water between the years 1764 and 1776, it seems to be necessary to
conclude that the views of the most conservative of the American
statesmen of the period concerning the connection between Great
Britain and the Colonies were these:

They considered, as I interpret their language, that the connection
between free and independent State of Great Britain, and the American
Colonies, as free states, had existed and of right ought to have
existed, according to the principles of the law of nature and of
nations--that law being based on principles opposed to the principles
applied by the governments of Europe, and being thus what may be
called a law of nature and of nations according to the American
System. Had they used a more definite and scientific phraseology, it
seems that their view would best be expressed by saying that they
considered that the relationship between Great Britain and the
Colonies had always existed according to the principles of the Law of
Connections and Unions of Free States. They accordingly admitted, 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 Union, to finally decide, by dispositions,
ordinances and regulations having the force of supreme law, made
through its Government after a judicial hearing in each case for the
investigation of facts and the application to them of the principles
of the Law of Connections and Unions of Free States, upon all
questions of common interest arising out of the connection and union;
and that each of the American Free States had power, through its
Legislature, to legislate according to the just public sentiment in
each, and the right to have its local laws executed by its Executive
and interpreted and applied by its Courts, free from all control by
the State of Great Britain, except what was necessary to protect and