Although the political connection of Great Britain with the United States of America had been violently rent asunder, there happily remained between the two countries the bonds of one common origin, language, religion, and mutual interest. No sooner had American independence been acknowledged than all prohibitory regulations made during the war were abolished. Indeed, for a time, no manifest or any other shipping document was required from any vessel of the United States arriving at or clearing out from a British port; and the Crown being meanwhile authorised to regulate the manner in which trade should be carried on, a royal proclamation was immediately issued on the 14th of March, 1783, for the admission, till further orders, into the ports of Great Britain, of any unmanufactured commodities, the produce of the United States, either in British or American ships, without the usual certificates, and on payment of the same duties as were payable on similar articles imported from British America. The same drawbacks and bounties were also allowed on goods coming from the United States as on those from the British possessions; and the benefit of the order was extended to all American vessels that had arrived since the 20th of January. These concessions, however, neither gave satisfaction to the American shipowners, nor to the English sticklers for the Navigation Act in all its force. A controversy arose respecting the extent of commercial rights to be conceded permanently to the United States, the practical point in dispute at the time being whether the Navigation Act should be held to apply to American shipping as fully as it did to other foreign vessels, and should thus exclude them from the English West India Islands. But their claim to be treated upon a more favoured footing than other nations was deemed untenable, though an exemption in their favour was urged in this particular case upon the general grounds of expediency. The shipowners, however, of Great Britain upheld the Navigation Act as the palladium of their naval power, and urged that a people who had renounced their allegiance to the mother-country could have no right to any special favour. Much agitation was also raised by the West India planters, who asserted that the prosperity of those islands depended on an unrestricted intercourse with America; and as their influence was powerful in parliament, ministers were on the point of yielding to the clamour; at least they connived with the governors of some of the West India Islands in permitting the free access of American vessels to their ports.