4583. LEGISLATURES, Dissolution by George III.—[continued].
Your Majesty, or your
governors, have carried this power [to dissolve
legislatures] beyond every limit known, or provided
for, by the laws. After dissolving one
House of Representatives, they have refused to
call another, so that, for a great length of time,
the legislature provided by the laws has been
out of existence. From the nature of things,
every society must at all times possess within
itself the sovereign powers of legislation. The
feelings of humanity revolt against the supposition
of a state so situated as that it May
not, in any emergency, provide against dangers
which, perhaps, threaten immediate ruin.
While those bodies are in existence to whom the
people have delegated the powers of legislation,
they alone possess and may exercise those
powers. But when they are dissolved by the
lopping off of one or more of their branches,
the power reverts to the people, who may exercise
it to unlimited extent, either assembling
together in person, sending deputies, or in any
other way they may think proper. [296]
We forbear
to trace consequences further; the dangers
are conspicuous with which this practice is
replete.—
Rights of British America. Washington ed. i, 137.
Ford ed., i, 442.
(1774)
