Page:Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History, Volume 1.djvu/463

 13. ANDREWS: COLONIAL CONDITIONS 449 when they showed that its confirmation was adapted to the furthering of England's poHcy, and that its vacation was to the injury of that poHcy. Voiding the law would lead to manufacturing, for the younger sons from sheer necessity, driven from agriculture, would turn to trade and manufac- turing, or else would be obliged to leave the country.^ Thus, by this argument, England was placed on the horns of a dilemma as regards the colonies, either beggary or insufficient population on the one side, or the promotion of trade and manufactures on the other. This, as Law surmised, " was a tender plot," and there is no doubt that as an argument it was frequently repeated in order that it might be " thot of at home," ^ These economic results are sufficient to show that the law was an organic part of the life of the colony. Indeed, as Talcott said in a later letter to Francis Wilks in London, " we cannot think our law will be looked upon to be contrary to the law of England for the colony could not have been settled without it." ^ The colony immediately made every e^ort through its agents, Dummer, Belcher, and Wilks, to defend the law if possible. There was reason for hope in such action f^'^m the fact that the Massachusetts law of 1692, after which the Connecticut law has been modeled, with one amendment, one addition, and three explanatory acts had been confirmed by the Crown.^ Furthermore, the law was a general one in New England and, if the Order in Council were to be insisted on, it might endanger the titles to a considerable amount of New England real estate; and it would seem incredible that the home government could persist in so crippling the col- onies.^ Therefore the colony was justified in believing that, if all the arguments were fairly presented to the Lords of ^Talcott Papers, I, pp. 147, 189; IT, pp. 245-248, ' Ibid., I, p. 123. » Ibid., II, p. 246. 'Talcott Papers, I, pp. 153-154. pp. 77-85. Governor Talcott says that the law had been sent over with other laws " some thirty years ago " by Gov'r Winthrop and that as nothing was said about the law then the colony had reason to think itself safe. There is a mistake here some- where; the law was passed in 1699 and Gov'r Winthrop sent over the Book of Laws as an enclosure in his letter of Oct, 27, 1698 B T Papers, Proprieties 2A, It may be that he is referrinir to the October order as revised in 1673.
 * Ibid., II, p. 79, Mass. Hist. Soc. Proc, 1860-62, p. 72-73