The first clause of this resolution is easily understood, and will be readily admitted.  To all the privileges which a charter can convey, they are, by a royal charter, evidently entitled.  The second clause is of greater difficulty; for how can a provincial law secure privileges or immunities to a province?  Provincial laws may grant, to certain individuals of the province, the enjoyment of gainful, or an immunity from onerous offices; they may operate upon the people to whom they relate; but no province can confer provincial privileges on itself.  They may have a right to all which the king has given them; but it is a conceit of the other hemisphere, that men have a right to all which they have given to themselves.

A corporation is considered, in law, as an individual, and can no more extend its own immunities, than a man can, by his own choice, assume dignities or titles.

The legislature of a colony (let not the comparison be too much disdained) is only the vestry of a larger parish, which may lay a cess on the inhabitants, and enforce the payment; but can extend no influence beyond its own district, must modify its particular regulations by the general law, and, whatever may be its internal expenses, is still liable to taxes laid by superiour authority.

The charters given to different provinces are different, and no general right can be extracted from them.  The charter of Pennsylvania, where this congress of anarchy has been impudently held, contains a clause admitting, in express terms, taxation by the parliament.  If, in the other charters, no such reserve is made, it must have been omitted, as not necessary, because it is implied in the nature of subordinate government.  They who are subject to laws, are liable to taxes.  If any such immunity had been granted, it is still revocable by the legislature, and ought to be revoked, as contrary to the publick good, which is, in every charter, ultimately intended.

Suppose it true, that any such exemption is contained in the charter of Maryland, it can be pleaded only by the Marylanders.  It is of no use for any other province; and, with regard even to them, must have been considered as one of the grants in which the king has been deceived; and annulled, as mischievous to the publick, by sacrificing to one little settlement the general interest of the empire; as infringing the system of dominion, and violating the compact of government.  But Dr. Tucker has shown, that even this charter promises no exemption from parliamentary taxes.

In the controversy agitated about the beginning of this century, whether the English laws could bind Ireland, Davenant, who defended against Molyneux the claims of England, considered it as necessary to prove nothing more, than that the present Irish must be deemed a colony.

The necessary connexion of representatives with taxes, seems to have sunk deep into many of those minds, that admit sounds, without their meaning.