What were the provisions of the Declaratory Act of 1766?
The answer would depend on whether you understand “provision” as “condition” or as “stipulation”. The stipulation was “in all cases whatsoever”, which would mean as much as “unconditional”. “The Declaratory Act asserted that Parliament “had, hath, and of right ought to have, full power and authority to make laws and statutes of sufficient force and validity to bind the colonies and people of America … in all cases whatsoever”. The phrasing of the act was intentionally unambiguous, and although many in Parliament felt that taxes were implied in this clause, some other Parliament members and many of the colonialists did not. Many of the colonists were busy celebrating their political victory (the repealing of the Stamp Act) to notice that the Declaratory Act subtley hinted that more acts would be coming. This Declaratory Act was copied almost word for word from the Irish Declaratory Act, an act which put Ireland in a position of bondage to their crown. The same fate was to come to the
