instructions are neither laws of public authority, nor rules of constitution; they 
can only be directory to those who are to govern; and if, in any instance, they are 
not complied with, that can never destroy the effect of a power executed by publick 
commission: But it may be matter for a charge of disobedience, in some cases, and 
misconduct in others, against him who governs. 478 
Richard Bland stated that if the governor should pass an act contrary to his 
instructions, he became subject to penalties, but the act so passed had the 
obligation of law until disallowed. For "if such act is void ab initio, the instructions 
would be absurd, because to restrain the governor from passing an 
act, which when passed is absolutely void as if it had never existed, is absurd 
and useless." 479 This contention was obviously devoid of meaning. The official 
justification of the colony legislature for passage of the 1758 act, transmitted 
to England, glossed over the instructional violation. 480 
Although Camm obviously was aware that the 1758 act was only disallowed 
and not declared null and void ab initio, the clergy sought to maintain that 
the August 10, 1759, Order in Council was a declaration of nullity. Or more 
accurately, it was advanced that by the "disallowance," the 1758 act became 
null and void ab initio as contrasted with the prospective operation of a 
conciliar "repeal." 481 In the proclamation issued by Fauquier to effectuate 
the Order in Council the word "repeal" was added to the usual conciliar lan- 
478 Carter, op. cit., 46. 
479 R. Bland, The Colonel Dismounted; or, 
The Rector Vindicated (1764), 27-28. 
480 Smith, The Parsons' Cause, 1755-65, 21 
Tyler's Quart. Hist, and Gen. Mag., 160-61; 
30 Southern literary Messenger (Feb., i860), 
127-28. Cf. Perry, op. cit., 469. Smith refers 
to this representation as "a justification of the 
Burgesses for their conduct in enacting a 
measure contrary to the laws of England regarding 
the colonies" (The Parsons' Cause, ut 
supra, 161). He also states that since the 1755 
act did not contain a suspending clause, "it 
clearly violated the established laws of the 
mother country" (ibid., 147). At another place 
it is asserted that the "colonial government had 
no authority in passing a measure contrary to 
the laws of England" (ibid., 155). Apparently 
the author without any discussion assumes that 
royal instructions were part of the laws of 
England. We have seen no support for this 
position. Cf. M. C. Tyler (Patrick Henry 
[1898], 40) who begs the entire question by 
declaring that the 1755 act "exceeded the constitutional 
authority of the legislature." 
481 This untenable clerical contention has been 
uncritically accepted by many writers; see 
Wirt, Sketches of the Life and Character of 
Patrick Henry (1818), 22; 1 Hawks, Contributions 
Eccl. Hist. U.S. (1836), 122; Everett, 
Patrick Henry (1855), 233; 3 Anderson, 
History of the Church of England in the 
Colonies (1856), 138; Eckenrode, Separation 
of Church and State in Virginia, 25; L. G. 
Tyler, The Leadership of Virginia in the War 
of the Revolution, 18 William and Mary College 
Quarterly (1910), 149; 19 ibid., 21. But 
cf. Campbell, History of the Colony and Ancient 
Dominion of Virginia (i860), 514, who 
admits that the conciliar order was not retrospective 
in operation. Although Scott (The 
Constitutional Aspects of the "Parson's Cause," 
31 Pol. Sci. Quart., 561-62) pointed out this 
confusion of the earlier historians, later writers 
have seen fit to perpetuate the error. See 
Morgan, Patrick Henry (1929), 61; Smith, 
The Parsons' Cause, 159, 163. Henry in 1 
Patrick Henry, Life, Corres. and Speeches 
(1891), 33, erroneously declares that Camm 
"was told by the Lords of Trade and the 
Privy Council that this [disallowance] would 
render the act void, ab initio."