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government; and the county government was administered mostly by certain officers of the hundreds. New York, while under the Dutch, had its village assemblies, which resembled the town meetings of New England. The county was a representative government, consisting of supervisors elected by the townships. In Pennsylvania the county existed before the township, and in the earlier history of the province it exercised most of the functions of local government. The officers of the county were elected by the people, and when townships were erected the people likewise elected the officers.

9. The Origin of the States.-The States of the United States had their origin in thirteen English colonies in America. A colony is a body of people migrating from their native country and making a settlement in a land beyond the boundaries of the parent state, but remaining more or less dependent upon the native state. A colony is perpetuated by the descendants of such settlers and later comers. The government is formed by authority of the home Government.

In the case of the English colonies in America the authority to establish them was given by means of charters which served as constitutions. In these charters the King of England agreed with the settlers that they and all their descendants born in the colonies should enjoy the rights of Englishmen at home.

10. The Government of the Colonies.-There were in the colonies three varieties of government: (a) The charter government, through which the Crown gave the colonists power to organize a government, elect the governor, and hold him responsible for his acts; (b) the proprietary government, by which the Crown granted a

tract of land to one or more individuals, called the proprietary, and empowered him or them to establish the government, appoint the governor, and instruct him how to rule; and (c) the royal government, established by the Crown, which appointed the governor and instructed him how to rule. None of the colonies was originally royal. At the time of the Revolution the charter colonies were Rhode Island and Connecticut; the proprietary, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Delaware; the royal, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Virginia, North and South Carolina, and Georgia. All the colonies had a legislature composed of two branches, except Pennsylvania and Georgia, which had a single-chambered legislature. The upper house was the council, which was advisory to the governor, as well as legislative and judicial. Its members in the royal colonies were usually appointed by the king; in the proprietary, by the proprietor. The lower house was composed of representatives chosen by the people; but the suffrage was very much restricted. Ownership of land, the payment of specified taxes, and religious beliefs of various sorts, were qualifications required of voters in colonial days. In Connecticut, in 1775, there were but 4,325 voters among 200,000 people.

A bill passed by the representatives had to pass the council and be approved by the governor before it became a law. Even then, in most colonies, it had to be submitted to the Crown within a period of three or five years. If annulled by the Crown it would not remain in force.

The judiciary was quite out of the reach of the legislatures. The judges were appointed by the governors, except in Connecticut and Rhode Island (where they were

elected by the legislature), and held office during good behavior.

11. Formation of State Governments.-When, after the Revolutionary War had begun, there was no further hope that the king would redress the grievances of the colonics, Congress, May 15, 1776, recommended the formation of State governments. This was done, as a rule, by a body of men in each colony, known as the Provincial Convention, or Provincial Congress, which, in 1775, had taken upon itself all the powers of government. It was composed of delegates elected by the people, in the same way as they had formerly elected their representatives in the legislature. In Connecticut and Rhode Island about the only thing required for the transition from colony to State was to strike out in the charter the words "king" and "colony" and insert the name of the State. These States used their old democratic charters as constitutions until 1818 and 1842 respectively. Thus, for the first time in the history of the world, the people, through their representatives, drew up constitutions that derived their authority from the consent of the governed.

12. The Origin of the Union.-Very early in the history of the colonies acts of partial union existed among some of them. Pennsylvania and Delaware had an agreement whereby the sheriffs of each province could pursue a hue and cry for a certain distance across the line. Virginia and North Carolina had laws governing the intercourse of their inhabitants, and so had others. Indian attacks brought about the first league. In 1643 Massachusetts, Plymouth, Hartford, and New Haven formed the New England Confederacy. Its delegatestwo from each colony-met annually, twice in suc

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cession at Boston, then at Hartford, New Haven, and Plymouth respectively, rotating among the four colonies once in every five years. This confederacy was dissolved in 1684.

The next danger that brought the colonies into some sort of union came from the French alliance with the Indians. From the meeting in Albany, in 1684, of commissioners from Massachusetts, New York, Maryland, and Virginia, to the Albany congress, in 1754, of delegates from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, there were ten such intercolonial conferences. After the settlement of Pennsylvania, which made the colonies continuous from the French possessions on the North to the Spanish possessions on the South, the possibilities of united effort for any purpose were very much greater. So in 1754, at the Albany congress, Benjamin Franklin proposed a permanent union to regulate Indian affairs, to make frontier settlements, and protect and defend the colonists. His scheme provided for a "President General" to be appointed by the Crown, and a "Grand Council" to be elected by the colonial legislatures. The plan was submitted to the colonies, but none voted to accept it; nor did England approve it.

Eleven years later, when the Stamp Act Congress met, the need of union was felt more strongly than ever. Nine colonies were represented by twenty-eight delegates, and all the others were in sympathy with the movement. It was the first Revolutionary congress. Petitions to the English Government and a declaration of rights were drawn up. Advanced ground on the way to union was taken by a member from South Carolina when he said:

"There ought to be no New England man, no New Yorker, known on the Continent; but all of us Americans." From 1765 to 1774 the habit of concerted action against the oppressive measures of Great Britain was very much strengthened by a system of correspondence. The circular letters that passed from colony to colony in those years aided greatly in bringing about the first Continental Congress from which the United States of to-day can trace an unbroken line of descent.

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