George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 4, 15th edition.

[174] Britain, by allowing them representatives in parlia-

chap. VII.} 1754.

ment; and Franklin replied, that unity of government should be followed by a real unity of country; that it would not be acceptable, unless a reasonable number of representatives were allowed, all laws restraining the trade or the manufactures of the colonies were repealed, and England ceasing to regard the colonies as tributary to its industry, were to foster the merchant, the smith, the hatter, in America not less than those on her own soil.

Unable to move Franklin from the deeply-seated love of popular liberty and power which was at once his conviction and a sentiment of his heart, Shirley turned towards the Secretary of State, and renewed his representations of the necessity of a union of the colonies, to be formed in England and enforced by act of parliament. At the same time he warned against the plea of Franklin in behalf of the Albany plan, which he described as the application of the old charter system, such as prevailed in Rhode Island and Connecticut, to the formation of an American confederacy.¹ The system, said he, is unfit for ruling a particular colony; it seems much more improper for establishing a general government over all the colonies to be comprised in the union. The prerogative is not sufficiently secured by the reservation to the crown of the appointment of a President of the Union with a negative power on all acts of legislation. As the old charter governments subjected the prerogative to the people, and had little or no appearance