and agreed to by the merchants
in most colonies. Better observed in New York than elsewhere, it was so
far maintained as to reduce the English importations into the Middle and
Northern colonies from L1,333,000 in 1768 to L480,000 in 1769. In
inducing the Ministry of Lord North to repeal the duties the association
played its part; but from the point of view of the conservatives it was
not without its disadvantages. The importation of goods from Holland was
forbidden in order to catch the smuggler; but the smuggler ignored the
agreement as readily as he signed it. Yet for a time the association was
no burden to the fair trader, who in anticipation had doubled his
orders, or sold "old, moth-eaten goods" at high prices. The merchants
were "great patriots," Chandler told John Adams, "while their old rags
lasted; but as soon as they were sold at enormous prices, they were for
importing." And in truth the fair trader's monopoly could not outlast
his stock, whereas the smuggler's business improved the longer the
association endured. In the spring of 1770, the New York merchants, with
their shelves empty, complaining that Boston was more active in
"resolving what it ought to do than in doing what it had resolved,"
declared that the association no longer served "any other purpose than
tying the hands of honest men, to let rogues, smugglers, and men of no
character plunder their country." Supported by a majority of the
inhabitants of the city, and undeterred by the angry protests of the
Sons of Liberty, they accordingly agreed to "a general importation of
goods from Great Britain, except teas and other articles which are or
may be taxed." Boston and Philadelphia soon followed the lead of New
York, and before the year was out the policy of absolute non-importation
had broken down.

The adoption of the modified non-importation policy was the more readily
approved by conservative patriots everywhere inasmuch as the English
Government had already made concessions on its part. It was on March 5,
the very day of the Boston massacre, that Lord North, characterizing the
law as "preposterous," moved the repeal of all the Townshend duties,
saving, for principle's sake, that on tea alone. For the second time a
crisis seemed safely passed, and cordial relations seemed once more
restored. British officers concerned in the massacre, defended by the
patriots John Adams and Josiah Quincy, were honorably acquitted in a
Massachusetts court. The Ne