If the Government of Great Britain was to be a government by the King, it logically followed that the inhabitants of the Realm of Great Britain and the inhabitants of the dependencies must constitute a single political organism. The House of Commons being, in the estimation of George III., a mere deliberative and registering body, at least so long as the warfare between him and them continued, there appeared to him to be no reason why the American Colonies should not be satisfied with the theory that the power of Parliament in the Colonies was unlimited and unconditional, since Parliament, in his view, was merely himself, assisted by the House of Lords and the House of Commons, as deliberative and registering bodies. But, if the Colonies were not satisfied, the exigencies of the political situation at home were such that he could not pay any attention to their complaints. An admission by him that the popular Assemblies of the Colonies had the right to control their Governments would have been an admission that the British House of Commons had the right to control the British Government. It was a logical necessity for the King and the Tory party, in the political situation then existing in England, in case the Colonial Assemblies claimed any other power than that of mere registration of the measures instituted by the King and deliberated and registered by the Lords and Commons, to reduce the Colonies to subjection by force.

On the other hand, the antagonism between the King and the House of Commons led the advocates of the claims of that House to be very jealous of all its prerogatives, so that many of the members who were opposed to the claims of the King vehemently upheld the unlimited and unconditional power of Parliament over the American Colonies. Thus the Colonies were between two contending factions in the British Government, both

working together to annul all the claims of the Colonies which could possibly interfere with the prerogatives claimed by either of them.

Both factions listened eagerly, therefore, to any argument, however specious, which went to show that the power of the King and Parliament was exactly the same in the American Colonies as in the Realm of Great Britain, and there were not wanting advocates who were ready to present arguments in favor of this theory.

The proposition that the powers of the King and Parliament were the same in the Colonies as in Great Britain meant, however, that the position which the English Government had taken in the time of the Commonwealth, and in which it had persisted for a century and more, that the Colonies were dominions and territories belonging to England or Great Britain," in the sense of being external to and dependent upon the body and personality of that State, was a mistake,— that the old distinction between the Realm and the Empire was unfounded,-that there was no British Empire, and that there was only a British Realm, of which Great Britain was an integral part and the American Colonies another integral part.

On this theory, it was necessary to prove that the nonrepresentation in the British Parliament of the inhabitants of the Colonies, or the impossibility, by reason of natural conditions, of their being effectively represented, did not differentiate their political status from that of the inhabitants of Great Britain. The advocates of the theory argued that the people of the Colonies were no worse off than the disfranchised men of Great Britain (of whom there were many at that time, owing to the crude and unsystematic arrangements established by statute relating to the representation in the House of Commons), and the women, children, idiots, convicts, and paupers of Great Britain, who were "virtually repre

sented" by the Parliament, composed of King, Lords, and Commons.

The first Act of Parliament which showed signs of the tendency of Parliament to treat the American Colonies as parts of the Realm, and to deny the obligation toward them to which Great Britain was justly subject as the Imperial State on which they were dependent, was the Act of 1750, by which, upon the inadequate consideration of admitting pig iron and bar iron from the Colonies into Great Britain free of duty, the erection, in any of the Colonies, of any "engine for slitting or rolling iron, or any plating forge to work with a tilt-hammer, or any furnace for making steel" was forbidden. A penalty of two hundred pounds was provided for violation of the Act, and any mill, furnace, or forge erected in violation of its provisions was declared a common nuisance which it was made the duty of the Governor to abate. This Act was doubtless justified, by those who believed in the existence of the Empire, as a proper adjustment of the terms of the "colonial pact as the French called it, or as necessary under the "mercantile system,' it was then understood. All the European metropoles took upon themselves to treat their Colonies in this way. If the metropole restricted itself in any way, this was regarded as a justification for almost any restriction of the dependency in favor of which the metropole restricted itself.

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But even if the Act of 1750 be conceded to be somewhat ambiguous concerning the theory on which Parliament legislated for the American Colonies, there is less doubt about the Act of 1751, by which the Colonies of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New Hampshire were forbidden to issue bills of credit except to meet the current expenses in anticipation of taxes or in case of emergency, or to make any bills of credit a legal tender. That this Act was not based on the theory

that the Colonies could not constitutionally issue money is clear from the fact that it applied only to certain of them, and that Parliament, after having enacted in 1763 an Act forbidding any Colony to make its bills of credit a legal tender, passed another Act in 1770, which allowed New York to issue bills of credit on loan paper and make them a legal tender.

Both these Acts were, of course, open to explanation as legislation of the Imperial State for the common welfare, since one purported to be a regulation of trade and the other a regulation concerning the currency; but they were both arbitrary measures (the Colonies not being consulted), and were local as well as general, in their effect; and hence might be claimed as precedents for the exercise of unconditional and unlimited power. For this reason, they provoked and alarmed the Colonists.

Almost at the same time that Parliament, by thus dictating to the Colonies regulations respecting their manufactures and internal commerce, began to treat them as integral parts of the Realm, "virtually represented" in Parliament, George II. began to act on the same principle. In 1752, by his order in Council, the Lords of Trade sent out instructions to all the Colonial Governors requiring them to submit full reports on all subjects and especially on all matters in which the Colonies were claimed to be violating the rights of the King or Parliament, and their recommendations concerning the action which ought to be taken.

While the answers of the Colonial Governors to these instructions were under consideration by the British Government, the war with France broke out, and, as it was evident that the British possessions in America would be attacked, it became important to Great Britain to keep the good-will of the Americans and of the Indian tribes which occupied the region between the French and the British possessions. Consequently all thought

of bringing the Colonies into the proper subjection of persons virtually" represented had to be given up, and measures had to be taken to induce the Colonies to put themselves in a position to effectually co-operate with Great Britain in negotiating with the Indian tribes and in defending the American frontier. In order to accomplish this, the British Government instructed the Colonial Governors to have the Colonies send representatives to the meeting with the Indian chiefs appointed to be held at Albany in July, 1754, who should assist in making a treaty of alliance with the Six Nations, and take measures for the general defence. Massachusetts Bay, Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire were represented. The delegates so met, all of whom were men of prominence in their respective Colonies, apparently without the least thought that they were acting in any way in violation of the purpose for which they were assembled, agreed upon a" Plan of Union," which proposed to the different Colonies" that humble application be made for an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain, by virtue of which one General Government may be formed in America, including all the said Colonies, and under which Government each Colony may retain its present constitution, except in the particulars wherein a change may be directed by the said Act."

The Plan of Union related to only two subjects-the administration, as dependencies of the American Colonies, of the Indian tribes and the settlements of whites in the Western country; and the defence of the Colonies. There was to be a President-General, to be appointed and supported by the Crown, and a Grand Council of delegates from the Colonies, appointed by their General Assemblies. The power of the President-General and Grand Council to enact laws (subject to the approval of the King in Council) and to levy taxes was thus worded: