(51 Geo. III., cap. 47) extended the above facilities to all Portuguese-built vessels or prizes owned and navigated by Portuguese subjects, without requiring that they should be residents in America.
Absurdity and impotency of these laws. On the revision of the Customs Laws in 1822 (3 Geo. IV., cap. 43, sect. 3), the principle and the above exceptions in favour of the United States and Portuguese colonies were preserved, and were further extended to countries in America or the West Indies, being, or having been, under the dominion of Spain. It must be remembered that, as respects the principle that the produce of Asia, Africa, and America was only to be imported into England from the place of its origin, the old law recognised the doctrine of the 5th section of the Navigation Act, that goods manufactured in any country should be held to be the produce of that country, even though made from materials produced elsewhere.
State of the law before the Declaration of American Independence. At the commencement of the American War of Independence, the chief regulations as to trade, the operations of which have been already described, were that the Americans could neither import nor export in any but British ships; they could not carry important articles of their own produce to any part of Europe other than Great Britain; and they could not import any goods from any part of Europe other than Great Britain.[1]*
- ↑ Those of my readers who are curious to study the laws whereby we hoped to bring the "rebellious colonies to order,"—vain hope!—or who may desire to know how the parent treated its own offspring when the children felt themselves strong enough to do for themselves, may read, as I have done, though perhaps not to much advantage, 14 Geo. III., cap. 19; 15 Geo. III., cap. 18; and 16 Geo. III., cap. 5: all passed in rapid succession under the melancholy delusion that they would have the effect of a Pope's Bull!—and that, too, on an enlightened but oppressed
