No. 64

I have received your Despatch No. 59 dated 17 May, respecting the
claim of the liquidation of the Queen Charlotte Mining Co. to a premium
of £500 offered by the Government of B.C. in 1864 for the first 200 tons produced in the Colony and shipped to any foreign Port.
You state in your Despatch you have not felt yourself at liberty to
recognize the validity of this claim, or to recommend it to the present
Legislature of the Colony.

As at present advised I am unable to concur in this view. If it
was desirable to offer such a premium at all it should have been made
subject to distinct conditions as to the time for which the offer was to
hold good and a vote for the purpose should have been placed on the
Estimates, but I am unable to perceive that the absence of any enactment
whether in an appropriation Act or otherwise absolves the Government and
Legislature of the Colony for the time being from the responsibility
(which in a general rule in such cases is accepted without question) for
obligations entered into by a preceding Government and Legislature.

As the offer does not appear at any time revoked it appears to me
that the good faith of the Colony is pledged to this expenditure, and
unless there are other reasons than those contained in the papers before
me which could be held to justify a contrary course the matter should be
brought under the notice of the Provincial Legislature.