case may require.

[Sidenote: Of the same.]

41. And be it enacted, that, if any free negro hath been twice convicted
for any of the said misdemeanors, and is judged by the said protector of
negroes, calling to his assistance two justices of the peace, to be
incorrigibly idle, dissolute, and vicious, it shall be lawful, by the
order of the said protector and two justices of peace, to sell the said
free negro into slavery: the purchase-money to be paid to the person so
remanded into servitude, or kept in hand by the protector and governor
for the benefit of his family.

[Sidenote: Governor to receive and transmit annual reports.]

42. And be it enacted, that the governor in each colony shall be
assistant to the execution of this act, and shall receive the reports of
the protector, and such other accounts as he shall judge material,
relative thereto, and shall transmit the same annually to one of his
Majesty's principal secretaries of state.

LETTER

TO

THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BUCKINGHAMSHIRE MEETING,

HELD AT AYLESBURY, APRIL 13, 1780,

ON THE SUBJECT OF

PARLIAMENTARY REFORM.

NOTE.

The meeting of the freeholders of the County of Buckingham,
which occasioned the following Letter, was called for the
purpose of taking into consideration a petition to Parliament
for shortening the duration of Parliaments, and for a more
equal representation of the people in the House of Commons.

Sir,--Having heard yesterday, by mere accident, that there is an
intention of laying before the county meeting _new matter, which is not
contained in our petition_, and the consideration of which had been
deferred to a fitter time by a majority of our committee in London,
permit me to take this method of submitting to you my reasons for
thinking, with our committee, that nothing ought to be hastily deter
mined upon the subject.

Our petition arose naturally from distresses which we _felt_; and the
requests which we made were in effect nothing more than that such things
should be done in Parliament as it was evidently the duty of Parliament
to do. But the affair which will be proposed to you by a person of rank
and ability is an alteration in the constitution of Parliament itself.
It is impossible for you to have a subject before you of more
importance, and that requires a more cool and more mature consideration,
both on its own account, and for the credit of our sobriety of mind, who
are to reso