206 Journal of the State Council, 1784-1789.

deminish and must defeat the Provision held out for securing the
Interest as the inducement for assenting to the propositions contained
in the said Act, and therein deceptious and derogatory to the Dignity
of the State, and we do accordingly instruct you not to allow any
Draw-back of the Duties imposed by the said recited Act. We are etc.

W. Smallwood"
To the Naval Officers

To which the Honorable John Kilty Esquire entered the following
dissent:
Dissentient,

1st Because the allowance of Draw backs is a part of the
Commercial law of the State; and must therefore obtain in all Cases
where it is not expressly prohibited.

By the Commercial Law I mean the Act of November
1785 "to alter and amend the laws respecting Commerce" etc., to-
gether with such parts of former Laws as [p 248] remain
unrepealed, and the System thus composed must operate in all its
parts until it shall be explicitly changed or abolished. The act im-
posing the duties in question bears not the smallest mark of an inten-
tion to exempt them from the operation of any rule which regards
duties in general; and the only reference to the commercial law
which it contains, is a direction to the Officers to be guided thereby
in the manner of receiving or securing, and paying these additional
duties into the Treasury, and while the general regulations were
in contemplation, it is reasonable to suppose that any one of them
not intended to affect those duties would have been noticed and
mentioned in the Act.

2nd. Because the present decision does not agree with the
practice of the Executive in a case entirely similar.

The argument that "the allowance would certainly
diminish and might defeat the Provision held out" etc. applies equally
to the authority of remitting fines and forfeitures, which the Board
still retains and exercises, although they are with a few exceptions
sacredly appropriated to the two Colleges the trustees of which might
as well as Messrs. Vanstaphorst complain that the provision intended
for them was diminished or defeated. But my Opinion in both cases
is that the parties entitled to the benefit of these provisions have no
right in them until they are paid into the Treasury, after having
undergone the operation of prior Laws. Holding therefore the
present construction to be erroneous, I have thought it expedient to
record my dissent to the order given to the Naval Officers on the

subject.

John Kilty
July 10. 1787

The Council adjourned till tomorrow morning 11 o'clock.