a province, like the vestry of a parish, may
judge very properly concerning the affairs of
its own particular district, but can have no
proper means of judging concerning those of
the whole empire. It cannot even judge properly
concerning the proportion which its own
province bears to the whole empire, or concerning
the relative degree of its wealth and
importance, compared with the other provinces;
because those other provinces are not
under the inspection and superintendency of
the assembly of a particular province. What
is necessary for the defence and support of the
whole empire, and in what proportion each
part ought to contribute, can be judged of
only by that assembly which inspects and superintends
the affairs of the whole empire.
It has been proposed, accordingly, that the
colonies should be taxed by requisition, the
parliament of Great Britain determining the
sum which each colony ought to pay, and the
provincial assembly assessing and levying it
in the way that suited best the circumstances
of the province. What concerned the whole
empire would in this way be determined by
the assembly which inspects and superintends
the affairs of the whole empire; and the provincial
affairs of each colony might still be regulated
by its own assembly. Though the
colonies should, in this case, have no representatives
in the British parliament, yet, if we
may judge by experience, there is no probability
that the parliamentary requisition would
be unreasonable. The parliament of England
has not, upon any occasion, shewn the smallest
disposition to overburden those parts of
the empire which are not represented in parliament.
The islands of Guernsey and Jersey,
without any means of resisting the authority
of parliament, are more lightly taxed than
any part of Great Britain. Parliament, in attempting
to exercise its supposed right, whether
well or ill grounded, of taxing the colonies,
has never hitherto demanded of them
any thing which even approached to a just
proportion to what was paid by their fellow-subjects
at home. If the contribution of the
colonies, besides, was to rise or fall in proportion
to the rise or fall of the land-tax, parliament
could not tax them without taxing,
at the same time, its own constituents, and
the colonies might, in this case, be considered
as virtually represented in parliament.
Examples are not wanting of empires in
which all the different provinces are not taxed,
if I may be allowed the expression, in one
mass; but in which the sovereign regulates
the sum which each province ought to pay,
and in some provinces assesses and levies it
as he thinks proper; while in others he leaves
it to be assessed and levied as the respective
states of each province shall determine. In
some provinces of France, the king not only
imposes what taxes he thinks proper, but assesses
and levies them in the way he thinks
proper. From others he demands a certain
sum, but leaves it to the states of each province
to assess and levy that sum as they think
proper. According to the scheme of taxing
by requisition, the parliament of Great Britain
would stand nearly in the same situation
towards the colony assemblies, as the king of
France does towards the states of those provinces
which still enjoy the privilege of having
states of their own, the provinces of
France which are supposed to be the best governed.
But though, according to this scheme, the
colonies could have no just reason to fear that
their share of the public burdens should ever
exceed the proper proportion to that of their
fellow-citizens at home, Great Britain might
have just reason to fear that it never would
amount to that proper proportion. The parliament
of Great Britain has not, for some
time past, had the same established authority
in the colonies, which the French king has in
those provinces of France which still enjoy
the privilege of having states of their own.
The colony assemblies, if they were not very
favourably disposed (and unless more skilfully
managed than they ever have been hitherto,
they are not very likely to be so), might still
find many pretences for evading or rejecting
the most reasonable requisitions of parliament.
A French war breaks out, we shall
suppose; ten millions must immediately be
raised, in order to defend the seat of the empire.
This sum must be borrowed upon the
credit of some parliamentary fund mortgaged
for paying the interest. Part of this fund
parliament proposes to raise by a tax to be
levied in Great Britain, and part of it by a
requisition to all the different colony assemblies
of America and the West Indies. Would
people readily advance their money upon the
credit of a fund which partly depended upon
the good humour of all these assemblies, far
distant from the seat of the war, and sometimes,
perhaps, thinking themselves not much concerned
in the event of it? Upon such a fund,
no more money would probably be advanced
than what the tax to be levied in Great Britain
might be supposed to answer for. The
whole burden of the debt contracted on account
of the war would in this manner fall,
as it always has done hitherto, upon Great
Britain; upon a part of the empire, and not
upon the whole empire. Great Britain is,
perhaps, since the world began, the only state
which, as it has extended its empire, has only
increased its expense, without once augmenting
its resources. Other states have generally
disburdened themselves, upon their subject
and subordinate provinces, of the most
considerable part of the expense of defending
the empire. Great Britain has hitherto suffered
her subject and subordinate provinces to
disburden themselves upon her of almost this
whole expense. In order to put Great Britain