Mr. Cornwall explained the nature of the supremacy, and shewed how the measure now proposed was not only consistent with it, but the best and wisest measure, as a measure of finance. He confirmed what his right honourable relation had said as to its being no new proposition, but haying been formerly made by Mr. Grenville.

Mr. T. Townshend replied to Mr. Cornwall.

Mr. Ackland. It is, sir, with the greatest diffidence I rise to deliver ray sentiments on this occasion to the House. Astonished at propositions I so little expected, I rise to beg permission of the House to make the following motion: That the Chairman do leave the Chair. I am prompted to it by a conviction, that the propositions laid before the House by the noble Lord, can, on the principles of the gentlemen on the other side, produce no good consequences; on the principles of the gentlemen of this side, must produce many bad ones. Sir, I have supported Administration on every American step they have taken during the Session, because I approved them; and as long as I continued to approve them I should have continued to support them. But, sir, I cannot approve this measure, and therefore beg to make the above motion.

Mr. Dundas, Solicitor General of Scotland, spoke in very strong terms, to mark the contradiction of the present measure to the Address, and to every other measure to which he had given his consent; declared that he could never accede to any concessions whatever, which he understood this to be, until the Americans did, in direct terms, acknowledge the absolute supremacy of this country; much less could he consent to such concessions, while they were in arms against it.

Sir Gilbert Elliot. The debate has taken a different turn from any that I could have conceived; and gentlemen have taken up ideas so contrary to every thing contained in the motion, that I own I cannot but wish to explain it as I understand it to be; not only as it stands in the present Resolution, but as I conceive it to be a part of a measure already entered into. The Address to his Majesty, in consequence of our considering the Papers, contained, in the sense in which I agreed to it, two correspondent lines of conduct. With force, to repress those that were in rebellion; with the protection of this country to defend those who were acting under the authority of it, to establish the Government, and to enforce the laws of this country in the Colonies, was one line of that conduct. You have addressed his Majesty to enforce all those measures that were necessary to carry this into effect. You have augmented your forces both by sea and land; you have raised money for this purpose; you have proceeded to measures of restriction, and are in a way to proceed still further in that course; in the whole of which nothing is looked to but the support and establishment of the supreme authority of this country. The other line, whose direction is concurrent and concomitant with this, has been the holding out a promised indulgence to those who will do their duty towards this country. In an Address you can only state this in general and vague terms. You could not, without taking it up as a particular point of consideration, and as a particular measure, express yourselves in an explicit and definitive manner to that point. While you are going on with the one part of this united, measure, will you stop short in this, to which you Rave pledged both your honour and humanity? Sir, so far from the measure now proposed being contradictory to, or inconsistent with the other, the plan on which you sat out at the opening of this business, would be defective, would he unjust, without it. While, therefore, you are maintaining the authority of this country, and that with measures of force, forget not your humanity and your policy. Each proposition is to me but part of one measure; and, as part of a measure which I have approved in the whole, I must give my consent to it.

Colonel Barré. How this new scheme of letting the Americans tax themselves, ever came into the noble Lord's head, I cannot conceive. Whether it be the genuine product of his own new wisdom and policy, or whether it arises from prodigious cunning; whether from advice of any new friends, or springs from the friendship of old enemies, is impossible to conceive. By what I can collect, it is not likely to gain him any new friends from this side the House; and I should have thought it was going to lose him several friends from that side, had not the right honourable gentleman who spoke last risen to his aid. When that gentleman pleases to exert his eloquence, there is something so powerful, so persuading, so leading in it, that those who were in doubt become immediately convinced. His opinion, whenever explicitly given, becomes like a standard, under which even troops which have turned their backs, may be rallied and brought again to their ranks; and, notwithstanding what we may have thought some few moments ago, we shall yet see all the troops reconciled to the march they are to make. And I begin now to see, that whatever may be the various doubts, the opinions and speeches on different sides, when we come to a division, I believe the use of a standard in this House will be seen, in that there will be scarcely any difference in numbers of those who have hitherto divided on either side. But though the noble Lord's new motion will cause no new divisions amongst us here, yet it is founded on that wretched, low, shameful, abominable maxim which has predominated in every measure of our late Minister, divide et impera. This is to divide the Americans; this is to break those Associations, to dissolve that generous union in which the Americans, as one man, stand in defence of their rights and liberties. If you are so weak as to imagine, from any thing which that sincerely associated band of Ministers can find in their own hearts, you can believe that the Americans are so foolish or so base to each other, you will be deceived. They are not such gudgeons as to be caught by such a foolish bait. But the noble Lord does not expect it will be accepted; it is meant only to propose something specious, which he knows the Americans will refuse, and therefore offers to call down tenfold more vengeance on their devoted heads, rendered thus ten times more odious, by refusing such fair, such reasonable, such just, such wise, and such humane offers; but neither will this snare succeed.

Lord North. I agree, sir that it is very probable the propositions contained in this Resolution may not be acceptable to the Americans in general. The Resolution certainly does not go to all their claims; it is, however, just, humane, and wise; and those in America who are just, who are wise, and who are serious, will, I believe, think it well worthy their attention. The gentleman has charged me with mean, low, and foolish policy, in grounding my measures on that maxim divide et impera. Is it foolish, is it mean, when a people, heated and misled by evil Councils, are running into unlawful combinations, to hold out those terms which will sift the reasonable from the unreasonable; that will distinguish those who act upon principle, from those who wish only to profit of the general confusion? If propositions that the conscientious and the prudent will accept, will at the same time recover them from under the influence and fascination of the wicked, I avow the using that principle which will thus divide the good from the bad, and give support to the friends of peace and good Government. A right honourable gentleman who always speaks and acts like a man of honour, and when he differs from his friends does it like a man of honour, thinks, that according to the sense in which he understood the Address, that the propositions now proposed by me, totally deviate and depart from it; I will beg leave to refer that gentleman to the explicit language which I held when I proposed the Address; was it not precisely, almost literally the same as what I now propose? I can even refer to my very words as being the same. I will appeal to the House as to the manner in which I explain the idea of the indulgence which the Address held out and promised; and having held out and promised such indulgence, if I had not followed it by some propositions which were open; explicit, and definitive, I might indeed have been charged with throwing out deceptions to gentlemen here, and with laying a snare for our fellow-subjects in America. Whatever may be the reception these propositions shall meet with, I feel that I have done my duty fairly and consistently.

Mr. Edmund Burke declared he came to the House this day, upon the report of a change of measures, with a full resolution of supporting any thing which might lead in any way towards conciliation; but that he found the proposition altogether insidious in its nature, and therefore purposely rendered to the last degree obscure and perplexed in its language. Instead of being at all fitted to produce peace, it was calculated to increase the disorders and con-