I pay as much respect as any man to the memory of Lord Chief Justice Hale; but I did not know that he had ever written upon the subject; and I differ very much from thinking with the noble Lord, that this manuscript ought to be published. So far am I from it, that I wish the manuscript had never been named; for Ireland is too tender a subject to be touched. The case of Ireland is as different as possible from that of our colonies. Ireland was a conquered country; it had its _pacta conventa_ and its _regalia_. But to what purpose is it to mention the manuscript? It is but the opinion of one man. When it was written, or for what particular object it was written, does not appear. It might possibly be only a work of youth, or an exercise of the understanding, in sounding and trying a question problematically. All people, when they first enter professions, make their collections pretty early in life; and the manuscript may be of that sort. However, be it what it may, the opinion is but problematical; for the act to which the writer refers never passed, and Lord Hale only said, that if it had passed, the Parliament might have abdicated their right. But, my Lords, I shall make this application of it. You may abdicate your right over the colonies. Take care, my Lords, how you do so, for such an act will be irrevocable. Proceed, then, my Lords, with spirit and firmness; and, when you shall have established your authority, it will then be a time to show your lenity. The Americans, as I said before, are a very good people, and I wish them exceedingly well; but they are heated and inflamed. The noble Lord who spoke before ended with a prayer. I cannot end better than by saying to it Amen; and in the words of Maurice, Prince of Orange, concerning the Hollanders: “_God bless this industrious, frugal, and well-meaning, but easily-deluded people._” The Stamp Act was repealed, and the Declaratory Act, thus advocated by Lord Mansfield, was also passed by a large majority. The positions taken by Lord Mansfield were answered in a variety of ways by the colonists. What may be called the American Case, was carefully stated in a “Declaration of Rights and Grievances,” passed by the New York Congress, October 19, 1765. The substance of the American claims may be summarized in the following propositions: 1. They owed their existence not to Parliament, but to the Crown. The King, in the exercise of the high sovereignty then conceded to him, had made them by charter _complete civil communities_, with legislatures of their own having power to lay taxes and do all other acts which were necessary to their subsistence as distinct governments. Hence,