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L.H.J.
Liber No. 49
Dec. 16
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Whence that Address infers,
" For which those Officers ought to be answerable."
And thus I shall leave it to the Consideration of your House, to
be made out in the best Manner you are able, so as to support that
Conclusion; or their unjust Representations, and your unreasonable
Complaints, must fall to the Ground : And shall now proceed to lay
before you such Reasons as have greatly contributed towards fixing
my Opinion, That neither are your Complaints Reasonable, nor their
Representations Just.
As the taking Impost-Bonds, instead of obliging the Trader to pay
the Duties down upon Importation, is immediately an Ease and En-
couragement to Trade, it may reasonably be presumed, that they have
been in Use in this Province from the first Commencement of En-
tering and Clearing Vessels amongst us; and indeed I am very credibly
informed, that as far as any Discoveries can be made upon this
Head, by looking back into former Times, it appears, that this In-
dulgence has been constantly and universally given to Trade in this
Province : That these Bonds were in Use amongst us so early as in
the Year 1715, appears from an Act of Assembly passed, whereby
the Attorney-General is prohibited from suing any Bond taken for
Country Duties, unless under Circumstances there specified; which
Description exactly corresponds with the Impost-Bonds taken at this
Day; and another Act passed in the Year 1717, gives a Fee for an
Impost-Bond 53. By those Acts of Assembly, the Legislature seems
to have considered these Bonds, not as a private Security taken by
the Naval-Officers upon his Indulgence, at his own Risque, given to
Trade, but as a Security to the Public for the Country Duties, and
taken payable to the Head of the Government; or the Attorney-
General as such, would have had nothing to do with them, nor would
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p. 223
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the Legislature have given the Officer a Fee for taking them: And
as even the first of these Acts is so far from introducing into Practice,
that it plainly supposes them to have been then in Use, or it never
would have provided against an Abuse in suing them; I think it may
be reasonably inferred, that they have been constantly and uni-
versally taken from the earliest down to the present Times, in all
Cases without Exception, unless such Exception can be shewn : And
as these Acts of Assembly have undoubtedly given them a legal Estab-
lishment, if they had none before, I presume a Right became then not
only vested in the Naval-Officer to take them as a Security to the
Public for the Country Duties, but likewise a Right of Exemption
in the Trader, who had Duties to pay, from paying them down at
the Time of Entry; and from hence, I presume, it is very far from
appearing, " That Impost-Bonds ought not to be taken," as being " an
Indulgence unknown to the Law."
But, " The Duty on such Servants is required to be paid at the
Time of Entry: " This is a Discovery which I very freely confess, I
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