Chapters on the Early Government of Connecticut, Vol. 3: With Critical and Explanatory Remarks on the Constitution of 1639 (Classic Reprint) - Softcover

Henry Bronson

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1331069130 ISBN 13: 9781331069133

Publisher: Forgotten Books, 2018

Synopsis

Excerpt from Chapters on the Early Government of Connecticut, Vol. 3: With Critical and Explanatory Remarks on the Constitution of 1639

The government accepted in the beginning by the planters, according to Dr. Palfrey (i, was found in practice inconvenient, and the commission, when the year had ex pired, was not renewed. But I suspect that inconvenience, merely, was not the motive for non-renewal. Much heavy work was to be done - work requiring the assistance of every able-bodied man - and it is probable that a more popular gov ernment was demanded. An army was to be raised and war material provided, and nothing could be accomplished without efficient organization. So, on the first day of May, 1637, a General Corte (the first in Connecticut), assembled in Hart ford, having two classes Or ranks of members. In the first were Roger Ludlow, William Phelps, Thomas Wells (of Hart ford), John Steele, William Swaine, and Andrew Ward, two from each town, all members of the old commission, Mr. Wells a short time only. They were grave magistrates, and the trusted counselors of the settlements, whose business it doubtless was to represent Wisely the several communities as a whole. They apparently occupied a position in the govern: ment similar to that of the magistrates under the Constitution of 1639. A very brief record does not give all the informa tion we desire on this and other points.

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Excerpt from Chapters on the Early Government of Connecticut, Vol. 3: With Critical and Explanatory Remarks on the Constitution of 1639 But steadfastness, in those times, was not a rare quality, and the proposed general movement, mostly without official sanction, was not long delayed. After it had begun, the General Court, in May, 1636, with the acquiescence of John Winthrop, Jr., whom the patentees in England had appointed governor of Connecticut, granted a commission to eight discreet persons to govern the new settlements for one year. Their names and the names of the towns they were probably expected, in some way, to represent, were: Roger Ludlow and William Phelps, of Windsor, John Steele and William Westwood, of Hartford, William Swaine and Andrew Ward, of Wethersfield, William Pynchon, of Agawam (Springfield), and Henry Smith, his son-in-law. Seemingly, for mutual convenience and support, Agawam was at first associated in government with the towns below. This connection, always wavering or disputed, was not formally ended till 1641. (See Palfrey's History of New England, i, 604.) There was a controversy about the boundary line and the right of jurisdiction which caused confusion and a vacillating policy. Undeniably, that was an extraordinary form of government which the people of Connecticut accepted as their own. Provided, as it was, by another colony - one with which they had now no political connection - it had, of course, no rightful authority, and could bind nobody. On the part of Massachusetts, it was a manifest usurpation. In appearance, the governed, as a body, had no voice in it, took no action concerning it, yet they submitted with seeming cheerfulness, considering it, probably, as a needful and convenient provisional arrangement. To the commissioners was given "full power to hear and determine, in a judicial way, all differences between party and party; to imprison, impose fines, and inflict corporal punishment for crimes, and to order the affairs o

Edition details

• Publisher: Forgotten Books
• Publication date: 2018
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1331069130
• ISBN 13: 9781331069133
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 119