The Complete Works in Philosophy, Politics and Morals of the late Dr. Benjamin Franklin, Vol. 3 [of 3] · Benjamin Franklin
FOOTNOTES:
With regard to the first, _that the colonies were_ settled _at the expence of Britain_, it is a known fact, that none of the twelve united colonies were settled, or even discovered, at the expence of England. Henry the VIIth indeed granted a commission to Sebastian Cabot, a Venetian, and his sons, to sail into the western seas for the discovery of new countries; but it was to be "_suis_ eorum propriis sumptibus et expensis," at their _own_ costs and charges[143]. They discovered, but soon slighted and neglected, these northern territories; which were, after more than a hundred years dereliction, purchased of the natives, and settled at the charge and by the labour of private men and bodies of men, our ancestors, who came over hither for that purpose. But our adversaries have never been able to produce any record, that ever the _parliament_ or government of England was at the smallest expence on these accounts: on the contrary, there exists on the journals of parliament a solemn declaration in 1642, (only twenty-two years after the first settlement of the Massachusetts, when, if such expence had ever been incurred, some of the members must have known and remembered it) "That these colonies had been planted and established _without any expence to the state_.[144]" _New-York_ is the only colony in the founding of which England can pretend to have been at any expence, and that was only the charge of a small armament to take it from the Dutch, who planted it. But to retain this colony at peace, another at that time, full as valuable, planted by private countrymen of _ours_, was given up by the crown to the Dutch in exchange, viz. Surinam, now a wealthy sugar-colony in Guiana, and which, but for that cession, might still have remained in our possession.
Of late, indeed, Britain has been at some expence in planting two colonies, _Georgia_[145] and _Nova Scotia_; but those are not in our confederacy; and the expence she has been at in their name, has chiefly been in grants of sums unnecessarily large, by way of salaries to officers sent from England, and in jobs to friends, whereby dependants might be provided for; those excessive grants not being requisite to the welfare and good government of the colonies; which good government (as experience in many instances of other colonies has taught us) may be much more frugally, and full as effectually provided for, and supported. With regard to the second assertion, _that these colonies were_ protected _in their infant state by England_, it is a notorious fact, that in none of the many wars with the Indian natives, sustained by our infant settlements for a century after our first arrival, were ever any troops or forces of any kind sent from England to assist us; nor were any forts built at her expence to secure our sea-ports from foreign invaders; nor any ships of war sent to protect our trade, till many years after our first settlement, when our commerce became an object of revenue, or of advantage to British merchants, and then it was thought necessary to have a frigate in some of our ports, during peace, to give weight to the authority of custom-house officers, who were to restrain that commerce for the benefit of England. Our own arms, with our poverty, and the care of a kind providence, were all this time our only protection, while we were neglected by the English government; which either thought us not worth its care, or, having no good will to some of us, on account of our different sentiments in religion and politics, was indifferent what became of us.
On the other hand, the colonies have not been wanting to do what they could in every war for annoying the enemies of Britain. They formerly assisted her in the conquest of Nova Scotia. In the war before last they took Louisbourg, and put it into her hands. She made her peace with that strong fortress, by restoring it to France, greatly to their detriment. In the last war, it is true, Britain sent a fleet and army, who acted with an equal army of ours, in the reduction of Canada; and perhaps thereby did more for us, than we in the preceding wars had done for her. Let it be remembered however, that she rejected the plan we formed in the congress at Albany, in 1754, for our own defence, by an union of the colonies; an union she was jealous of, and therefore chose to send her own forces; otherwise her aid to protect us was not wanted. And from our first settlement to that time, her military operations in our favour were small, compared with the advantages she drew from her exclusive commerce with us.
We are however willing to give full weight to this obligation; and as we are daily growing stronger, and our assistance to her becomes of more importance, we should with pleasure embrace the first opportunity of showing our gratitude, by returning the favour in kind. But when Britain values herself as affording us protection, we desire it may be considered, that we have followed _her_ in all _her_ wars, and joined with her at our own expence against all she thought fit to quarrel with. This she has required of us, and would never permit us to keep peace with any power she declared her enemy, though by separate treaties we might well have done it. Under such circumstances, when, at her instance, we made nations our enemies, whom we might otherwise have retained our friends; we submit it to the common sense of mankind, whether her protection of us in these wars was not our _just due_, and to be claimed of _right_, instead of being received as a _favour_? And whether, when all the parts of an empire exert themselves to the utmost in their common defence, and in annoying the common enemy, it is not as well the _parts_ that protect the _whole_, as the _whole_ that protects the _parts_? The protection then has been proportionably mutual.
And whenever the time shall come, that our abilities may as far exceed hers, as hers have exceeded ours, we hope we shall be reasonable enough to rest satisfied with her proportionable exertions, and not think we do too much for a part of the empire, when that part does as much as it can for the whole. The charge against us, _that we refuse to_ contribute _to our own protection_, appears from the above to be groundless: but we farther declare it to be absolutely false; for it is well known, that we ever held it as our duty to grant aids to the crown, upon requisition, towards carrying on its wars; which duty we have cheerfully complied with, to the utmost of our abilities; insomuch that frequent and grateful acknowledgments thereof by king and parliament appear on their records[146]. But as Britain has enjoyed a most gainful monopoly of our commerce, the same, with our maintaining the dignity of the king's representative in each colony, and all our own separate establishments of government, civil and military, has ever hitherto been deemed an equivalent for such aids, as might otherwise be expected from us in time of peace. And we hereby declare, that on a reconciliation with Britain, we shall _not only_ continue _to grant aids in time of war_, as aforesaid; but, whenever she shall think fit to abolish her monopoly, and give us the same privileges of trade as Scotland received at the union, and allow us a free commerce with all the rest of the world, we shall willingly agree (and we doubt not it will be ratified by our constituents) to _give and pay_ into the sinking fund [100,000_l._] sterling per annum for the term of one hundred years, which, duly, faithfully, and inviolably applied to that purpose, is demonstrably more than sufficient to extinguish _all her present national_ debt, since it will in that time amount, at legal British interest, to more than 230,000,000_l._[147]
But if Britain does not think fit to accept this proposition, we, in order to remove her groundless jealousies, _that we aim at independence, and an abolition of the navigation act_, (which hath in truth never been our intention) and to avoid all future disputes about the right of making that and other acts for regulating our commerce, do hereby declare ourselves ready and willing to enter into a _covenant with Britain_, that she shall fully possess, enjoy, and exercise that right, for an hundred years to come, the same being _bonâ fide_ used for the common benefit; and in case of such agreement, that every assembly be advised by us, to confirm it solemnly, by laws of their own, which, once made, cannot be repealed without the assent of the crown. The last charge, _that we are dishonest traders, and aim at defrauding our creditors in Britain_, is sufficiently and authentically refuted by the solemn declarations of the British merchants to parliament, (both at the time of the stamp-act and in the last session) who bore ample testimony to the general good faith and fair dealing of the Americans, and declared their confidence in our integrity, for which we refer to their petitions on the journals of the house of commons. And we presume we may safely call on the body of the British tradesmen, who have had experience of both, to say, whether they have not received much more punctual payment from us than they generally have from the members of their own two houses of parliament.
On the whole of the above it appears, that the charge of _ingratitude_ towards the mother country, brought with so much confidence against the colonies, is totally without foundation; and that there is much more reason for retorting that charge on Britain, who not only never contributes any aid, nor affords, by an exclusive commerce, any advantages to Saxony, _her_ mother country; but no longer since than in the last war, without the least provocation, subsidized the king of Prussia while he ravaged that _mother country_, and carried fire and sword into its capital, the fine city of Dresden. An example we hope no provocation will induce us to imitate.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.