Excerpt from The Origin and the Results of the Imperial Federation Movement in England While this belief was held by most public men, and by many writers on colonial subjects from the early part of the century, its influence was combined with that of another theory before it began to affect the practical action of the government. This was the doctrine that the colonies were nothing but a burden, and that it would be better for England to be rid of them. It is impossible to trace here in any detail the rise and growth of this doctrine, interesting as it might be to do so. It undoubtedly had its origin, like the other idea, in the trou bles of the American revolutionary period. Briefly stated by Adam Smith, just as the war, was beginning,2 and by Dean Tucker a little later,3 it received still more complete and strik ing development from Jeremy Bentham; in 1793, in a paper addressed to the revolutionary government in France, but not published at the time. After an interval of about thirty years, the idea again made its appearance, and this time apparently with some considerable popular support.4 It appeared in the reviews, and was heard in the House of Commons. A writer in the Quarterly Review} of January, considered the no tion prevalent enough to deserve an answer, and indicated its character by saying: It may not be amiss to advert to some objections occasionally advanced against these dependencies altogether. It is sometimes insisted that colonies are burdens. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.