Appendix. 427

judged necessary, which they had accordingly done; and that they,
and none others, were the proper judges of the necessity of such
uses and purposes. Besides, the bill is so drawn in other parts, which
relate to the accounting, that by no rules of construction, the trustees
could have been answerable for that money. But what we have
said is sufficient for the present purpose; hence you and the rest of
the world may now judge, who acted with a proper care in the dis-
posal of the country's money; you, who voted so large a sterling
sum as 500l. or 600l. per annum for three years, to be disposed of
by certain persons called trustees, as they should think fit; or we,
who neither then would, or now will, concur in such a vote; and
it would have been more than probable, if that bill had passed into a
law, that the people would very soon have had cause to acknowledge,
it could not have been more inconvenient to commit this trusteeship
or guardianship (if you would have it so) to any gentleman in our
house, than to some persons out of it; and we with that infalibility
you mention, was as far from your house, as it is from ours.

Contempo-
rary Printed
Pamphlet
Md.Hist.Soc.
p. 47

However, we cannot be mistaken in this, that such a bill is not
to be found in any English government; and which, if it had passed
into a law, would have had the effects we before mentioned, of
establishing a new and dangerous power amongst ourselves, making
the whole Province ridiculous to our neighbours, and the risk of
incurring his Majesty's displeasure.
Your message of the 6th instant would not have been less decent,
if the extraordinary threat of the people's doing themselves justice,
had been omitted: whatever you may be pleased to suggest to your-
selves or others, we can never be so insensible of any hardships or
difficulties the people of Maryland may have just cause to complain
of, as not to join chearfully in proper methods for their redress
and ease, and procuring justice to be done them: but we may pre-
sume to say, that the language of doing themselves justice, cannot
be consistent with their subjection and obedience due to his Maj-
esty, who makes the laws the rule of his actions, and will expect and

p. 48

exact from his subjects, that their actions also should be comformable
to those laws.
To conclude, we hope the world (which has been so much talked
of in this debate) will have an opportunity of seeing this message,
together with the bill and the others on the same subject.

The Upper House in their Address of the 27th April, 1761, to his
Excellency Governor Sharpe says,
"Bills for the support of an agent in England have been often
sent to us for our concurrence, and we have as often refused it, not
only because we were unwilling to subject the country to the
burthen of an unnecessary imposition, but because the nature and
tendency of these bills have been such, as it can hardly be imagined
the framers of them could entertain the least hope, that we should

p. 49