number: And let these be rather noblemen and gentlemen, than merchants; for they look ever to the present gain.

The result of these experiments was to convince the English Government that a private corporation with governmental powers was an ineffectual instrumentality for administering dependencies like the American Colonies, whose populations had a will and a juridical conscience of their own which they were capable of expressing by combined action. All experiments in this direction relating to the American Colonies practically ended in 1624, upon the revocation of the Virginia Charters, though the Charter of the Council for New England was not surrendered until some years later.

James I. died April 6, 1625, while a Commission to investigate the affairs of Virginia was still sitting. On May 23, 1625, Charles I., after consultation with Sandys, who was a great friend of his and who had joined in an argument before the Commissioners in favor of a new charter to the old Company, stated his intention in a Proclamation" to resume the government," so that

there should be one uniform course of government throughout all our whole monarchy; That the government of the Colony of Virginia shall immediately depend upon ourself, and not be committed to any company or corporation, to whom it may be proper to trust matters of trade, but cannot be fit or safe to communicate the ordering of state affairs, be they of never so mean consequence.

The Proclamation stated that he intended to establish a royal Council in England and another in Virginia. He in fact did so, but he left the Virginians their representation in the General Assembly.

The effect of this Proclamation was to establish two principles of the administration of the American Colonies: First, that, to an orderly administration it was necessary that there should be an Imperial Council located

in England, composed of expert persons appointed by the King, which should be a consultative body for the King when he was exercising the Imperial power on behalf of England, and which might also have administrative powers; and second, that the Colonies, being separated by distance so that they could not be incorporated into the body of the Realm, were to be regarded as States for some purposes.

UNTIL

CHAPTER V

IMPERIAL COUNCILS, 1625-1750

NTIL the year 1750, at least, there continued to be an Imperial Council in England for America,usually assisted by a referee Council,—which, with the King, represented England or Great Britain as the Imperial State.

Charles I., for nine years after his accession, administered personally the affairs of the American Colonies, acting with the advice of his Privy Council. Under this arrangement, the Charter of the Massachusetts Bay Company was granted in 1629, by which the persons named in it were incorporated as a guild or private company, having governmental privileges but also full power to admit or exclude. The officers of the guild were a Governor and Assistants, elected by the members at a "General Court." The members were called "freemen." No place was specified in which the guild should be located, though it was granted land in New England.

In 1632, Charles I., by Charter, granted the region called Maryland to Lord Baltimore as Count Palatine and Lord Proprietor. The region and its inhabitants were incorporated by the name of "The Province of Maryland." The object doubtless was to keep alive, among the colonists, the idea of allegiance to the person of the King, and to secure the personal responsibility of a Proprietor.

By Commission of April 28, 1634, Charles I. appointed as "Lords High Commissioners for the Plantations," the Archbishop of Canterbury (William Laud), the Arch

bishop of York, the Lord Keeper, the Lord High Treasurer, and eight other Officers of State-thus showing that the administration of the dependencies was regarded as a matter of very great importance and that the office of Lord High Commissioner for the Plantations was regarded as one of great dignity. These Commissioners constituted an Imperial Administrative Council, and not merely a Privy Council for Colonial Purposes. They were given power to make laws and orders for the government of the Colonies, with the King's assent; to impose penalties and imprisonment for offences in ecclesiastical matters; to remove governors and require an account of their government; to appoint judges and magistrates and establish courts; to hear and determine all manner of complaints from the Colonies; to have power over all charters and patents, and to revoke those surreptitiously and unduly obtained."

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This last power was doubtless given with reference to the Massachusetts Bay Charter, under a claim that, in moving the whole administration of the Company to New England, an improper advantage had been taken of the omission in the Charter to limit the location of the Company to some place in England, and that this action was evidence of fraudulent intent in obtaining the Charter. This claim was evidently unfounded and made without sufficient investigation, since Governor Winthrop states that the omission was intentional, and that the Company refused to take the Charter unless it were unlimited in the matter of location.

Under the administration of the Lords High Commissioners for the Plantations, the region called Maine was, in 1639, granted to Sir Ferdinando Gorges as a County Palatine and a Proprietary Province by the name of "The Province of Maine."

The establishment of the Province of Maine, modelled exactly after the Province of Maryland, in which, though

the Lord Palatine was required to act by the advice and consent of the freeholders, he was permitted to determine to what extent they should participate in the government,—the one immediately north of Virginia and the other immediately north of Massachusetts Bay,―made the Lords High Commissioners exceedingly unpopular in the old Colonies. In Massachusetts Bay, the antagonism to them was increased by a judgment obtained by their efforts in 1635, declaring the Charter forfeited, and by the appointment, in 1637, of Sir Ferdinando Gorges as Governor-General of New England. The objection of the colonists was not, however, to the Imperial Council because it was such, but to the acts and beliefs of the men who composed the Council.

The Commission to the Lords High Commissioners for the Plantations was revoked in 1639, and from that time until 1641 the troubles of England within itself and with Scotland and Ireland made it impossible for much attention to be given to the affairs of the American Colonies. The administration of the Colonies reverted to the charge of the King, who acted under the advice of a Committee of the Privy Council for Foreign Plantations.

The Lords and Commons of England, during the first two years of their contest with King Charles, after his flight from London in 1641, seem to have been inclined to treat the Colonies as if they were integral parts of the Realm. They suggested that the Colonies send representatives to Parliament, but the Colonies refused; and, in 1643, the Massachusetts Bay Colony and the Providence Plantations sent Agents to England to present their matters of dispute to the Lords and Commons for disposition, Roger Williams representing the Providence Plantations. After conference between the Colonial Agents and the leaders of the Lords and Commons, there was no more talk of the Colonies being represented in Parliament. They had realized that their interests lay in the direction