thereof directly or indirectly either in person or estate willfully to wrong disturbe trouble or molest any person whatsoever within this Province professing to beleive in Jesus Christ for or in respect of his or her religion or the free exercise thereof within this Province other than is provided for in this Act that such person or persons soe offending, shalbe compelled to pay trebble damages to the party soe wronged or molested, and for every such. offence shall also forfeit 20° sterling in money or the value thereof, half thereof for the use of the Lo: Proprietary, and his heires Lords and Proprietaries of this Province, and the other half for the use of the party soe wronged or molested as aforesaid, Or if the partie soe offending as aforesaid shall refuse or bee unable to recompense the party soe wronged, or to satisfy such ffyne or forfeiture, then such Offender shalbe severely punished by publick whipping & imprisonment during the pleasure of the Lord Proprietary, or his Leiuetenant or cheife Governor of this Province for the tyme being without baile or maineprise.

No. 22. Navigation Act

October 9/19, 1651

UNDER the early colonial charters, the American colonies were generally exempted, either wholly or for a term of years, from the operation of the various acts for the regulation of trade then in force. The activity of the Dutch, however, gradually secured to that nation the virtual control of the colonial carrying trade. To regain this trade for the English, Parliament, in 1645, passed the first of a long series of acts and ordinances commonly spoken of collectively as the Navigation Acts. The ordinance of 1645 prohibited the importation into England, in other than English vessels manned by English seamen, of whale oil and other products of the whale fisheries. An ordinance of the following year restricted the foreign trade of the colonies to English bottoms. In 1649 the importation into England, Ireland, “or any of the dominions thereof," of French wines, wool, and silk was prohibited. In 1650, Virginia and certain of the West India colonies, where opposition to Puritanism had broken out, were declared to be in rebellion; and in order "to hinder the carrying over of any such persons as are enemies to this Commonwealth, or that may prove dangerous to any of the English plantations in America," foreign vessels were forbidden to trade with the colonies, save under license from Parliament or the Council of State. The act of 1651 aimed to secure the colonial trade for the mother country by "a policy of coercion pure and simple."

REFERENCES. Text in Scobell's Acts of Parliament (ed. 1653), 165–170.

The original text is in black letter, except the words here printed in italics; and there is no division into paragraphs. On the history and effects of the Navigation Acts, as touching America, see Beer's Commercial Policy of England towards the American Colonies, in Columbia Coll. Studies, III., No. 2; Channing's Navigation Laws, in Amer. Antiq. Soc. Proceedings, 1889; Scott's Development of Constitutional Liberty, chap. 8.

An Act for increase of Shipping and Encouragement of the Navigation of this Nation.

For the Increase of the Shipping and the encouragement of the Navigation of this Nation, which under the good Providence and protection of God, is so great a means of the Welfare and Safety of this Commonwealth; Be it Enacted by this present Parliament, and the Authority thereof, That from and after the First day of December, One thousand six hundred fifty one, and from thenceforwards, No Goods or Commodities whatsoever, of the Growth, Production or Manufacture of Asia, Africa or America, or of any part thereof; or of any Islands belonging to them or any of them, or which are described or laid down in the usual Maps or Cards of those places, as well of the English Plantations as others, shall be Imported or brought into this Commonwealth of England, or into Ireland, or any other Lands, Islands, Plantations or Territories to this Commonwealth belonging, or in their Possession, in any other Ship or Ships, Vessel or Vessels whatsoever, but onely in such as do truly and without fraud belong onely to the People of this Commonwealth, or the Plantations thereof, as the Proprietors or right Owners thereof: And whereof the Master and Mariners are also for the most part of them, of the People of this Commonwealth, under the penalty of the forfeiture and loss of all the Goods that shall be Imported contrary to this Act; as also of the Ship (with all her Tackle, Guns and Apparel) in which the said Goods or Commodities shall be so brought in and Imported; The one moiety to the use of the Commonwealth, and the other moiety to the use and behoof of any person or persons who shall seize the said Goods or Commodities, and shall prosecute the same in any Court of Record within this Commonwealth.

And it is further Enacted . . ., That no Goods or Commodities of the Growth, Production or Manufacture of Europe, or of any part thereof, shall after the First day of December, One thousand six hundred fifty and one, be Imported or brought into this Commonwealth of England, or into Ireland, or any other Lands,

Islands, Plantations or Territories to this Commonwealth belonging, or in their possession, in any Ship or Ships, Vessel or Vessels. whatsover, but in such as do truly and without fraud belong onely to the people of this Commonwealth, as the true Owners and Proprietors thereof, and in no other, except onely such Foreign Ships and Vessels as do truly and properly belong to the people of that Countrey or place, of which the said Goods are the Growth, Production or Manufacture; or to such Ports where the said Goods can onely be, or most usually are first Shipped for Transportation; And that under the same penalty of forfeiture and loss expressed in the former Branch of this Act, the said Forfeitures to be recovered and imployed as is therein expressed.

And it is further Enacted . . ., That no Goods or Commodities that are of Foreign Growth, Production or Manufacture, and which are to be brought into this Commonwealth, in shipping belonging to the people thereof, shall be by them Shipped or brought from any other place or places, Countrey or Countreys, but onely from those of their said Growth, Production or Manufacture; or from those Ports where the said Goods and Commodities can onely, or are, or usually have been first shipped for Transportation; And from none other Places or Countreys, under the same penalty of forfeiture and loss expressed in the first Branch of this Act, the said Forfeitures to be recovered and imployed as is therein expressed.

And it is further Enacted . . ., That no sort of Cod-fish, Ling, Herring, Pilchard, or any other kinde of salted Fish, usually fished for and caught by the people of this Nation; nor any Oyl made, or that shall be made of any kinde of Fish whatsoever; nor any Whale-fins, or Whale-bones, shall from henceforth be Imported into this Commonwealth, or into Ireland, or any other Lands, Islands, Plantations or Territories thereto belonging, or in their possession, but onely such as shall be caught in Vessels that do or shall truly and properly belong to the people of this Nation, as Proprietors and Right Owners thereof: And the said Fish to be cured, and the Oyl aforesaid made by the people of this Commonwealth, under the penalty and loss expressed in the said first Branch of this present Act; the said Forfeit to be recovered and imployed as is there expressed.

And it is further Enacted. . ., That no sort of Cod, Ling, Herring, Pilchard, or any other kinde of Salted Fish whatsoever,

which shall be caught and cured by the people of this Commonwealth, shall be from and after the First day of February, One thousand six hundred fifty three, Exported from any place or places belonging to this Commonwealth, in any other Ship or Ships, Vessel or Vessels, save onely in such as do truly and properly appertain to the people of this Commonwealth, as Right Owners; and whereof the Master and Mariners are for the most part of them English, under the penalty and loss expressed in the said first Branch of this present Act; the said Forfeit to be recovered and imployed as is there expressed.

Provided always, That this Act, nor anything therein contained, extend not, or be meant to restrain the Importation of any of the Commodities of the Streights or Levant Seas, loaden in the Shipping of this Nation as aforesaid, at the usual Ports or places for lading of them heretofore within the said Streights or Levant Seas, though the said Commodities be not of the very Growth of the said places.

Provided also, That this Act nor any thing therein contained, extend not, nor be meant to restrain the Importing of any EastIndia Commodities loaden in the Shipping of this Nation, at the usual Port or places for lading of them heretofore in any part of those Seas, to the Southward and Eastward of Cabo Bona Esperanza, although the said Ports be not the very places of their Growth.

Provided also, That it shall and may be lawful to and for any of the people of this Commonwealth, in Vessels or Ships to them belonging, and whereof the Master and Mariners are of this Nation as aforesaid, To load and bring in from any of the Ports of Spain and Portugal, all sorts of Goods or Commodities that have come from, or any way belonged unto the Plantations or Dominions of either of them respectively.

Be it also further Enacted . . ., That from henceforth, it shall not be lawful to any person or persons whatsover, to load or cause to be loaden and carryed in any Bottom or Bottoms, Ship or Ships, Vessel or Vessels whatsover, whereof any Stranger or Strangers born (unless such as be Denizens or Naturalized) be Owners, part Owners or Master, Any Fish, Victual, Wares, or things of what kinde or nature soever the same shall be, from one Port or Creek of this Commonwealth to another Port or Creek of the same, under penalty to every one that shall offend contrary

to the true meaning of this Branch of this present Act, to forfeit all the Goods that shall be so laden or carried, as also the Ship upon which they shall be so laden or carried, the same Forfeit to be recovered and imployed as directed in the First Branch of this present Act.

Lastly, That this Act nor any thing therein contained, extend not to Bullion, nor yet to any Goods taken, or that shall be taken by way of Reprizal by any Ship or Ships, having Commission from this Commonwealth.

Provided, That this Act, or any thing therein contained, shall not extend, nor be construed to extend to any Silk or Silk-wares which shall be brought by Land from any parts of Italy, and there bought with the proceed of English Commodities, sold either for money or in Barter; but that it shall and may be lawful for any of the People of this Commonwealth to ship the same in English Vessels from Ostend, Newport, Roterdam, Middleburgh, Amsterdam, or any Ports thereabouts; The Owners and Proprietors first making Oath by themselves, or other credible Witness, before the Commissioners of the Customs for the time being or their Deputies, or one of the Barons of the Exchequer, That the Goods aforesaid were so bought for his or their own proper Accompt in Italy.

No. 23. First Navigation Act

1660

THE act of 1660, usually known as the First Navigation Act, embodied, in more systematic form, the important provisions of earlier acts, with the object of protecting both English and colonial shipping, and exploiting the colonial trade for the benefit of the mother country. As the act was passed by the Convention Parliament, it was confirmed in 1661 by the first Parliament, known technically as the thirteenth, regularly assembled after the restoration of Charles II.

REFERENCES.

Text in Statutes of the Realm, V., 246–250. The act is cited as 12 Car. II., c. 18. For general references, see under No. 22, ante.

AN ACT for the Encourageing and increasing of Shipping and Navigation.

[I.] For the increase of Shiping and incouragement of the Navigation of this Nation, wherin under the good providence and protection of God the Wealth Safety and Strength of this