1162 ADMINISTRATION AND LEGISLATION [PART V 
responsibility or require approval beyond that of the local 
Legislature. Self-government would be utterly annihilated 
if the views of the Imperial Government were to be preferred 
to those of the people of Canada. It is, therefore, the duty 
of the present Government, distinctly to affirm the right of 
the Canadian Legislature to adjust the taxation of the 
people in the way they deem best, even if it should unfor- 
tunately happen to meet the disapproval of the Imperial 
Ministry. Her Majesty cannot be advised to disallow such 
acts, unless her advisers are prepared to assume the adminis- 
tration of the affairs of the Colony irrespective of the views 
of its inhabitants. 
The Imperial Government are not responsible for the 
debts and engagements of Canada. They do not maintain 
its judicial, educational, or civil service ; they contribute 
nothing to the internal government of the country, and the 
Provincial Legislature, acting through a Ministry directly 
responsible to it, has to make provision for all these wants’; 
they must necessarily claim and exercise the widest latitude 
as to the nature and extent of the burthens to be placed 
upon the industry of the people. The Provincial Government 
believes that his Grace must share their own convictions on 
this important subject; but as serious evil would have 
resulted had his Grace taken a different ‘course, it is wiser 
bo prevent future complication by distinctly stating the 
position that must be maintained by every Canadian Adminis- 
tration. 
These remarks are offered on the general principle of 
Colonial taxation. It is, however, confidently believed, that 
had his Grace been fully aware of the facts connected with 
the recent Canada Customs Act, his dispatch would not 
have been written in its present terms of disapproval. 
The Canadian Government are not disposed to assume the 
obligation of defending their policy against such assailants 
as the Sheffield Chamber of Commerce ; but as his Grace 
appears to have accepted these statements as correct, it may 
be well to show how little the memorialists really understood 
of the subject they have ventured to pronounce upon so 
emphatically. 
The object of the Memorial is * to represent the injury 
anticipated to the trade of this town (Sheffield) from the 
recent advance of the import duties of Canada’. To this 
it is sufficient reply to state that no advance whatever was 
made on Sheffield goods by the Customs Act in question ; 
the duty was 20 per cent. on these articles enumerated in the