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CHAPTER were not materially different. The right to become such was secured to all inhabitants of "civil, peaceable, 1663. and honest conversation," possessing £20 estate, about $66, "besides their persons," which, by a subsequent act, was explained to mean besides personal property.

This preference of a property qualification instead of the spiritual one of church membership, and the known inclination of Connecticut toward the half-way covenant, were reasons, among others, of the unwillingness of New Haven to coalesce under the new charter. The New Sept. Haven people appealed to the Commissioners for the United Colonies of New England against this invasion of their independence on the part of Connecticut. But the advice of that body; the alarm occasioned, the next year, by the grant of New York, which extended as far east as Connecticut River, and threatened thus to absorb New Haven under a far less congenial jurisdiction; more than all, Winthrop's prudent and conciliatory measures, at length consolidated the new colony, of which for the next fourteen years he was annually chosen governor. The office of deputy governor, at first bestowed on Mason, for several years before deputy governor of Connecticut and acting governor in Winthrop's absence, was pres1667. ently given to William Leet, of New Haven, one of the original planters of that colony, its last governor, and, after Winthrop's death, his successor as governor of the united colony. Connecticut, thus consolidated, contained nineteen towns, distributed into four counties: New Haven, Hartford, Middlesex, and New London. A superior court of law and county courts were established. The peculiar usages of New Haven being abandoned, the laws of Connecticut were extended to the whole prov. ince. The theocratic system of New Haven thus lost its legal establishment, but the administration of the entire

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colony was long greatly influenced by theocratic ideas. CHAPTER The ministers and churches, upheld by taxes levied on the whole population, retained for many years a pre- 1663. dominating and almost unlimited authority. No other assemblies for public worship were tolerated. The town meetings, as in the rest of New England, were held in the meeting-houses, which were, indeed, the only public buildings. The ministers, who were always present, opened these meetings with prayer, and their influence, in all doubtful cases, was almost always decisive of the result.

New Haven thus absorbed into Connecticut, the new province sent henceforward but two representatives to the meeting of Commissioners for the United Colonies of New England. The political consequence of that board was, however, terminated. The superintendence of the Indian missions, and the disbursement of the funds remitted from England for that purpose, became henceforth its chief business. The meetings became triennial, and soon entirely ceased. An attempt had been made at the Restoration to strip of its property the English corporation for the conversion of the Indians, on the ground that its creation had been irregular and illegal. It was rescued, however, by the efforts of Ashurst and Baxter, but particularly of Robert Boyle, distinguished among the founders of natural science in England. The king granted a new charter, thus confirming a decree which Clarendon, in his character of chancellor, had made in favor of the old corporation.

While Connecticut and Rhode Island were rejoicing in their charters, Massachusetts remained uneasy and suspicious. An evasive answer had been returned to the royal letter. The only concession actually made was the administration of justice in the king's name. Mean

CHAPTER While, complaints against the colony were multiplying. XIV. Gorges and Mason, grandsons of the grantees of Maine

1663. and New Hampshire, alleged that Massachusetts had oc

cupied their provinces. Gorton and other inhabitants of Rhode Island preferred the claim formerly pending before Cromwell, for damages sustained by the seizure of their goods and cattle at the time of their arrest and trial. Wrongs and encroachments were also alleged by the chiefs of the Narragansets, who prayed the king's interference and protection. Controversies had arisen as to the boundaries of Connecticut and Rhode Island on the one side, and of Rhode Island and Plymouth colony on the other, and as to the title to lands in that vicinity un. 1664. der purchases from the Indians. The king presently sig

nified his intention to send out commissioners for hearing and determining all these matters a piece of information which occasioned no little alarm in Massachusetts, aggravated by the appearance of a large comet. A fast was proclaimed. The charter was intrusted to a select committee of the General Court for safe keeping.

The commissioners selected by the king were those already mentioned in a previous chapter, Nichols, Carr, and Cartwright, sent with a small armament to take possession of New Netherland, to whom was added Samuel Maverick, a resident of Massachusetts, son of the first minister of Dorchester, and the more obnoxious on that Aug. account, being regarded as a traitor. The arrival of the commissioners at Boston, and their first intercourse with the magistrates, has been adverted to already in the history of New Netherland. The magistrates déclared themselves unauthorized to raise troops for the expedition thither without the consent of the General Court. The commissioners declined to await the meeting of that body, and departed, advising the magistrates against

their return to take the king's letter into serious consid- CHAPTER eration.

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The court, which presently met, voted two hundred 1664. soldiers; but they were not needed, New Netherland Sept. having already submitted. As one step toward compliance with the king's demands, it was enacted, that all freeholders twenty-four years of age, "rated at ten shillings to a single rate," and certified by the minister of their town to be "orthodox in their principles," and "not vicious in their lives," might be admitted freemen, though not church members. However useful in conciliating some of the more wealthy and well-disposed among the hitherto non-freemen, this law made no substantial change in the elective franchise. Comparatively few possessed the requisite amount of property, and the required certificate could only be obtained by those known to be thoroughly well affected. The court, at the same time, voted a remonstrance to the king against the appointment of the commissioners, as being a violation of their chartered rights; and they made an order prohibiting any appeals to their authority or exercise of it within the jurisdiction of Massachusetts.

The people of Connecticut, well satisfied at the subjection of the Dutch, with whom they had been in such constant collision, and having boundary questions to settle both on the east and west, received the king's commissioners with all respect. Governor Winthrop, as we have seen in a former chapter, accompanied them to the conquest of New Netherland. After settling the boundaries of Connecticut and New York, of which the particulars will be stated hereafter, and leaving Nichols at New York as governor, Carr and Cartwright proceeded Dec. to Massachusetts to meet Maverick.

The hopes of the sectaries in that colony had been so

CHAPTER far raised, that Thomas Gould, with eight others, after

XIV. meeting for some time in secret, had formally organized 1664. a Baptist Church in Boston. Prosecutions were comMay 28. menced against its prominent members, who were first admonished, then fined for absence from public worship, then disfranchised, imprisoned, and presently banished. But still the organization contrived to survive, the first Baptist Church of Massachusetts. Still another inroad, not less alarming, was now made upon ecclesiastical uniformity. The commissioners, on their arrival, caused the English Church service to be celebrated at Bostonthe first performance of that hated ceremonial in that Puritan town. Out of respect to the inveterate prejudices of the people, the surplice was not used. But the Liturgy alone was sufficiently distasteful.

The remonstrances of Massachusetts against the powers and appointment of the commissioners were esteemed in England unreasonable and groundless. Clarendon and others, to whom the magistrates had written, justified the commission, and recommended submission to it. Very little attention, however, was paid to this advice. The magistrates were sturdy and unbending; the commissioners were haughty, overbearing, and consequential.

Both parties disliked and suspected each other; and the correspondence between them soon degenerated into a bitter altercation.

Pending this correspondence, the commissioners made 1665. a visit to Plymouth and Rhode Island. The Plymouth people, anxious to obtain a charter, professed a willingness to comply with all the king's demands, as expressed in his letter to Massachusetts demands, indeed, to which, according to their account, their existing practice in most points conformed. The commissioners settled the boundary controversy between Plymouth and Rhode

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