TO GIVE IMMEDIATE ORDERS FOR REMOVING HIS TROOPS FROM BOSTON, DELIVERED IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS, JANUARY 20, 1775.

INTRODUCTION.

On the 20th of January, 1775, Lord Dartmouth, Secretary of State, laid before the House of Lords va rious papers relating to American affairs. Upon this occasion Lord Chatham moved an "address to his Majesty for the immediate removal of his troops from Boston," and supported it by the following speech. When he arose to speak, says one who witnessed the scene, "all was silence and profound attention. Animated, and almost inspired by his subject, he seemed to feel his own unrivaled superiority. His venerable figure, dignified and graceful in decay, his language, his voice, his gesture, were such as might, at this momentous crisis, big with the fate of Britain seem to characterize him as the guardian genius of his country."

SPEECH, &c.'

MY LORDS,-After more than six weeks' possession of the papers now before you, on a subject so momentous, at a time when the fate of this nation hangs on every hour, the ministry have at length condescended to submit to the consideration of this House, intelligence from America with which your Lordships and the public have been long and fully acquainted.

dishonored army, trusting solely to the pickax and the spade for security against the just indignation of an injured and insulted people.

My Lords, I am happy that a relaxation of my infirmities permits me to seize this earliest opportunity of offering my poor advice to save this unhappy country, at this moment tottering to its ruin. But, as I have not the honor of access to his Majesty, I will endeavor to transmit to him, through the constitutional channel of this House, my ideas on American business, to rescue him from the misadvice of his present ministers. I congratulate your Lordships that the business is at last entered upon by the noble Lord's [Lord Dartmouth] laying the papers before you. As I suppose your Lordships are too well apprised of their contents, hope I am not premature in submitting to you my present motion. [The

The measures of last year, my Lords, which have produced the present alarming state of America, were founded upon misrepresentation. They were violent, precipitate, and vindictive. The nation was told that it was only a faction in Boston which opposed all lawful government; that an unwarrantable injury had been done to private property, for which the justice of Parliament was called upon to order reparation; that the least appearance of firmness would awe the Americans into submission, and upon only pass-motion was read.] ing the Rubicon we should be "sine clade victor."2

That the people might choose their representatives under the influence of those misrepresentations, the Parliament was precipitately dissolved. Thus the nation was to be rendered instrumental in executing the vengeance of administration on that injured, unhappy, traduced people.

I wish, my Lords, not to lose a day in this urgent, pressing crisis. An hour now lost in allaying ferments in America may produce years of calamity. For my own part, I will not desert, for a moment, the conduct of this weighty business, from the first to the last. Unless nailed to my bed by the extremity of sickness, I will give it unremitted attention. I will knock at the door of this sleeping and confounded ministry, and will rouse them to a sense of their danger.

But now, my Lords, we find that, instead of suppressing the opposition of the faction at Bos- When I state the importance of the colonies to ton, these measures have spread it over the this country, and the magnitude of danger hangwhole continent. They have united that whole ing over this country from the present plan of people by the most indissoluble of all bands-in-misadministration practiced against them, I detolerable wrongs. The just retribution is an in- sire not to be understood to argue for a reciprocdiscriminate, unmerciful proscription of the inno-ity of indulgence between England and America. cent with the guilty, unheard and untried. The I contend not for indulgence, but justice to Amerbloodless victory is an impotent general with his ica; and i shall ever contend that the Americans This speech was reported by Mr. Hugh Boyd, justly owe obedience to us in a limited degreea man of high literary attainments, and bears very they owe obedience to our ordinances of trade strong marks of accuracy. and navigation; but let the line be skillfully drawn between the objects of those ordinances

a Victorious without slaughter.

and their private internal property. Let the sacredness of their property remain inviolate. Let it be taxable only by their own consent, given in their provincial assemblies, else it will cease to be property. As to the metaphysical refinements, attempting to show that the Americans are equally free from obedience and commercial restraints, as from taxation for revenue, as being unrepresented here, I pronounce them futile, frivolons, and groundless.

onciliation, you delay forever. But, admitting that this hope (which in truth is desperate) should be accomplished, what do you gain by the imposition of your victorious amity? You will be untrusted and unthanked. Adopt, then, the grace, while you have the opportunity, of reconcilement or at least prepare the way. Allay the ferment prevailing in America, by removing the obnoxious hostile cause-obnoxious and unserviceable; for their merit can be only inaction: "Non dimicare est vincere," their victory can never be by exertions. Their force would be most disproportionately exerted against a brave, generous, and united people, with arms in their hands, and courage in their hearts: three millions of people, the genuine descendants of a valiant and pious ancestry, driven to those deserts by the narrow maxims of a superstitious tyranny. And is the spirit of persecution never to be appeased? Are the brave sons of those brave forefathers to inherit their sufferings, as they have inherited their virtues? Are they to sus

When I urge this measure of recalling the troops from Boston, I urge it on this pressing principle, that it is necessarily preparatory to the restoration of your peace and the establishment of your prosperity. It will then appear that you are disposed to treat amicably and equitably; and to consider, revise, and repeal, if it | should be found necessary (as I affirm it will), those violent acts and declarations which have disseminated confusion throughout your empire. Resistance to your acts was necessary as it was just; and your vain declarations of the omnipotence of Parliament, and your imperious doc-tain the infliction of the most oppressive and untrines of the necessity of submission, will be found equally impotent to convince or to enslave your fellow-subjects in America, who feel that tyranny, whether ambitioned by an individual part of the || Legislature, or the bodies who compose it, is equally intolerable to British subjects.

The means of enforcing this thraldom are found to be as ridiculous and weak in practice as they are unjust in principle. Indeed, I can not but feel the most anxious sensibility for the situation of General Gage, and the troops under his command; thinking him, as I do, a man of humanity and understanding; and entertaining, as I ever will, the highest respect, the warmest love for the British troops. Their situation is truly unworthy; penned up-pining in inglorious inactivity. They are an army of impotence. You may call them an army of safety and of guard; but they are, in truth, an army of impotence and contempt; and, to make the folly equal to the disgrace, they are an army of irritation and

vexation.

115

exampled severity, beyond the accounts of history or description of poetry: "Rhadamanthus habet durissima regna, castigatque auditque.” So says the wisest poet, and perhaps the wisest statesman and politician. But our ministers say the Americans must not be heard. They have been condemned unheard. The indiscriminate hand of vengeance has lumped together innocent and guilty; with all the formalities of hostility, has blocked up the town [Boston], and reduced to beggary and famine thirty thousand inhabitants.

But his Majesty is advised that the union in America can not last. Ministers have more eyes than I, and should have more ears; but, with all the information I have been able to procure, I can pronounce it a union solid, permanent, and effectual. Ministers may satisfy themselves, and delude the public, with the report of what they call commercial bodies in America. They are not commercial. They are your packers and factors. They live upon nothing, for I But I find a report creeping abroad that min- call commission nothing. I speak of the minisisters censure General Gage's inactivity. Let terial authority for this American intelligence— them censure him it becomes them-it be- the runners for government, who are paid for comes their justice and their honor. I mean not their intelligence. But these are not the men, to censure his inactivity. It is a prudent and nor this the influence, to be considered in Amernecessary inaction; but it is a miserable condi-ica, when we estimate the firmness of their union. tion, where disgrace is prudence, and where it is necessary to be contemptible. This tameness, however contemptible, can not be censured; for the first drop of blood shed in civil and unnatural war might be "immedicabile vulnus."3

I therefore urge and conjure your Lordships immediately to adopt this conciliating measure. I will pledge myself for its immediately producing conciliatory effects, by its being thus well timed; but if you delay til! your vain hope shall be accomplished of triumphantly dictating rec

3 Nil prosunt artes; erat immedicabile vulnus.
All arts are vain: incurable the wound.
Ovid's Metamorphoses, book x., 189.

Even to extend the question, and to take in the 4 Not to fight is to conquer.

5 The passage is from the Eneid of Virgil, book vi., 366-7.

Gnosius hæc Rhadamanthus habet durissima regna,
Castigatque auditque dolos.

O'er these dire realms
The Cretan Rhadamanthus holds his sway,
And lashes guilty souls, whose wiles and crimes
He hears.

Lord Chatham, from the order of the words, gives them an ingenious turn, as if the punishment came before the hearing; which was certainly true of justice as then administered in America, though not in the infernal regions of Virgil.

really mercantile circle, will be totally inade- | Rights vindicated the English Constitution; the quate to the consideration. Trade, indeed, in- same spirit which established the great fundacreases the wealth and glory of a country; but mental, essential maxim of your liberties, that its real strength and stamina are to be looked for no subject of England shall be taxed but by his among the cultivators of the land. In their sim- own consent. plicity of life is found the simpleness of virtuethe integrity and courage of freedom. These true, genuine sons of the earth are invincible; and they surround and hem in the mercantile bodies, even if these bodies (which supposition I totally disclaim) could be supposed disaffected to the cause of liberty. Of this general spirit existing in the British nation (for so I wish to distinguish the real and genuine Americans from the pseudo-traders I have described)-of this spirit of independence, animating the nation of America, I have the most authentic information. It is not new among them. It is, and has ever been, their established principle, their confirmed persuasion. It is their nature and their doctrine. I remember, some years ago, when the repeal of the Stamp Act was in agitation, conversing in a friendly confidence with a person of undoubted respect and authenticity, on that subject, and he assured me with a certainty which his judgment and opportunity gave him, that these were the prevalent and steady principles of America-that you might destroy their towns, and cut them off from the superfluities, perhaps the conveniences of life, but that they were prepared to despise your power, and would not lament their loss, while they have-what, my Lords ?-their woods and their liberty. The name of my authority, if I am called upon, will authenticate the opinion irrefragably.

If illegal violences have been, as it is said, committed in America, prepare the way, open the door of possibility for acknowledgment and satisfaction; but proceed not to such coercion, such proscription; cease your indiscriminate inflictions; amerce not thirty thousand-oppress not three millions for the fault of forty or fifty individuals. Such severity of injustice must forever render incurable the wounds you have already given your colonies; you irritate them to unappeasable rancor. What though you march from town to town, and from province to province; though you should be able to enforce a temporary and local submission (which I only suppose, not admit), how shall you be able to secure the obedience of the country you leave behind you in your progress, to grasp the dominion of eighteen hundred miles of continent, populous in numbers, possessing valor, liberty, and resistance?

This glorious spirit of Whiggism animates three millions in America, who prefer poverty with liberty, to gilded chains and sordid affluence; and who will die in defense of their rights as men, as freemen. What shall oppose this spirit, aided by the congenial flame glowing in the breast of every Whig in England, to the amount, I hope, of double the American numbers? Ireland they have to a man. In that country, joined as it is with the cause of the colonies, and placed at their head, the distinction I contend for is and must be observed. This country superintends and controls their trade and navigation; but they tax themselves. And this distinction between external and internal control is sacred and insurmountable; it is involved in the abstract nature of things. Property is private, individual, absolute. Trade is an extended and complicated consideration: it reaches as far as ships can sail or winds can blow: it is a great and various machine. To regulate the numberless movements of its several parts, and combine them into effect for the good of the whole, requires the superintending wisdom and energy of the supreme power in the empire. But this supreme power has no effect toward internal taxation; for it does not exist in that relation; there is no such thing, no such idea in this Constitution, as a supreme power operating upon property. Let this distinction then remain forever ascertained; taxation is theirs, commercial regulation is ours. As an American, I would recognize to England her supreme right of regulating commerce and navigation; as an Englishman by birth and principle, I recognize to the Americans their supreme, unalienable right in their property: a right which they are justified in the defense of to the last extremity. To maintain this principle is the common cause of the Whigs on the other side of the Atlantic and on this. "Tis liberty to liberty engaged," that they will defend themselves, their families, and their country. In this great cause they are immovably allied: it is the alliance of God and natureimmutable, eternal-fixed as the firmament of heaven.

To such united force, what force shall be opposed? What, my Lords? A few regiments in America, and seventeen or eighteen thousand men at home! The idea is too ridiculous to This resistance to your arbitrary system of take up a moment of your Lordships' time. Nor taxation might have been foreseen. It was obcan such a national and principled union be revious from the nature of things, and of mankind; sisted by the tricks of office, or ministerial maand, above all, from the Whiggish spirit flourish-neuver. Laying of papers on your table, or ing in that country. The spirit which now resists your taxation in America is the same which formerly opposed loans, benevolences, and shipmoney in England; the same spirit which called all England on its legs, and by the Bill of

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It was Dr. Franklin.

counting numbers on a division, will not avert or postpone the hour of danger. It must arrive, my Lords, unless these fatal acts are done away; it must arrive in all its horrors, and then these boastful ministers, spite of all their confidence and all their maneuvers, shall be forced to hide their heads. They shall be forced to a disgrace

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