Note 84 — PAPERS ON AMERICAN SUBJECTS, DURING THE REVOLUTIONARY TROUBLES.

"The stamp act says, that the Americans shall have no commerce, make no exchange of property with each other, neither purchase nor grant nor recover debts; they shall neither marry nor make their wills, unless they pay such and such sums" in specie for the stamps which must give validity to the proceedings. The operation of such a tax, had it obtained the consent of the people, appeared inevitable; and its annual productiveness, if I recollect well, was estimated by its proposer in the house of commons at the committee for supplies, at 100,000l. sterling. The colonies being already reduced to the necessity of having paper-money, by sending to Britain the specie they collected in foreign trade, in order to make up for the deficiency of their other returns for Britain's manufactures; there were doubts where could remain the specie sufficient to answer the tax. B. V.