the Orders in Council and to order them into execution according to "tenor, 
true intent and meaning thereof." This petition was accordingly granted. 419 
When the Orders in Council were presented at the Superior Court, the judges 
"having some doubts respecting the powers given them by the votes of Assembly 
upon the said petition" and petitioners "being unwilling to risque 
matters of such great importance to them upon an uncertain foundation, nothing 
was done respecting the premises." Therefore, in October petitioners 
prayed an Assembly direction to the March Superior Court to take cognizance 
of the conciliar orders and to do everything requisite and necessary to carry 
them into execution "according to their tenor, true intent and meaning." After 
some disagreement between the two legislative houses as to the phraseology 
of the legislative direction, in March it was agreed that the "decrees be ordered, 
judicially, into execution by the justices of the Superior Court according to the 
established practice and usage of that court." 420 
When the Orders in Council were presented at the March, 1770, sitting of 
the Superior Court, at the motion of respondents' counsel a commissioner was 
appointed to take depositions. Appellants then petitioned that the conciliar 
orders be executed according to the Assembly direction. But respondents, relating 
their previous tender, alleged that the sums tendered "by the laws and 
the constant and uninterrupted customs, usages, and practices of all the courts 
in this colony," as might appear by depositions and affidavits ready to be produced, 
were "sufficient for the redemption of the said mortgaged estate and 
for vacating and discharging the mortgage aforesaid," and thereupon prayed 
judgment. Depositions of Stephen Hopkins, Daniel Jenckes, and Jonathan 
Randall were then tendered by respondents and read, appellants' objections 
thereto being overruled. Counsel were then heard. 421 Henry Marchant, for 
respondents, objected to carrying the judgments into execution, averring "that 
the King and Council had made up said judgments contrary to law, reason, 
equity, and justice; and when the King and Council made up such a judgment, 
the King was no King, and therefore the Court ought to set aside said judgments 
and make up a judgment of their own according to law." It was further 
maintained that respondents never had a hearing before the King and Council, 
their counsel having deserted them. The usual recital of having heard counsel 
in the Committee report was termed "only a matter of form." 422 
419 MS Petitions to R.I. Gen. Assemb., 1768- 
70, #103. 
i2o lbid., #140. The petition is first endorsed 
as granted on October 27, 1769, but this is 
deleted. Then on Feb. 28, 1770, it was granted 
by the lower house; on March 1 the upper 
house concurred, but with the amendment that 
the Superior Court order the decrees into execution 
"agreeable to law." On March 2 the 
lower house adhered to its former vote. The 
upper house then concurred, with the amendment 
as finally issued; the lower house concurred 
on March 3. 
421 MS R.I. Sup. Ct. ]ud. Judgment Book., 
'754-72, 428-31. 
422 6 APC, Col., #871; PC 1/55.