Page:Cambridge Modern History Volume 7.djvu/235

 1774] Support in return for protection. 203 conquered. They had responded cheerfully, but they reaped no benefit : everything obtained belonged solely to Great Britain. As for bearing a share of the general expenses of government, was it not enough that the colonies, of themselves, supported a government as expensive to them as was the internal government of Great Britain to its inhabitants ? And had they not always responded cheerfully when called upon by the Crown? Why then distrust them now? Dulany too pointed out that the British Ministry, in the time of the late war with France, so far from thinking it proper for the House of Commons to "give and grant" the property of the colonists to support the war in America, had directly applied to the colonies to tax them- selves ; and he added that they had promised to recommend Parliament to reimburse the colonies in the expenses they had borne, a promise which was made good. Hamilton, in 1774, referring to claims upon the colonies for the support of the British navy, because of its protection of America, replied that Great Britain enjoyed a monopoly of the trade of the colonies. The colonies were compelled to trade with the mother-country, and the profits were a great source of wealth to her; were not these sufficient recompense? Franklin's answer, as will be seen below, was that Great Britain was entitled to a toll or duty for guarding the seas. Another objection was, that a power of regulation by government was a power of legislation; and a power of legislation must be universal and supreme. The conclusion drawn was, that as the colonies had acknowledged the power of Parliament to regulate their commerce, they had thereby acknowledged every other power of legislation by that body. Dickinson answered that the objection was based upon confusion. There was a time when England had no colonies; trade was the object for which they had been encouraged. Love of freedom was a chief motive of the adventurers : the connexion of colonies with the parent-State was a new thing in the English laws. That the rights of England extinguished the rights of the adventurers rights essential to the freedom they would have had, had they stayed at home was against reason, humanity, and the constitution of England. Colonies could not have been planted on such terms. The colonists simply claimed what they would have had had they never left England. But there was another principle touching trade. All the power of Parliament could not regulate trade at pleasure. It had to be regulated by treaties and alliances formed by the King, without the consent of the nation, with other States. When a universal empire was established, and not till then, could regulations of trade properly be called Acts of the supreme legislature. But let it be admitted that the power to regulate trade is vested in Parliament. Still, commerce rested on concessions and restrictions mutually stipulated between the different powers of the world. How the people of England shall trade must be determined by Germans, Frenchmen, Spaniards.