1701 to

people. The legislature, the tribunals, the subordinate executive offices of Delaware knew little external control. The subsequent years in Pennsylvania exhibit con1710. stant collisions between the proprietary, as owner of the unappropriated public territory, and a people eager to enlarge their freeholds. The scoldings of David Lloyd may be consigned to oblivion; the integrity of the mildly aristocratic James Logan, to whose judicious care the proprietary estates were intrusted, has preserved a purity unsullied by the accusations or impeachments of the assembly. Strifes also existed on political questions. The end of government was declared to be the happiness of the people, and from this maxim the duties of the governor were derived. But the organization of the judiciary was the subject of longest

controversy. That the tenure of the judicial office 1707. should be the will of the people was claimed as "the people's right." The rustic legislators insisted on their right to institute the judiciary, fix the rules of court, define judicial power with precision, and by request displace judges for misbehavior. Neither would they, even in the highest courts, have English lawyers for judges. "Men

skilled in the law," said they, " of good integrity, are 1706. very desirable; yet we incline to be content with the

best men the colony affords." And the courts obtained no permanent organization till the accession of the house of Hanover. The civil constitution included feudalism and democracy; from this there could be no escape but through the sovereignty of the people. Twice, indeed, the province had almost become a royal one, once by act of parliament, and once by treaty. But, in England, a real regard for the sacrifices and the virtues of William Penn gained him friends among English statesmen; and the malice of pestilent English officials, of Quarry, and the men employed in enforcing the revenue laws, valuing a colony only by the harvest it offered of emoluments and jobs, and ever ready to appeal selfishly to the crown, the church, or English trade, was never able to overthrow his influence. His poverty, consequent on his disinterested labors, created a willingness to surrender his province to the crown; but he

insisted on preserving the colonial liberties, and the crown hardly cared to buy a democracy. If the violent conflicts of the assembly, in their eagerness to engross all authority, and gain control over the questions of property between the province and its proprietary, seemed sometimes to compel a surrender of his powers of government, yet the bare apprehension of such a result always brought the colonists to a gentler temper.

In the government of Penn, there were an executive dependent for support on the people and all subordinate executive officers elected by the people; the judiciary dependent for its existence on the people; all legislation originating exclusively with the people; no forts, no armed police, no militia; perfect freedom of opinion; no established church; no difference of rank; and a harbor opened for the reception of all mankind, of children of every language and every creed. Could it be that the invisible power of reason would be able to order and to restrain, to punish crime and to protect property, under such a constitution? Would not confusion, discord, and rapid ruin successively follow? Or was it a conceivable thing that, in a country without army, without militia, without forts, and with no sheriffs but those elected by the rabble," wealth and population should increase, and the spectacle be given of the happiest and most prospered land? Never did any country enjoy so much prosperity, or increase so rapidly in wealth and numbers, as Pennsylvania.

In New Jersey, had the proprietary power been vested in the people or reserved to one man, it would have survived; but it was divided among speculators in land, who, as a body, had gain, and not freedom, for their end. In April, 1688, "the proprietors of East New Jersey had surrendered their pretended right of government," and the surrender had been accepted. In October of the same year, the council of the proprietaries of West New Jersey voted to surrender to the secretary-general for the dominion of New England "all records relating to government." Thus the whole province fell, with New York and New England, under the consolidated government of Andros. At the rev

olution, therefore, the sovereignty over New Jersey was merged in the crown; and the legal maxim, soon promulgated by the lords of trade, that the domains of the proprietaries might be bought and sold, but not their executive power, weakened their attempts at the recovery of authority, and consigned the colony to a temporary anarchy.

Will you know with how little government a community of husbandmen may be safe? For twelve years, the province was not in a settled condition. From June, 1689, to August, 1692, East New Jersey had apparently no superintending administration, being, in time of war, destitute of military officers as well as of magistrates with royal or proprietary commissions. They were protected by their neighbors from external attacks; and there is no reason to infer that the several towns failed to exercise regulating powers within their respective limits. Afterwards commissions were issued by two sets of proprietors, of which each had its adherents; while a third party, swayed by disgust at the confusion, and by disputes about land titles, rejected the proprietaries altogether. In the western moiety, Daniel Coxe, as largest owner of the domain, claimed exclusive proprietary powers; yet the people disallowed his claim, rejecting his deputy under the bad name of a Jacobite. In 1691, Coxe conveyed such authority as he had to the West Jersey Society; and, in 1692, Andrew Hamilton was accepted as governor under their commission. This rule, with a short interruption in 1698, continued

1689.

1699.

through the reign of William. But the law officers 1694. of the crown questioned even the temporary settlement; the lords of trade claimed all New Jersey as a royal province, and proposed a settlement of the question by "a trial in Westminster Hall on a feigned issue." The proprietaries, threatened with the ultimate interference of parliament in respect to provinces "where," it was said, "no regular government had ever been established," resolved to resign their pretensions. In their negotiations with the crown, they wished to insist that there should be a triennial assembly; but King William, though he had against his inclination approved an act of parlia

ment of that nature for England, would never consent to it in the plantations.

In the first year of Queen Anne, the surrender 1702. took place before the privy council. The domain, Apr. 17. ceasing to be connected with proprietary powers, was, under the rules of private right, confirmed to its possessors, and was never confiscated. After the revolution, even to the present time, their rights have been respected like other titles to estates.

The surrender of "the pretended" rights to government being completed, the two Jerseys were united in one province; and the government was conferred on Edward Hyde, Lord Cornbury, who, like Queen Anne, was the grandchild of Clarendon. Retaining its separate legislature, the province had for the next thirty-six years the same governors as New York. It never again obtained a charter: the royal commission and the royal instructions to Lord April. Cornbury constituted the form of its administration. To the governor appointed by the crown belonged the power of legislation, with consent of the royal council and the representatives of the people. A freehold, or property qualification, limited the elective franchise. The governor could convene, prorogue, or dissolve the assembly at his will, and the period of its duration depended on his pleasure. The laws were subject to an immediate veto from the governor, and a veto from the crown, to be exercised at any time. The governor, with the consent of his council, instituted courts of law, and appointed their officers. The people took no part in constituting the judiciary. Liberty of conscience was granted to all but papists, but favor was invoked for the church of England, of which, at the same time, the prosperity was made impossible by investing the governor with the right of presentation to benefices.

In suits at law, the governor and council formed a court of appeal if the value in dispute exceeded two hundred pounds, the English privy council possessed ultimate jurisdiction. Two instructions mark, one a declining bigotry, the other an increasing interest. "Great inconvenience," Bays Queen Anne, "may arise by the liberty of printing

in our province" of New Jersey; and therefore no printing-press might be kept, "no book, pamphlet, or other matters whatsoever, be printed without a license." And, in conformity with English policy, especial countenance of the traffic "in merchantable negroes" was earnestly enjoined. The courts, the press, the executive, became dependent on the crown; and the interests of free labor were sacrificed to the cupidity of the Royal African company.

One method of influence remained to the people of New Jersey. The assembly must fix the amount of its grants to the governor. The queen did not venture to prescribe, or to invite parliament to prescribe, a salary; still less, herself to concede it from colonial resources. Urgent that all appropriations should be made directly for the use of the crown, to be audited by her officers, she wished a fixed revenue to be settled; but the colonial deliberations were respected, and the wise assembly, which never established a permanent revenue, often embarrassed its votes of supplies by insisting on an auditor of its own.

The freemen of the colony were soon conscious of the diminution of their liberties. For absolute religious freedom, they obtained only toleration; for courts resting on enactments of their own representatives, they had courts instituted by royal ordinances; and the sense of their loss quickened their love of freedom by an undefined sentiment of having suffered a wrong. By degrees they claimed to hold their former privileges by the nature of an inviolable compact. The surrender of their charter could change the authority of the proprietaries, but not impair their concessions of political liberties. Inured to self-reliance and selfgovernment, no thought of independence sprung up among them; but the Quakers and Puritans of East and West New Jersey, cordially joining to vindicate their common liberties, never feared to encounter a royal governor, and were ever alert to resist encroachments on their rights.

1689.

In New York, the dread of popery and despotism bewildered the hasty judgment of the less cultivated. There were differences in origin; the Dutch were not