lieved from the dangerous neighborhood of the French, who had hitherto in some degree kept them in check, and with nothing to oppose their farther progress but a torpid Spanish government at New Orleans, it was naturally supposed that the colonies would regularly and eagerly push forward their settlements into the interior, until they had driven the Spaniards from the continent; in short, that they would run, as British subjects, the same career, which they have, in fact, pursued as citizens of the United States.

This was the superficial aspect of the case; but a keener foresight into the future might, perhaps, even then have satisfied the observer that the result of these arrangements would be of a directly opposite character, and would tend to weaken and dismember, rather than consolidate and strengthen, the British power. The neighborhood of the French was the principal circumstance that counteracted this tendency to independence, which naturally grew out of the remote situation of the British colonies, and their peculiar habits of thought and feeling. At the occurrence of every new war in Europe, the British settlements in America were exposed to new inroads from the interior, aggravated in their effects by all the horrors of savage warfare. The necessity of obtaining the aid of the mother country in repelling these attacks, and the sym

pathy generated by the concert of action thus produced, created, for the time, a community of feeling, which could never have been produced in any other way. The acquisition of Canada removed this check to the spirit of independence; and it might, perhaps, have been anticipated that this spirit would now develop itself with greater assurance and freedom than before. But even in this view of the subject, no contemporary observer would ever have predicted the rapidity, with which the new combination of circumstances produced its effects. At no period in the history of the colonies had the feeling on their part towards the mother country been so cordial, as it was at the conclusion of the peace of 1763. Twelve years afterwards, the mother country and the colonies were at open war; in thirteen, the colonies had declared independence; and in twenty, the representatives of the same powers, that made the arrangements of 1763, signed, at Paris, another set of treaties, the principal result of which was to recognize the national existence of the United States. So rapid, in some cases at least, is the progress of the revolutions which determine the fortunes of nations, and change the face of the world.

The event, which immediately brought on this new and wholly unexpected series of occurrences, took place in England in the year

following the peace, and was one of its results. Desiring to make the reductions in the taxes, that are usual after the close of a long war, and finding it necessary at the same time to provide for the interest of a large war debt, the British ministry, in order to combine the two objects as far as possible, began to look about for new sources of revenue, and conceived the idea of raising funds by taxing the colonies. In pursuance of this project, on the 10th of March, 1764, a declaratory resolution was adopted in Parliament, to the effect, that it "would be proper to impose certain stamp duties on the colonies and plantations, for the purpose of raising an American revenue, payable into the British exchequer." At the next session of Parliament, in the year 1765, a law was passed, in conformity with this resolution, commonly called the Stamp Act.

The resolution and the act, though adopted by large majorities, were opposed in Parliament by a respectable minority, chiefly on the ground of constitutional law. The right of the government to raise money from the people by taxation was declared to be coëxtensive with, and incidental to, the right of the people to be represented in Parliament. As the colonies were not represented in Parliament, they could not rightfully be taxed. The correctness of this principle, even in its application to the mother country,

may, perhaps, be regarded as somewhat questionable. With the inhabitants of the British islands, the right of being directly represented in Parliament is far from being, or having been at any time, coëxtensive with the duty of paying taxes; and the idea of virtual representation, it was supposed, might as well be applied to the population of the colonies, as to the unrepresented part of that of the mother country.

It may be urged, indeed, with some degree of plausibility, that, where the legislator is himself subject to his own laws, there is less danger of oppression than where they are made applicable only to a distant country. But this is a consideration of equity and expediency, rather than of strict right. In reality, the constitutional rights of British subjects, which at home depended on usage rather than strict definition, became, in the anomalous circumstances under which the colonies were settled, so entirely matters of inference and construction, that they must necessarily have been interpreted differently, and with almost equal degrees of plausibility, by the colonies and the government. It was the true policy of the government to avoid every thing that would provoke discussion on the subject, since, whatever the merits of the case might be, any agitation of the question would necessarily stimulate the existing tendency to independence.