ettlement of grievances and adjustment of
powers might have knitted the two peoples together in an enduring
league, if it had not been for George the Third.

[Sidenote: 1765--England and her colonial governors]

The mind of George the Third was saturated with a belief in his
personal importance; the heart of George the Third was exalted by the
determination to play a dominating part in the country of his birth and
the history of his reign. The hostility to the exercise of home
authority latent in the colonies irritated the King like a personal
affront. To resist or to resent the authority of the Government of
England was to resist and to resent the authority of the sovereign who
was determined that he would be to all intents and purposes the
Government of England. If the relationship between England and America
had been far happier than George found it at the time of his accession,
it probably would not long have preserved a wholesome tenor. But the
relationship was by no means happy. The colonial assemblies were for
the most part at loggerheads with the colonial governors. These
governors, little viceroys with petty courts, extremely proud of their
power and self-conscious in their authority, generally detested the
popular assemblies upon whom they were obliged to depend for the
payment of their salaries. Their dislike found secret expression in
the letters which it was the duty and the pleasure of the colonial
governors to address to the Home Government. The system of colonial
administration in England was as simple as it was unsatisfactory. At
its head was a standing committee of the Privy Council which had been
established in 1675. This committee was known at length as "The Lords
of the Committee of Trade and Plantations," and in brief and more
generally as "The Lords of Trade." It was the duty of the colonial
governors to make lengthy reports to the Lords of Trade on the {81}
commercial and other conditions of their governorships. It was too
often their pleasure to supplement these State papers with lengthy and
embittered private letters, addressed to the same body, making the very
most and worst of the difficulties they had to deal with in their work.
The colonies, as represented in these semi-official communications,
were turbulent, contumacious, discontented, disrespectful to viceregal
dignity, rebellious against the authority of Great Britain. These
communications informed the minds of the Lords o