The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5)
J >> John Marshall >> The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5)Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30
Massachusetts had asserted a right over this territory. Her claim
derived aid, not only from the factions which agitated these feeble
settlements, but also from the uncertainty of the tenure by which the
inhabitants held their lands. Only the settlers at Portsmouth had
acquired a title from Mason; and the others were, consequently,
unfriendly to his pretensions. These causes produced a voluntary offer
of submission to the government of Massachusetts, which was accepted;
and the general court passed an order, declaring the inhabitants of
Piscataqua to be within their jurisdiction, with the privileges of
participating in all their rights, and of being exempted from all
"public charges, other than those which shall arise for, or among
themselves, or from any action, or course that may be taken for their
own good or benefit." Under the protecting wing of this more powerful
neighbour, New Hampshire attained the growth which afterwards enabled
her to stand alone; and long remembered with affection the benefits
she had received.[70]
[Footnote 70: Chalmer. Hutchison.]
Charles, environed with difficulties arising from his own misrule, was
at length compelled to meet his Parliament; and, in November, the
great council of the nation was again assembled. The circumstances
which had caused such considerable emigrations to New England, existed
no longer. The puritans were not only exempt from persecution, but
became the strongest party in the nation; and, from this time, New
England is supposed to have derived no increase of population from the
parent state.[71]
[Footnote 71: Hutchison.]
[Sidenote: Confederation of the New England colonies.]
{1643}
About the same period many evidences were given of a general
combination of the neighbouring Indians against the settlements of New
England; and apprehensions were also entertained of hostility from the
Dutch at Manhadoes. A sense of impending danger suggested the policy
of forming a confederacy of the sister colonies for their mutual
defence; and so confirmed had the habit of self-government become
since the attention of England was absorbed in her domestic
dissensions, that it was not thought necessary to consult the parent
state on this important measure. After mature deliberation, articles
of confederation were digested; and in May 1643, they were
conclusively adopted.[72]
[Footnote 72: This was an union, says Mr. Trumbull, of the
highest consequence to the New England colonies. It made
them formidable to the Dutch and Indians, and respectable
among their French neighbours. It was happily adapted to
maintain harmony among themselves, and to secure the rights
and peace of the country. It was one of the principal means
of the preservation of the colonies, during the civil wars,
and unsettled state of affairs in England. It was the great
source of mutual defence in Philip's war; and of the most
eminent service in civilising the Indians, and propagating
the Gospel among them. The union subsisted more than forty
years, until the abrogation of the charters of the New
England colonies by King James II.]
By them the united colonies of New England, viz. Massachusetts,
Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven, entered into a firm and
perpetual league, offensive and defensive.
Each colony retained a distinct and separate jurisdiction; no two
colonies could join in one jurisdiction without the consent of the
whole; and no other colony could be received into the confederacy
without the like consent.
The charge of all wars was to be borne by the colonies respectively,
in proportion to the male inhabitants of each, between sixteen and
sixty years of age.
On notice of an invasion given by three magistrates of any colony, the
confederates were immediately to furnish their respective quotas.
These were fixed at one hundred from Massachusetts, and forty-five
from each of the other parties to the agreement. If a larger armament
should be found necessary, commissioners were to meet, and ascertain
the number of men to be required.
Two commissioners from each government, being church members, were to
meet annually on the first Monday in September. Six possessed the
power of binding the whole. Any measure approved by a majority of less
than six was to be referred to the general court of each colony, and
the consent of all was necessary to its adoption.
They were to choose annually a president from their own body, and had
power to frame laws or rules of a civil nature, and of general
concern. Of this description were rules which respected their conduct
towards the Indians, and measures to be taken with fugitives from one
colony to another.
No colony was permitted, without the general consent, to engage in
war, but in sudden and inevitable cases.
If, on any extraordinary meeting of the commissioners, their whole
number should not assemble, any four who should meet were empowered to
determine on a war, and to call for the respective quotas of the
several colonies; but not less than six could determine on the justice
of the war, or settle the expenses, or levy the money for its support.
If any colony should be charged with breaking an article of the
agreement, or with doing an injury to another colony, the complaint
was to be submitted to the consideration and determination of the
commissioners of such colonies as should be disinterested.[73]
[Footnote 73: Chalmer. Hutchison. Trumbull.]
[Sidenote: Rhode Island excluded from it.]
This union, the result of good sense, and of a judicious consideration
of the real interests of the colonies, remained in force until their
charters were dissolved. Rhode Island, at the instance of
Massachusetts, was excluded; and her commissioners were not admitted
into the congress of deputies which formed the confederation.
On her petitioning at a subsequent period to be received as a member,
her request was refused, unless she would consent to be incorporated
with Plymouth. This condition being deemed inadmissible, she never was
taken into the confederacy. From the formation of this league, its
members were considered by their neighbours as one body with regard to
external affairs, and such as were of general concern; though the
internal and particular objects of each continued to be managed by its
own magistrates and legislature.
The vigorous and prudent measures pursued by the united colonies,
disconcerted the plans of the Indians, and preserved peace.
Rhode Island and Providence plantations, excluded from the general
confederacy, were under the necessity of courting the friendship of
the neighbouring Indians. So successful were their endeavours that, in
the year 1644, they obtained from the chiefs of the Narraghansetts a
formal surrender of their country.[74]
[Footnote 74: Chalmer.]
The first general assembly, consisting of the collective freemen of
the plantations, was convened in May, 1647. In this body the supreme
authority of the nation resided. The executive duties were performed
by a governor and four assistants, chosen from among the freemen by
their several towns; and the same persons constituted also the supreme
court for the administration of justice. Every township, forming
within itself a corporation, elected a council of six, for the
management of its peculiar affairs, and for the settlement of its
disputes.[75]
[Footnote 75: Ibid.]
{1644}
Hitherto the governor, assistants, and representatives, of
Massachusetts had assembled in the same chamber, and deliberated
together. At first their relative powers do not seem to have been
accurately understood; nor the mode of deciding controverted questions
to have been well defined. The representatives being the most numerous
body, contended that every question should be decided by a majority of
the whole, while the assistants asserted their right to a negative.
More than once, this contest suspended the proceedings of the general
court. But the assistants having, with the aid of the clergy,
succeeded on each occasion, the representatives yielded the point, and
moved that separate chambers should be provided for the two branches
of the legislature. This motion being carried in the affirmative,
their deliberations were afterwards conducted apart from each other.
This regulation was subsequently modified with respect to judicial
proceedings; for the legislature was the court of the last resort. If,
in these, the two houses differed, the vote was to be taken
conjointly.
[Sidenote: New England takes part with Parliament.]
In England, the contests between the King and Parliament, at length
ripened into open war. The colonies of New England took an early and
sincere part on the side of Parliament. Their interests were committed
to such agents as might best conciliate the favour of the House of
Commons, who, in return, manifested the impression received from them,
and from the general conduct of their northern colonies, by passing a
resolutions exempting from the payment of "duties or other customs,"
until the house should order otherwise, all merchandises exported to
or from New England.[76] And, in 1644, the general court passed an
ordinance declaring "that what person soever shall by word, writing,
or action, endeavour to disturb our peace directly or indirectly by
drawing a party under pretence that he is for the King of England, and
such as join with him against the Parliament, shall be accounted as an
offender of a high nature against this commonwealth, and to be
proceeded with either capitally or otherwise, according to the quality
and degree of his offence; provided always that this shall not be
extended against any merchants, strangers and shipmen that come hither
merely for trade or merchandise, albeit they should come from any of
those parts that are in the hands of the King, and such as adhere to
him against the Parliament; carrying themselves here quietly, and free
from railing, or nourishing any faction, mutiny, or sedition among us
as aforesaid."[77]
[Footnote 76: In the subsequent year Parliament exempted New
England from all taxes "until both houses should otherwise
direct;" and, in 1646, all the colonies were exempted from
all talliages except the excise, "provided their productions
should be exported only in English bottoms."]
[Footnote 77: Hutchison.]
These manifestations of mutual kindness were not interrupted by an
ordinance of Parliament, passed in 1643, appointing the earl of
Warwick, governor in chief and lord high admiral of the colonies, with
a council of five peers, and twelve commoners, to assist him; and
empowering him, in conjunction with his associates, to examine the
state of their affairs; to send for papers and persons; to remove
governors and officers, appointing others in their places; and to
assign over to them such part of the powers then granted as he should
think proper. Jealous as were the people of New England of measures
endangering their liberty, they do not appear to have been alarmed at
this extraordinary exercise of power. So true is it that men close
their eyes on encroachments committed by that party to which they are
attached, in the delusive hope that power, in such hands, will always
be wielded against their adversaries, never against themselves.
[Sidenote: Treaty with Acadie.]
This prosperous state of things was still farther improved by a
transaction which is the more worthy of notice as being an additional
evidence of the extent to which the colonies of New England then
exercised the powers of self-government. A treaty of peace and
commerce was entered into between the governor of Massachusetts,
styling himself governor of New England, and Monsieur D'Aulney,
lieutenant general of the King of France in Acadie. This treaty was
laid before the commissioners for the colonies and received their
sanction.
{1646}
[Sidenote: Petition of the non-conformists.]
The rigid adherence of Massachusetts to the principle of withholding
the privilege of a freeman from all who dissented from the majority in
any religious opinion, could not fail to generate perpetual
discontents. A petition was presented to the general court, signed by
several persons highly respectable for their situation and character,
but, not being church members, excluded from the common rights of
society, complaining that the fundamental laws of England were not
acknowledged by the colony; and that they were denied those civil and
religious privileges to which they were entitled, as freeborn
Englishmen, of good moral conduct. Their prayer to be admitted to the
rights, or to be relieved from the burdens, of society, was
accompanied with observations conveying a very intelligible censure on
the proceedings of the colony, and a threat of applying to Parliament,
should the prayer of their petition be rejected.
The most popular governments not being always the most inclined to
tolerate opinions differing from those of the majority, this petition
gave great offence, and its signers were required to attend the court.
Their plea, that the right to petition government was sacred, was
answered by saying that they were not accused for petitioning, but for
using contemptuous and seditious expressions. They were required to
find sureties for their good behaviour; and, on refusing to
acknowledge their offence, were fined at the discretion of the court.
An appeal from this decision having been refused, they sent deputies
to lay their case before Parliament; but the clergy exerted themselves
on the occasion; and the celebrated Cotton, in one of his sermons,
asserted "that if any should carry writings or complaints against the
people of God in that country to England, it would be as Jonas in the
ship." A storm having risen during the passage, the mariners,
impressed with the prophecy of Cotton, insisted that the obnoxious
papers should be thrown overboard; and the deputies were constrained
to consign their credentials to the waves. On their arrival in
England, they found Parliament but little disposed to listen to their
complaints. The agents of Massachusetts had received instructions to
counteract their efforts; and the governments of New England were too
high in favour, to admit of a rigid scrutiny into their conduct.[78]
[Footnote 78: Chalmer. Hutchison.]
In some of the internal dissensions which agitated Massachusetts,
Winthrop, a man of great influence, always among their first
magistrates, and often their governor, was charged while deputy
governor with some arbitrary conduct. He defended himself at the bar,
in the presence of a vast concourse of people; and, having been
honourably acquitted, addressed them from the bench, in a speech which
was highly approved.
As this speech tends to illustrate the political opinions of the day,
an extract from it may not be unworthy of regard. "The questions," he
said, "which have troubled the country of late, and from which these
disturbances in the state have arisen, have been about the authority
of the magistrate and the liberty of the people. Magistracy is
certainly an appointment from God. We take an oath to govern you
according to God's law, and our own; and if we commit errors, not
willingly, but for want of skill, you ought to bear with us, because,
being chosen from among yourselves, we are but men, and subject to the
like passions as yourselves. Nor would I have you mistake your own
liberty. There is a freedom of doing what we list, without regard to
law or justice; this liberty is indeed inconsistent with authority;
but civil, moral, and federal liberty, consists in every man's
enjoying his property, and having the benefit of the laws of his
country; which is very consistent with a due subjection to the civil
magistrate. And for this you ought to contend, with the hazard of your
lives."[79]
[Footnote 79: Hutchison.]
During the remnant of his life, he was annually chosen governor.
{1649}
About this time, a controversy which had long subsisted between
Massachusetts, and Connecticut, was terminated. The latter, for the
purpose of maintaining Saybrooke, had laid a duty on all goods
exported from Connecticut river. The inhabitants of Springfield, a
town of Massachusetts lying on the river, having refused to pay this
duty, the cause was laid before the commissioners of the united
colonies; and, after hearing the parties, those of Plymouth and New
Haven adjourned the final decision of the case until the next meeting,
in order to hear farther objections from Massachusetts, but directed
that, in the meantime, the duty should be paid.
At the meeting in 1648, Massachusetts insisted on the production of
the patent of Connecticut. It was perfectly well known that the
original patent could not be procured; and the agents for Connecticut,
after stating this fact, offered an authentic copy. The commissioners
recommended that the boundary line should be run, to ascertain whether
Springfield was really in Massachusetts, but still directed that the
duty should continue to be paid. On this order being made, the
commissioners of Massachusetts produced a law of their general court,
reciting the controversy, with the orders which had been made in it,
and imposing a duty on all goods belonging to the inhabitants of
Plymouth, Connecticut, or New Haven, which should be imported within
the castle, or exported from any part of the bay, and subjecting them
to forfeiture for non-payment. The commissioners remonstrated strongly
against this measure, and recommended it to the general court of
Massachusetts, seriously to consider whether such proceedings were
reconcilable with "the law of love," and the tenor of the articles of
confederation. In the meantime, they begged to be excused from "all
farther agitations concerning Springfield."
In this state of the controversy fort Saybrooke was consumed by fire,
and Connecticut forbore to re-build it, or to demand the duty. In the
following year, Massachusetts repealed the ordinance which had so
successfully decided the contest.[80]
[Footnote 80: Chalmer. Hutchison.]
Thus does a member of a confederacy, feeling its own strength, and the
weakness of those with whom it is associated, deride the legitimate
decisions of the federal body, when opposed to its own interest or
passions, and obey the general will, only when that will is dictated
by itself.
{1651}
Although, while civil war raged in the mother country, New England had
been permitted to govern itself as an independent nation, Parliament
seems to have entertained very decisive opinions respecting the
subordination of the provinces, and its own controlling power. The
measures taken for giving effect to these opinions, involved all the
colonies equally. The council of state was authorised to displace
governors and magistrates, and to appoint others. Massachusetts was
required to take a new patent, and to hold its courts, not in the name
of the colony, but in the name of the Parliament. The general court,
unwilling to comply with these requisitions, transmitted a petition to
Parliament, styling that body "the supreme authority," and expressing
for it the highest respect. They stated their uniform attachment to
Parliament during the civil war, the aid they had given, and the
losses they had sustained. After speaking of the favours they had
received, they expressed the hope "that it will not go worse with them
than it did under the late King; and that the frame of this government
will not be changed, and governors and magistrates imposed on them
against their will." They declared, however, their entire submission
to the will of Parliament; and, avowing for that body the most zealous
attachment, prayed a favourable answer to their humble petition.
But the united colonies had lately given great umbrage by supplying
Virginia and Barbadoes, then enemies of the commonwealth, with warlike
stores and other commodities. It was also matter of real complaint
that their exemption from the payment of duties enabled them to enrich
themselves at the expense of others; and a revocation of their
privileges in this respect was seriously contemplated. Yet the
requisitions concerning their charter were never complied with, and do
not appear to have been repeated.[81]
[Footnote 81: Chalmer. Hutchison.]
{1653}
[Sidenote: Machinations of the Dutch with the Indians.]
In this year, war was declared by England against Holland. The united
colonies, accustomed to conduct their affairs in their own way, did
not think themselves involved in this contest, unless engaged in it by
some act of their own. The Dutch at Manhadoes, too weak to encounter
their English neighbours, solicited the continuance of peace; and, as
the trade carried on between them was mutually advantageous, this
request was readily granted. Intelligence however was soon brought by
the Indians, that the Dutch were privately inciting them to a general
confederacy for the purpose of extirpating the English. This
intelligence gave the more alarm, because the massacre at Amboyna was
then fresh in the recollection of the colonists. An extraordinary
meeting of the commissioners was called at Boston, who were divided in
opinion with regard to the propriety of declaring war. In consequence
of this division, a conference was held before the general court and
several elders of Massachusetts. The elders, being requested to give
their opinion in writing, stated "that the proofs and presumptions of
the execrable plot, tending to the destruction of so many of the dear
saints of God, imputed to the Dutch governor, and the fiscal, were of
such weights as to induce them to believe the reality of it; yet they
were not so fully conclusive as to clear up a present proceeding to
war before the world, and to bear up their hearts with that fullness
of persuasion which was mete, in commending the case to God in prayer,
and to the people in exhortations; and that it would be safest for the
colonies to forbear the use of the sword; but advised to be in a
posture of defence until the mind of God should be more fully known
either for a settled peace, or more manifest grounds of war."[82] With
this opinion of the elders, the vote of the general court concurred.
[Footnote 82: Chalmer. Hutchison.]
The intelligence of the practices of the Dutch governor with the
Indians becoming more certain, all the commissioners except Mr.
Bradstreet of Massachusetts, declared in favour of war. Their
proceedings were immediately interrupted by a declaration of the
general court of Massachusetts, that no determination of the
commissioners, although they should be unanimous, should bind the
general court to join in an offensive war which should appear to be
unjust. A serious altercation ensued, in the course of which the other
colonies pressed the war as a measure essential to their safety; but
Massachusetts adhered inflexibly to its first resolution. This
additional evidence of the incompetency of their union to bind one
member, stronger than all the rest, threatened a dissolution of the
confederacy; and that event seems to have been prevented only by the
inability of the others to stand alone. Alarmed at their situation,
and irritated by the conduct of their elder sister, Connecticut and
New Haven represented Cromwell, then lord protector of England, the
danger to which the colonies were exposed from the Dutch and the
Indians; and the hazard the smaller provinces must continue to incur,
unless the league between them could be maintained and executed
according to its true intent, and the interpretation which its
articles had uniformly received.
{1654}
With his usual promptness and decision, Cromwell detached a small
armament for the reduction of the Dutch colony, and recommended to
Massachusetts to furnish aid to the expedition. Although the
legitimate requisitions of the government of the union had been
ineffectual, the recommendation of the lord protector was not to be
disregarded; and the general court passed a resolution conforming to
it. A treaty of peace, which was signed in April, saved the Dutch
colony.[83]
[Footnote 83: Chalmer. Hutchison.]
[Sidenote: Expedition against Acadie.]
{1655}
The progress of the French in their neighbourhood had been viewed with
regret and apprehension by all New England. Sedgewic, the commander of
the forces which had been destined against Manhadoes, animated with
the vigour of his master, was easily prevailed on to turn his arms
against a people, whose religious tenets he detested, and whose
country he hated. He soon dislodged the French from Penobscot, and
subdued all Acadie. The ministers of his most christian majesty,
pending the negotiations for the treaty of Westminster, demanded
restitution of the forts Pentagoet, St. Johns, and Port Royal; but,
each nation having claims on the country, their pretensions were
referred to the arbitrators appointed to adjust the damages committed
on either side since the year 1640; and the restitution of Acadie was
postponed for future discussion.