* * * * *
This legislation, Mr. President, as I have said before, emanating from
the mother country, fixed the institution upon the colonies. They could
not resist it. All their right was limited to petition, to remonstrance,
and to attempts at legislation at home to diminish the evil. Every
such attempt was sternly repressed by the British Crown. In 1760, South
Carolina passed an act prohibiting the further importation of African
slaves. The act was rejected by the Crown; the Governor was reprimanded;
and a circular was sent to all the Governors of all the colonies,
warning them against presuming to countenance such legislation. In
1765, a similar bill was twice read in the Assembly of Jamaica. The news
reached Great Britain before its final passage. Instructions were sent
out to the royal Governor; he called the House of Assembly before him,
communicated his instructions, and forbade any further progress of the
bill. In 1774, in spite of this discountenancing action of the mother
Government, two bills passed the Legislative Assembly of Jamaica; and
the Earl of Dartmouth, then Secretary of State, wrote to Sir Basil
Keith, the Governor of the colony, that "these measures had created
alarm to the merchants of Great Britain engaged in that branch of
commerce;" and forbidding him, "on pain of removal from his Government,
to assent to such laws.
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