The same year a bill was brought into the House of Commons in England for the better regulation of the charter and proprietary governments in America, and of his majesty's plantations there; the chief design of which was, to reduce all charter and proprietary governments into regal ones. Men conversant in the history of past ages, particularly in that of the rise and progress of different states, had long foreseen the rapid increase of American colonies, and wisely judged, that it would be for the interest of the kingdom to purchase them for the Crown as soon as possible. At different times administration, in the reigns of King William and Queen Anne, held treaties with the Proprietors for this purpose: but some obstacles always came in the way, or some accidents occurred, which prevented a final agreement. At this time while Penn was about selling the government of Pennsylvania, for twelve thousand pounds, to the Crown, he was seized with an apoplexy, and died before the deeds were executed. Lord Baltimore, the Duke of Beaufort, and Lord Craven, all minors, petitioned to be heard by counsel against passing the bill. The province of Massachuset's Bay petitioned against it, alledging that the charter they had received from King William placed them on the same footing with the different corporations in England, and that it would be equally hard and unjust to deprive them of their charter privileges, as to disfranchise the English corporations. The colony of Connecticut, whose charter was intended to be taken away by this bill, in like manner petitioned to be excepted out of it. These petitions, together with the reasons assigned in support of them, the committee of the House found some difficulty in answering, and therefore, instead of proceeding farther in an affair of such national concern, the design was entirely dropt.