Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol I).djvu/212

king might, in cases of extraordinary necessity or emergency, take away a charter, where the defence or protection of the inhabitants required it, leaving them in possession of their civil rights.

§ 186. Such are some of the royal prerogatives, which were supposed to exist by the crown-writers in the colonial establishments, when not restrained by any positive charter or bill of rights. Of these, many were undisputed; but others were resisted with pertinacity and effect in the colonial assemblies.^[1]

§ 187. In regard to the authority of parliament to enact laws, which should be binding upon them, there was quite as much obscurity, and still more jealousy spreading over the whole subject.^[2] The government of Great Britain always maintained the doctrine, that the parliament had authority to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever.^[3] No acts of parliament, however, were understood to bind the colonies, unless expressly named therein.^[4] But in America, at different times and in different colonies, different opinions were entertained on the subject.^[5] In fact, it seemed to be the policy of the colonies, as much as possible, to withdraw them-

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1. The reader will find the subject of the royal prerogative in the colonies discussed at large in Chitty on the Prerogatives of the Crown, ch. 3, p. 25 to 40; in Stokes on the Constitution of the Colonies, passim; in Chalmers's Annals of the Colonies; and in Chalmers's Opinions, 2 vols. passim. See also Com. Dig. Prerogative.
2. 1 Pitk. Hist. 164 to 169, 186, 198, 199, 200 to 205; App. 448, No 9; Id. 452, 458; 3 Wilson's Works, 238, 239, 240, 241, 242, 243; 2 Wilson's Works, 54, 55, 58; Mass. State Papers, 338, 339, 314, 352 to 364; 1 Pitk. Hist. 255.
3. 3 Wilson's Works, 205; 1 Chalm. Annals, 140, 687, 690; Stokes's Colon. 146.
4. 1 Black. Comm. 107, 108; Chitty on Prerog. 33.
5. 1 Pitk. Hist. 198, 199, 200 to 205, 206, 209; Marshall's Colon, ch. 13, p. 352; 1 Chitty on Prerog. 29; 1 Chalmers's Opinions, 196 to 225; 1 Pitk. Hist. ch. 6, p. 16 to 212.