Note 170 — Chapter V · (continued 2)
Reading edition
On the very day, October, 1677, that they proposed, in obedience to his Majesty's command, to pass an order that "the Governor and all inferior magistrates should see to the strict observation of the Acts of Navigation and Trade," they made an order "that the law requiring all persons, as well inhabitants as strangers, that have not taken it, to take the oath of fidelity to the country, be revived and put in practice throughout the jurisdiction" (Palfrey, Vol. III., pp. 311-315)—an order intended to counteract the execution of the Acts of Navigation and Trade by the King's Collector, and of which he complained to England.
"The agents of the colony endeavoured to explain this law to the Board (of Colonial Plantations in England), and to soften their indignation against it, but without effect." (Ib., p. 315.) "All persons who refused to take the oath of fidelity to the country were not to have the privilege of recovering their debts in Courts of law, nor to have the protection of the Government." (Truth and Innocency Defended, etc.)