"instructions are allowed to be laws, where the laws of Great Britain and 
Barbados are silent." 3 ' 6 This remark may have been induced by the fact that 
two years previously Attorney General Rawlin of this colony had rendered an 
opinion that an act creating paper money which was contrary to the royal instructions 
was void. 877 
Some insight into the validity of a colonial act passed contrary to royal 
instructions is gained from an incident in New Jersey a few years later. In 
August, 1721, Governor Burnet communicated to the Board of Trade the 
desirability of a change in the instruction relating to the constitution of the 
colony assembly. 3 ' 8 The prevailing instruction provided that representation 
in the General Assembly was to be as follows: two members from Perth Amboy, 
two from each of the five counties of East New Jersey, two from Bridlington 
[Burlington], two from each of the four counties of West New Jersey, 
and two from Salem. 379 Since the issuance in 1705 of this instruction, population 
increase had resulted in the creation of a new county in West New 
Jersey, but this county had no representation. To correct this situation, Burnet 
proposed replacement of the Salem representation by that of the new county. 
This was justified on the score that the creation of separate Salem representation 
had been political, and the Salemites were few and disaffected. 380 
The sole obstacle which presented itself to such an instructional change 
was found in a 1709 act passed in the province under Governor Lovelace, 381 
the validity of which, however, was open to doubt. The act existed only in 
print, the original having been lost; no duplicate was ever sent to England 
for approbation; a bill being brought in the assembly to enact all printed 
acts whose originals were lost, the act in question was rejected as irregular. 382 
Burnet further advanced that "if this act was extant upon record it would be 
void ipso facto because it is contrary in many things to the tenour of the instruction 
and is thereby null till confirmed by his Majesty, according to the 
express words of that instruction." 383 The main difference between the act 
and the instruction was the lower property qualifications for representatives 
Col. Hist. N.Y., 1186. But we have seen no 
other evidence of the existence of such an instruction 
as was controverted in this cause. 
376 A Representation of the Miserable State of 
Barbados (1719), vii-viii. 
377 2 Chalmers, Opinions, 28. 
378 5 Doc. Rel. Col. Hist. N.J., 12. 
379 1 Labaree, Royal Instructions, #164. 
380 5 Doc. Rel. Col. Hist. N.J., 12-13. 
381 An Act Regulating the Qualification of 
Representatives to Serve in General Assembly 
in this Province of New Jersey (Acts Gen. 
Assemb. Prov. N.J., [1732], 8-9). Although 
Burnet asserted that the act was passed pursuant 
to the instruction in force, such recommendatory 
clause is first found in the instructions 
of Governor Hunter, when the act in 
question had already been passed (1 Labaree, 
Royal Instructions, #164). Cf. Tanner, The 
Province of New Jersey, 325. 
382 5 Doc. Rel. Col. Hist. N.J., 14. On the loss 
of the act and the failure of passage of the proposed 
bill see 4 ibid., 45, 56-58. 
383 5 Doc. Rel. Col. Hist. N.J., 14.