colonists of the privilege of
trial by jury; had made by Act of Parliament, without trial, the city of
Boston not only responsible for tea destroyed by seventeen individuals,
but blocked up its port not only until the money was paid, but until the
city authorities should give guarantee satisfactory to the King that the
tea and other revenue Acts should be enforced--a proceeding
unprecedented and unparalleled in the annals of British history. Even in
more arbitrary times, when the cities of London, Glasgow, and Edinburgh
were made responsible for property lawlessly destroyed within their
limit, it was only until after trial in each case, in which those
cities had an opportunity of defence, and in neither case was the trade
of the city prohibited and destroyed. But the British Ministry and
Parliament proceeded still further by superseding the most essential
provisions of the Charter of the Province of Massachusetts, and changing
its whole constitution of government--a high-handed act of arbitrary
government which had not been attempted by either Charles the First or
Charles the Second in regard to the same colony; for when charges were
brought, in 1632, against the Massachusetts authorities, for having
violated the Charter, Charles the First appointed a commission, gave the
accused a trial, which resulted in their acquittal and promised support
by the King; and when they were accused again in 1634, the King did not
forthwith cancel their Charter, but issued a second commission, which,
however, never reported, in consequence of the commencement of the civil
war in England, which resulted in the death of the King. Then, in the
restoration, when charges were preferred, by parties without as well as
within the province, against the Government of Massachusetts, King
Charles the Second appointed a commission to examine into the
complaints, and at length tested their acts by trial in the highest
courts of law, and by whose decision their first Charter was cancelled
for repeated and even habitual violations of it. But without a trial, or
even commission of inquiry, the King and Parliament changed the
constitution of the province as well as extinguished the trade of its
metropolis.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 354: When the words of Lord Chatham were reported to the King,
his Majesty was "stung to the heart," and was greatly enraged,
denouncing Lord Chatham as an "abandoned politician," "the trumpet of
sedition," and classified him