e that "it maybe proper to charge certain stamp duties in the said
colonies and plantations." Of all the plans for taxing America, he said,
this one seemed to him the best; yet he was not wedded to it, and would
willingly adopt any other preferred by the colonists, if they could
suggest any other of equal efficacy. Meanwhile, he wished only to call
upon honorable members of the House to say now, if any were so minded,
that Parliament had not the right to impose any tax, external or
internal, upon the colonies; to which solemn question, asked in full
house, there was not one negative, nor any reply except Alderman
Beckford saying: "As we are stout, I hope we shall be merciful."

It soon appeared that Americans did have objections to a stamp tax.
Whether it were equitable or not, they would rather it should not be
laid, really preferring not to be dished up in any sauce whatever,
however fine. The tax might, as ministers said, be easily collected, or
its collection might perhaps be attended with certain difficulties;
in either case it would remain, for reasons which they were ready to
advance, a most objectionable tax. Certain colonial agents then in
England accordingly sought an interview with the first minister in order
to convince him, if possible, of this fact. Grenville was very likely
more than ready to grant them an interview, relying upon the strength of
his position, on his "tenderness for the subjects in America," and
upon his well-known powers of persuasion, to bring them to his way
of thinking. To get from the colonial agents a kind of assent to his
measure would be to win a point of no slight strategic value, there
being at least a modicum of truth in the notion that just government
springs from the consent of the governed.

"I have proposed the resolution [the minister explained to the agents]
from a real regard and tenderness for the subjects in the colonies. It
is highly reasonable they should contribute something towards the charge
of protecting themselves, and in aid of the great expense Great Britain
has put herself to on their account. No tax appears to me so easy and
equitable as a stamp duty. It will fall only upon property, will be
collected by the fewest officers, and will be equally spread over
America and the West Indies.... It does not require any number of
officers vested with extraordinary powers of entering houses, or extend
a sort of influence which I never wished to increase. The colonists