The questions of where to locate, in whose hands to place, and how to exercise the state’s powers of deadly military force inform a perennial topic in political theory and coalesce into a recurrent problem in political practice. Liberty Fund presents Writings on Standing Armies, a newly collected, authoritative edition of the most important pamphlets on the “standing armies” controversy of 1697–98. In addition, these writings express a subtext that is of equal and enduring importance: the transforming effects exerted by the prolonged possession of power on individuals and administrations.

This essay is among the most articulate defenses of Parliament’s supremacy over the colonies on matters of trade and taxation. It defended the Stamp Act on both policy and constitutional grounds, advocating a late mercantilist position in favor of a “wise and proper use of the colonies” as being “the principal Object of a British Minister’s care.” Constitutionally, it argued that all subjects, regardless of location, were virtually represented by Parliament.

This essay inverts the Grenville administration’s arguments, asserting that a true understanding of the Atlantic trade proves that a reduction of income supporting the circulation of goods must reduce commerce overall. This was in addition to the fact that “as Liberty is the grand Incentive to Industry and Commerce…a Decay of both would ensue the Loss of it.” The writer then cautions that nullification of colonial charters might well eventuate in the loss of English liberty at home.

This text shows a strong familiarity with religious and legal thought, referencing England’s constitutional development, including the relationship of Parliament to Ireland as well as the evils arising from the management of India by the East India company. Grounded in the theological universalism of its day, the essay contended that “That just God, whom we have all so deeply offended, can hardly inflict a severer punishment, than by committing us to the natural consequences of our own conduct.”

This text presents a fusion of natural law, natural rights and contemporary Christian universalism, contending that the American colonies are deserving of their own governance on grounds of “the plain maxims of the law of nature, and the clearest doctrines of Christianity.” The primary end of the work is to show that “The Americans, in common with the whole race of man, have indisputably an inherent right to liberty,” and that the “the rights of sovereignty reside in the people themselves.”

The author of “America Vindicated” presented arguments and word choices very similar to an essay written by the American New York jurist William Smith (1728-1793). This piece presents a strong refutation of Parliamentary Supremacy and virtual representation on the grounds that actual representation must be considered a fundamental part of the British constitution: The text calls for reform by creating a general colonial parliament.

This essay makes the case for the unitary nature of the authority of the King-in-Parliament as representative of all domains under British authority, disputing the American claim, with specific reference to Benjamin Franklin, that the colonies were outside “the realm.” Thus, Gray argues, “All the sovereignty the king has over the colonies he has as being sovereign of the British nation.” As such, the colonies were to be considered as subject to the “supreme legislative body” of Parliament.

The essay argues against Parliament’s taxation of America, contending that “subordinate states,” whether Wales or the “palatinates of Chester and Durham” or the colonies, can only be taxed by representatives of their own choosing because “it is just, equal and agreeable to the constitution,” and the colonists have “inherited this franchise of raising money upon themselves from their ancestors.” The text is informed by English and American sources, citing Locke, James Otis, and Benjamin Franklin.

This essay presents one of the strongest responses to the claim of Parliamentary supremacy over the colonies. It is indicative of a robust revival of Old Whig ideas in England on the question of limited government, a revival that began with the Stamp Act in the 1760s and reached a highpoint in 1775. In this text the author draws from a long legal history to assert that all powers of government receive “their binding force from the sufferance, consent, and acquiescence of the people at large.”

This essay defends Parliament’s authority over America “when considered as a collective Body of Colonies,” because only it could consider “the general good of the whole.” While certainly consistent with an idea of virtual representation, the essay’s focus on an intercolonial perspective and the general interests of the empire, marks a distinctive alternative case for the supremacy of Parliament.