History of the United States

by John Clark Ridpath

21. Circumstances suggested a union of the colonies. The western frontier was exposed to the hostilities of the Dutch on the Hudson. Similar trouble was apprehended from the French on the north. Indian tribes capable of mustering a thousand warriors were likely at any hour to fall upon the helpless villages. Common interests made a union indispensable.

22. The first effort to consolidate the colonies was ineffectual. But in 1643, a plan of union was adopted, by which Massachusetts, Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven were joined in a confederacy, called The United Colonies of New England. The chief authority was conferred upon an assembly composed of two representatives from each colony. These delegates were chosen annually at an election where all the freemen voted by ballot. There was no president other than the speaker of the assembly. Provision was made for the admission of other colonies into the union, but none were ever admitted.

23. At a meeting of the assembly in December, 1641, Nathaniel Ward brought forward a written instrument, which was adopted as the constitution of the State. This statute was called the Body of Liberties, and was ever afterward esteemed as the great charter of colonial freedom.

Persecution of the Quakers.

24. In July of 1656 the Quakers began to arrive at Boston. The first who came were Ann Austin and Mary Fisher. They were caught and searched for marks of witchcraft, and then thrown into prison. After several weeks' confinement they were brought forth and banished. Before the end of the year, eight others were arrested and sent back to England. A law was passed that Quakers who persisted in coming to Massachusetts should have their ears cut off and their tongues bored through with a red-hot iron. In 1657 the assembly of the four colonies convened, and the penalty of death was passed against the Quakers as disturbers of the public peace.

Trade Restrictions.

25. The English Revolution had now run its course. Cromwell was dead. Tidings of the restoration of Charles II. reached Boston on the 27th of July, 1660. On the reestablishment of the English monarchy, a law was passed by which all vessels not bearing the English flag were forbidden to trade in New England. Articles produced in the colonies and demanded in England should be shipped to England only. The products of England should not be manufactured in America, and should be bought from England only; and a duty of five per cent. was put on both exports and imports. This was the beginning of those measures which produced the American Revolution.

26. In 1664 war broke out between England and Holland. It became a part of the English plans to conquer the Dutch settlements on the Hudson. Charles II. was also anxious to obtain control of all the New England colonies. He therefore appointed four commissioners to settle colonial disputes, and to exercise authority in the name of the king. The real object was to get possession of the charter of Massachusetts. In July, 1664, the royal judges arrived at Boston. They were rejected in all the colonies except Rhode Island. Meanwhile, the English monarch, learning how his judges had been received, recalled them, and they left the country. For ten years after this event the colony was very prosperous.