the english parliament had absolute power to make laws for the province of virginia the inhabitants were subjects there being no citizenship courts sitting in england were able to issue prorogative writs and in fact removed a governor on a writ of quo warranto all laws passed by the house of burgesses had to be approved by the crown and all virginia court judgments could be appealed to the crown that prerogative writs could be sent to britain's colonies was used in arguing for the right of habeas corpus in guantanamo bay otherwise the english courts considered virginia outside their jurisdiction and accepted the independence of local courts obviously a country cannot possess another country unless it has executive legislative and judicial power over it would you say that the virginia was a part of england do you think that bermuda etc are part of england today or canada for that matter until britain ceded its power to legislate in