red to consider further of the several Papers which were presented to the House by the Lord North, upon the 19th and 31st days of January last, and yesterday, by his Majesty's command; and that the Petitioners be heard by themselves, their Agents, or Counsel, before the said Committee, in support of their Petition, if they think fit;

An amendment was proposed to be made to the question, by leaving out from the word "whom" to the words "and that the Petitioners," and inserting "the words, the Petition of the Merchants, Traders, and others, of the City of London, concerned in the commerce of North America, is referred," instead thereof;

And the question being put, that the words proposed to be left out, stand part of the question,

It passed in the Negative.

And the question being put, that the words, "the Petition of the Merchants, Traders, and others, of the City of London, concerned in the commerce of North America, is referred," be inserted instead thereof,

It was resolved in the Affirmative.

Then the main question, so amended, being put,

Ordered, That the said Petition be referred to the consideration of the Committee of the Whole House, to whom the Petition of the Merchants, Traders, and others, of the City of London, concerned in the commerce of North America, is referred; and that the Petitioners be heard by themselves, their Agents, or Counsel, before the said Committee, in support of their Petition, if they think fit.

The Order of the Day being read;

The House resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole House to consider further of the several Papers which were presented to the House by the Lord North, upon the 19th and 31st days of January last, and yesterday, by his Majesty's command.

Lord North recapitulated the information contained in the Papers; discriminated the temper of the Colonies; pointed out those where moderation prevailed, and where violence was concealed under the appearance of duty and submission; and named such as he thought were in a state of actual rebellion. He spoke of arts which he asserted were employed on both sides the Atlantic to raise this seditious spirit. He drew a comparison between the burdens borne by the people of Great Britain and those of America. The annual taxes paid by the inhabitants of Great Britain, he said, amounted to ten millions sterling, exclusive of the expenses of collection; and the number of inhabitants of Great Britain he supposed to be eight millions, therefore every inhabitant paid at least twenty-five Shillings annually.

The total taxes of the Continent of America amount to no more than seventy-five thousand Pounds; the number of inhabitants of America were three millions, therefore an inhabitant of America paid no more than six Pence annually. He then proceeded to lay down the Legislative supremacy of Parliament; stated the measures adopted by America to resist it, and the almost universal confederacy of the Colonies in that resistance. Here, he said, he laid his foot on the great barrier which separated, and for the present disunited both countries; and on this ground alone of resistance and denial, he raised every argument leading to the motion he intended to make; which, he said, would be for an Address to the King, and for a conference with the Lords, that it might be the joint Address of both Houses. He hinted that the measures intended to be pursued, in case the King should comply with their Address, were to send more Force; to bring in a temporary Act to put a stop to all the foreign trade of New England, particularly to their fishery on the banks of Newfoundland, till they returned to their duty; at the same time declaring that whenever they should acknowledge the supreme authority of the British Legislature, pay obedience to the laws of this Realm, and make a due submission to the King, their real grievances, upon their making proper application, should be redressed. His Lordship observed that the other Colonies were not so culpable, and he hoped might yet be brought to a sense of their duty to the mother country by more lenient measures. The question, he said, lay within a very narrow compass: it was simply, whether we should abandon this claim, and at once give up every advantage arising both from the sovereignty and the commerce, or to ensure both? Or whether we should resort to the measures indispensably necessary on such an occasion? He concluded with moving,

"That an humble Address be presented to his Majesty, to return his Majesty our most humble thanks for having been graciously pleased to communicate to this House the several Papers relating to the present state of the British Colonies in America, which, by his Majesty's commands, have been laid before this House, and from which, after taking them into our most serious consideration, we find that a part of his Majesty's subjects in the Province of the Massachusetts Bay have proceeded so far to resist the authority of the supreme Legislature, that a rebellion at this time actually exists within the said Province; and we see, with the utmost concern, that they have been countenanced and encouraged by unlawful combinations and engagements entered into by his Majesty's subjects, in several of the other Colonies, to the injury and oppression of many of their innocent fellow-subjects resident within the Kingdom of Great Britain, and the rest of his Majesty's Dominions; this conduct on their part appears to us the more inexcusable, when we consider with how much temper his Majesty and the two Houses of Parliament have acted in support of the Laws and Constitution of Great Britain; to declare that we can never so far desert the trust reposed in us as to relinquish any part of the sovereign authority over all his Majesty's Dominions, which by law is vested in his Majesty and the two Houses of Parliament; and that the conduct of many persons, in several of the Colonies, during the late disturbances, is alone sufficient to convince us how necessary this power is for the protection of the lives and fortunes of all his Majesty's subjects; that we ever have been, and always shall be, ready to pay attention and regard to any real grievances of any of his Majesty's subjects which shall, in a dutiful and constitutional manner, be laid before us; and whenever any of the Colonies shall make a proper application to us, we shall be ready to afford them every just and reasonable indulgence; but that, at the same time, we consider it as our indispensable duty humbly to beseech his Majesty that his Majesty will take the most effectual measures to enforce due obedience to the laws and authority of the supreme Legislature; and that we beg leave, in the most solemn manner, to assure his Majesty that it is our fixed resolution, at the hazard of our lives and properties, to stand by his Majesty, against all rebellious attempts, in the maintenance of the just rights of his Majesty and the two Houses of Parliament."

Mr. Dunning: Sir, the noble Lord has endeavoured, by every light into which he can throw the question, to prove that the resistance of the Americans, though it has gone no further than Votes and Resolutions, is actual and open rebellion, and we are to come to a Resolution declaratory of the same idea; I think, sir, that there is no difficulty in proving the direct contrary position; that the American! are not in rebellion, that the Votes and Resolutions of the several Congressess, both Provincial and Continental, are decent and moderate, though firm declarations of the estimation in which liberty ought to be held, and tempered with the highest expressions of loyalty and duty to their Sovereign. Against what is it that they rebel? Do they deny allegiance to his Majesty? Are they in arms in opposing the King's Troops? By what explanation, or by what misconception their conduct is now to be branded with so violent and so fatal an epithet, I cannot apprehend. You passed Acts in the last session, which, instead of governing America, carried tyranny into the bowels of America, and overturned all legal constitution in one of their Provinces; and you utterly ruined the capital of the Empire in that part of the world, by way of punishing the insolence of a mob. You executed those Acts by force of Arms; the people of the Colonies thinking themselves tyrannically used, and conceiving that the nature of their dependency upon the Parliament of Great Britain was not well understood on either side of the water, in order to treat with this country upon such momentous points, convened a General Congress; the Deputies met in that Congress, came to Resolutions declaratory of their ideas of their submission unto Britain, full of duty and allegiance to the King, and respect towards Parliament; but as all free countries have licentious subjects, and freedom in that country is attended