Quartering Act
The Quartering Act required colonial assemblies to house and supply British troops, and New York refused. The act did not billet soldiers in private homes, which is what the later American amendment is usually taken to be about; it obliged the colonies to provide barracks, and failing that inns, alehouses and empty buildings, and to supply bedding, firewood, candles, cooking utensils, salt, vinegar and a ration of beer or cider. The cost fell on the colonial assemblies. That is the constitutional point. An assembly required by Westminster to vote money it had not chosen to vote is not a legislature, and refusing was the only way of testing whether it was. New York, where the commander-in-chief for North America had his headquarters and the largest garrison, declined to comply fully in 1766, providing some of what was demanded and not the salt, vinegar and drink. Parliament answered with the New York Restraining Act of 1767, suspending the colony's assembly until it obeyed. That is a considerably larger claim than a tax — the power to abolish a representative body for a vote it had taken — and it alarmed assemblies in colonies with no troops at all. New York complied before the suspension took effect. The act was renewed and extended, and the version of 1774 among the Coercive Acts permitted the quartering of troops in occupied dwellings, which is what the Third Amendment answers. The suspension of New York's assembly is the measure historians point to when explaining why colonies with no grievance of their own began to take an interest. A legislature that can be switched off is a committee, and every assembly in America drew the inference.
- Year: 1765 CE
- Category: Political
