subordinate lawmaking body, and where the King's decisions are concerned, it counts for nothing." On this occasion, a compromise was reached, allowing the governor's levy on parcels of less than 100 acres lying east of the mountains. Harrison again joined the fray with Britain after it adopted the Townshend Acts, formally asserting the Parliament's right to tax the colonies. He was appointed in 1768 to a special committee to draft a response for the colony. A resolution asserted the right of British subjects to be taxed only by their elected representatives. The American colonies achieved their objective with a repeal of the Townshend Acts through the action of Lord North, who nevertheless continued the tax on tea. Harrison was a 1770 signer of the Virginia Association, an association of Virginia lawmakers and merchants boycotting British imports until the British Parliament repealed its tea tax. He also sponsored a bill declaring that Parliament's laws were illegal without the colonists' consent. Harrison, at this time, also served as a justice in Charles City County. When the city of Williamsburg lacked the funds for the construction of a courthouse, he and fellow delegate James Littlepage organized a group of "Gentlemen Subscribers" who purchased an unused building and presented it to the city in 1771. Early in 1772, Harrison and Thomas Jefferson were among a group of six Virginia house delegates assigned to prepare and deliver an address to the king which called for an end to the importation of enslaved people from Africa. Biographer Howard Smith indicates that the request was delivered and was unambiguous in its object to close the slave trade; the king rejected it. Congressional delegate in Philadelphia In 1773, colonists protested the British tax on tea by destroying a shipment during the Boston Tea Party. While all of the colonies were inspired by the news, some patriots, including Harrison, had misgivings and believed the Bostonians had a duty to reimburse the East India Company for its losses at their hands. The British Parliament responded to the protest by enacting more punitive measures, which colonists called the Intolerable Acts. Despite his qualms, Harrison was among 89 members of the Virginia Burgesses who signed a new association on May 24, 1774, condemning Parliament's action. The group also invited other colonies to convene a Continental Congress and called for a convention to select its Virginia delegates. At the First Virginia Convention, Harrison