In Thomas Fitch’s The Reason and Howard’s A Letter from a Gentleman in Halifax we get two very different perspectives on the rights of the American colonies with respect to the British Crown. Fitch is in favor of the Colonies having the right to make their own legislation, particularly those concerning taxation. He argues that the inhabitants of the Colonies have the Crown-given rights of all the British, and that the British Parliament should “charge no internal taxations upon them without their consent” (Fitch 407). The gentleman from Halifax, on the other hand, views the Colonies as subject to all legislation and taxation enacted by Parliament. This is because of the fact that he argues the inhabitants of the Colonies understood their rights and privileges according to the charters they accepted. In short, Howard views them as corporations created by the crown that are confined within parameters based on the charters they accepted, “…for when they accepted of their charters they tacitly submitted to the terms and conditions of them” (Howard 535).
In addition to the contrasting perspectives, the two writers also contrast one another in terms of style, attitude, and subject matter. Fitch’s The Reason is a surefire cure for insomnia. Written in a formal, legalistic manner, Fitch’s writing style and use of language are enough to make most readers nod off. The tone and manner of the piece is very formal, and comes off like a legal document that is threatening some kind of action if its demands are not met. Fitch enumerates points, raises objections and undermines them with answers, and he continually refers to established laws and the constitution of Great Britain to validate his contention that the Colonies should not be internally taxed without their consent. His list of reasons reads like a legal document, including his use of words like viz. A quick look at the first three of his points demonstrates th...