66 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
teen chests of Spanish dollars and a hundred casks of coined copper— 
the advantage of honest money was so manifest that instead of being 
insulted on every street corner Hutchinson became the most popular 
man in the province. ‘Twelve years later he wrote: “I think I may be 
allowed to call myself the father of the present fixed medium.” 
In his forty-first year he was advanced to the dignity of Judge of 
Probate and Justice of the Common Pleas. The duties of his office 
were discharged with industry, integrity and intelligence. Six years 
later he resigned his position to become for a time Lieutenant-Gover- 
nor. He was a man of humane instincts and took an active part in the 
succour of the Acadian exiles, about one thousand of whom were brought 
to Boston. The fall of Quebec and generous reimbursement of the 
colonists by the mother country for their sacrifices created a commercial 
buoyancy previously unknown. In 1760, on the death of Chief Justice 
Sewall, Hutchinson was appointed as his successor in the highest legal 
office in the province. As he entered upon its duties George III. was 
proclaimed king; and soon began that conflict between the Crown and 
the colony which ended in what has been called the “ Schism of the 
Angle-Saxon race.” 
The Council chamber in the old State House, Boston, was the 
theatre of much of that controversy. Much dignity was affected by the 
court. The Chief Justice and other judgés wore immense judicial wigs, 
scarlet robes, and cambric bands. The barristers of Boston also wore 
gowns, bands, and tie wigs, which were supposed to be essential to the 
administration of justice and exhibition of loyalty to the Crown. 
As a man whose fortune was made by merchant adventures, the 
Chief Justice was personally in favour of free trade. A good deal of 
smuggling had in the past been winked at, but as supreme officer of the 
Crown, it was his duty to see to the enforcement of the laws. The search 
of premises for smuggled goods was strenuously resisted. “The taxes 
were evaded,” says Hosmer, “the whole country being given over to 
unlawful trade in a way most demoralizing. The warehouses were few 
indeed in which there were no smuggled goods.” 
From this date Hutchinson’s popularity began to wane. He was 
at this time “ Lieutenant-Governor, President of the Council, Chief 
Justice, and Judge of Probate.” This combination of functions was 
not the result of rapacity of office, for the emolument for the whole 
was very meagre and was sometimes abridged in the annual grants of 
the House, or indeed entirely cut off. But as Hutchinson possessed 
wealth, leisure, ability, and high character, the office sought the man, 
not the man the office. 
We may not here enter into the details of the Stamp Act contro- 
versy. In order to meet the colonial military expenditure, a stamp 
