Thursday, October 18, 2007

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

The second of the many charges laid out in the America’s “Declaration of Independence” contends that “He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.” This claim indicted King George III of several acts; first of disallowing state governors to pass laws, regardless of how important or urgent their enactment may have been, and of requiring suspension of the bill’s movement until the King gave his assent. Finally, King George is accused of neglecting to address these bills. These laws that King George put in place impeded the efficient function of the American colonial political process and passed the deciding power abroad, where the implications and importance of the issues could not be fully grasped and were ultimately not punctually or properly dealt with.
This claim refers to a series of British acts, beginning with the Proclamation of 1763, which among other regulations, forbade colonial governments to have official relations agreements with Native peoples (Houghton Mifflin). This was among the first of many movements of Britain to establish their authority over the politics of America.
However, the larger, more authoritative act was to follow. In 1766, King George established the Declaratory Act, which ensued the repealed Stamp Act (Houghton Mifflin). The Declaratory Act passed all the powers of decision in the colonies onto the British Parliament, where there were no American colonists represented (Chaffin, 1974). While British Parliament’s main objective with the enactment of the Declaratory Act was to later be able to easily impose internal taxation on the colonies, it had an important effect on the ability of the Americans to be governed properly (Chaffin 1974). Information could not have been as complete and rapidly transmitted as it was between the people and the government. While this should have been self-evident, the bill passed through British Parliament with no amendments and with consensus (Chaffin 1974).
The Declaratory Act left the American colonies in situation which they could not overcome through the political process, since in the Act is was declared that any proceedings that questioned the right of British to have this complete legislative power over America would be discarded as untrue and invalid (Chaffin 1974). In part because of this, it became clear that the only way for Americans to change this unfair balance of power and governing rights was through revolution.

The Founding of the American Republic:
http://www.fee.org/publications/the-freeman/article.asp?aid=6447

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