Great Events in the History of North and South America

by Charles A. Goodrich

Now, was it to be expected that those who had left home, and all its endearments, for the sake of enjoying a larger liberty, would consent to have that liberty abridged, especially after having tasted its blessings for years? If the Pilgrim Fathers had such notions themselves, was it to be supposed that their children would cherish less manly and patriotic sentiments? The spirit of liberty does not easily die, where there is aliment to keep it alive. The blood of freemen, or those who aspire to freedom, instead of becoming weaker, as it flows down in successive generations, usually becomes more pure and more excitable. This was verified in the history of the colonies, anterior to the Revolution. They were men of whom the principles of liberty had taken strong hold. Their distance from the mother-country—her neglect of them—the exercise of civil and religious freedom for a number of years—all served to excite and strengthen a desire for independence. Such an event was the natural result of the principles with which the colonies began their career. It was the natural result of the physical courage and strength acquired in felling forests, resisting savages, and in carrying out those plans and enterprises in which a young, ardent, and ambitious people are likely to engage.

2. Their forms of government were conducive to independence.

In the settlement of the colonies, three forms of government were established. These were usually denominated Charter, Proprietary, and Royal governments. The difference arose from the different circumstances under which the colonies were settled, as well as the different objects of the first emigrants. The Charter governments were confined to New England. The Proprietary governments were those of Maryland, Pennsylvania, the Carolinas, and the Jerseys. The others were royal governments, or those which were immediately under the British crown.[28]

As early as 1619, only twelve years from its settlement, a provincial legislature, in which the colonists were represented, was introduced into Virginia. In Plymouth and in Massachusetts, the colonies organized their body, politic and social, upon principles of perfect equality. And, as the Puritans spread themselves over New England, they gave to the distinct communities which they established, constitutions still more democratic. In January, 1639, three years from the commencement of the Connecticut colony, the planters on Connecticut river convened at Hartford, and formed a system of government which continued, with scarcely any alterations, to the year 1818. Of this system, Dr. Trumbull observes: "With such wisdom did our venerable ancestors provide for the freedom and liberties of themselves and their posterity. Thus happily did they guard against every encroachment on the rights of the subject. This, probably, is one of the most free and happy constitutions of civil government ever formed. The formation of it, at so early a period, when the light of liberty was wholly darkened in most parts of the world, and the rights of man were so little understood in others, does great honor to their ability, integrity, and love of freedom."

In Maryland and Pennsylvania, the first assemblies established a popular representation, and in all their political regulations proceeded upon broad views of civil freedom. The same remark, says Mr. Walsh, may be extended to the Carolinas and New York.

The very first principles, then, of the colonists in relation to government were anti-monarchical. In their incipient colonial state, they had the feelings of freemen; and all their institutions, as far as they were allowed to carry them, spoke of liberty and equality.

This spirit was never lost to the colonies. In the variety of fortune which they subsequently encountered—in every change of monarch abroad—in every shift of rulers at home—through royal smiles and royal frowns—in times of war and in times of peace—their love of liberty continued unabated, and even increased. Thus early began those sentiments of freedom and independence which, uniting in their course with other streams, ended at length in a deep, broad, irresistible current against British oppression.

3. Influence of the expenses incurred by the colonies in their settlements, and in their several wars and those of the mother-country.

"All the thirteen colonies," says Mr. Walsh, "with the exception of Georgia, were established, and had attained to considerable strength, without the slightest aid from the treasury of the mother-country."

Neither the crown nor the parliament paid a dollar towards purchasing the soil of the Indians—the original masters of that soil. These purchases were made by the colonists themselves. The settlement of the province of Massachusetts Bay alone cost two hundred thousand pounds—an enormous sum at the era at which it was effected. Lord Baltimore expended forty thousand pounds in his establishment of the colony of Maryland. On that of Virginia, immense wealth was lavished by the first settlers. The first planters of Connecticut consumed great estates in purchasing lands of the Indians and in making settlements.