branch of the Legislature in the enjoyment of its free and independent exercise of legislation which is left by this Bill, but on the contrary, this Bill, though not in terms yet in effect, makes the Assembly of Jamaica conform its legislation to the will of the Council or Governor; and thus the Governor and Council are the only branches of the Legislature left in the exercise of their will and judgment in the legislation which takes place. The Assembly is compelled to surrender its own will and its own judgment to the will and judgment of the Council or of the Governor, in order that they may preserve the existence of their right of legislation. Can you call this the abandonment of the former Bill, the abandonment of the attempt to subvert the constitution of Jamaica, by suspending the functions of the Assembly? It is a mockery and insult to tell the Assembly they may exercise their functions, when at the same time, you tell them that they are to be exercised in obedience to the dictates of others, and at the peril of being deprived of the exercise of them if the Assembly follows its own judgment, rather than yield to the will and judgment of a third party. Sir, in the other case which I have put, what is the course which the Assembly must adopt although they may be secure of the concurrence of the Council for the purpose of protecting themselves against the disallowance of the Bill by the Governor? They must previously ascertain what is his opinion of the Bill; and what are the enactments to which the Governor is instructed to give his consent, and they must make their enactments conformable to his instructions. Here, then, you have the House of Assembly not exercising its own deliberation, not exercising its free will in the adoption or rejection of any measure of legislation; but exercising it only according to the instructions which they find the Governor has received.

Sir, I ask, does the Assembly, under this Bill, retain that which it was intended, the Assembly should retain, namely, its rights and privileges as a free and deliberative body. Sir, quite the contrary; the Assembly, upon this occasion, is not, as in the ordinary case in which a Bill must obtain the consent of the other branches of the Legislature, in a situation in which they can meet each other by the introduction of another Bill, but the penalty for not conforming to the will of the Council or Governor is, that upon this subject they are no longer per

that legislation is to be transferred to the Governor, with the advice of the Council. It is the creation, in fact, in this great Colony which has enjoyed a Constitution from its first settlement of that species of Government which exists in the Crown Colonies, legislation by the Governor in Council, or rather legislation dictated by the Colonial Secretary in Downing-street.

Sir, with a degree of speciousness intended to excite a belief that the Government was desirous of respecting that Parliamentary pledge which was given 18th of George the 3rd, chapter 12, there is a direction that the Governor with the advice of the Council shall not, by any law or ordinance which they make, impose any rate, tax, or duty, excepting merely such penalty as may be imposed to enforce the observance or punish the non-observance of any infraction of that ordinance. Now, Sir, this recognition of the obligatory force of the 18th of George the 3rd, chapter 12, takes place in a clause where it is of no use at all, in order to disguise the total disregard of it in the clause which immediately follows. In the enactment of these ordinances founded on the order in Council, no possible occasion could arise for the levying of taxes or for raising a revenue-it is only in the subsequent clause that the Act of the 18th of George the 3rd, chapter 12, could apply; where, as I shall presently shew the House, a power is granted to the Governor of exercising legislation for the purpose of enforcing the imposition of duties, and the application of the proceeds of those duties.

Sir, the effect of the first of those clauses is to allow the Assembly to retain its existence in name and as a shadow, but by depriving it of the power of free and voluntary deliberation to destroy it, substantially and in reality.

Sir, the second clause would produce the same effect; but it is open to other objections. It gives a power to the Governor with the advice of the Council to revive and continue in force, or re-enact all or any of the laws of the Island, which have expired since the 30th of October, 1838, if they have not since been revived or continued in force or re-enacted by the Governor, Council, and Assembly. To enable the House to judge of the full effect of this provision, I should apprize you, that the temporary laws which may be re-enacted are of two descriptions, the one imposing taxes, the other not imposing taxes. About

liamentary Charter of the 18th Geo. 3rd, c. 12. Sir, it is in fact a repeal of that statute, although the Government have not the hardihood to propose its repeal in express terms.

Sir, from the moment this Bill passes, if ever it could pass into a law, the public revenue of the Colony, the amount to be raised, and the manner in which it is to be raised, and the purposes to which it is to be applied, are withdrawn from their Legitimate Constitutional Guardians, the Representatives of the People, and placed under

tax it imposed reduced, although the revenue which that Act would have produced, has been supplied by the Assembly from other sources, or by means of other taxes, it would be competent for the Governor to re-enact the expired Act, and thus actually impose a tax on the people of Jamaica, of his own authority, and against the consent of their Representatives in Assembly. Sir, under this Bill the people of Jamaica, are put out of the pale of the British Constitution, they are deprived of the most valuable right it confers, that of holding their property in security, because it cannot be taken from them without the consent of themselves or their Representatives.

Sir, it is a mockery, it is an insult, on one's understanding, to discuss this measure as giving to the Assembly a locus pænitentiæ, as adopting a spirit of conciliation towards that Body, or the people of Jamaica.

Thus, Sir, in defiance of the sense which the House expressed on the former Bill, in contradiction of the principles which were necessarily professed by her Majesty's Ministers, in abandoning that Bill, they propose by the present Bill to destroy the popular branch of the free Constitution of Jamaica and to reduce that Colony to the condition of a conquered Crown colony.

The Assembly is not to retain its exclusive right of originating all grants of money, and all taxes. The burthens to which the people of Jamaica will be subject are to be imposed on them, not with their own consent, or that of their Representatives in Assembly, but by the sole arbitrary will of their Governor, and the money thus extorted from them appropriated at his discretion.

Sir, this Enactment in the Bill now be fore the House, is utterly incompatible with the principles of the British Constitu

inroad on the Constitution, so gross an injury on the people of Jamaica, I am persuaded, the House will not sanction.

Sir, I observe, that the second Clause, contains a proviso, that these revived laws, are not to be continued beyond the 31st of December, 1840, that is, the Governor is not to be intrusted with despotic power beyond the 31st of December, 1840. What is to be the legislation for Jamaica, or its form of Government after that period, we have not been told. If this Bill passed into a Law, do you suppose, that a man of character would be found to undertake the onerous trust of a Representative in Assembly, that Assembly holding out no inducement of patronage, or of personal interest, and into which Assembly no man enters from any other motive than that of rendering a service to the Colony-service which he cannot render without making many sacrifices.

Sir, there has been no calumny, numerous and atrocious and false as the calumnies have been against the Assembly, so gross as to suppose, that there is one of its Members, who would degrade himself by becoming the instrument of such a Legislative Body as this Bill would create.

Sir, the former Bill, with its avowed purpose of suspending the functions of the Assembly of Jamaica, was reprobated and resisted by the great body of persons who had an interest in the Colony, and who considered, that its obvious and necessary tendency was to degrade the Assembly, and to excite in the larger portion of the population a feeling of distrust towards those persons and towards the persons of whom the Assembly have been composed.

Sir, is there any one who can doubt, the Petitions which have been laid upon your Table must prevent this House from doubting, that the present Bill is equally reprobated, and that its effects will be the state it to the House as a fact, which cannot be controverted, that the salaries of the Governor, the Chief Justice, and Assistant Judges, the stipends of the Rectors and Curates of the island, and the salaries of the Custom-house Officers, and of every other servant of the public, are not depend

taxes raised under the expired Acts. The Acts under which these different functionaries derive their appointments, established their salaries, and provided for the pay

ment, a Revenue adequate to defray the expences of the Civil Government, and, therefore, this unconstitutional interposition of Parliament, is not required on that ac

count.

Sir, amongst the Acts which are represented as having expired, and which the Governor would have the power of reviving, is one described the Tonnage Act. Now, the Tonnage Act, which produces an annual Revenue of 22,000l. does not expire until 1843. The Act which has expired, is the Tonnage and Gunpowder Duty Act, which produces only the sum of 2,6571. But even this sum still remains payable because it will now be collected under an Act called the Permanent Revenue Act, the 1st Geo. 2nd, c. 1.

Now, Sir, the House is called upon by one of the allegations in the preamble, to believe that those expired laws imposing taxes are required to be revived without delay. I suppose, it was intended to represent to the House, that the Government might be obstructed, and the payment of the salaries of civil officers not provided for, in consequence of the supplies not having been raised.

Sir, if that allegation were true, I have a satisfactory answer. It was not by the default of the Assembly, that those supplies were not raised-the Assembly offered to raise them-they would not make the question regarding their right of internal legislation, an excuse for their refusal of the supplies-they would not allow it to interfere with their desire to raise those supplies. That the supplies were not raised, is through the default, not of the Assembly, but of the Governor, who, instead of allowing the Assembly to proceed to raise them, refused to accept them, and kept the House of Assembly under prorogation.

But the allegation that it is necessary to revive these expired Money Acts, in order to provide for the expenses of the Civil

the Treasury of the island. There is no specific appropriation of the proceeds of particular taxes for the payment of those salaries. I proceed to shew to the House, the sources from which the Treasury derives the money from which these salaries are paid. By the Act of the 1st Geo. 2, с. 1, a permanent revenue of 8,000l. per annum, and subsequently increased to 10,000l., was settled upon the Crown. By that Act, duties were imposed on certain articles, in order to raise that revenue; and the proceeds arising from those duties, were appropriated to the payment of specified purposes. In consequence of the increase of trade and other causes, the actual proceeds of those duties exceed the permanent revenue by the sum of 18,000l. This surplus of 18,000l. per annum, becomes a fund in the Treasury, applicable to the public ser vice. To this must be added, the original sum of 10,000l., which is appropriated to the payment of part of the Governor's salary, to the maintenance of forts, to the salaries of the Attorney-general and other officers. To this sum of 28,000l., must be added the sum of 20,000l., collected under the Stamp Act, which is not expired, and the Tonnage Duty of 25,000l., which does not expire till the year 1843. have already mentioned sums amounting to 73,0001. applicable to the public service. Again, there are taxes which, although imposed in December, 1837, did not become payable until the close of the year 1838. The Receiver-general was in possession, during this year of the proceeds of the taxes imposed under the expired Act.

I

But, Sir, I have not yet enumerated all the other sources of revenue which are perfectly independent of these temporary Acts. The duty on foreign goods produces about 66,210l. The House is aware, that the Act of the Imperial Parliament passed in the 3rd and 4th of th the late King's reign,

imposes all those duties; but at the same time, leaves it to the Legislative Assemblies of the different Colonies, to impose those duties by their own acts. Now the Act of the Jamaica Legislature which imposed them having expired, they have been, and will continue to be, collected under the authority of the British Statute, to which I have referred. | That statute directs, that the proceeds shall be paid over to the Receiver-general for the use of the Colony. In his hands they become applicable to all such purposes as are authorised by acts of the Governor, Council, and Assembly; and, consequently, as I have shewn, to the payments which they direct, of all those salaries, stipends, and other contingencies of the Civil Government. To these sources of revenue must be added, the Act imposing a duty on exports and imports, which does not expire until 1839, and which produces upwards of 60,000l. In fact, there are funds amounting to more than 200,000l. sufficient, much more than sufficient, to provide for all the existing charges of the Civil Government. It cannot, therefore, be said, that the want of adequate supplies to defray the expenses of the Civil Government of the Colony, renders this Bill necessary.

on juries, and from those lists the panels are to be made; but the panels thus made, continue in operation long after the Act itself has expired. The Courts of Justice have not been in the slightest degree obstructed or delayed by the expiration of this Act. They have been, and still are sitting, and the Provost Marshal will continue to return Juries under the control and superintendance of the Supreme Court as beneficially to the suitors, the jurors and the public, as if this Act were still in operation.

Sir, I have concluded my observations on the character and description of those temporary expired laws. I trust I have satisfied the House that the power given by this Bill to the Governor of re-enacting them, is no less than the power of enacting the ordinances under the first clause, subversive of the Constitution of Jamaica, because it deprives the Assembly of its freedom and independence of deliberation, subjects the people of the Colony to taxation without their own consent or that of their representatives, but at the will and discretion of the Governor.

Now, Sir, what is the pretext upon which this attack is made on the Constitution of Jamaica. Sir, I look to the Preamble of this Bill to discover it.

one of those laws of which it can be said, that injury has been, or can be, sustained by any delay in reviving it. Take, for instance, the Laws appointing Commissioners of Forts and Fortifications, and Public Works, and Public Accounts, all of these being, to a certain extent, Money Bills, must originate with the Assembly, and which the Assembly, therefore, would reenact. No public works which the Assembly had authorised, have been delayed by those Acts having expired. The contracts which had been entered into under the previous Law, and which are either performed, or in progress, continue valid; and the application of the monies in the Receiver-general's hands for the payment of the works, has been already provided for by the previous Act. But then, it is said, there are other laws of such a nature, that their revival is of more urgent necessity and the Process Law has been mentioned as an example. But is it really intend ed to be represented, that it is necessary to revive this Act without delay? Let any one look at its provisions. It will be found, for instance, that it directs the returns of the lists of those who are to serve