Mr. Otis roundly asserted, that this statute, and the preceding statutes, never could be executed. The whole power of Great Britain would be ineffectual; and by a bold figure, which will now be thought exaggeration, he declared, that if the king of Great Britain in person were encamped on Boston common, at the head of twenty thousand men, with all his navy on our coast, he would not be able to execute these laws. They would be resisted or eluded.
JOHN ADAMS.
TO THE HON. WM. TUDOR.
Quincy, August 21, 1818.
DEAR SIR,
MR. OTIS quoted another author, "The political and commercial works of Charles D'Avenant, L.L. D. vol. 2. discourse 3 On the plantation trade." I cannot transcribe seventy six pages, but wish that Americans of all classes would read them. They are in the same strain with Downing, Child, Gee, Ashley, Charles 2, James 2, William and Mary, William 3, Ann, George 2, and George 3; all conspiring to make the people of North America hewers of wood and drawers of water, to plantation governors, custom house officers, judges of admiralty, common informers, West India planters, naval commanders, in the first place; and, after all these worthy people should be amply supported, nourished, encouraged and pampered, if any thing more could be squeezed from the hard earnings of the farmers, the merchants, the tradesmen and labourers in America, it was to be drawn into the exchequer in England, to aggrandize the British navy.
Mr. Otis proceeded to another species of statutes, relative to our internal policy, even our domestic manufactures and fireside comforts; I might say, our homespun blankets and woollen sheets, so necessary to cover some of us, if not all of us, in our slumbers in the long nights of our frozen winters. I shall refer to these statutes as they occur, without any regard to order, and shall not pretend to transcribe any of them.
"Furs of the plantations to be brought to Great Britain. 8 Geo. 1. c. 15. ss. 24."
"Hats, not to be exported from one plantation to another. 5 Geo. 2. c. 22."