the immediate government of the crown. And the governors were thereby farther empowered, by the consent of the council and reprefentatives of the people fo fummoned, to make, conftitute, and ordain laws, ftatutes, and ordinances, for the public peace, welfare, and good government of their colony, as near as may be agreeable to the laws of England, under such reftrictions and regulations as are ufed in other Colonies. And until fuch a form of government can be established, all persons inhabiting in, or reforting to thofe Colonies, were affured of the royal protection for the enjoyment of the benefit of the English laws; for which purpose courts of judicature were directed to be conftituted to determine all caufes, as well criminal as civil, according to law and equity, and, as near as may be agreeable to the laws of England, with a right of appeal to the king's privy council, under the ufual limitations and reftrictions.

The Quebec bill went to eftablifh most important regulations. Its firft object was to affix new boundaries to the province: in doing which, it, in fact, renounced the claims which had been made by the commiffioners appointed by the British court to fettle with the French the limits of Nova Scotia, or Acadia, after the peace of Aix-la-Chapel; for it made the province of Quebec, or Canada, to extend along the fouthern coaft of the river St. Laurence, from Chaleur Bay almoft to Crown Point; to maintain the contrary to which, was the principal business of that commiffion. The bill, in farther defcribing the new limits to the province, carried them over the whole interior country which lay behind the New England provinces, together with thofe of New York and Pennsylvania, to the borders of the Ohio. The limits would moft probably have been extended quite to the back of

Georgia,

Georgia, if the charter granted to the province of Virgi nia had not conveyed the right to all lands weftward, quite to the river of Miffiffippi; fo that here the progress was ftopped, and it ftruck off weftward, through no less than ten degrees of longitude, to the eastern banks of the Miffiffippi, from whence it proceeded northward, until it touched the fouthern boundary of the lands granted to the Hudson's Bay Company, being from about the fortieth to the fiftieth degree of latitude. Thefe regions, in which nature delights in the majeftic, include the five great lakes, are much more extenfive than the kingdom of France, and are capable of fubfifting a larger number of inhabitants. The other grand object in the bill was, to new model the government of a province, thus extended to the circumferencè of a mighty empire. It granted the free exercife of the religion of the church of Rome, fubject to the king's fupremacy; and granted to the clergy of that church, the power of holding, receiving, and enjoying their accuftomed dues and rights, with refpect to fuch perfons only, as fhall profefs that religion; a right being reserved in his majesty to make fuch provifion out of the rest of the accustomed dues and rights, for the encouragement of the proteftant religion, and for the maintenance and fupport of a proteftant clergy within the province, as fhall appear neceffary and expedient. In all matters of controverfy, relative to property and civil rights within the province of Quebec, refort to be had to the laws of Canada, as the rule for the decifion of the fame. The governor, lieutenant-governor, or commander in chief, with the confent of the legislative council, have the power of enacting new laws, except fuch as lay any tax or duty and repealing or altering old ones, but all fuch acts must receive the royal approbation to be in force. Real and perfonal eftates might be difpofed of by will, if executed either according

to

to the laws of Canada or England. The criminal law of England was, by this bill, continued in the province. The provincial affembly was hereby abolished, by being fufpended in the following terms, and whereas it is at prefent inexpedient to call an affembly," and the council to confift of no more than twenty-three, or less than feventeen, composed of perfons refident in the province, and appointed by the king.

Mr. Dunning called it the most pernicious bill ever offered to parliament. He reprefented the form of government thereby given to the inhabitants of Canada, as effentially the fame in form, and more liable to abuse, than the one they had formerly enjoyed under the crown of France; and that the ecclefiaftical establishment granted to them, was intended to cheat them out of their civil liberties as British subjects. It was intended, he faid, to operate two ways, first, for establishing arbitrary power in that vast extent of country; and fecondly, to employ that power, thus modified and rendered obedient to the will of the poffeffors, in affifting to overthrow the liberties of America. Mr. Thurlow (Attorney-general) ftated to the house the different governments which had prevailed in Canada from the first settling in that country by the French; and contended, that it was dangerous, cruel, and unprecedented, to establish new laws in a conquered country. General Carleton, Governor of Canada, was examined. He shewed the inconfiderable number of proteftants fettled in Canada, compared with those who professed the Roman catholic faith. The inhabitants in general, he faid, liked the old French laws in preference to the English form of government; and he was of opinion, the bill then depending would be generally relished. In the progrefs of the bufinefs many other witneffes were examined;

examined; viz. Mr. Hay, chief justice of that province; Mr. Mazeres, curfitor-baron of the Exchequer, and late attorney-general there, and agent to the English inhabitants of Canada; Dr. Marriott, the king's advocate-general in England; Monf. Lolbiniere, a French gentleman of confiderable property in Canada. It was propofed that General Murray, who was the first British governor of the colony, and continued in that capacity feveral years, should be fummoned to attend, but it was overruled. The information obtained by these witneffes, was, principally, as to the preference given by the French inhabitants to the French or English laws; and it seemed pretty evident, that different fentiments prevailed among different ranks and conditions ; the gentry made choice of the French code, the middle order and peasantry preferred the English laws.

A petition was prefented to the house from Thomas and William Penn, owners of a great part of the province of Pennfylvania, representing the great injury their property would receive by the bill, and praying to be heard by counfel. Another petition was prefented, figned by feveral merchants trading to Canada, which fet forth, that feveral claufes in the bill would materially affect their property. Counsel was heard at the bar in behalf of both petitions. A petition was likewife prefented by the city of London against the bill. Serjeant Glynn infifted, that it was a breach of the royal promise contained in the proclamation in the year 1763, which declared, that all persons who would go over to Quebec, fhould be entitled to the fame laws and protection as they had had in England; whereas the bill. before the houfe went to establish French laws, and the Roman catholic religion. In reply to the attorney-general, he fhewed, that it was far from being unprecedented to introduce

troduce a new code of laws into a conquered country, Ireland and Wales were proofs thereof.

In fupport of the bill it was urged, that the laws which regarded perfonal property, and contracts between man and man, were much the fame in France as in England. The French had no notion of a trial by jury, and disliked it as an innovation. The treaty of Paris, it was faid, had fecured to the French Canadians the free exercise of their religion, as far as was confiftent with the laws of England; and our penal laws with respect to religion, it was afferted, did not extend beyond this kingdom, as the king's fupremacy did; and the Roman catholics of Canada were obliged by the act to give a proof of their allegiance, by taking an oath which was therein prescribed, against all such papal claims as interfered therewith. The fecuring to the Romish clergy their tythes, by the act, was no more than placing them in the condition which they stood in at the conqueft; fubject however to this disadvantage, that no person profeffing the proteftant religion was to contribute any thing to their support. The extenfion of the boundaries of the province beyond the limits described in the proclamation, was justified by the plea, that several French families were fettled in remote parts of the country, beyond the former districts, and an entire colony was established among the Illinois Indians.

The oppofition to the bill, was founded on the monstrous incongruity, which appeared in a British legislature establishing a form of arbitrary government in any part of the empire. Such a conduct was unknown in the history of this country, and would have been execrated at any other time than the present. The fetting afide the affembly of the province, was imputed to the utter diflike which the mi

nistry