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The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria cover

The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria

Chapter 36: SENTIMENTS OF THE AMERICANS ON THE DECLARATORY ACT.
By Edward Farr
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About This Book

The volume traces British political, parliamentary, and military developments from the accession of George III through the early nineteenth century, chronicling changes of ministry and cabinet, debates over colonial taxation and the American conflict, parliamentary controversies involving figures such as Wilkes and Warren Hastings, questions of Catholic relief and slave-trade abolition, and responses to the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars, including major naval and continental campaigns, the union with Ireland, and domestic legislation on finance, civil liberties, and parliamentary reform.

SENTIMENTS OF THE AMERICANS ON THE DECLARATORY ACT.

The manner in which the repeal of the Stamp Act was received in America seemed to justify the measure. Although accompanied with the Declaratory Act, it was welcomed by many persons among the higher classes, of honest and upright mind, with great satisfaction. Washington declared that those who were instrumental in procuring the repeal were entitled to the thanks of all well-wishers to Great Britain and her colonies. There were fierce republican spirits, however, in New England, who viewed the Declaratory Act in the same light which they had viewed the Stamp Act; and as soon as the first burst of joy had subsided, this was made the subject of their declamation, and a stimulus to popular excitement. Public writers were employed to prevent a return of harmony between Great Britain and her colonies, and though addresses of thanks were voted by the assemblies to the king, this was but an evanescent show of gratitude. The same temper was found especially to prevail in the assembly of Massachusets against the Declaratory Act, as had been displayed against the Stamp Act, and the spirit of resistance soon spread to the other colonies. The right of legislative authority assumed by Great Britain over her colonies was loudly questioned, and bills were passed in the assemblies independently of the British parliament, and in defiance of our declared sovereign legislative right. One breach was therefore healed by the repeal of the Stamp Act, but another was opened by the scarcely less obnoxious act with which it was accompanied. A tree of liberty had been planted, and there was a universal disposition to preserve its leaves and its fruits from the touch of kingly and sovereign power.