Part 6 (1/2)

Biographical Studies.-William Pitt and Sir Robert Walpole. Consult Green, Short History of England, on their policies, using the index.

PART II. CONFLICT AND INDEPENDENCE

CHAPTER V

THE NEW COURSE IN BRITISH IMPERIAL POLICY

On October 25, 1760, King George II died and the British crown pa.s.sed to his young grandson. The first George, the son of the Elector of Hanover and Sophia the granddaughter of James I, was a thorough German who never even learned to speak the language of the land over which he reigned. The second George never saw England until he was a man. He spoke English with an accent and until his death preferred his German home. During their reign, the principle had become well established that the king did not govern but acted only through ministers representing the majority in Parliament.

George III and His System

The Character of the New King.-The third George rudely broke the German tradition of his family. He resented the imputation that he was a foreigner and on all occasions made a display of his British sympathies. To the draft of his first speech to Parliament, he added the popular phrase: ”Born and educated in this country, I glory in the name of Briton.” Macaulay, the English historian, certainly of no liking for high royal prerogative, said of George: ”The young king was a born Englishman. All his tastes and habits, good and bad, were English. No portion of his subjects had anything to reproach him with.... His age, his appearance, and all that was known of his character conciliated public favor. He was in the bloom of youth; his person and address were pleasing; scandal imputed to him no vice; and flattery might without glaring absurdity ascribe to him many princely virtues.”

Nevertheless George III had been spoiled by his mother, his tutors, and his courtiers. Under their influence he developed high and mighty notions about the sacredness of royal authority and his duty to check the pretensions of Parliament and the ministers dependent upon it. His mother had dinned into his ears the slogan: ”George, be king!” Lord Bute, his teacher and adviser, had told him that his honor required him to take an active part in the shaping of public policy and the making of laws. Thus educated, he surrounded himself with courtiers who encouraged him in the determination to rule as well as reign, to subdue all parties, and to place himself at the head of the nation and empire.

From an old print George III Political Parties and George III.-The state of the political parties favored the plans of the king to restore some of the ancient l.u.s.ter of the crown. The Whigs, who were composed mainly of the smaller freeholders, merchants, inhabitants of towns, and Protestant non-conformists, had grown haughty and overbearing through long continuance in power and had as a consequence raised up many enemies in their own ranks. Their opponents, the Tories, had by this time given up all hope of restoring to the throne the direct Stuart line; but they still cherished their old notions about divine right. With the accession of George III the coveted opportunity came to them to rally around the throne again. George received his Tory friends with open arms, gave them offices, and bought them seats in the House of Commons.

The British Parliamentary System.-The peculiarities of the British Parliament at the time made smooth the way for the king and his allies with their designs for controlling the entire government. In the first place, the House of Lords was composed mainly of hereditary n.o.bles whose number the king could increase by the appointment of his favorites, as of old. Though the members of the House of Commons were elected by popular vote, they did not speak for the ma.s.s of English people. Great towns like Leeds, Manchester, and Birmingham, for example, had no representatives at all. While there were about eight million inhabitants in Great Britain, there were in 1768 only about 160,000 voters; that is to say, only about one in every ten adult males had a voice in the government. Many boroughs returned one or more members to the Commons although they had merely a handful of voters or in some instances no voters at all. Furthermore, these tiny boroughs were often controlled by lords who openly sold the right of representation to the highest bidder. The ”rotten-boroughs,” as they were called by reformers, were a public scandal, but George III readily made use of them to get his friends into the House of Commons.

George III's Ministers and Their Colonial Policies

Grenville and the War Debt.-Within a year after the accession of George III, William Pitt was turned out of office, the king treating him with ”gross incivility” and the crowds shouting ”Pitt forever!” The direction of affairs was entrusted to men enjoying the king's confidence. Leaders.h.i.+p in the House of Commons fell to George Grenville, a grave and laborious man who for years had groaned over the increasing cost of government.

The first task after the conclusion of peace in 1763 was the adjustment of the disordered finances of the kingdom. The debt stood at the highest point in the history of the country. More revenue was absolutely necessary and Grenville began to search for it, turning his attention finally to the American colonies. In this quest he had the aid of a zealous colleague, Charles Townshend, who had long been in public service and was familiar with the difficulties encountered by royal governors in America. These two men, with the support of the entire ministry, inaugurated in February, 1763, ”a new system of colonial government. It was announced by authority that there were to be no more requisitions from the king to the colonial a.s.semblies for supplies, but that the colonies were to be taxed instead by act of Parliament. Colonial governors and judges were to be paid by the Crown; they were to be supported by a standing army of twenty regiments; and all the expenses of this force were to be met by parliamentary taxation.”

Restriction of Paper Money (1763).-Among the many complaints filed before the board of trade were vigorous protests against the issuance of paper money by the colonial legislatures. The new ministry provided a remedy in the act of 1763, which declared void all colonial laws authorizing paper money or extending the life of outstanding bills. This law was aimed at the ”cheap money” which the Americans were fond of making when specie was scarce-money which they tried to force on their English creditors in return for goods and in payment of the interest and princ.i.p.al of debts. Thus the first chapter was written in the long battle over sound money on this continent.

Limitation on Western Land Sales.-Later in the same year (1763) George III issued a royal proclamation providing, among other things, for the government of the territory recently acquired by the treaty of Paris from the French. One of the provisions in this royal decree touched frontiersmen to the quick. The contests between the king's officers and the colonists over the disposition of western lands had been long and sharp. The Americans chafed at restrictions on settlement. The more adventurous were continually moving west and ”squatting” on land purchased from the Indians or simply seized without authority. To put an end to this, the king forbade all further purchases from the Indians, reserving to the crown the right to acquire such lands and dispose of them for settlement. A second provision in the same proclamation vested the power of licensing trade with the Indians, including the lucrative fur business, in the hands of royal officers in the colonies. These two limitations on American freedom and enterprise were declared to be in the interest of the crown and for the preservation of the rights of the Indians against fraud and abuses.

The Sugar Act of 1764.-King George's ministers next turned their attention to measures of taxation and trade. Since the heavy debt under which England was laboring had been largely incurred in the defense of America, nothing seemed more reasonable to them than the proposition that the colonies should help to bear the burden which fell so heavily upon the English taxpayer. The Sugar Act of 1764 was the result of this reasoning. There was no doubt about the purpose of this law, for it was set forth clearly in the t.i.tle: ”An act for granting certain duties in the British colonies and plantations in America ... for applying the produce of such duties ... towards defraying the expenses of defending, protecting and securing the said colonies and plantations ... and for more effectually preventing the clandestine conveyance of goods to and from the said colonies and plantations and improving and securing the trade between the same and Great Britain.” The old Mola.s.ses Act had been prohibitive; the Sugar Act of 1764 was clearly intended as a revenue measure. Specified duties were laid upon sugar, indigo, calico, silks, and many other commodities imported into the colonies. The enforcement of the Mola.s.ses Act had been utterly neglected; but this Sugar Act had ”teeth in it.” Special precautions as to bonds, security, and registration of s.h.i.+p masters, accompanied by heavy penalties, promised a vigorous execution of the new revenue law.

The strict terms of the Sugar Act were strengthened by administrative measures. Under a law of the previous year the commanders of armed vessels stationed along the American coast were authorized to stop, search, and, on suspicion, seize merchant s.h.i.+ps approaching colonial ports. By supplementary orders, the entire British official force in America was instructed to be diligent in the execution of all trade and navigation laws. Revenue collectors, officers of the army and navy, and royal governors were curtly ordered to the front to do their full duty in the matter of law enforcement. The ordinary motives for the discharge of official obligations were sharpened by an appeal to avarice, for naval officers who seized offenders against the law were rewarded by large prizes out of the forfeitures and penalties.

The Stamp Act (1765).-The Grenville-Townshend combination moved steadily towards its goal. While the Sugar Act was under consideration in Parliament, Grenville announced a plan for a stamp bill. The next year it went through both Houses with a speed that must have astounded its authors. The vote in the Commons stood 205 in favor to 49 against; while in the Lords it was not even necessary to go through the formality of a count. As George III was temporarily insane, the measure received royal a.s.sent by a commission acting as a board of regency. Protests of colonial agents in London were futile. ”We might as well have hindered the sun's progress!” exclaimed Franklin. Protests of a few opponents in the Commons were equally vain. The ministry was firm in its course and from all appearances the Stamp Act hardly roused as much as a languid interest in the city of London. In fact, it is recorded that the fateful measure attracted less notice than a bill providing for a commission to act for the king when he was incapacitated.

The Stamp Act, like the Sugar Act, declared the purpose of the British government to raise revenue in America ”towards defraying the expenses of defending, protecting, and securing the British colonies and plantations in America.” It was a long measure of more than fifty sections, carefully planned and skillfully drawn. By its provisions duties were imposed on practically all papers used in legal transactions,-deeds, mortgages, inventories, writs, bail bonds,-on licenses to practice law and sell liquor, on college diplomas, playing cards, dice, pamphlets, newspapers, almanacs, calendars, and advertis.e.m.e.nts. The drag net was closely knit, for scarcely anything escaped.

The Quartering Act (1765).-The ministers were aware that the Stamp Act would rouse opposition in America-how great they could not conjecture. While the measure was being debated, a friend of General Wolfe, Colonel Barre, who knew America well, gave them an ominous warning in the Commons. ”Believe me-remember I this day told you so-” he exclaimed, ”the same spirit of freedom which actuated that people at first will accompany them still ... a people jealous of their liberties and who will vindicate them, if ever they should be violated.” The answer of the ministry to a prophecy of force was a threat of force. Preparations were accordingly made to dispatch a larger number of soldiers than usual to the colonies, and the ink was hardly dry on the Stamp Act when Parliament pa.s.sed the Quartering Act ordering the colonists to provide accommodations for the soldiers who were to enforce the new laws. ”We have the power to tax them,” said one of the ministry, ”and we will tax them.”

Colonial Resistance Forces Repeal

Popular Opposition.-The Stamp Act was greeted in America by an outburst of denunciation. The merchants of the seaboard cities took the lead in making a dignified but unmistakable protest, agreeing not to import British goods while the hated law stood upon the books. Lawyers, some of them incensed at the heavy taxes on their operations and others intimidated by patriots who refused to permit them to use stamped papers, joined with the merchants. Aristocratic colonial Whigs, who had long grumbled at the administration of royal governors, protested against taxation without their consent, as the Whigs had done in old England. There were Tories, however, in the colonies as in England-many of them of the official cla.s.s-who denounced the merchants, lawyers, and Whig aristocrats as ”seditious, factious and republican.” Yet the opposition to the Stamp Act and its accompanying measure, the Quartering Act, grew steadily all through the summer of 1765.

In a little while it was taken up in the streets and along the countryside. All through the North and in some of the Southern colonies, there sprang up, as if by magic, committees and societies pledged to resist the Stamp Act to the bitter end. These popular societies were known as Sons of Liberty and Daughters of Liberty: the former including artisans, mechanics, and laborers; and the latter, patriotic women. Both groups were alike in that they had as yet taken little part in public affairs. Many artisans, as well as all the women, were excluded from the right to vote for colonial a.s.semblymen.

While the merchants and Whig gentlemen confined their efforts chiefly to drafting well-phrased protests against British measures, the Sons of Liberty operated in the streets and chose rougher measures. They stirred up riots in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston when attempts were made to sell the stamps. They sacked and burned the residences of high royal officers. They organized committees of inquisition who by threats and intimidation curtailed the sale of British goods and the use of stamped papers. In fact, the Sons of Liberty carried their operations to such excesses that many mild opponents of the stamp tax were frightened and drew back in astonishment at the forces they had unloosed. The Daughters of Liberty in a quieter way were making a very effective resistance to the sale of the hated goods by spurring on domestic industries, their own particular province being the manufacture of clothing, and devising subst.i.tutes for taxed foods. They helped to feed and clothe their families without buying British goods.

Patrick Henry Legislative Action against the Stamp Act.-Leaders in the colonial a.s.semblies, accustomed to battle against British policies, supported the popular protest. The Stamp Act was signed on March 22, 1765. On May 30, the Virginia House of Burgesses pa.s.sed a set of resolutions declaring that the General a.s.sembly of the colony alone had the right to lay taxes upon the inhabitants and that attempts to impose them otherwise were ”illegal, unconst.i.tutional, and unjust.” It was in support of these resolutions that Patrick Henry uttered the immortal challenge: ”Caesar had his Brutus, Charles I his Cromwell, and George III....” Cries of ”Treason” were calmly met by the orator who finished: ”George III may profit by their example. If that be treason, make the most of it.”