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L. H. J.
Liber No. 50
April 26
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Caution should prevail, at a Time when your Honours allow, that
Forms sought not to be so religiously observed as to defeat the Duty
we owe to our King and Country, which demands, at so critical a
Juncture, a full Exertion of all our Powers.
And we must observe it is a little extraordinary, that your Honours
should now express your Wishes, that the Proposition made in our
Message of the 12th, had come sooner, that you might have been
sooner able to communicate your Sentiments, since by proceeding
in the same Manner you did in the most important Case of this Sort
which has before happened, you might long ago have communicated
them, and you had sufficient Reason from what was then done, to
be satisfied we should have shewn the utmost Readiness to do every
Thing we could, consistently with our Rights and Privileges, to
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p. 106
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have procured a Passage to either of the former Bills, or the Bill now
under Consideration.
The Corrections made by us in this Bill, after we had received it
with a Negative from you, and which are mentioned in our Message
of the 12th, are so very trifling, that we shall not dispute whether it
might be consistent with Parliamentary Modes of Proceeding, or not,
to make them.
We shall now proceed to consider, and endeavour to obviate, the
several Objections to the Bill, which you have been pleased to point
out in your Message of the 18th.
As to the first against the Preamble, because it asserts, that only
the Delegates give and grant, your Honours certainly must be satis-
fied, when we remind you, that it is exactly conformable to the
Sale of the Land Tax Acts in England, and for that Reason we think
unexceptionable.
Your Objection to our assuming (as you are pleased to call it)
the sole Nomination of the Officers mentioned in the Bill, we presume
is against our Rights of nominating Commissioners for executing
that Part of the Bill relating to an Assessment on real and personal
Estates, &c. In Support of this Right, we need only mention, that
it is a Right indisputable in the House of Commons at Home: This
your Honours must know, if you have ever look'd into the Land Tax
Acts, where, in many of them may be found, the Names at large of
all the Commissioners for the several Counties and Places in Eng-
land; in others an Appointment (without naming them) of the Com-
missioners named in some preceding Act : The same Rights we find
exercised by the Commons in the Nomination of Commissioners in
Bills for examining and stating Public Accounts.
What Argument then can be drawn from his Lordship's Charter ?
Will it be contended that the King has granted by that Charter a
Power which the Crown does not exercise, or even attempt to exer-
cise? Surely it will not. His Lordship's Power by the Charter to
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