His influence. When the question of emigration was under discussion other gentlemen who thought of going turned to Winthrop as the natural leader, declaring that they would remain in England if he should desert them. He was not only the official head, but he was indeed the soul, of the migration of 1630, and he went to America confident of a call divine like that of Moses. [Note 6.]
IX.
Cradock. It is a fact worthy of note that the three primary steps toward the establishment of free government in America were due to Englishmen who did not themselves cross the sea. The Great Charter of 1618 to the Virginia colony, and the "large patent" to the Plymouth Pilgrims, were granted, as we have seen, under the leadership of Sir Edwin Sandys, Governor of the Virginia Company of London. The third of the measures which placed colonial government on a popular basis was due to the governor of another corporation engaged in colony planting.
Cradock's plan. On the 28th of July, 1629, while Winthrop and his friends were debating their removal to New England, Mathew Cradock, a wealthy and liberal merchant, who held the office of governor, or, as we should say, president, of the Massachusetts Company, read in a "general court" or meeting of the company "certain propositions conceived by himself," as it is carefully recorded. He proposed "that for the advancement of the plantation, the inducing and encouraging persons of worth, quality and rank to transplant themselves and families thither and for other weighty reasons"—reasons which probably it was not thought best to spread upon the records, but which were the core of the whole matter—for these reasons Cradock proposed to "transfer the government of the plantation to those that shall inhabit there," and not to continue it in subordination to a commercial company in London. Mass. Records, July 29, 1629. The sorrows of the Virginia colony under the administration of Sir Thomas Smyth and the disagreements between the Pilgrims and their "adventurers" in London had taught a wholesome lesson. Sainsbury's Calendar, May 17, 1626. Three years earlier Sir Francis Wyatt, the best of all the early governors of Virginia, had set forth in an elaborate report that the principal cause of the "slow proceeding of the growth of the plantation" was that the government had been divided between England and Virginia. Massachusetts escaped from this embarrassment.
X.
Evolution of the Mass. government. The evolution of the Massachusetts government may now be traced through its several stages. A company was formed, partly of Dorchester men, but chiefly of residents of London. This company secured a patent to lands in Massachusetts Bay from the Council for New England. The patentees intended both a commercial enterprise and a Puritan settlement. Hubbard, chap. xviii. They sent Endecott, one of their number, as agent or superintendent, with a company of servants and others, to prepare the way for the migration of other patentees. In March, 1628, they secured a liberal charter from the king, which gave them the right to establish in Massachusetts a government subordinate to the company. The plan was to settle a government in the form rendered familiar by that of the Virginia Company. The Massachusetts Company in London sent a commission to Endecott as governor on the place, subject to the orders of the company in England. A council of assistants was associated with him, but there was as yet no provision for giving the people a voice in the government. [Note 7.]
The change of plan. Winthrop and his coterie of gentlemen appear to have been dissatisfied with the prospect of living under a government directed from England, and thus subject to English stockholders and liable to interference from the court. Cradock had been a leader and the most liberal investor in the enterprise. He, no doubt, readily foresaw the great advance that the colony would make if Winthrop and his friends should embark their lives and fortunes in it, and he may have intended to emigrate himself. The annulling of the charter of the Virginia Company on frivolous pretexts had shown how easily the Massachusetts charter might meet the same fate in a reign far more devoted to arbitrary government than that of James and entirely hostile to Puritanism. There could hardly be a doubt that the charter would be revoked as soon as its projectors should develop their true purpose before the all-observing eyes of Laud, who was now rising rapidly to dominant influence in the government. It was at this juncture probably that Cradock conceived his ingenious plan. He would resign his place and have the officers of the company chosen from gentlemen about to embark for the plantation. The charter prescribed no place of assembling to the company, which had been left free apparently to make its headquarters at its birthplace in Dorchester or at its new home in London. It was also free to meet in any other place. The meetings of the company might therefore be held in Massachusetts, where the Puritanism of its proceedings would attract less attention. The governor and other officers would then be chosen in the colony; the company and the colony would thus be merged into one, and the charter transported to Massachusetts would perhaps be beyond the reach of writs and judgments.
XI.
The Cambridge agreement. No doubt the influential company of friends who were debating a removal to New England were informed of Cradock's proposition before it was mooted in the company on the 28th of July. The plan was probably thought of in consequence of their objection to emigration under the Virginia system. Cradock's proposition was at least the turning point of their decision. 1629. Nearly a month later, on the 26th of August, the leaders of Winthrop's party assembled to the number of twelve, at Cambridge, and solemnly pledged themselves, "in the presence of God who is the searcher of all hearts," "to pass the Seas (under God's protection) to inhabit and continue in New England." The preamble states the object of this migration. It was not civil liberty, the end that political Puritans had most in view, and certainly there is no hint of a desire for religious liberty. Even the conversion of the Indian is not uppermost in this solemn resolve. "God's glory and the church's good" are the words used. This has the true ring of the Puritan churchman. The whole pledge is couched in language befitting men who feel themselves engaged in a religious enterprise of the highest importance.
This pledge contained a notable proviso. The signers agreed to emigrate only on condition that "the whole government together with the patent for said plantation" should be transferred and legally established in the colony by order of the General Court of the Company, and that this should be done before the last of the ensuing month. There was opposition to the removal of the government, and this peremptory condition was necessary. Three days later, after a debate, the company voted that its government should be transferred to Massachusetts Bay.