The
duty on every skin, piece of vellum or parchment, and sheet of
paper used in any law court was 3d.- 2 pounds. There were also
duties on counselor or solicitor appointments of 10 pounds per
sheet. Duties extended to licenses for retailing spirituous
liquors and wines, bonds for payment of money, warrants for
surveying or setting out of any lands, grants and deeds of land,
appointments to certain civil public offices, indentures, leases,
conveyances, bills of sale, grants and certificates under public
seal, insurance policies, mortgages, passports, pamphlets,
newspapers (about 1s. per sheet), advertisements in papers (2s.
each), cards, and dice. The colonists saw this as a departure
from past duties because it was an "internal tax". All of the
original thirteen American colonies had adopted Magna Carta
principles directly or indirectly into their law. The stamp duties
seemed to the colonists to violate these principles of liberty.
Patrick Henry asserted that only Virginia could impose taxes in
Virginia. Schoolmaster and lawyer John Adams in Massachusetts
asserted that no freeman should be subject to any tax to which he
had not assented. In theory, colonists had the same rights as
Englishmen per their charters, but in fact, they were not
represented in Parliament and Englishmen in Parliament made the
laws which affected the colonists. They could not be members of
the House of Lords because they did not have property in England.
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