376 Appendix.

Contempo-
rary Printed
Pamphlet
Md.Hist.Soc.

I will now proceed to shew that it cannot, by the Rules of fair
Construction, be deduced from any Thing in the Message, that the
Lower House arrogate to themselves the Rights and Privileges of
a British House of Commons, in that general and unlimited Sense
intended by the Upper House: The only Privilege at present in
Contest, between the two Houses, being as to the Mode of proceed-
ing on Money Bills, the Claim of the Lower House ought to be
considered as relative to this Point alone; so that the Assertion is
captious and uncandid. By recurring to the Messages between the

p. 9

two Houses, on this Occasion, it will clearly appear, not that the
Lower House claim in general the Rights and Privileges of the
British House of Commons, but that their Claim is either expressly
or impliedly limited to those Rights and Privileges which regard
the granting of Supplies. Their first Message runs thus — "As we
are willing to depart from a strict Parliamentary Course, and for
the present to wave our Rights, respecting the Mode of proceeding
on Money Bills, we hope your Honours will overlook the Strictness
of Parliamentary Forms, and point out your Objections," &c. Their
Honours Answer shews that, at this time, they do not think any
Thing more was insisted upon than the Rights exercised by the
House of Commons in regard to Money Bills; for it runs thus —
"It having, as the Journals shew, been usual for the Upper House
not only to amend Supply Bills that had been framed in the Lower,
but often to prepare such Bills themselves, and send them down for
the Concurrence of the Lower House; we are confident it would
not have been irregular for this House to have proposed Amend-
ments to the Bill you were pleased to send us." The Reply of the
Lower House is as follows — "We cannot but express our Sorrow,
that an occasional Waver of our Rights, in respect to the Mode of
proceeding on Money Bills, should serve only to put your Honours
upon assuming a Right not only of proposing, but also of preparing
and sending down Money Bills for the Concurrence of this House; —
a Right which the House of Lords, in our Mother Country, inde-

p. 10

pendent as they are, have rarely, if ever, asserted to be in them, or
attempted to exercise, or if they have, the Assertions have ever been
positively denied, and the Attempt to exercise the Right carefully
frustrated by the House of Commons; being looked upon by them
as an Invasion of the Rights and Privileges inherent in them only.
The like Rights and Privileges, we do insist, are constitutionally
inherent in us, as the Representatives in Assembly of free British
Subjects, and we hope we shall be allowed to exercise them without
Controul, unless it can be shewn (which we cannot conceive) that
our dependent State upon our Mother Country (of which we are
duly sensible, and in whose Determinations we shall always chear-
fully acquiesce) necessarily deprives us of any Part of them." Now
what can, by any rational Construction, be intended by these Rights
and Privileges, but the several Rights and Privileges respecting the