On May 18th, Richmond brought forward a series of resolutions condemnatory of the American policy of the Government.[1] The debate which followed was one of the most violent of the time. When speaking on the bill for reversing the adjudications against Wilkes, Shelburne had said that North, by giving Luttrell an appointment under the Crown, in order to enable him to vacate his seat and appear as a candidate for Middlesex, had acted unconstitutionally and ought to be impeached.[2] Hillsborough now retaliated, and said that not North, but the minister who had refused to assert the authority of the Crown over the Colonies, ought to be impeached. Shelburne answered by accusing the Government of wishing to establish a royal despotism both at home and in America, and to silence free discussion within the walls of Parliament. "Under these circumstances," he said, "it might become necessary for the Opposition to mark their sense of the situation by ceasing to attend the House." Gower thereupon told Shelburne that the Opposition might please themselves, and appealed to his majority, which he knew he could safely do, to support him against the taunts of speakers whom he said he despised.[3]
Liberty indeed, as Shelburne had said, was threatened in England and America alike. Alarmed at the news which reached them of renewed disturbances at Boston, the Ministers on the 6th July issued an Order in Council, directing "that the rendezvous of his Majesty's ships stationed in North America should be in the harbour of Boston, and that the fortress should be put into a respectable state of defence, and garrisoned by the King's regular troops."[4] In this condition of affairs Chatham hurried up to London. "I was in town on Wednesday last," he wrote to Calcraft, "saw Lord Rockingham, and
- ↑ Parliamentary History, xvi. 1010, May 18th, 1770. On March 5th, 1770, Lord North had proposed a bill in keeping with the terms of Lord Hillsborough's Circular, repealing all the duties of 1767 except that on tea. The measure passed after meeting the resistance of the whole Opposition—so far as the exception of tea was concerned—in the House of Commons. Being a Money Bill, it was not discussed in the House of Lords.
- ↑ Parliamentary History, xvi. 966.
- ↑ Ibid. xvi. 1026.
- ↑ By a curious coincidence these disturbances took place on March 5th, 1770, the same day on which Lord North introduced his bill in the House of Commons.
