VIII: 1649.—In this year, an assembly, believed to have been composed of a Protestant majority, passed the act which has been lauded as the source of religious toleration. It is "An Act concerning Religion," and, in my judgment, is less tolerant than the Charter or the Governor's Oath, inasmuch as it included Unitarians in the same category with blasphemers and those who denied our Saviour Jesus Christ, punishing all alike, with confiscation of goods and the pains of death. This was the epoch of the trial and execution of Charles I, and of the establishment of the Commonwealth.
IX: 1654.—The celebrated act I have just noticed, however, was passed fifteen years after the original settlement, which exceeds the period comprised in the actual founding of Maryland. Besides this, the political and religious aspect of England was changing, and the influence of the home-quarrel was beginning to be felt across the Atlantic. In 1654, during the mastery of Cromwell, religious freedom was destroyed: Puritanism became paramount; Papacy and Prelacy were denounced by law; and freedom was assured only to Puritans, and such as professed "faith in God by Jesus Christ, though differing in judgment, from the doctrine or worship publicly held forth."
X.—It has been alleged that the clause in the Maryland Charter securing "God's holy rights and the true Christian religion," is only an incorporation into Lord Baltimore's instrument, of certain clauses contained in the early Charters of Virginia. If the reader will refer to the 1st volume of Henning's Statutes at large, he will find all those documents in English, but unaccompanied by the original Latin. Thus, we have no means of judging the accuracy of the translation, or identity of language in the Maryland and Virginia instruments. Adopting, however, for the present, the translation given by Henning, we find no coincidence of phraseology either to justify the suspicion of a mere copy, or to subject our charter to the limitations contained in the Virginia patents. Disabilities are to be construed strictly in law, and our charter is not to be interpreted by another, but stands on its own, independent, context and manifest signification.
The first Virginia Charter or Patent was issued to Sir Thomas Gates and others, April 10th, 1606, in the 4th year of James's English reign. Among the "Articles, Orders, Instructions," &c., set down for Virginia, 20th Nov., 1606,—(though nothing is said about restrictions in religion, while the preamble commends the noble work of propagating the Christian religion among infidel savages,)—is the following clause:—"And we doe specallie ordaine, charge, and require the presidents and councills," (of the two Colonies of Virginia,) "respectively, within their severall limits and precincts, that they with all diligence, care and respect, doe provide, that the true word and service of God and Christian faith, be preached, planted and used, not only within every of the said severall colonies and plantations, but alsoe, as much as they may, among the salvage people which doe or shall adjoine unto them, or border upon them, according to the DOCTRINE, RIGHTS, and RELIGION, now professed and established within our realme of England."—1st Henning, 69.
The second charter or patent, dated 23d May, 1609, 7th "James I," was issued to the Treasurer and Company for Virginia, and in its XXIX section, declares: "And lastly, because the principal effect, which we can desire or expect of this action, is the conversion and reduction of the people in those parts unto the Worship of God and Christian religion, in which respect we should be loath, that any person be permitted to pass, that we suspected to affect the superstitions of the Church of Rome; we do hereby declare that it is our will and pleasure that none be permitted to pass in any voyage, from time to time, to be made unto the said country, but such as shall first have taken the Oath of Supremacy; &c., &c.—1st Henning, 97.
The third Charter of James the I, in the 9th year of his English reign, was issued 12th March, 1611-12 to the Treasurer and Company for Virginia. The XIIth section empowers certain officers to administer the Oath of Supremacy and Allegiance, to "all and every persons which shall at any time or times hereafter go or pass to said Colony of Virginia."
The Instructions to Governor Wyatt, of 24th of July, 1621, direct him:—"to keep up the Religion of the Church of England, as near as may be," &c., &c.—1st Henning.
All these extracts, it will be observed, contain limitations and restrictions, either explicitly in favor of the English Church, or against the, so called, "superstitions of the Church of Rome." The Maryland Charter shows no such narrow clauses, and consequently, is justly free from any connexion, in interpretation, with the Virginia instruments. Besides this, we do not know that the language of the original Latin of the Virginia Charters, is the same as ours, and, therefore, it would be "reasoning in a circle," or, "begging the question," if we translated the Maryland Charter into the exact language of the Virginian. The phraseology—"God's holy rights and the true Christian religion,"—unlimited in the Maryland Patent,—was a distinct assertion of broad equality to all professing to believe in Jesus Christ. It was not subject to any sectarian restriction, and formed the basis of religious liberty in Maryland, until it was undermined during the Puritan intolerance in 1654.