This article examines the role of documents, their circulation, and their archivization in the enactment of the imperial constitution of the British Empire in the Atlantic world during the long eighteenth century. It focuses on the Board of Trade's dispatch of “Instructions” and “Queries” to governors in the American colonies, arguing that it was through the circulation of these documents and the use of archives that the board sought to enforce constitutional norms of bureaucratic conduct and the authority of central institutions of imperial administration. In the absence of a singular, codified written constitution, the British state relied upon a variety of different kinds of documents to forge the imperial Atlantic into a governed space. The article concludes by pointing to the continuing centrality of documents and archives to the bureaucratic manifestation of the imperial constitution in the immediate aftermath of the American Revolution.

中文翻译：

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通过文件进行治理：贸易委员会、其档案和 18 世纪英国大西洋世界的帝国宪法

本文考察了在漫长的 18 世纪大西洋世界大英帝国帝国宪法的制定过程中，文件的作用、流通和归档。它侧重于贸易委员会向美洲殖民地的州长发出“指示”和“询问”，认为正是通过这些文件的流通和档案的使用，委员会试图执行官僚行为的宪法规范和中央帝国行政机构的权威。在没有单一的成文成文宪法的情况下，英国政府依靠各种不同类型的文件将帝国大西洋打造为一个受治理的空间。