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 200 The King as representative of Great Britain. [i768~ Parliament would not and could not tax them until it had qualified itself to do so by admitting his people to representation, who ought to make part of the common consent. But were not these charters of the colonies, though granted in fact by the Kings of England, granted in law by Parliament as the sovereign power of the nation ? The Whigs said that they were not ; though the elder Adams, inconsistently with that idea, had in 1768 spoken of the charters as a royal promise "on behalf of the nation," for making which it had never till very lately been "questioned but the King had power." The Whigs generally however would have said, then or later, that that was a mere slip or inadvertence. That they generally held that the King's promise was made in his own right alone is clear. Galloway, speaking with ample knowledge, said of the idea, "We find it in all the resolves and petitions of the American assemblies, town meetings, and provincial committees, and even in the proceedings of the Continental Congress," which indeed had declared upon it. Galloway pronounced the idea a delusion, "a distinction nowhere to be found "; the charters had been granted by the King as representative of Great Britain ; they had therefore been granted by Parliament, and hence the colonies derived their rights from the British legislature. He supported the proposition thus. The King held the great seal in his representative capacity only. One right which he had under the seal was to form territory within the realm into inferior bodies politic, vesting in the people there the power to make laws for the regulation of internal police, but not to discharge the people from obedience to Parliament, because that would weaken and dismember and in the end destroy the State. The colonies were by their own admission members of the State ; which he seems to lead the reader to infer, was bringing them "within the realm." Every colony in America had been settled under licence and authority of the great seal, "affixed by the repre- sentative of the body politic of Britain," to the charters. There was no other source from which the King could derive authority. He brushed aside the position taken by some that the oath of allegiance in America was professed to the King, not as representative of Great Britain, but as representing the several legislatures of the colonies; it was "a new and unheard of capacity of his Majesty"; it made his Majesty the representative of his own representatives, delegates or substitutes. Seabury dealt with the matter thus : "To talk of being liege subjects to King George while we disavow the authority of Parliament is another piece of Whiggish nonsense. . .If we obey the laws of the King, we obey the laws of Parliament. If we disown the authority of the Parliament, we disown the authority of the King. The King of Great Britain was placed on the throne by virtue of an Act of Parliament, and he is King of America by virtue of being King of Great Britain. He is therefore King of America by Act of Parliament."