privilege in Maryland. By the ordinance of 1637, issued by the lord proprietor, the political organization was closely modeled after that of Virginia. The constitutional development of the other Southern Colonies followed, in the main, the same method of growth. The date of the Lords Proprietors' Charter for the Province of Carolina is 1663; in 1719, the government was changed to that of a Colony of the King of England. So by successive steps, with many vicissitudes, with varying fortunes, with some modifications, the general type was adopted, and Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia became separate political entities, with a common allegiance to, and dependence upon, the mother country of Great Britain. At the beginning of the Revolutionary War, three forms of government existed in the Colonies. In Rhode Island and Connecticut, the Governors were elected by the people. In Maryland, Delaware, and Pennsylvania, the Governors were appointed by the proprietors. The King had no officers, except in the Admiralty Courts and in the Customs, and his name was hardly known in the acts of government. In the other colonies the Royal Governors were appointed by the Crown.' CHAPTER III.. IN the colonial period there were thirteen commonwealths, with thirteen local governments. Each colony, distinct in origin, was separate from, and independent of, the others; each was a dependency, and an integral part of the British Empire; each was a creature of the British state, and legally subject to its sovereignty. The common bond of union was through the allegiance to the British Crown. The corporations, created by laws of Great Britain, scattered along the Atlantic coast, were as distinct and individual as are different railroad companies, which have severally obtained charters and grants of land from the United States.' In all that pertained to the regulation of their respective affairs, they acted singly. A British subject, residing within one of the Colonies, had, within the territory of the other Colonies, the common law rights of a British subject, but no more, and not otherwise, than he would have had in a British colony in Asia. Each colony had its legislative assembly, elected by its own people, and its separate judiciary. The basis of representation was different. In Massachusetts townships 1 Dr. Small's Beginnings of American Nationality, p. 14. ΙΟ were the unit; in Virginia, counties; but in each the assembly was a representative body. The laws enacted had force, authority, sanction, only within the limits of the colony, and had no extra-territorial validity. What Massachusetts did had no civil efficacy, no governmental sanction, over Connecticut or Rhode Island. This common dependence, this amenability to British law, juxtaposition on a remote continent, sense of common danger from neighboring Indian tribes, and community of origin, language, literature, religion, and civil rights, naturally drew the Colonies into relationships of fraternity and friendship. Diversity of climate and productions and interposed mountains sectionalize peoples, raise international problems, and provoke alienations. The economic history of the Colonies, if thoroughly explored, would throw much needful light on their final union. This influence lessened colonial isolation, broadened the horizon of mutual interests, drew toward trade centres, and tended to develop a national character. Inter-communication, also, softened prejudices, promoted social intercourse, expanded trade, created a trend toward colonial fellowship and co-operation. The coast trade supplemented the work and influence of the interior highways, and brought colonial interests into closer unity. Massachusetts, in 1636, the very year in which Hampden resisted the payment of ship money, 3 asserted her exclusive power of taxation.' So did other colonies. In 1623 Virginia asserted the same separate power. In 1651 a treaty was made between the Commonwealth of England. and the Colony of Virginia, by which it was agreed that the Virginia colonist was as free as the English subject; that the Assembly of Virginia should transact all of her affairs; that her people should have free trade with all nations, as the people of England had; and that taxes should not be imposed, nor forts erected, nor garrisons maintained in Virginia, but by the consent of her Assembly. The violation of the Navigation Acts of Cromwell and of Charles II., and of the Sugar Act of 1733, were proofs of the independent spirit of the colonists, and of their self-government in some economic matters. On the other hand, there were elements, tending not to cohesion, but to division and segregation. In those days, the Colonies skirted thousands of miles of unfamiliar coast; in the deficiency of means of intercourse, travel was slow, trade and commerce were limited and expensive, and there were not a few local jealousies. With the facilities for travel and trade which are so familiar at the present time, with the practical annihilation of space by steam and electricity, with the demonstrated experiment of a Federal Union, we fail to compre |