name of the "United Colonies of New England." By the terms of this union, the internal affairs of each Colony were left to its own government. In war, each was to furnish its proportion of men according to its population, and the common affairs of the Confederacy were to be conducted by a Congress composed of two Commissioners from each Colony.

During the civil wars of England, while the government was in the hands of the Republican Parliament, and afterwards under the Protectorate of Cromwell, the most friendly feelings subsisted between the colonists and the ruling power of the parent country.

Virginia, which was settled in 1607, made an effort to introduce the representative system of government in 1619, which incurred the displeasure of James the First, who took her Charter from her. On his decease, shortly after this act, he was succeeded by his son Charles the First, who levied tribute upon the Virginians for their assumption. He devolved upon the Governor and Council the whole legislative and executive powers of the Colony, empowering them to levy taxes, to seize the property of the late company, and to apply it to public uses, and to transport colonists to England to be tried for crimes committed in Virginia. New York, Virginia, New Jersey, Georgia and the Carolinas, were, during this period, and up to the Revolutionary War, under the direct control of the Royal Charters, and royally appointed Governors and Councils, who had almost absolute control of the lives, property and persons of the colonists.

Massachusetts, increasing in population and commercial importance, began to populate Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island. Her people were restless under the oppression of the Mother Country, and

as early as 1630 had the powers of government transferred from the Crown to the people of the Colony, so as to allow the latter to elect annually a Governor, a Deputy Governor, and eighteen Assistants. Still aspiring to ascend the ladder of broader liberties, she in 1639 claimed the right of representation, but there was nothing in her Charter permitting this. The General Court, the name by which the State Legislature is known to this day, was established; and, although it would seem that the people had no right, save by the law of nature, yet they entered upon the representative system, composed of the Governor, the Assistants, or at least six of them, and the body of freemen which constituted the General Court, by which the powers of Government were to be exercised. But this body, unwieldy from the fact of its lacking the prescribed powers and modus operandi of performing its functions, gave place in 1644 to the General Court, having two distinct bodies with a negative upon each other.

The Colonial condition of Rhode Island, from 1644 to 1663, under the Charter obtained by Roger Williams, during the contest between the King and Parliament for the supremacy in Britain, was a pure Democracy; but on the restoration of the Kingdom to Charles II, in 1663, they received a new Charter not materially reducing their powers. The spirit of Republicanism had already asserted itself, and the New England Colonies had, imperceptibly to the Mother Country, established a system of representative government, which contained the germ of America's Freedom, and which no power on earth could destroy.

The league formed by the Colonies of Massachusetts, Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven, in 1643, by the name of the "United Colonies of New England,"

was the first practical union of forces to accomplish their objects of resistance from without ever attempted in America; and although the purposes set forth in the articles of compact were to insure mutual protection against the Indians, and the Dutch at Manhattan, yet it is fair to conclude that a future union for their political rights was in the minds of the leaders in this project; still, by this compact, each Colony was only to provide, in time of war, soldiers in proportion to its population, and the internal affairs of each Colony were to be conducted by itself.

The general affairs of the Confederacy were to be conducted by a Congress composed of two Commissioners from each Colony. The times were auspicious for the development of Republican ideas in the new world. In fact, the colonists of New England, since their Constitution, signed on board the Mayflower, showed upon many occasions a tending toward larger liberties than those granted them by their Charters and by the English Parliament.

The civil wars in England, by which the King was deposed, and the Government declared Republican, the subsequent overthrow by Cromwell, and the liberal treatment of the colonists by the Parent Country during this period, were well calculated to inspire them with the spirit of their own freedom; and the children. and grand-children of the colonists of these times, when they stepped into the arena, sword in hand, in 1776, were but following the instincts and teachings of their ancestors for broader liberties.

The Royal or Provincial Governments of the Colonies, or a portion of them, were distinguished from those of the Colonial, particularly in this, that the Royal Charters gave the individuals to whom the grant was made, the

almost exclusive power to make and enforce all laws as to them might seem best.

Those Colonies or Plantations, under Royal Charters at the breaking out of the Revolution, were Virginia, New York, New Jersey, the Carolinas, Georgia, and New Hampshire; but these Colonies had, since their settlement, passed through many phases, particularly New Hampshire, whose spasmodic political somersaults render her early history a little ludicrous, placing herself under the Government of Massachusetts in 1641, and in 1680 becoming a separate Royal Province. In 1686 the authority of Massachusetts was again extended over her. Soon after, the people took the government into their own hands, but again returned to their first love and placed themselves under the protection of Massachusetts in 1690; separated again in 1692, and united in 1699; and again separated in 1741, it is to be hoped for the last time.

Virginia from 1607 to 1619, had had three Charters and as many forms of rule applied to her-all, however, under the direct control of the Home Government; but a growing desire for more liberty, aided by the liberal spirit of their Governor, caused them in 1619, to enter upon a system of government almost Republican in form; and the first Colonial Assembly ever held in America, was called and held at Jamestown, June 29, 1619; but the jealousy of the ruling monarch, King James I, was aroused, and dreading the consequences of this liberty, demanded their Charter to be surrendered, and upon refusal of this, issued his order of quo warranto. Judgment was rendered against the company, their Charter declared forfeited, and all its powers reverted to the Crown in 1624. Under the rule of James I, and his successor Charles I, the most oppres

sive laws were mercilessly inflicted upon Virginia, and, crushed to desperation by the tyranny of these laws, mercilessly carried into execution by their Governor, Sir John Harvey, the people in 1636, seized him, made him a prisoner, and sent him to England, sending agents with him to represent their grievances. Harvey was, however, returned with renewed measures of oppression to govern Virginia.