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L. H. J.
Liber No. 50
April 26
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Purpose was always intended by us to be sent up to your Honours,
as soon as the Bill for granting the Money should be passed by you.
Your Objections against the Exemption of Persons to be Assessors,
because others ought to be included, we think has little Weight, as
there is very little Probability of the Persons named by your Honours
being appointed; however most of the Exemptions you enumerate,
we shall readily agree to; tho' we cannot well understand what you
mean by the Words, " and other Persons under the like Circum-
stances.
The double Tax, so far as it respects Papists (who seem to be
the Non- Jurors that are the principal Objects of your Regard) is by
the Bill to be avoided by the same Qualification that is required by
the Act passed in 1756, for granting Forty Thousand Pounds for his
Majesty's Service. As the Tax was not then objected to by any
Branch of the Legislature, and as we have not been apprized of any
Objection from any other Quarter, we did not apprehend an Im-
position of a similar Nature would be opposed by your Honours,
especially at this dangerous Crisis, when a Foreign Popish Power is
exerting it's utmost Efforts to subjugate the British Colonies in
North-America to Popery and Slavery. However, as you have been
pleased to say, you cannot, in Conscience, Justice, or good Policy,
agree to the Tax, as you think such a Measure must effectually
Banish them (the Papists we presume you mean) we have deter-
mined in this Instance, rather to wave our undoubted Rights on this
very interesting Occasion, than to lose a Bill of so much Importance
to his Majesty's Service and our own immediate Security; and do
therefore propose, that Non- Jurors, to avoid the double Tax, be only
obliged to take the Oaths prescribed by the Land Tax Bills in Eng-
land. This Test of their Loyalty surely cannot be thought unreason-
able, and their Refusal to give it will be such a glaring Proof of
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p. 112
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Disaffection to our present happy Establishment, as ought to meet
with a public Discouragement. As this Tax is constantly imposed
in our Mother Country, if your Honours should, notwithstanding the
Concession that has been made on our Part, still refuse to consent
to it here, the Loss of this necessary Bill must lie at your Door; for
it is our determined Resolution to adhere to the Regulation now
proposed, as it is thought by our Constituents, as well as Ourselves,
one necessary Means to secure domestic Peace and Tranquility.
We shall take another Opportunity to answer what your Honours
have said of the Papists being drove from their Native Country by
the Severity of it's Laws, &c. and as we have never discovered any
Thing in History or otherwise, that will Justify, or even Countenance,
your Assertion, that the Papists were promised and allowed an
Asylum here, we should be glad to have it explained to us, that a
Matter which has occasioned so much Altercation, may be fully dis-
cussed and settled.
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