ARTICLE SIGNED "CANDIDUS."
[Boston Gazette, October 7, 1771.]
Messieurs EDES & GILL,
Instead of voted Aid,
"Th' illegal imposition followed harsh
With Execration given, or ruthless squeez'd
From an insulted People."
THOMPSON.
I Think it necessary the publick should be inform'd, that his Excellency Thomas Hutchinson, Esq; Governor of this Province, has lately receiv'd, a warrant from the Lords of the Treasury in England, for the Sum of Twenty-two Hundred and fifty Pounds Sterling for his Services for one year and a half, being at the rate of Fifteen Hundred Sterling or Two Thousand L. M. per Ann. - The payment is to be made out of the Commissioners Chest; wherein are reposited the Treasures that are daily collected, tho' perhaps insensibly, from the Earnings and Industry of the honest Yeomen, Merchants and Tradesmen, of this continent, against their Consent; and if his friends speak the truth, against his own private judgment. - This treasure is to be appropriated according to the act of parliament so justly and loudly complain'd of by Americans, for the support of civil government, the payment of the charges of the administration of justice, and the defence of the colonies: And it may hereafter be made use of, for the support of standing armies and ships of war; episcopates & their numerous ecclesiastical retinue; pensioners, placemen and other jobbers, for an abandon'd and shameless ministry; hirelings, pimps, parasites, panders, prostitutes and whores - His Excellency had repeatedly refused to accept the usual Salary out of the treasury of this province; which leads us to think that his eminent patron the Earl of Hillsborough, or his most respected friend Sir Francis Bernard, who is ever at his Lordship's elbow, had given him certain information that this honorable stipend would be allow'd to him - Whether he tho't the generous grant of a thousand sterling, annually made to his predecessors, and offer'd to him, by the assembly, not adequate to his important services to the province in supporting and vindicating its charter and constitutional rights and liberties; or whether he was forbid by instruction from his Lordship to receive it, which is probable from his own words, "I could not consistent with my duty to the King"; or lastly, and which is still more probable, Whether he was ambitious of being, beyond any of his predecessors, a Governor independent of the free grants of the assembly, which is no doubt reconcileable with his Excellency's idea of a constitutional governor of a free people, are matters problematical. - Adulating Priestlings and others, who have sounded his high praises in the news-papers, and in the church of God, as well as in other solemn assemblies, may perhaps echo the fallacious reasoning from one of his publick speeches, "The people will not blame (him) for being willing to avoid burdening them with his support, by the increase of the tax upon their polls and estates," since it is now "provided for another way." In all ages the supercilious part of the clergy have adored the Great Man, and shown a thorough contempt of the understanding of the people. But the people, and a great part, I hope, of the clergy of this enlightened country, have understanding enough to know, that a Governor independent of the people for his support, as well as his political Being, is in fact, a MASTER; and may be, and probably, such is the nature of uncontroulable power, soon will be a TYRANT. It will be recorded by the faithful historian, for the information of posterity, that the first American Pensioner - the first independent Governor of this province, was, not a stranger, but one "born and educated" in it - Not an ANDROSS or a RANDOLPH; but that cordial friend to our civil constitution -that main Pillar of the Religion and the Learning of this country; the Man, upon whom she has, (I will not say wantonly) heaped all the Honors she had to bestow - HUTCHINSON!! - We are told that the Justices of the Superior Court are also to receive fixed salaries out of this American revenue! - "Is it possible to form an idea of slavery, more compleat, more miserable, more disgraceful, than that of a people, where justice is administer'd, government exercis'd, and a standing army maintain'd, at the expence of the people, and yet without the least dependence upon them? If we can find no relief from this infamous situation" - I repeat it, "If we can find no relief from this infamous situation ", let the ministry who have stripped us of our property and liberty, deprive us of our understanding too; that unconscious of what we have been or are, and ungoaded by tormenting reflections, we may tamely bow down our necks, with all the stupid serenity of servitude, to any drudgery which our lords & masters may please to command" - I appeal to the common sense of mankind. To what a state of misery and infamy must a people be reduced! To have a governor by the sole appointment of the crown, under the absolute controul of a weak and arbitrary minister, to whose dictates he is to yield an unlimited obedience, or forfeit his political existence while he is to be supported at the expence of the people, by virtue of an authority claimed by strangers, to oblige them to contribute for him such an annual stipend, however unbounded, as the crown shall be advised to order! If this be not a state of despotism, what is? Could such a governor, by all the arts of persuasion, prevail upon a people to be quiet and contented under such a mode of government, his noble patron might spare himself the trouble of getting their Charter vacated by a formal decision of parliament, or in the tedious process of law - Whenever the relentless enemies of America shall have compleated their system, which they are still, though more silently pursuing, by subtle arts, deep dissimulation, and manners calculated to deceive, our condition will then be more humiliating and miserable, and perhaps more inextricable too, than that of the people of England in the infamous reigns of the Stuarts, which blacken the pages of history; when,
"Oppression stalk'd at large and pour'd abroad
Her unrelenting Train; Informers - Spies -
Hateful Projectors of aggrieving Schemes
To sell the starving many to the few,
And drain a thousand Ways th' exhausted Land…
And on the venal Bench
Instead of Justice, Party held the Scale,
And Violence the Sword."
Your's,
CANDIDUS.