The stamp act raised a storm of indignation in the American colonies. Some of them, and especially the New England colonies, already had a substantial grievance in the heavy blow dealt to their prosperity by the repression of their contraband trade. Their discontent was increased by a suspicion that England was about to establish episcopacy among them at their expense, for Archbishop Secker and other English churchmen were anxious to introduce bishops into America. A more sentimental, though an efficient cause of irritation also existed in the affectation of superiority adopted by Englishmen towards their colonial fellow-subjects. The stamp tax brought their discontent to a head, and gave the party hostile to government an opportunity for stirring up opposition. During the year unwisely allowed by Grenville for considering the proposed tax, they busily agitated against it. While at that time the Americans allowed that parliament had a right to impose duties for the regulation of trade, they denied its right to levy an internal tax for the purpose of revenue, because they were not represented in parliament.
Opposition to the ministerial policy naturally began in Boston, where the repression of contraband trade weighed most heavily and where—though that was a smaller matter—the dislike to episcopacy was specially strong. The town-meeting promptly passed resolutions denying the right of parliament to tax the colonies without their consent. The meeting was led by Samuel Adams, a man of frugal life and austere character, who, after failing as a brewer and as a tax collector, adopted the career most congenial to his tastes and talents of political agitator. The resolutions were adopted by the provincial assembly, and on its invitation five other colonies joined with Massachusetts in sending memorials and petitions to England against the proposed tax. The assembly of Virginia was in session when the news came that the tax was enacted, and Patrick Henry, a lawyer, brought forward some defiant resolutions, of which four were carried, though only by a small majority. His speech, which contained an insolent reference to the king, was much admired. A general congress of the colonies was proposed by Massachusetts and met at New York on November 7. Representatives of nine colonies attended and others sent expressions of good-will. The members drew up a statement of their claims and grievances in moderate terms, and further expressed them in an address to the king, a memorial to the lords, and a petition to the commons.
These orderly proceedings were accompanied by outbursts of lawless violence. Societies for resistance were organised. The "sons of liberty," as they called themselves in reference to Barré's speech, were active in Boston, and in August, 1765, a mob plundered the house of a man who was nominated as a distributor of stamps, destroyed a building on his land which they believed was to be used as a stamp-office, hanged him in effigy, and forced him to renounce his appointment. A sermon preached by Jonathan Mayhew, a popular unitarian minister, on the words "I would that they were even cut off which trouble you," was followed by a more serious riot. Public buildings were attacked, the records of the admiralty court were burnt, and the rioters forced their way into the custom-house and got at the liquor in the cellars. Maddened by drink they wrecked the stately mansion of Hutchinson, the lieutenant-governor, and destroyed his fine collection of books and manuscripts. Persons of good position more or less openly encouraged these excesses and no one was punished for them. Outbreaks of mob violence, though of a less riotous kind, took place in Rhode Island, Connecticut, and elsewhere. On November 1, the day on which the stamp act came into operation, copies of it were offered for sale headed, "The folly of England and the ruin of America," bells were tolled, and mock funerals passed through the streets.
Everywhere the new stamps were seized and destroyed. At New York the lieutenant-governor, encouraged by the presence of the king's troops, tried to secure the stamps sent to the town. A riot ensued. General Gage, the commander-in-chief, declined to interfere at the risk of beginning a civil war, and the stamps were surrendered and locked up in the town hall. Besides these not a parcel of stamps was left in the colonies. For a time this put an end to legal business, and the courts were closed. Then lawyers agreed to take no notice of the lack of stamps on documents, and at last the governors declared that the operation of the act was to be reckoned as suspended. Retaliatory measures were concerted. Merchants combined to stop all importation from England, cancelled their orders and delayed sending remittances. Associations were formed for abandoning the use of English goods, and the richest citizens either wore old clothes or rough material of colonial production. Manufactories of linen, cloth, and hardware were started, and in order to insure a supply of wool, butchers were forbidden by their customers to kill lambs.
The distinction made by the party of resistance between external and internal taxation was in accordance with previous practice. Though parliament had frequently imposed port-duties on the colonies, it had abstained from imposing taxes within them. The stamp act was a new departure. English history afforded ground for the distinction, which was alleged in Bate's case, in the reign of James I., in support of the claim of the crown. Yet it is clearly artificial, for a division of taxes, such as into external and internal, only concerns their incidence; it is a matter which belongs to economics and does not affect political right. The colonists' claim of exemption from parliamentary taxation on the ground of non-representation appeals to the sympathy of Englishmen. Both in England and America there were some who desired that the colonies should be represented in parliament, but their distance from England and the ignorance of both peoples as regards the circumstances and needs of each other would have been fatal objections to any such scheme. The claim of the colonists seems to imply a misapprehension of the character of parliament; for parliament is not a mere meeting of delegates, it is an imperial assembly, and its sovereignty is neither derived from the perfection of its constitution nor lessened by its imperfection. Taxation is an attribute of sovereignty, and parliament had a right to tax the colonies because the sovereign power resided in it. Where else could it reside? To deny the right to tax and to admit the right to legislate was inconsistent. How could parliament, in virtue of its sovereign authority, have a right to pass a bill ensuring personal freedom in the colonies, and yet have no right to pass another bill imposing a tax on them? The logical outcome of the American contention was that all parliamentary legislation concerning the colonies was null, except so far as they chose to admit it. Under all their arguments lay the germ of independence, though as yet the leaders of the agitation loudly professed loyalty.
UNSTATESMANLIKE POLICY.
That the tax was reasonable in intention, equitable in incidence, and in itself tolerable, few probably will now deny. Nor will any one surely deny that the act was foolish and unstatesmanlike. Strict definitions of legal right are not safe guides in practical politics: sentiment and circumstances should be held to be of far greater account. The Americans maintained that there was an important difference between external and internal taxation, and, in common with all other Englishmen, they highly valued the right expressed in the maxim, "No taxation without representation". It was a fatal mistake to disregard their belief and, for the sake of avoiding a not very serious expenditure, to seem to deny what they claimed as their heritage as Englishmen. Heavy as its expenses were, Great Britain could have afforded to take upon itself the sum required for the defence of the colonies. Grenville could not see the matter in this light. Well-meaning and wishing to act fairly both towards England and the colonies, he brought trouble on both alike by his insistence on legal right. His administration was fruitful in evil. He permitted parliament to enter on a disastrous struggle with Wilkes in order to gratify the king; he raised up discord between England and her most important colonies; he allowed the strength of England to decay by grudging to spend the money needed for the maintenance of the navy, and its dignity to be impaired by neglecting to insist on the payment of the Manila ransom, though for that he was not individually responsible. One judicious act of his administration may be recorded here. The Isle of Man, though under the allegiance of the king, was not fully under the royal authority; the king had no courts and no officers there, and it was, as Burke said, "the very citadel of smuggling". In 1765 the crown bought the rights of the Duke and Duchess of Atholl over the island for £70,000, and it became thenceforward an integral part of the realm of England.
FOOTNOTES:
[65] Hardwicke to Newcastle, Add. MS. 32,948, f. 54.
[66] G. Rose, Diaries, ii., 192.