They considered, as I interpret their language, that the connection
between the American Colonies, as free states, and the free and
independent State of Great Britain had existed and of right ought to
have existed under the law of nature and of nations, interpreted in so
broad a sense that it may perhaps be called the American system of the
law of nature and of nations. They accordingly claimed, as I
understand them, that Great Britain, as a free and independent state,
had power, as Justiciar over the American free states for the common
purposes of the whole connection, to finally decide, in a judicial
manner, according to the principles of the law of nature and of
nations, upon all questions arising out of the connection between
them; and that each of the American free states had power, through its
legislature, to legislate according to the just public sentiment in
each, concerning its purely local matters, and had the right to have
its local legislation executed by its executive, and interpreted and
applied in private cases by its courts.

Some of the Americans, and those the most patriotic and conservative,
thought that Great Britain had jurisdiction to ascertain and execute
the law of nations for the common purposes, and in the exercise of
that jurisdiction to control, by its decrees and regulations, the
action of individuals in the Colonies. This was to regard Great
Britain and America as consolidated for the common purposes so as to
form what may be called a Justiciary Union. They were content, so long
as Great Britain acted on the theory that she was the Justiciar of the
British-American Union for the common purposes, and maintained a
competent tribunal for determining what were common and what local
purposes according to the principles of the law of nature and of
nations, that she should finally determine the limits of her own
jurisdiction as the Justiciar State of the Union. While I do not mean