Petition to of independence was commenced. Its sad history and issue are but too well known. In vain Congress adthe king, Sept. dressed a petition to the king, for redress and conciliation. It received no answer. In vain Lord 1st. 1775. Overtures for peace, 1778. Chatham devoted the last energies of his wasting life1 to effect a reconciliation, without renouncing the sovereignty of England. In vain the British Parliament, humbling itself before its rebellious subjects, repealed the American tea duty, and renounced its claims to imperial taxation.2 In vain were Parliamentary commissioners empowered to suspend the acts of which the colonists complained, to concede every demand but that of independence, and almost to sue for peace.3 It was too late to stay the civil war. Disasters and defeat befell the British arms, on American soil; and, at length, the independence of the colonies was recognized.* Such were the disastrous consequences of a misunderstanding of the rights and pretensions of colonial communities, who had carried with them the laws and franchises of Englishmen. And here closes the first period in the constitutional history of the colonies. Crown We must now turn to another class of dependencies, not originally settled by English subjects, but acquired from other states by conquest or cession. To these a different rule of public law was held to apply. They were dominions of the crown; and governed, according to the laws 1 Lord Chatham was completely secluded from political and social life, from the spring of 1767 to the spring of 1769; and again, from the spring of 1775 to the spring of 1777. 2 28 Geo. III. c. 12; Parl. Hist., xix. 762; Ann. Reg., 1778, 133. 3 28 Geo. III. c. 13. 4 No part of English history has received more copious illustration than the revolt of the American colonies. In addition to the general histories of England, the following may be consulted:- Franklin's Works, Sparks's Life of Washington, Marshall's Life of Washington, Randolph's Mem. of Jefferson, Chalmers' Political Annals, Dr. Gordon's History of the American Revolution, Grahame's History of the United States, Stedman's History, Bancroft's History of the American Revolution. stitutions colonies. prevailing at the time of their acquisition, by the king in council. They were distinguished from other set- Free contlements as crown colonies. Some of them, how-to crown ever, like Jamaica and Nova Scotia, had received the free institutions of England, and were practically selfgoverned, like other English colonies. Canada, Canada. the most important of this class, was conquered from the French, in 1759, by General Wolfe, and ceded to England, in 1763, by the treaty of Paris. In 1774, the administration of its affairs was intrusted to a council appointed by the crown; 2 but, in 1791, it was ́ divided into two provinces, to each of which representative institutions were granted. It was no easy problem to provide for the government of such a colony. It comprised a large and ignorant population of French colonists, having sympathies with the country whence they sprung, accustomed to absolute government and feudal institutions, and under the influence of a Catholic priesthood. It further comprised an active race of British settlers, speaking another language, professing a different religion, and craving the liberties of their own free land. The division of the provinces was also a separation of races; and freedom was granted to both alike. The immediate objects of this measure were to secure the attachment of Canada, and to exempt the British colonists from the French laws; but it marked the continued adhesion of Parliament to the principles of self-government. In discussing its policy, Mr. Fox laid down a principle, which was destined, after half a century, to become the rule of colonial administration. "I am convinced," said he, "that the only means of retaining distant colonies with advantage, is to enable them to govern themselves." In 1785, representative institutions were given 1 Clark's Colonial Law, 4; Mills' Colonial Constitutions, 19, &c. 2 14 Geo. III. c. 83. 18. 8 31 Geo. III. c. 31; Parl. Hist., xxviii. 1377. 4 See Lord Durham's description of the two races. - Report, 1839, p. 8– 5 March 6th, 1791; Parl. Hist., xxviii. 1379; Lord J. Russell's Life of Fox, ii. 259; Lord Stanhope's Life of Pitt, ii. 89. to New Brunswick, and, so late as 1832, to Newfoundland; and thus, eventually, all the British American colonies were as free, in their forms of government, as the colonies which had gained their independence. But the mother country, in granting these constitutions, exercised, in a marked form, the powers of a dominant state. She provided for the sale of waste lands, for the maintenance of the church establishment, and for other matters of internal polity. colonies. England was soon compensated for the loss of her colonies Australian in America, by vast possessions in another hemisphere. But the circumstances under which Australia was settled were unfavorable to free institutions. Transportation to the American plantations, commenced in the reign of Charles II., had long been an established punishment for criminals.1 The revolt of these colonies led to the establishment of penal settlements in Australia. New South Wales was founded in 1788,2 and Van Diemen's Land in 1825. Penal settlements were necessarily without a constitution, being little more than state prisons. These fair countries, instead of being the homes of free Englishmen, were peopled by criminals sentenced to long terms of punishment and servitude. Such an origin was not promising to the moral or political destinies of Australia; but the attractions which it offered to free emigrants gave early tokens of its future greatness. South Australia and New Zealand, whence convicts were excluded, were afterwards founded, in the same region, without free constitutions. The early political condition of the Australian colonies forms, indeed, a striking contrast to that of the older settlements, to which Englishmen had taken their birthrights. But free emigration developed their resources, and quickly reduced the criminal population to a subordinate element in the society; and, in 1828, local 1 4 Geo. I. c. 2; 6 Geo. I. c. 23. Banishment was made a punishment, in 1597, by 39 Elizabeth, c. 4; and transportation, by orders in council, in 1614, 1615, and 1617. — Mills' Colonial Constitutions, 344. 2 24 Geo. III. c. 56; Orders in Council, Dec. 6th, 1786. 8 Mills' Colonial Const., 325. legislatures were granted to New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land.1 Transpor continued. While these colonies were without an adequate population, transportation was esteemed by the settlers, as the means of affording a steady supply of labor; but tation disas free emigration advanced, the services of convicts became less essential to colonial prosperity; and the moral taint of the criminal class was felt more sensibly. In 1838, Sir William Molesworth's committee exposed the enormities of transportation as part of a scheme of colonization; and in 1840 the sending of convicts to New South Wales was discontinued. In Van Diemen's Land, after various attempts to improve the system of convict labor and discipline, transportation was finally abolished in 1854. Meanwhile, an attempt to send convicts to the Cape of Good Hope in 1848, had been resisted by the colonists, and abandoned. In the following year, a new penal settlement was founded in Western Australia. The discontinuance of transportation to the free colonies of Australia, and a prodigious increase of emigration Free constituand productive industry, were preparing them for tions to Ausa further development of freedom at no distant onies. period. tralian col tion after the war. From the period of the American war the home government, awakened to the importance of colonial ad- Colonial ministration, displayed greater activity, and a more administraostensible disposition to interfere in the affairs of American the colonies. Until the commencement of the difficulties with America, there had not even been a separate department for the government of the colonies; but the board of trade exercised a supervision, little more than nominal, over colonial affairs. In 1768, however, a third secretary of state was appointed, to whose care the colonies were intrusted. In 1782, the office was discontinued by Lord Rockingham, after the loss of the American provinces; but was revived 19 Geo. IV. c. 83. in 1794, and became an active and important department of the state.1 Its influence was felt throughout the British colonies. However popular the form of their institutions, they were steadily governed by British ministers in Downing Street. In crown colonies, Colonies governed in Downing the dominion of the crown was absolute; and the authority of the colonial-office was exercised diStreet. rectly, by instructions to the governors. In free colonies it was exercised, for the most part, indirectly, through the influence of the governors and their councils. Self-government was there the theory; but in practice, the governors, aided by dominant interests in the several colonies, contrived to govern according to the policy dictated from Downing Street. Just as, at home, the crown, the nobles, and an ascendant party were supreme in the national councils, so in the colonies, the governors and their official aristocracy were generally able to command the adhesion of the local legislatures. A more direct interference, however, was often exercised. Ministers had no hesitation in disallowing any colonial acts of which they disapproved, even when they concerned the internal affairs of the colony only. They dealt freely with the public lands, as the property of the crown, often making grants obnoxious to the colonists; and peremptorily insisting upon the conditions under which they should be sold and settled. Their interference was also frequent regarding church establishments and endowments, official salaries and the colonial civil lists. Misunderstandings and disputes were constant; but the policy and will of the home government usually prevailed. Another incident of colonial administration was that of Patronage. patronage. The colonies offered a wide field of employment for the friends, connections, and political partisans of the home government. The offices in England, 1 Mills' Colonial Const., 2-13. |