f free trade versus monopolies
and during the summer of 1652, after the Council of Trade had fallen
into disfavor, debated at length the desirability of opening the Turkey
trade as freely to adventurers as was that of Portugal and Spain. It
listened to a number of forcible papers presented in the interest of
free trade in opposition to trade in the hands of companies; it dealt
with the operation of the Navigation Act of 1651 and rendered decisions
regarding penalties, exemptions, licenses, and the disposal of prizes
and prize goods; it devoted a large amount of time to plantation
business; and, for the time being, probably supplanted consideration
of these matters by the Council of State, and rendered unnecessary the
appointment of any other committee on colonial affairs. Except for the
Admiralty Committee and one or two other committees to which special
matters were referred, as concerning Newfoundland, there appears to
have been no other subordinate body actually in charge of affairs in
America between December 17, 1651, and April 15, 1653. The period was
an important and critical one, and the committee must have had before
it business connected with nearly every one of the colonies in America.
The Council of State referred to it petitions, etc., from and relating
to Massachusetts, Plymouth, New Haven, Rhode Island, Newfoundland,
Maryland and Virginia, Barbadoes, Nevis, Providence Island, and the
Caribbee Islands in general. It dealt with the proposed attack on
the Dutch at New Amsterdam, losses of merchant ships, privateer's
commissions and letters of marque; the Greenland and Newfoundland
fisheries, naval stores, and land disputes. It drafted bills and
governors' commissions, considered vacancies in the colonies, and
received applications for office, and, in one case, promoted the
founding of a plantation in South America.[22] This business was
performed to a considerable extent through subcommittees, many of
which met in the little Horse Chamber and acted in all particulars as
regular committees. On one occasion, the entire committee was appointed
a subcommittee, and very frequently the committee met for no other
purpose than to hear the report of a subcommittee. These subcommittees,
which were generally composed of councillors, referred matters to
outside persons, merchants, judges, and doctors of civil law, while
the committee itself called before it merchants, officials, members
of other committees, and indeed an