Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688

by Thomas Jefferson Wertenbaker

In the spring of 1685 Effingham received notification from the Privy Council of the death of Charles II and the accession of the Duke of York as James II.[969] He replied a few days later, "I have, with the greatest solemnity this place is capable of proclaimed his Majesty King James II in all the considerable places of this colony, where the great Acclamations and Prayers of the People gave a universal Testimony of their Obedience."[970] Despite these outward manifestations of joy, the people were by no means pleased to have a Roman Catholic monarch upon the English throne. When news reached Virginia that the Duke of Monmouth was in open rebellion, and had gained important successes over his Majesty's forces, there was grave danger that the commons of the colony might espouse his cause.[971] Many were so emboldened, wrote Effingham, "that their tongues ran at large and demonstrated the wickedness of their hearts, till I secured some and deterred others from spreading such false reports by my Proclamation".[972] The defeat and execution of the Duke of Monmouth for a time ended all thought of resistance to the King.

But Effingham found the people sullen and discontented and the Burgesses more stubborn than ever. The session of Assembly of 1685 was, perhaps, the most stormy ever held in Virginia. The House made a strenuous and successful resistance to a vigorous attempt to deprive it of its control over taxation. In 1662, when the Assembly was dominated by Sir William Berkeley, an act had been passed empowering the Governor and Council to levy annually for three years a tax of not more than twenty pounds of tobacco per poll.[973] In 1680 the Council had requested Lord Culpeper to represent to the King the disadvantages of leaving taxation entirely in the hands of the Assembly, hoping that his Majesty would by proclamation revive the law of 1662.[974] The greatest item of expense to the government, they argued, arose from the Assembly itself, "ye charge of which hath been too often found to be twice as much as would have satisfied all publiq dues".[975] The matter was presented to the consideration of the Burgesses in 1680, but was lost in the committee room.[976]

The King and Privy Council, although they approved of the levy by the Governor and the Council, did not venture to grant them that power by royal proclamation. They instructed Lord Howard, however, in his commission of 1683, to propose for passage in the Assembly a law similar to that of 1662.[977] Accordingly, in 1684, Effingham placed the matter before the Burgesses and told them that it was the King's desire that they give their consent. But they ignored his message, and the Governor could not press the matter at that time. In the next session, however, he became more insistent. "I must remind you," he told the Burgesses, "of what was omitted in ye last Assembly ... that a Law may passe whereby His Majesty's Governor with ye advice of ye Council may be empowered to lay a levy."[978] But the Burgesses would not yield. "The House," they replied, "... do humbly signifye to your Excellency, that they can noe waies concede to or comply with that proposition, without apparent and signal violation of ye great trust with them reposed."[979] And when Effingham urged them to reconsider their action, they passed a resolution unanimously refusing to relinquish this their greatest privilege.

After the prorogation of the Assembly, Lord Howard wrote home his complaints against the stubborn Burgesses. "Your Lordships," he said, "will ... find their total denyal that the Governor and Council should have any power to lay the least Levy to ease the necessity of soe frequent Assemblys.... This was propounded by mee to them before his Majesty's Instructions came to my hand that I should,... but nothing would prevail nor I beleeve will, unless his Majesty's special command therein."[980]

A long and acrimonious quarrel occurred over the quit-rents. Because of the lack of specie in the colony, it had always been necessary to collect this tax, when it was collected at all, in tobacco. In March, 1662, the Assembly had passed a law fixing the rate of payment at two pence a pound, which was then not far from the current price. But the decline in value of the commodity which had occurred since 1662, had resulted in a great diminution in the tax.

In July, 1684, the King wrote Effingham that he had taken over all the rights of Arlington and Culpeper to the quit-rents, and announced it his intention to use them for the support of the Virginia government. He directed the Governor to secure the repeal of the law of 1662 and to forbid all payments in tobacco. "You must ... impower," he wrote, "the Officers of our Revenue to collect (them) ... according to ye reservation of 2s per every hundred acres ... to be paid in specie, that is in Mony."[981]

As tobacco sold, in 1684, at a half penny a pound, this order, had it been put into operation, would have quadrupled the value of the quit-rents, and increased materially the burdens of the planters. The Burgesses, in alarm, petitioned the Governor to allow the old arrangement to continue, declaring that the lack of specie made it impossible to comply with the King's order. And they refused to repeal the law of March, 1662.

Displeased at their obstinacy, the King, in August, 1686, nullified the law by proclamation. "Being now informed," he declared, "that several persons goe about to impede our Service ... by imposing bad tobacco upon our collectors at the rate of 2d per llb, under pretence of an Act of Assembly of March 30, 1662, ... Wee have thought fit to Repeal the said Act."[982]

Even then the Burgesses resisted. At the session of 1686 they petitioned on behalf of all the freeholders of the colony that the quit-rents should be paid as formerly. To make payment in specie, they declared, would not only be ruinous, but utterly impossible.[983] So angered were they and so determined not to obey, that Effingham found it expedient to consent to a compromise. It was agreed that the tax should be collected in tobacco as before, but at the rate of one penny per pound, which, as Effingham said, was not ad valorum. Thus the only result of this long quarrel was to double the value of the quit-rents, and to add greatly to the burdens of the impoverished and discontented people.[984]

Even more bitter was the contest over the so-called Bill of Ports. This measure was designed to remedy the scattered mode of living in Virginia, by appointing certain places as ports of landing and shipment, and confining to them all foreign trade. Throughout the seventeenth century almost all shipping was done from private wharves. The country was so interspersed with rivers, inlets and creeks, deep enough to float the largest vessels, that ports were entirely unnecessary. Each planter dealt directly with the merchants, receiving English manufactured goods almost at his front door, and lading the ships with tobacco from his own warehouse. This system, so natural and advantageous, seemed to the English Kings, and even to the colonists, a sign of unhealthful conditions. More than once attempts had been made to force the people to build towns and to discontinue the desultory plantation trade.