The Parliament at Westminster saw itself as the supreme lawmaking authority throughout all British possessions and thus entitled to levy any tax without colonial approval. They argued that the colonies were legally British corporations subordinate to the British parliament, and they pointed to numerous instances where Parliament had made laws in the past that were binding on the colonies. Parliament insisted that the colonies effectively enjoyed a "virtual representation" as most British people did, as only a small minority of the British population elected representatives to Parliament, but Americans such as James Otis maintained that they were not "virtually represented" at all.