[The dissensions in the Watertown church soon led to a more active interference by the government of the colony. The party of the elder and pastor plainly resented this interference. There may be some connection between that fact and the following famous "remonstrance" in the matter of taxation.]
[1631/2. February 17.] The governour and assistants called before them, at Boston, divers of Watertown; the pastor and elder by letter, and the others by warrant. The occasion was, for that a warrant being sent to Watertown for levying of £8, part of a rate of £60, ordered for the fortifying of the new town, the pastor and elder, etc., assembled the people and delivered their opinions, that it was not safe to pay moneys after that sort, for fear of bringing themselves and posterity into bondage. Being come before the governour and council, after much debate, they acknowledged their fault, confessing freely, that they were in an error, and made a retractation and submission under their hands, and were enjoined to read it in the assembly the next Lord's day. The ground of their error was, for that they took this government to be no other but as of a mayor and aldermen, who have not power to make laws or raise taxations without the people; but understanding that this government was rather in the nature of a parliament, and that no assistant could be chosen but by the freemen, who had power likewise to remove the assistants and put in others, and therefore at every general court (which was to be held once every year) they had free liberty to consider and propound anything concerning the same, and to declare their grievances, without being subject to question, or, etc., they were fully satisfied; and so their submission was accepted, and their offence pardoned.
[Winthrop was overconfident. The Watertown men must soon have recovered from the browbeating he had given them. May 1, Winthrop called together the Assistants informally at his house, and warned them "that he had heard the people intended at the next court to desire that the Assistants might be chosen anew every year, and that the governor might be chosen by the whole court, and not by the Assistants only. Upon this, Mr. Ludlow grew into a passion, and said that then we should have no government, but there would be an interim wherein every man might do what he pleased." The others, however, did not anticipate quite such deplorable results, and wisely concluded to submit. The results appear in the following entry.]
[May 8, 1632.] A general court at Boston. Whereas it was (at our first coming) agreed, that the freemen should choose the assistants, and they the governour, the whole court agreed now, that the governour and assistants should all be new chosen every year by the general court, (the governour to be always chosen out of the assistants;) and accordingly the old governour, John Winthrop, was chosen; accordingly all the rest as before, and Mr. Humfrey and Mr. Coddington also, because they were daily expected....
... A proposition was made by the people that every company of trained men might choose their own captain and officers; but the governor giving them reasons to the contrary, they were satisfied without it.
Every town chose two men to be at the next court, to advise with the governour and assistants about the raising of a public stock, so as what they should agree upon should bind all, etc.
[The facts about this meeting of the General Court are given even more briefly in the Records, but in agreement with these statements of Winthrop. The Records omit, naturally, all reference to the preceding action at Watertown, which explains these reforms. The freemen had now recovered the right to choose all magistrates annually, together with some direct local control over taxation; but the lawmaking power was still retained, unconstitutionally, by the Assistants.]
65. Legislation and Administration by the "Assistants," 1630-1633
Records of Governor and Company of Massachusetts Bay, I (under dates given).
These extracts show the moral and economic ideas of the ruling class. The extracts are all taken from records of the Courts of Assistants, meeting at Charlestown or Boston.