ioners upon the bounty of the
British Parliament, to be paid in pounds, shillings, and pence for the
rights and privileges which should have been secured to them by national
treaty as British subjects. The House of Commons had adopted a
resolution against continuing the American war for the _purpose of
enforcing the submission of the colonies_; but it had not resolved
against continuing the war to protect the rights and property of British
subjects in the colonies. A campaign for this purpose, on the refusal of
the American Commissioners to recognize what was sanctioned by the laws
and usages of nations, would have been honourable to the British
Government, would have been popular in England, and would have divided
America; for there were many thousand "Whigs" in America, who believed
in the equity of treating the Loyalists after the war as all others were
treated who conformed to the laws, as has been the case in Holland,
Ireland, and Spain. England was then mistress of the seas, held New
York, Charleston, Rhode Island, Penobscot, and other military posts, and
could soon have induced the Americans to do what their Peace
Commissioners at Paris had refused to do--place British subjects in
America upon the same footing as to property that they possessed before
the war, and that they possess in the United States at this day. England
could have easily and successfully refused granting to the United
States a foot of land beyond the limits of the thirteen colonies, and
thus have secured those vast western territories now constituting the
larger part of the United States, and retained the garrisons of New
York, Rhode Island, and Charleston as guarantees until the stipulated
conditions in regard to the Loyalists should be fulfilled. A joint
Commission in America could have settled upon equitable grounds all
disputed claims in much less time than the six years occupied by a
Parliamentary Commission in examining into and deciding upon the
individual claims of Loyalist claimants. If the war to reduce the
colonies to absolute submission had been unpopular in England, the peace
upon the terms submitted to by the English Commissioners and the
Ministry was equally unpopular. If England had been wrong in its war of
coercion against the revolting colonists, was she not equally wrong, and
more than wrong, in abandoning to their enemies those who had abided
faithful to her laws and commands? The language of the speeches of
members of both