When they had crowded into the house where they were to meet, and had taken seats, their first step was to reassert their authority "as the supreme power in this country."[50] Then they took a step which for three centuries has puzzled historians—they elected Sir William Berkeley Governor. That this decision was made at the opening of the session would lead us to believe that it reflected the general sentiment of the people. They had had experience of Berkeley's energy, concern for the welfare of the colony, refusal to use the courts for personal gain. Certainly this is the view he himself took of his election. "In consideration of the service I had done the country in defending them and destroying great numbers of Indians ... and in view of the equal justice I had distributed to all men, not only the Assembly but the unanimous votes of all the country made me Governor."[51]
It is possible, also, that the Assembly had in mind the possibility that the monarchy might be restored. Their action came just nine weeks before Charles II set foot on English soil at Dover amid the cheers of the crowds on the beach. The word may have gone from plantation to plantation that it would please Charles and recommend the colony to his favor to know that they had made choice of the former royal Governor, a man noted for his devotion to his father and himself.
Yet the Assembly made it clear that Sir William would hold office from them as the supreme power in the colony. They stipulated that he must call an Assembly at least once in every two years, that he should not dissolve the Assembly without permission from the House, and that in appointing members of the Council he must have their approbation.
Berkeley hesitated. Appearing before the Assembly he expressed his gratitude for the honor done him, and protested that there were many among them who were "more sufficient for it" than he. When he first came to Virginia, he said, he had a commission from his "most gracious master King Charles of ever blessed memory." When the King was put to death, his son sent him another commission to govern Virginia, but Parliament sent a force against him, and finding him defenceless, took over the colony. But Parliament continued not long, and now his intelligence was not enough to tell him who or what ruled England. "But, Mr. Speaker, it is one duty to live obedient to a government, and another of a very different nature to command under it." Yet when he had asked the Council for their advice, and they had concurred unanimously in his election, he consented.[52]
Thus this professed enemy of republican principles became the head of a semi-independent little republic. To Governor Stuyvesant, of New Netherlands, he wrote: "I am but a servant of the Assembly, neither do they arrogate any power to themselves further than the miserable distractions of England force them to. For when God shall be pleased in his mercy to take away and dissipate the unnatural division of their native country, they will immediately return to their own professed obedience."[53]
Though Charles was proclaimed King in England on May 8, 1660, it was only in September that the slow moving vessels of the day brought the news to Virginia. It was with elation that Berkeley wrote to the sheriffs in every county that God had invested "our most gracious sovereign, Charles II," with the "just rights of his royal father," and charged them to proclaim him King forthwith. In Jamestown there was rejoicing, marked by the firing of cannon, and the blare of trumpets. The country people for miles around must have flocked in to aid in making way with six cases of drams and a hundred and seventy-six gallons of cider.[54]
Berkeley's joy was tempered with the fear that the King might be angry with him for having accepted office from the "rebel" Assembly. But Charles reassured him, and sent him a new commission. Overjoyed, Berkeley replied: "I ... do most humbly throw myself at your Majesty's feet ... that you yet think me worthy of your royal commands. It is true ... I did something, which if misrepresented to your Majesty, may cause your Majesty to think me guilty of a weakness I should ever abhor myself for. But it was no more ... than to leap over the fold to save your Majesty's flock, when your Majesty's enemies of that fold had barred up the lawful entrance to it, and enclosed the wolves of schism and rebellion ready to devour all within."[55]
Thus the Commonwealth period in Virginia came to an end. No longer was the Assembly to be the supreme power, selecting the Governor and Council, and controlling local government. The old struggle for self-government had to be resumed; the representatives of the people again had to steel themselves against the encroachments of arbitrary Kings and arbitrary Governors. More than a century was to elapse before the rights surrendered when Charles II was proclaimed were regained.
But the training in self-government received during the eight years that the people were their own masters stood them in good stead in the conflicts ahead. Having tasted the sweets of freedom, they were ready to resist when Governors vetoed their bills, or corrupted the Burgesses, or swayed the courts, or bullied the Council. The Commonwealth period foreshadowed Bacon's Rebellion and the American Revolution; the constitutional Assembly of 1652 foreshadowed Bacon's Assembly of June, 1676, and the Virginia Convention of 1776.