of a double power in parliament.
He remarked:--"The parliament of Great Britain sits at the head of her
extensive empire in two capacities--one as the local legislature of this
island, with the executive power as her instrument of action; the other
and nobler capacity is what I call her imperial character, by which she
guides and controls all the inferior and provincial legislatures." In
this, he maintained, her power was boundless; and having entered at
large on its utility, and the manner in which it had been exercised,
he thus concluded:--"It is agreed that a revenue is not to be had from
America: if, then, we lose the profit, let us at least get rid of the
odium." No arguments, however powerful, were of avail--the motion was
negatived.

A third measure of restriction introduced into the commons by ministers
was "A Bill for the impartial Administration of Justice in the Cases
of Persons questioned for any Acts done by them in the Execution of the
Laws, as for the Suppression of Riots and Tumults in the Province of
Massachusets Bay, in New England." By this bill the governor, if he
found that a person indicted for murder, or any other capital offence,
incurred in suppressing such tumults, was not likely to obtain an
impartial trial, might send the person so indicted to another colony or
to Great Britain, to be fairly tried there. This bill was to be limited
to four years, and in support of it Lord North argued, that it was
absolutely necessary to give effect to the other coercive measures; that
it was in vain to appoint a magistracy that would act if none could be
found bold enough to act with them and execute their orders; that
these orders would probably be resisted by force; and this force would
necessitate force on the side of government, and probably occasion the
shedding of blood. He asked, what officers would risk this event if the
rioters themselves, or their abettors, were afterwards to sit as
their judges? And he alleged, that a precedent was to be found in our
own laws, in the case of smuggling, it being customary to remove the
trial of smugglers to another county: the Scotch rebels were also,
he said, in 1745, tried in England. North next urged, that particular
privileges ought to give way on some occasions, and that when the public
safety of our own country was endangered even the _Habeas Corpus_ had
been suspended. The bill, he remarked, was not meant to screen guilt,
but to protect innocence. The Ameri