History of Nova Caesarea - Part 7



CHAP. XVII.
The Assembly's reply to Lord Cornbury's letter to their remonstrance.

The assembly did not immediately go upon the consideration of a reply,
having before them the treasurer, Peter Fauconier's accounts, in which
they found many articles extraordinary in their nature, several of them
being paid by Cornbury's order barely, and the whole without vouchers;
they sent for him; he attending, refused to lay his vouchers before them
without the governor's commands; two members were sent to the governor, to
desire him to order the treasurer to lay the vouchers of his accounts, and
the orders for the payment of the sums therein mentioned before them; the
governor said, he had already ordered it, though it was what he could not
legally do, because the lord high treasurer had appointed an auditor
general for the province, and he not being in it, had deputed one to audit
the accounts, and that the treasurer was accountable only to the lord high
treasurer; but if the house was dissatisfied with any articles in the
accounts, and thought proper to apply to him, he would satisfy them: This
was not done; and the accounts, extraordinary as they were, remained
unsettled 'till Hunter's administration several years after. Several bills
of consequence were now also under consideration; but Cornbury,
apprehensive, that if he suffered the sessions to continue much longer, it
would produce something not to his advantage, on the 16th adjourn'd the
house 'till the next September, to meet him at Amboy. In the October
following they met accordingly: The first thing now concluded on, was a
reply to the foregoing auswer to their remonstrance; next place, they
resolved N. C. D. that they would raise no money 'till the governor
consented to redress the grievances of the country; which if he did, they
would raise £.1500, for support of government for one year.

On the 28th, the house sent a committee to acquaint the governor, that
having seen his answer to their remonstrance in print, they thought fit to
make a reply to it, and desired to know when he would admit them to wait
on him with it; the governor said, he would return an answer in due time;
they waited for his message 'till next day, and then concluding he
intended to elude giving them opportunity of presenting, it, sent a
committee with it, but he would not receive it;1 upon which they ordered
it to be entered in their journal, as follows:

"May it please your excellency,

"WE, the representatives of this her majesty's province of New-Jersey,
finding her majesty's subjects greatly, and as we are very well satisfied
with good reason, aggrieved; thought we could not answer the trust reposed
in us by our country, should we not endeavour to get those hardships
removed under which they labour.

"It was needless to hunt after imaginary grievances, real ones in too
great numbers presenting themselves; and though from you we have missd of
obtaining that relief that the justice of our complaints intituled us to;
yet we do not dispair of being heard by her sacred majesty, at whose royal
feet we shall in the humblest manner lay an account of our sufferings; and
however contemptible we are, or are endeavoured to be made appear, we are
persuaded her majesty will consider us as the representatives of the
province of New-Jersey, who must better know, what are the grievances of
the country they represent, than a governor can do, who regularly ought to
receive informations of that kind from them; and we do not doubt that
glorious queen will make her subjects here as easy and happy as she can.

"When we told your excellency, we had reason to think some of our
sufferings were very much owing to your excellency's long absence from
this province, which rendered it very difficult to apply to your lordship
in some cases that might need a present help, we spoke truth; and
notwithstanding all your excellency has said of a months or twelve weeks
in a year, and the weekly going of a post; we cannot be perswaded to
believe, that nine months and upwards in a year, is not a long absence,
especially when the seal of the province is carried and kept out of the
government all that time; and the honourable colonel Ingoldsby, the
lieutenant governor, so far from doing right, that he declined doing any
act of government at all; whether he governs himself by your excellency's
directions or not, we cannot tell; but sure we are, that this province
being as it were without government for above nine months in a year, we
must still think it a great grievance, and not made less so by carrying
the seal of the province to New-York, and laying her majesty's subjects
under a necessity of applying from the remotest part of this province, for
three parts of the year and better, to your excellency at fort Ann, in New-
York, from which place most of the commissions and patents granted during
your excellency's absence, are dated, (by what authority we shall not
enquire) notwithstanding a lieutenant governor resides in the province,
and is by her majesty's commission impowered to execute the queen's
letters patents, and the powers therein contained, during your
excellency's absence from this province of New-Jersey; without which
powers given and duly executed, a lieutenant governor is useless and an
unnecessary charge; and we cannot think, that her sacred majesty, who
honoured that gentleman with so great a mark of her royal favour, as
giving him a commission for lieutenant governor of New-Jersey, did at the
same time inhibit him from executing the powers therein exprest.

"Things are sometimes best illustrated by their contraries; and
perhaps the most effectual way to convince the world, that this complaint
is frivolous and untrue, as by your excellency alledged, would be, for
your excellency to bring the seal of the province of New-York to
Burlington, keep it there, and do all the acts of government relating to
the province of New-York, at Burlington, in New-Jersey, for about three
fourths of a year, and let the lieutenant governor reside at New-York
during that time, without doing any act of government, adjourn their
assemblies on the very day, or day before they are to meet, that they may
not lose the advantage of travelling to New-York, from the remotest part
of that province, and at a time when it cannot be done without the utmost
prejudice to their affairs; it's hardly probable they would be pleased
under such an administration, notwithstanding the ease of informing your
excellency every week by the post, of any emergency that might happen.

"We are apt to believe, upon the credit of your excellency's assertion,
that there may be a number of people in this province who will never be
faithful to, or live quietly under any government, nor suffer their
neighbours to enjoy any peace, quiet nor happiness, if they can help
it; such people are pests in all govemments, have ever been so in this,
and we know of none who can lay a fairer claim to these characters than
many of your excellency's favorites.

"What malice and revenge were in the prosecution of the condemned persons,
we don't know; we never heard of any 'till now, and hardly can be
persuaded to believe it's possible there should be in both the instances.

"It is not impossible, there might be malice in the prosecution of the
woman who was condemned for poisoning her husband; there not being (as is
said) plain proof of the fact, but it was proved she had attempted it
before more than once; and there were so many other concurring
circumstances as did induce the jury, who were of the neighbourhood (and
well knew her character) to find her guilty, and it is hardly probable
their so doing was an act of malice.

"The woman who murdered her own child, did it in such a manner, and so
publickly, that it is unreasonable to suppose there could be any malice in
the prosecution of her, and we cannot think (notwithstanding your
excellency's assertions) that you can or may believe there was. This woman
was a prisoner in the sheriff's custody for breach of the peace, and going
about some of the household affairs the sheriff employed her in, with a
knife in her hand, her child who was something froward, followed her
crying; upon which the mother turned back to it and cut its throat; but
not having cut it deep enough, the child still followed her all bloody,
and crying, O! mother you have hurt me; the mother turned back a second
time, and out it effectually, and then took it up and carried it to the
sheriff or his wife, at whose feet she laid it: How far such a wretch is
entitled to the queen's favour, her majesty can best tell, when she is
made acquainted with the fact; but sure we are, she never gave your
excellency the power of pardoning wilful murder:

Whether your excellency has or has not reprieved them, you best know,
and are only accountable to her majesty for your procedures therein; tho'
we have too much reason to believe, the favourable opinion your excellency
has so publickly expressed of her, has been a great reason to induce her
to make her escape, which she has done. ---- We thought it our duty,
humbly to represent that matter to your excellency's consideration, and
had reason to be apprehensive of the judgments of almighty God, whose
infinite mercy has hitherto suspended the execution of his justice,
notwithstanding that great provocations have been given him, by impiety,
prophaneness and debauchery, under the mask of a pretended zeal for his
glory, and love for his church: It is not our business to enter into
religious controversies; we leave them to divines, who ought best to
understand things of that nature, and who may perhaps inform us what is
meant by denying the very essence of the saviour of the world.

"We cannot yet be persuaded, that an innocent person should pay fees; what
the practice in England is, we did never enquire, but believe, that
persons acquitted by a grand jury, do not pay those extravagant fees they
are made to pay here; we did not govern ourselves by the practice there,
but the unreasonableness of the thing; and your excellency does grant,
that what we say is in some measure to be allowed, were the juries in this
country such as they ought to be; we hope they are, and our experience has
not convinced us, that persons who under pretence of conscience refuse an
oath, have yet no regard for the oaths they take, as your excellency says.
The temptations to resentment prove often too powerful, and irresistably
engage us in unbecoming heats, and when the characters of men are written
with pens too deeply dipt in gall, it only evinces a want of temper in the
writer. Our juries here are not so learned or rich as perhaps they are in
England; but we doubt not full as honest. We thought the only office for
probate of wills was at Burlington; but your excellency has convinced us,
that it is wherever your excellency is, and consequently may be at York,
Albany, the east end of Long-Island, or in Connecticut, or New-England, or
any place more remote should your excellency's business or inclination call
you there; which is so far from making it less a grievance, that it rather
makes it more so; and notwithstanding those soft, cool, and considerate
terms of malicious, scandalous and frivolous, with which your excellency
vouchsafes to treat the assembly of this province; they are of opinion,
that no judicious or impartial men, will think it reasonable, that the
inhabitants of one province should go into another to have their wills
proved, and take letters of administration at Fort Ann, from the governor
of New-York, for what should regularly be done by the governor of
New-Jersey in Jersey, to which place all the acts of government relating
to New-Jersey, are limited by the queen's letters patents under the great
seal of England; and when your excellency is absent from New-Jersey, to
be executed by the lieutenant governor; and by the said letters patents not
the least colour of authority is given to your excellency, to do any act of
government relating to New-Jersey, any where but in Jersey; nor is there
any instruction (that we know of) contradicting the said letters patents
any where upon record in this province, to warrant your excellency's
conduct in that affair: If this be not cause, and just cause of complaint,
we do not know what is; we are inclined to believe, the province of
New-York would think it so, were they to come to Amboy or Burlington,
to prove wills, &c.

"We do not think, that what we desire, is an invasion of the queen's
right; but what her majesty, without infringement of her prerogative
royal, may assent to; and their late majesties of blessed memory, did, by
their governor colonel Fletcher, assent to an act made in New-York, in the
year 1692, entitled, An act for the supervising intestates estates, and
regutating the probate of wills, and granting letters of administration;
by which the court of common pleas in the remote counties of that
province, were impowered to take the examination of witnesses to any will
within their respective counties, and certify the same to the secretary's
office; and the judges of the several courts in those remote counties,
impowered to grant probates of any will, or letters of administration, to
any person or persons, where the estate did not exceed £.50; what has been
done there may with as much reason be done here, without sacrificing the
queen's prerogative royal to the humours or caprices of any person or
persons whatsoever.

"It is the general assembly of the province of New-Jersey, that complains,
and not the quakers, with whose persons (considered as quakers) or
meetings we have nothing to do, nor are we concerned in what your
excellency says against them; they perhaps, will think themselves obliged
to vindicate their meetings from the aspersions which your excellency so
liberally bestows upon them, and evince to the world how void of rashness
and inconsideration your excellency's expressions are, and how becoming it
is for the governor of a province to enter the lists of controversy, with
a people who thought themselves entitled to his protection of them in the
enjoyment of their religious liberties; those of them who are members of
this house, have begged leave in behalf of themselves and their friends,
to tell the governor, they must answer him in the words of Nehemiah to
Sanballat, contained in the 8th verse of the 6th chapter of Nehemiah, viz.
There is no such thing done as thou sayest, but thou feignest them out of
thine own heart.

"We are so well assured the fact is true, that the secretary's office
is kept at Burlington only, that we still are of opinion it is a grievance,
for the reasons we have assigned; the proprietors records has not any
thing to do with the secretary's office, but is an office wholly belonging
to the proprietors, and altogether at their disposal; and is not a
secretary's office kept at Amboy, either as far as the nature of the thing
requires or can admit of, or any way at all.

"And as the assemblies and courts sit alternately at Amboy and Burlington,
so it is highly reasonable the secretary's office should be kept
alternately also at both these places, or by deputy in one of them, and
may be very well done without making two secretaries.

"Both this and the rest of our complaints, are not with design to amuse
the people, but are just and reasonable; and we believe, will by the
people be thought to be grievances 'till they are redressed; who can no
more think it reasonable, that all the inhabitants of the eastern division
should come to the office at Burlington, than that all of the western
division should go to Amboy.

"We are still of opinion, the grant we complain of is against the statute
we mentioned, because it is exclusive of others, and to the prejudice of
the publick. It can never be thought reasonable to prohibit any body to
cart their own goods, or any body's else, as by virtue of that grant has
been done; and not only in the road from Amboy to Burlington, but in the
road from Shrewsbury; and a patent may as well be granted to keep horses
to hire, by which a man may be hindred to ride his own: It is destructive
to the common rights of men, and a great grievance, and we had reason to
endeavour to get it redressed.

"It's true, a certain convenience for transportation of goods, is no
doubt of great use, and the profit that accrues by such undertakings, is
the motive that induces any persons to be at the charge of them, and
providing fit carriages for that end, and of ascertaining the times and
prices of carrying; and the more providers of such carriages, the more
certain and cheap the transportation, and freest from imposition; and
consequently the fewer carriages, the less certain and dearer, and the
persons under a necessity of using them more subject to be imposed upon by
the carrier; now whether granting by which others are excluded, waving the
unlawfulness of it, be a means to increase the number of the undertakers
in that kind, or to lessen them, and confine those who have any occasion
to transport goods, to give such price as he that has the patent thinks
fit to impose, we leave to all men of common sense to judge; and if
experience may be admitted to determine that matter, it is plain that
transportation of goods, both be land and water, is dearer than it was
before the granting of that patent: It's true, the certainty was not so
great as now; for now we are certain that a man cannot with his own carts
carry his own goods, but that if he does they will be seized; and if that
be one of the conveniences which the wise people in Europe think of
absolute necessity, we shall think it no irony to be called wiser, in
differing from them, and calling them monopolies as they are, and
prejudicial to trade, and especially that between York and Amboy,
Burlington and Philadelphia; which did not owe its beginning to your
excellency's patent, but was begun long before your excellency had any
thing to do with New-Jersey, and in all probability had much more
increased were it not for that patent; and we believe whenever the
gentlemen of the law will give your excellency their true opinion of it,
you will not be long in doubt whether tis a monopoly or not: We thought it
a monopoly, as we do still, and a grievance, as is also both that and
other grants made by your excellency at fort Ann in New-York, for any
thing in Jersey.

"Your excellency has neither by birth nor acquisition, a right to the
sovereignty of New-Jersey; nor have you any power of governing the queen's
subjects here, but what her majesty is pleased to grant you by her letters
patents, under the great of England; by which letters patents the powers
therein contained, are limited to that country, which was formerly granted
by king Charles the second, under the name of Nova-Caesaria or New-Jersey,
and which has since been subdivided by the proprietors, and called East
New-Jersey, and West New-Jersey, and which her majesty is pleased to
reunite under one entire government, viz. "The divisions of East and West
New-Jersey, in America; and in ease of your excellency's death, or absence
from that country, which was subdivided by the proprietors, and called
East New-Jersey and West New-Jersey, the powers of government are lodged
in other hands." Now either fort Ann and the city of New-York, is in that
country granted by king Charles the second, and sub-divided by the
proprietors thereof, and called East New-Jersey and West New-Jersey; or
your excellency is absent from New-Jersey, when you are at fort Ann in New-
York; that fort Ann is in New-Jersey, we believe, that even your
excellency will think impracticable to persuade us to do so much violence
to our reason as to believe; therefore your excellency when at fort Ann,
or any where in New-York, is absent from New-Jersey; and what the
consequence is we need not say, thinking the pretence of a power to do
acts of government relating to New-Jersey, at fort Ann, in New-York, to be
so manifestly absurd, as to need nothing further to be said against it.

"There is nothing more common in the statutes than the establishing fees,
and we are of opinion that all fees have been established by act of
parliament; and indeed it seems to us unreasonable they should be
established by any other authority; for if a governor, either with or
without his council, can appoint what sums of money shall be paid for
fees, he may make them large enough to defray the charge of government,
without the formality of an act of assembly, to raise a revenue for the
necessary support of the same; and if it does not come up to the taxing of
the queen's subjects, without their consents in assembly, we are to seek
what does.

"We cannot think the clause of your excellency's instructions, which we
have recited, to be so foreign to the matter of fees, as your excellency
says it is, for the enforcing the payment of fees by any authority but
that of the assembly's, is taking away a man's goods otherwise than by
established or known laws, except the act of a governor and council be a
law, which we think is not, nor never intended by the queen it should; nor
do we think, by the instructions your excellency mentions, you are to
establish fees; but only to regulate those already appointed, and to take
care that no exaction was used; but if it did, your excellency has
convinced the world, that you do not think yourself bound by the queen's
instructions, but where the law binds also.

"As in the ease of Ormston, where nothing could be more positive than her
majesty's directions; yet your excellency did not think yourself
ministerial, or by not complying with her majesty's orders, that you
accused the best of queens, with commanding her governor to do a thing
which was not warranted by law; nor never enquired, whether the refusing
obedience to her commands, was a fit return for the many favours she had
bestowed upon you; but govern'd yourself in that singular instance as near
as you could by the law. The seventh clause was not put in to arraign the
queen's express commands to your excellency; but to complain of the great
hardships her majesty's subjects lay under, by your excelency's putting
the records there mentioned, into the hands of Peter Sonmans, who is not
the proprietor's recorder, nor had no express command from the queen to
put the books into his hands; and may in part answer the challenge made by
your excellency in the last part of the next foregoing clause; for your
excellency had commanded the said records to be put into the hands of Mr.
Bass, the queen's secretary; up which; application was made to her
majesty, who was pleased to give an order in favour of the proprietors;
and without all peradventure, it was intended tbey should be in the hands
of the proprietor's recorder, which Mr. Thomas Gordon was at that time,
and regularly is still, being constituted by the majority of the
proprietors in the eastern division, and by your excellency sworn; Mr.
John Barclay was also by your excellency sworn, and a proclamation issued
in his favour; since which Mr. Peter Sonmans arrived from England, and
upon application to your excellency, was by your excellency, admitted
receiver general of the quit rents, and the proprietors records by your
excellency put into his hands; which, with submission, we think could not
be done regularly by your excellency: For in the first place, they were
constituted by the majority of the proprietors, whose servants they were,
and to whom they were accountable, and to none else.

"2. These places were the properties of Mr. Thomas Gordon and Mr. John
Barclay; and to deprive them of them, without due course of law, is what
your excellency has no authority to do, nor can have.

"3. Whether they were made by the greater or lesser part of the
proprietors, your excellency was no ways concerned, nor had any right of
determining in the favour of either one or other, the law being open to
any who thought themselves aggrieved.

"4. Those books and records were the properties of the general
proprietors; and if your excellency can dispossess any proprietor of them
(for Thomas Gordon was a proprietor) and put them into the hands of
another, you may by the same rule dispossess any one of their goods,
and give them to who you think fit, and any proprietor of their property,
and give it to which of the proprietors you think fit, as is actually done
by your excellency in the case of Sonmans; and was attempted with the
same violence in favour of Mr. Bass: It will not be a sufficient answer to
this, to say, Sonmans was proprietor's agent; which whether he was or
was not, your excellency had no right to determine to any other purpose
but administering an oath to him, after which he was of course to be
allowed; and so ought as many agents as the proprietors made, who were
not accountable to your excellency for any procedures in the proprietors
affairs, that were not unlawful.

"5. Sonmans neither had, nor pretended to have, at that time (whatever he
has done since) any right or colour of right, to be the proprietors
recorder, not any mention being made of it in that very lame commission he
had; and were he to have the top of his pretences, it would but to be
deputy to a person in England; and whether he has a right or not, is a
great question, and regularly only determinable at the common law; but
your excellency's shorter method of procedure saves disputes of that kind:
If this be acting according to established and known laws, not repugnant
to, but as agreeable as may be, to the laws of England; if this be
administering those laws for the preservation and protection of the
people, we would be very gladly informed, what perverting of them can be;
as to the matter of fact, we aver it to be truth, that Mr. Sonmans did not
reside in the province, had not given security for the keeping of those
records, as by the queen is positively directed, they were carried out of
the Eastern division, and were produced at the supreme court at Burlington
at the time of our complaint.

"Those things, and that gentleman's character, are so well known, that it
is needless to offer any thing else in justification of that reasonable
request we made, that they might be so kept as her majesty's subjects
might have recourse to them, and in the hands of such of whose fidelity
there is no reason to doubt.

"These, may it please your excellency, were the grievances we complained
of; and they were but a small number of many we could with equal justice
remonstrate; and which, notwithstanding those soft, cool, and considerate
terms of false, scandalous, and malicious, and other bitter invectives
which your excellency so often uses to the representative body of a
country; we are still of opinion, they are not imaginary, but real
grievances, not false, but God knows too true and which it was our duty,
in discharge of the trust reposed in us, to get redress'd.

Our sad experience has convinced us, that our endeavours have not met with
a success answerable to what might reasonably be our expectations, and
that instead of redressing the grievances of the country, their number is
encreased: Before we enumerated those grievances of an higher nature, and
attended with worse consequences, we first said, the treatment the people
of New-Jersey had received, was very different from what they had reason
to expect under the government of a queen deservedly famous for her just,
equal and mild administration; that the hardships they endured, were not
owing to her majesty, who they were well assured, would by no means, make
any of her subjects miserable, nor continue their misfortunes were she
acquainted with them, and in her power to give them relief; but that the
oppressions they groaned under, were the unkind effects of mistaken power;
and what these effects were, and who the cause of them, we proceeded to
shew; and if the instances we there give, be true, it will then appear to
the world, that the expressions we have used, are the softest could be
chosen, and very far short of what the nature of the thing could bear, and
that these bold accusers are a sort of creatures called honest men, just
to the trust reposed in them by the country, who will not suffer their
liberties and properties to be torn from them by any man, how great
soever, if they can hinder it.

"And that the reasonableness of our complaints may appear the plainer, we
shall consider what your excellency has said in answer, and leave it to
our superiors, and to all just and impartial men, whether we are not a
people the most abused of any of her majesty's subjects.

"As to the first instance, your excellency does acknowledge the fact to be
true, and offers the following reasons to justify your conduct to the
council of proprietors: The first is, that by her majesty's directions
you are to allow of all such agents as the general proprietors shall
appoint, such agents qualifying themselves by taking such oaths as the
queen is pleased to direct, and no other; that no persons under the name
of a council of proprietors, have ever tendered themselves to take such
oaths; consequently they are not capable of acting as agents.

"1. That the council of proprietors are a people pretending to act by a
power derived from certain persons who have no power to grant, and that
this a truth, viz. that they are a people pretending to act by a power
derived from certain persons, who had no power to grant, your excellency
is satisfied; besides other reasous, by this in particular, that the
assembly have voted to put the records into the hands of Peter Sonmans, to
be a grievance; whereas their not qualifying themselves is a greater
grievance. To set this matter in a true light, it will not be improper to
produce the words of the instructions; which are as follows:

'You are to permit the surveyors and other persons appointed by the
forementioned general proprietors of the soil of that province, for
surveying and recording the surveys of lands granted by and held of
them, to execute accordingly their respective trusts: And you are
likewise to permit, and if need be, to aid and assist such other agent or
agents, as shall be appointed by the said proprietors for that end, to
collect and receive the quit rents, which are or shall be due unto them,
from the particular possessor of any tracts or parcel of land from time to
time; provided always, that such surveyors, agents, or other officers
appointed by the said general proprietors, do not only take proper oaths
for the due execution and performance of their respective offices and
employments, and give good and sufficient security for their so doing;
but that they likewise take the oaths appointed by act of parliament to be
taken instead of the oaths of allegiance and supremacy; as also the test,
and subscribe the forementioned association; all which you are accordingly
to require of them, and not otherwise to admit any person into any such,
office or employment.' After the proprietors had surrendered their power
of government, relating to their soil, they were under a necessity of
employing persons, to survey and record the surveys of lands granted by
and held of them; and in the Eastern division, several quit rents being
due to them, there was a necessity of having one or more agents to collect
and receive those rents; which persons (because the crown intended, that
the proprietors by the surrender of their government, should by no means
be insecure in their properties) your excellency was directed not only to
permit such officers to be and execute their respective trusts, but also
to aid and assist them, if need were; and because such offices were places
of trust, both with respect to the proprietors and the inhabitants, it was
directed, that they should take proper oaths, and give good and sufficient
security; and that they who enjoyed those places of trust, might be
persons well affected to the present government, there was especial care
taken, to direct, that they should take the oaths appointed by act of
parliament to be taken, which your excellency was to require of them, and
not otherwise to admit them to execute those trusts: From all which we
observe, first, that no agents are concerned in that instruction, but such
as were to survey and record the surveys of lands, and collect the quit-
rents.

"2. That the proprietors were not limited to employ a certain number of
agents, but might employ as many as they thought fit; all which your
excellency was to aid and assist if need were.

"3. Your excellency was not to expect while they tendered themselves to
take the oaths appointed, but to require them to take them; and upon their
refusal not to admit them; for it was impossible they, or any else, should
deem themselves bound by the queen's instructions to certain performances,
except such instructions had been made publick, and they made acquainted
with it.

"Now in the first place, your excellency never published any such
instruction, nor ever did require those agents called the council of
proprietors to comply with it by taking any oaths.

"2. The council of proprietors are not such agents as the instructions
mention.

"3. Were that instruction binding, your excellency has by no means
complyed with it; for the surveyor appointed by the proprietors of the
western division, has several times tendered himself to take and
subscribe according to her majesty's directions, and has been refused.

"4. Mr. Sonmans, tho' a bankrupt, and his powers disputed, admitted to
keep the records of the eastern division, and that without any
security; and persons who were sworn to those places, and employed by
proprietors, and a greater number, not only not permitted to act, but
deprived of their places (with which your lordship had nothing to do)
without a due course of law, forceably by your lordship's directions.

"Lastly, the council of proprietors are attornies to private men, for
the taking care of their several properties, and are neither concerned in
that instruction, nor bound by it; if they were, we shall not dispute how
far that instruction may be a law to your lordship, but we are sure 'tis so
to no body else, but where the laws of the land bind without it; and if so,
'tis no sufficient warrant to destroy any man's property, or deprive him of
the use of it, without the judgment of his peers; for your lordship cannot
but know, if you do not, the last clause of the petition of right will tell
you, that the queen's servants are to serve her according to law, and not
otherwise; and every gentleman of the law can inform your excellency, if
he pleased, that the queen's authority or warrant produced (if you had
done any such thing) cannot justify the commission of an unlawful act;
which this certainly must be, except the law provides that no man must
make an attorney but with your lordship's approbation: As to the second
reason, to use your excellency's expressions, if we could wonder at any
thing your excellency has done, it would be at the reason your excellency
gives, as much as at the action; it being a plain pretending to a right of
judging solely who have a right to their estates, and who not, and
according to that judgment to permit them to retain or force them to part
with their possessions; for in the first place, that matter was never
brought before your lordship, and what information you had (if you had
any) was private; and we are told no freeman can be dispossessed of his
freehold but by judgment of his peers, or the law of the land; but here is
at once a determination, that a number of proprietors, nigh or above nine
tenths of the whole, have no right to grant, and accordingly they are
prohibited taking up or disposing of their lands; for the council of
proprietors, are all proprietors themselves, except Mr. Morris their
president; and we cant see, but any freeman, or number of freemen in the
province, may be dispossessed by the same measures; for 'tis but your
lordship's saying, the persons they had their lands from, had no right to
grant, and then order the possessors to make no further improvements,
nor to dispose of any of their lands; and thus conclude them without the
tedious formality of the old magna charta way; and who is hardy enough
to dispute with a man that commands two provinces?

"2. What your excellency asserts, with relation to the council of
proprietors, viz. that they were persons deriving a power from those who
had no right to grant, is what your excellency neither did, nor could
know; that you did not know it, nothing is more plain; because your
excellency some days after your lordship's answer to our remonstrance,
summoned some of the council of proprietors before yourself in council,
and there asked them the following questions, viz. First, who the late
council of proprietors were? Secondly, who were the present council of
proprietors? Thirdly, who they derived their powers from? Fourthly,
what their powers were? By which it appears, your excellency neither
knew who the council of proprietors were, what their powers were, nor
who they derived them from; which is very far from knowing whether
the persons who gave them those powers, had power to grant or not; and
that your excellency could not know, is as plain; because the deeds of
what proprietors are in this country, you never did see; and those that are
in England, you could not see.

"How your excellency is, from our voting the putting the records
into Mr. Sonmans hands to be a grievance, satisfied that the persons from
whom the council of proprietors derive their power, have no power to
grant; is very much beyond our poor capacities to understand, and may
perhaps be of the number of those unanswerable objections your lordship
tells us of in your answer. To the next clause your lordship justifies your
proceedings with the assemblymen, as being your duty; and that what
you did, was by virtue of the queen's instructions; how far they will
justify your excellency's conduct is our next business to speak to; but in
the first place we are obliged to your excellency, for acknowledging the
matter of fact; which tho' notoriously known, was omitted to be entered
in the journals of this house, by your excellency's faithful servant, Mr.
William Anderson, late clerk of this house.

"By the queen's instructions, not the least colour of authority is
given to your excellency, to be a judge of the qualifications of
assemblymen, so as to admit or reject them; which is not only a direct
contradiction to the very nature and being of assemblies, but must render
the liberties, lives and properties of the people entirely at your
excellency's disposal; which as her majesty never intended, so without
doubt she never did intend by any instruction to make so precarious; and
how well she'll be pleased at wresting her instructions to authorize what
we are well satisfied she will be very far from countenancing, time may
inform us: This house could not be so much wanting to themselves, and
the province they represent, as to omit taking notice of a procedure,
which tends to destroy the very being of assemblies, by rendering them
the tools of a governor's arbitrary pleasure, and the enemies instead of
the preservers of the liberties of their country; and we are well assured,
that nothing your excellency has said, will perswade the world to believe,
that your excellency or any other governor, has that power you pretend
to, or that it can be consistent with the liberties of a free people.

"That there were considerable sums of money raised; that most of them were
raised with intent and purpose to give to your lordship, to procure the
dissolution of the last assembly, and procure such officers as the
contributors should approve of; that in all probability the money so
raised, was given to your lordship; that the assembly was dissolved; that
the contributors were complied with as far as could be; that you did
receive from doctor John Johnston, two hundred pounds, upon the score
of the proprietors of the eastern division of New-Jersey; are such
notorious tuths, that it is a vanity to deny them; and will be believed,
notwithstanding all the force of evasive arts to perswade to the contrary:
And since we have mentioned doctor Johnston, it's not amiss to enquire,
whether the services you were to do the proprietors were such as your
lordship ought, or ought not to have done; if they were such as you ought
to have done, you ought not to have taken money for the doing of them;
if they were such as you ought not to have done, much less ought your
lordship to have taken money; and had you not been more than ordinarily
concerned in those private contributions, without all peradventure would
have used all possible endeavours to have detected the thing, and not
given those publick marks of your favour to the persons most concerned in
the persuading and procuring of them.

"As to what relates to the assembly, as your lordship is not accountable
to this house for what reasons you dissolved them, neither is this house
to your lordship for their proceedings; they acted as became a house of
representatives in the affair of Mr. Gordon, and what they did, was not
without your lordships approbation; if that could add any thing to the
power they had: As to your excellency's reflections on private men, 'tis
below the representative body of a province to take any further notice of
them, than to do that justice to the two worthy members of this house, as
to say, they both have, and deserve better characters than your excellency
gives them; and that the humblest application you can make to her majesty
will never induce her to grant you a power to use any means to procure a
satisfaction but what the laws allow of, without such application: We
concluded, by acquainting your excellency, that the way to engage the
affections of a people, was to let them be unmolested in the quiet
enjoyment of those things which belong to them of right, and should have
dated our happiness from your excellency's complying with so reasonable
and just a desire; to which your excellency replied, that you could never
answer taking advice from men, who did not know how to govern themselves,
and who have always opposed the service of the queen, and interest and
good of their country: We shall wave the admirable coolness of temper, and
considerateness of the reflection; and say, your excellency could hardly
have used plainer terms, to tell us, you will not let us be quiet in the
enjoyment of what belongs to us of right; and your excellency's
proceedings since that, has effectually convinced the world, that we have
not put a wrong construction on your excellency's expressions.

"Are not her majesty's loyal subjects haul'd to goals, and there
lie without being admitted to bail? and those that are the conditions of
their recognizances are, that if your excellency approves not of their
being bailed, they shall return to their prisons; several of her majesty's
good subjects forced to abscond, and leave their habitations, being
threatened with imprisonment, and no hopes of receiving the benefit of
the law; when your excellency's absolute will is the sole measure of it:
One minister of the church of England, dragg'd by a sheriff from
Burlington to Amboy, and there kept in custody, without assigning any
reason for it, and at last hauld by force into a boat by your excellency,
and transported like a malefactor, into another government, and there
kept in a garrison a prisoner; and no reason assigned for these violent
procedures, but your excellency's pleasure: Another mininister of the
church of England, laid under a necessity of leaving the province, from
the reasonable apprehensions of meeting with the same treatment; no
orders of men either sacred or civil, secure in their lives, their
liberties or estates; and where these procedures will end, God only knows.

If these, and what we have named before, be acts of mercy, gentleness and
good-nature; if this be doing for the good, welfare and prosperity of the
people of this province; if this be the administering laws for the
protection and preservation of her majesty's subjects; then have we been
the most mistaken men in the world, and have had the falsest notion of
things; calling that cruelty, oppression and injustice, which are their
direct opposites, and those things slavery, imprisonment and hardships,
which are freedom, liberty and ease; and must henceforth take France,
Denmark, the Muscovian, Ottoman and Eastern empires, to be the best models
of a gentle and happy government.

"Your excellency at last endeavours to persuade the country, that the
assembly, instead of protecting are invading the liberties of the people;
and if we might have the liberty of using some of your excellency's cool
and considerate terms, perhaps the following instances might justify those
expressions; but we leave that to just and impartial men, who no doubt
will apply them where they are most due. Your excellency asserts in the
first place, 'You have presumed to take the queen's subjects into the
custody of the serjeant at arms, who are not members of your house; which
you can't lawfully do, and is a notorious violation of the liberties of
the people.' Answer: There is nothing more known, than that the contrary
to what your excellency says is true, and hardly a session of parliament
but affords multitudes of instances, nay, several instances can be
produced during the time of your excellency's being in the house of
commons; and what your excellency means by asserting a thing, which every
body that knows any thing, knows is not so, we can't tell.

"Secondly, 'You have taken upon you to administer an oath to one of your
members, and have expell'd him from the house for refusing to take an oath
which you could not legally administer to him; this is most certainly
robbing that member of his property, and a most notorious assuming to
yourselves a negative voice to the freeholders election of their
representatives, for which there can be no precedent found.' Answer: We
never did administer an oath, (tho' we think we have power so to do) what
oaths were administered were administered by justices of the peace before
us: We expell'd that member for several contempts for which we are not
aceountable to your excellency, nor no body else in this province: We
might lawfully expel him; and if we had so thought fit, might have
rendered him incapable of ever sitting in this house; and of this many
precedents may be produced. We are the freeholders representatives; and
how it's possible we should assume a negative voice at the election of
ourselves, is what wants a little explanation to make it intelligible.

"Thirdly, 'You have arbitrarily taken upon you to command the
high-sheriff of this country, to discharge a prisoner who was in his
custody at the suit of one of the queen's subjects; and he has been weak
enough to do it, for which he lies liable to be sued for an escape,
whenever the gentleman thinks fit to do it, and from which you can't
protect him; this is a notorious violation of the right of the subject,
and a manifest interruption of justice.' Answer: The person we ordered to
be discharged, was an evidence attending by order of the house, and under
the protection of this house; who were only wanting to themselves, in not
sending the high-sheriff and lawyers to the same place, for daring to offer
so publick an affront to the representative body of a country.

"Fourthly, 'You have taken upon you to appoint one of your members to act
as clerk of the committee of the whole house, which you have no power to
do, &c.' Answer: Your excellency has been so very much mistaken in all the
foregoing clauses, that we have great reason to believe you are so in
this: This house has always, 'till of late, made their own clerks, and
your excellency cannot shew us any law why we may not do it still, should
we think fit to insist on it: We have made no encroachments on her
majesty's prerogative royal, nor never intended to do it, but shall to our
utmost, study to preserve it, and honourably support her government over
us, and hope your excellency will think it for the service of the queen to
comply with our reasonable desires; which will very much encourage us so
to do.

"Divers of the members of this assembly being of the people called
Quakers, do assent to the matter and substance, but make some exceptions
to the stile.

"By order of the house,

"Sam. Jenings, speaker.

"P. M. Die Veneris. 24
"Octobris, 1707."

1 Their message to introduce it he received, and the next day laid it
before the council, as follows: "The house of representatives having sent
a message to your excellency, to know when your excellency would be waited
upon with a reply this house has made to your excellency's answer to their
remonstrance; and your excellency having not, as is usual in such cases,
assigned them any time, they have appointed us to wait on your excellency
with the said reply, and to deliver it to you."



CHAP. XVIII.
Memorial of the West-Jersey proprietors residing in England, to the lords
commissioners for trade anel plantations; The lieutenant governor, with
some of the council, address the queen; The last meeting of assembly,
under Cornbury's administration; They continue their complaints; Samuel
Jenings's death and character.

The foregoing proceedings being by connection necessary together, has
delayed the following memorial a little out of course as to strict order
of time: The western proprietors residing in England, had much resented
Cornbury's treatment of the inhabitants, especially in relation to the
three members being kept out of the assembly, by which he gained a
majority devoted to his measures; and thus they complain:

"To the right honourable the lords commissioners for trade and plantations.

"The humble memorial of the proprietors of the Western division of the
province of New-Jersey, in America.

"We humbly acknowledge your lordships great justice, in making the terms
of our surrender of government, part of the lord Cornbury's instructions
relating to the said province; and heartily with his excellency had given
us occasion of acknowledging his due observation of the instruction,
instead of troubling your lordships with a complaint of his breach of
them, which we are fully assured from undoubted testimonies his excellency
has made in the following instances; and tho' he endeavours to palliate
his proceedings there, by frequently and publickly asserting, that your
lordships consented to no terms upon our surrender; yet were that as great
a truth as it is a mistake, and those instructions had been only of grace
and favour, we conceive him to be obliged, and ourselves intituled to his
punctual observation of them.

"It is one of the terms consented to by your lordships, and one of his
excellency's instructions from your lordships; that the general assembly
shall consist of four and twenty representatives; two to be chosen by the
inhabitants, housholders of the city or town of Perth-Amboy; two by the
inhabitants, housholders of the city or town of Burlington; ten to be
chosen by the freeholders of the eastern, and ten by the freeholders of
the western division; in which election, every elector is to have one
hundred acres of freehold land in his own right, within the division for
which he shall choose; and every person elected is to have one thousand
acres of freehold land in his own right, within the division for which he
shall be chosen.

"This instruction, which we relied on as the chief security of our estates
in that province, his excellency has not only violated, but has totally
destroyed that part of our constitution; and in such a manner as will
render all assemblies a meer piece of formality, and only the tools of
a governor's arbitrary pleasure.

"For setting which proceeding in a due light, we must crave leave to lay
before you lordships the account we have received of it from our agent,
and other reputable persons of that province.

"An assembly having been called and chosen, in the year 1703, pursuant to
your lordships instructions, prepared bllls for settling the rights of the
proprietors and planters, and for raising a revenue of thirteen hundred
pounds per annum, for three years, (which they knew was the utmost the
country could bear) for the support of the government; but his excellency
requiring a greater sum, several persons, our constant enemies and
invaders of our proprieties, and who therefore opposed the bill for
settling our rights, undertook to procure an assembly more obedient to
his excellency's demands; and by that and other arguments, which out of
regard to his honour, we choose to wave the mention of; prevailed upon
him to dissolve that assembly, and to call another to sit in November last;
the writs were issued, and the election directed to be made, in such haste,
that in one of the writs the qualifications of the persons to be elected
was omitted, and the sheriff of one county not sworn 'till three days
before the election, and many of the towns had not any (much less due)
notice of the day of election; but passing by these, and many other illegal
artifices used by those undertakers, to obtain an assembly to their own
humour; we shall insist only upon one grand instance, which is not to be
parrallel'd in any of her majesty's plantations, and could not have been
attempted without his excellency's encouragement, nor put in practice
without his concurrence.

"When this assembly was met, and attended his excellency in council, in
order to be sworn, Mr. Revell and Mr. Leeds, (two of the governor's
council, and of the undertakers to procure such an assembly as they had
promised) suspecting the strength of their party, objected against three
of the members, returned, as persons not having each, one thousand acres
of land, and therefore unqualified to serve in the assembly; though these
persons had such estates in land, and were generally known to have so, and
at the time of their election had convinced Revell and Leeds, who opposed
them under that pretence, of the truth of it; and this objection was not
examinable or determinable by his excellency or his council, or otherwise
than in the house of representatives, who are the only proper judges of
their own members; yet his excellency, upon this bare suggestion of Revel
and Leeds, refused to swear these members, and excluded them from sitting
to serve their country; this attempt was seconded by another trick of
Revell and Leeds, who immediately sent the following note to the house of
representatives.

" 'To the honourable the house of representatives.

" 'Gentlemen,

" 'We underwritten, supposing we had good reason to charge three of the
persons returned to serve as representatives in this general assembly; but
upon due consideration find it difficult to come to a true determination
thereof, until we can by further enquiry find the truth of what we have
been informed of; we therefore humbly desire fourteen days time further,
that we may be able more fully to inform this house therein, which we
humbly suppose at present cannot reasonably be expected from us; we
subscribe ourselves your humble supplicants,
" 'THOMAS REVELL.
" 'DANIEL LEEDS.' "
" 'Nov.15, 1704.' "

"The counties for which they were chosen to serve expressed a great
dissatisfaction at the exclusion of their members; and these and several
other representatives deliver'd an address to his excellency, for having
them admitted to their right; which met with no other reception, than
being called a piece of insolence and ill manners.

"By this exclusion of three members, and the contempt of the address for
their admission, the undertakers gained a majority by one in the house of
representatives, who adjourned the hearing of this case, until they had
reaped the fruits of their iniquity, and accomplished the ends for which
it was contrived; for whilst this case was depending, a bill for taking
away the qualifications of electors and the elected; and placing the
right of choosing and being chosen in the freeholders generally, without
any express value of their estates was prepared and pass'd, wherein there
is this remarkable and self condemning declaration of his excellency's
proceedings, viz. that representatives met in general assembly are and
shall be the judges of the qualifications of their own members.

"After this and one other act, which we shall hereafter take notice of in
its proper place, were passed, a day of hearing was allowed to the three
excluded members, and notice of it given to Revell and Leeds, who would
not vouchsafe to appear, but having already obtained their ends,
graciously signified by a message, their mistake in their objection to
those members.

"The house proceeded in the inquiry, and by deeds and other authentick
proofs, was so fully satisfied of the estates of the excluded members, and
that Revell and Leeds had been convinced thereof, at the time of their
elections, that the house unanimously declared them duly qualified, and
sent two of their body to acquaint his excellency of it, and to pray they
might be sworn; but his excellency, whether out of a desire of assuming
the glory of his arbitrary proceeding wholly to himself, or of making the
country sensible that notwithstanding the act so lately passed, declaring
the house judges of their own members; he was resolved to exercise that
power for the future; or for what other reason we know not, told those
messengers he must be satisfied of their qualifications, as well as the
house; and still keeps them out of the assembly.

"This we conceive to be the assuming a negative voice to the freeholders
election of their representatives; and such an invasion of the rights of
the assembly, as will, if tolerated or connived at, place the whole
legislature in the governor; for if he can, at his pleasure, reject
three representatives, he may reject all, and make what laws he thinks fit
without the formality of an assembly; but if this notorious violation of
our constitution had not been made by him, and the assembly had
consisted of it's full proportion of duly elected members; we conceive,
and are advised, that his excellency had no authority, nor any probable
colour from his instructions for passing this act; for though the
instruction relating to the election of general assembies, allows an
alteration by act of assembly, of the number of the representatives, and
the manner of their being elected; it leaves no power to the general
assembly to alter the qualifications of the electors or elected; which was
intended to be a standing and unalterable part of the constitution, as most
agreeable to the constitution of England, where the electors of knights of
the counties must have a certain fixed freehold; and the elected are
generally the principal landed men of their respective counties; but the
alteration now made, was intended to put the election of representatives
into the meanest of the people, who being impatient of any superiors,
will never fail to choose such from amongst themselves, as may oppress
us, and destroy our rights.

"It is another term of our surrender, and an instruction to his
excellency, that no act should be made to lay a tax upon unprofitable
lands; but his excellency has encouragd and assented to a bill in this last
assembly, for taxing (without distinction) all lands belonging to the
inhabitants there, and to all others not inhabiting there who have settled
any plantations, either by tenants, servants or negroes; it is objection
enough to this act, that there is no other colony in America wherin
uncultivated lands are taxed; and as this act was intended, so none more
effectual could have been contrived, to prejudice the country in general,
or the proprietors in particular; for if any man who has a thousand or
more acres of land, which he can neither manure nor sell (as most of the
first planters have) he must pay a tax for this land, which may eat up the
greatest part of the profit of what he can and does cultivate; or he must
desert the whole; and if we, who have great tracts of land of many
thousand acres to sell, lett or settle but a few acres to maintain our
agents or servants, we must pay a tax for all the residue which yields us
nothing: In consequence of this act several persons who had agreed with
our agent for lands, have renounced their bargains, and removed into other
countries, where they can purchase great tracts of land, preserve them for
their posterity to settle on and we, unless relieved from this oppression,
must deliver up our lands or our purses: This tax is imposed by the act
passed in the assembly for raising a revenue of two thousand pounds per
annum, for two years, for the support of her majesty's government within
that province; and we have great reason to believe it to be part of the
return promised by the undertakers to his excellency, for his dissolving
the former assembly, and curtailing the last of three members.

"It is another term of our surrender, and an instruction to his
excellency, that the surveyors and other persons appointed by us, for
surveying and recording the surveys of land granted and sold by us, shall
be permitted to execute their trusts; but his excellency has taken upon
him, even contrary to the advice of his council, to appoint fees for
patenting lands; which has created an opinion in the people, that the
power of granting lands is in him, has lessened the credit of our title to
lands, and encouraged the planters to dispute our right.

"His excellency has ordered all publick books, records and papers, to be
delivered by our late secretary to Mr. Bass, our great debtor, and
therefore our avowed enemy, and has carried our records of deeds and
conveyances out of the province; by this method the proprietors of both
the divisions are deprived of all means to justify their past
administration of the evidences of their grants of lands to the purchasers
under them, (all the surveys and patents being recorded in those books)
and will destroy the office of our register, or at least will disable him
to perform his duty in some cases; which by acts of general assembly he is
obliged to do.

"It is a further term of our surrender, and instructions to his
excellency, that all officers be appointed by advice of the council; but
his excellency has constituted several officers without such advice, and
particularly a sheriff of Burlington, who was therefore suspended by order
of council, and yet continued to act under his lordship's appointment.

"We are further informed, that his excellency hath put several mean and
contemptible persons into the commission of the peace, particularly one
***** whom he knew to be under prosecution for felony; and has given
commissions in the militia to others, who have no estate in the province,
and therefore are not like to be zealous in the defence of it.

"It is matter of some wonder to us, that after so many acts of despotic
power, his excellency did not assume to himself, or obtain from the last
assembly, an authority of licencing any persons to purchase lands from the
Indians; but condescends to apply to your lordships, for an alteration of
his instructions in that particular; there wants only the breach of this
instruction to compleat the ruin of our interests in New-Jersey, and we
humbly hope your lordships will not enable him to give that finishing
stroke: This instruction, founded upon the right which the crown of
England claims by the law of nations, to all countries discovered by
English subjects, was intended to assert that right against the pretences
of many planters, who set up the Indians title in competition with it; and
if that right be taken from the grantees of the crown, all patents and
grants of the whole main land of North-America, have been only royal
frauds, under the sanction of the great seal of England, and no man will
ever after purchase lands under that title.

"His excellency was lately so fully satisfied of the policy and
reasonableness of asserting this right to the crown and its grantees, that
in the year 1703, he recommended, and assented to an act of assembly,
for restraining all persons besides the proprietors, from purchasing lands
from the Indians, under great penalties; and for vacating all such
purchases formerly made, unless the purchasers took a fresh grant from
the proprietors; of which act we humbly pray your lordships perusal.

"We are purchasers for ready money, under a grant from king Charles the
second, and are willing to sell our lands and the Indians title to it, at
reasonable rates, according to the goodness of the soil and situation and
ought not to be compelled to accept a quit-rent (much less a quit-rent to
be let by other persons than ourselves as his excellency proposes) instead
of selling for ready money; nor ought our properties to be at the disposal
of a governor: Tis not the want of a power in the planters to purchase
lands from the Indians, but the taxing of uncultivated lands, and
overturning the constitution for assembly-men, that has occasioned those
persons mentioned by his excellency, to remove to Pennsylvania and other
colonies.

"May it please your lordships,

"The usage we have received from his excellency, is so contrary to the
terms of our surrender of government, to the assurances we had from your
lordships, of the due observance of them, and to the plain instructions
given by your lordships to his excellency; that we humbly hope, it will
not be thought any immodesty or want of duty in us, to protest, as we
protest against all the proceedings of the last assembly, wherein by the
arbitrary exclusion of three members without any just exception, the
country was not duly represented, and to beg your lordships intercession
with her majesty, that the acts passed in that assembly may not be
confirmed by her royal assent.

"We further pray, that colonel Lewis Morris, who has been a second time
suspended from his place in council, by his excellency, only for using the
freedom which every member of the council is entitled to, and ought to
exercise, of opposing any bill brought before them, if he conceives it
prejudicial to the interest either of the country in general, or of any
particular persons, may be restored; and that your lordships will please
to place in the room of such as are dead, some of the persons following,
viz. Mr. Miles Foster, Mr. Richard Townley, Mr. Hugh Huddy, Mr. William
Hall and Mr. John Harrison, who are men of known integrity and estates;
and as a further security of ou estates there, and that no persons may at
any time be admitted of the governors council, or to be in the commission
of the peace, or of the militia, but such who have real estates in the
province suitable to their stations, and who reside there.

"Signed by Thomas Lane, Paul Dominique, John Bridges, Rob. Mitchel, Tho.
Burrow, Fra. Mitchel, Eben. Jones, Jos. Broosbank, John Norton, Jo.
Bennet, E. Richier, Tho. Skinner, Rich. Greenaway, Jos. Collins, Cha.
Mitchel, Jos. Micklethwait, Tho. Lewes, Wm. Snelling." Two days after
Cornbury had refused to receive the assembly's reply, he sent for them,
and though several important bills were unfinish'd, adjournd the house
to the spring next year: Not receiving the reply in form, he escaped the
necessity of attempting to clear up what he could not do with justice or
equity: Some of the glaring facts still confirm'd the truth of the charges
against him, he thought he had a more effectual way of dealing; that was,
to lodge a complaint with the queen; aecordingly by an underhand artifice,
his trusty friend the lieut. governor Ingoldsby, with some of the council,
signed and privately transmitted an address, as follows:

"To the Queen's most excellent majesty.

"The humble address of the lieutenant governor and council of Nova-
Caesaria or New-Jersey, in America.

"May it please your majesty;

"We the lieutenant governor and council of your majesty's province of Nova-
Caesaria or New-Jersey, having seriously and deliberately taken into
consideration the proceedings of the present assembly or representative
body of this province, thought our selves bound, both in duty and
conscience, to testify to your majesty, our dislike and abhorrence of the
same; being very sensible, that the unaccountable humours and pernicious
designs of some particular men, have put them upon so many irregularities,
with intention only to occasion divisions and distractions, to the
disturbance of the great and weighty affairs which both your majesty's
honour and dignity as well as the peace and welfare of the country
required; their high encroachments upon your majesty's prerogative royal;
notorious violations of the rights and liberties of the subjects; manifest
interruptions of justice, and most unmannerly treatment of his excellency
the lord Cornbury, would have induced us sooner to have discharged our
duty to your majesty, in giving a full representation of the unhappy
circumstances of this your majesty's province and government; had we not
been in hopes that his excellency the lord Cornbury's full and ample
answer to a most scandalous libel, called the remonstrance of the assembly
of Nova Casaria or New-Jersey, which was delivered to the governor by the
assembly at Burlington in May last, would have opened the eyes of the
assembly, and brought them back to their reason and duty; but finding that
those few turbulent and uneasy spirits in the assembly, have still been
able to influence and amuse the judgments of many well-meaning men in that
body; as appears by another late scandalous and infamous libel, called,
'The reply of the house of representatives of the province of New-Jersey,
to an answer made by his excellency Edward viscount Cornbury, governor of
the said province, to the humble remonstrance of the aforesaid house:'
We are now obliged humbly to represent to your majesty, the true cause,
which we conceive may lead to the remedy of these confusions.

"The first is owing to the turbulent, factious, uneasy, and disloyal
pnnciples of two men in that assembly, Mr. Lewis Morris, and Samuel
Jenings, a quaker; men notoriously known to be uneasy under all
government; men never known to be consistent with themselves; men to whom
all the factions and confusions in the government of New-Jersey and
Pennsylvania for many years are wholly owing; men that have had the
confidence to declare in open council, that your majesty's instructions
to your governors in these provinces, shall not oblige or bind them, nor
will they be concluded by them, further than they are warranted by the
law, of which also they will be the judges; and this is done by them, (as
we have all the reason in the world to believe) to encourage not only this
government, but also the rest of your governments in America, to throw
off your majesty's royal prerogative, and consequently to involve all your
dominions in this part of the world, and the honest, good and well-meaning
people in them, in confusion, hoping thereby to obtain their wicked
purposes.

"The remedy for all these evils, we most humbly propose, is, that your
majesty will most graciously please to discountenance those wicked
designing men, and shew some dislike to this assembly's proceedings, who
are resolved neither to support this your majesty's government by a
revenue, nor take care to defend it by settling a militia: The last libel,
called "the reply, &c." came out so suddenly, that as yet we have not; had
time to answer it in all its particulars; but do assure your majesty it is
for the most part false in fact, and that part of it which carries any
face of truth, they have been malicious and unjust in not mentioning the
whole truth; which would have fully justified my lord Cornbury's just
conduct.

"Thus, having discharged this part of our duty, which we thought at
present incumbent upon us, we beg leave to assure your majesty, that
whenever we shall see the people of this province labour under any thing
like a grievance; we shall, according to our duty, immediately apply to
the governor, with our best advice for the redress of it; and we have no
reason yet to doubt of a ready compliance in him; we shall not be
particular, but crave leave to refer to his excellency's representation of
them to the right honourable the lords commissioners for trade and
plantations.

"The strenous asserting of your majesty's prerogative royal, and
vindicating the honour of your governor the lord Cornbury, will in our
humble opinion, be so absolutely necessary at this juncture, that without
your so doing, your majesty will find yourself deceived either in
expectation of a revenue for support of the government, or militia for its
defence.

"In hopes your majesty will take these important things into your
consideration, and his excellency the lord Cornbury, with all the members
of your majesty's council, into your royal favour and protection. We shall
conclude with our most fervent prayers to the most high, to lengthen your
days, and encrease your glories; and that ourselves in particular, and all
others in general, who reap the benefit of your majesty's most gentle and
happy government, may be, and ever continue the most loyal and dutiful of
subjects to the most glorious and best of queens.

"Rich. Ingololsby, William Pinhorme, R. Mompeson, Thomas Revell, Daniel
Leeds, Daniel Coxe, Richard Townley, Rob. Quarry, William Sandford."

On the 5th of the month called May, this year, [1708] the assembly met at
Burlington: Jenings their speaker being indisposed, Thomas Gordon was chose
to sueceed him: They received the speech; and delivered their address the
12th; which containing the old story of grievances, so displeased the
governor, that he immediately adjournd them to the September following, to
meet at Amboy, but in the interval dissolved them and being himself soon
after superseded, he met them no more; the business of the last session
began by his telling them in his speech. It was the great desire he had to
see the service of the queen, and good of the province carried on,
supported and provided for, that induced him to call them together; to
prepare and pass such laws as were proper; and that he might not be
wanting in his duty, he should point out what he thought required their
immediate notice; the first was a bill for support of government; that the
revenue the queen expected was £.1500, per annum, to continue 21 years;
next the reviving or re-enacting the militia bill, which was likely soon
to expire; that he had every session since he had been governor,
recommended the passing a bill or bills for confirming the right and
property of the soil of the province to the general proprietors, according
to their respective rights and titles; as also to settle and confirm the
particular titles and estates of all the inhabitants of the province, and
others, claiming under the proprietors; that he was still of opinion, such
a bill would best conduce to the improvement, as well as peace and quiet
of the province; that he had last year recommended the passing of bills
for erecting and repairing prisons and court houses in the different
counties, the building of bridges in places where they were wanting, by
general tax; and as late experience had taught the necessity of settling
the qualifications of jurymen, he desired they would prepare bills for
these purposes; and revive such of the acts of assembly passed in the time
of the proprietary government as would be of use, that they might be
presented for the queen's approbation.

The assembly in their address on this occasion, declare, they then were,
and always had been ready and desirous to support the government to the
utmost of their poor abilities; that they were heartily sorry for the
misunderstanding between the governor and them; that about twelve months
ago they had humbly represented to him, some of the many grievances their
country laboured under; most of which they were sorry to say, yet
remained, and daily increased; that they found the queen's good subjects
of the province were continually prosecuted by informations, upon
frivolous pretences, which rendered that excellent constitution of grand
juries useless; and if continued, would put it in the power of an attorney
general, to raise his fortune upon the ruin of his country.

That they found it a great charge to the country, that juries and evidences
were brought from remote parts of the province, to the supreme courts at
Burlington and Amboy; that it was a great grievance that the practice of
the law was so precarious, that innocent persons were prosecuted upon
informations, and actions brought against several of the queen's subjects,
in which the gentlemen licensed to practice the law, were afraid to appear
for them; or if they appeared, did not discharge their duty to their
clients, for fear of being suspended, without being convict of any crime
deserving it, or reason assigned; as was done at Burlington, in May last,
to the damage of many of the queen's good subjects. That they found the
representatives of this her majesty's province so slighted, and their
commands so little regarded, that the clerk of the crown had refused to
issue a writ for the electing a member wanting in their house; they hoped
he would consider, and remove these and many other inconveniencies and
grievances that the province labor'd under; which would enable them to
exert the utmost of their abilities, in supporting her majesty's
government, and would make them happy under the mild and meek
administration of a great and glorious queen; that they doubted not, were
her majesty rightly informed of the poverty and circumstances of their
country, and that their livelyhoods depended upon the seasons of the year;
their most gracious sovereign would pity their condition, and never expect
the settlement of any support of government, further than from one year to
another.

That they found the present militia bill so great a grievance to their
country, they could never think of reviving or re-enacting it, as it now
was; though they were heartily willing to provide for the defence of their
country, which they hoped might be done with greater ease to the people;
that they had been, and still were endeavouring to answer her majesty's
commands, in confirming the right and property of the soil of the province
to the general proprietors, according to their respective rights and
titles; and likewise to confirm and settle the particular titles and
estates of all the inhabitants, and other purchasers, claiming under the
proprietors; but tho' they had several times met in general assembly, they
had not opportunity to perfect it; they acknowledge the favour of being
put in mind of providing prisons, court-houses, and bridges, where such
were wanting, which they should take into consideration.

That they had a bill for settling the qualifications of juries, prepared
last sitting at Amboy, and should now present it; and thanking him for
reminding them of reviving their former laws; say, they had before
appointed a committee for that end; but were impeded by Bass, the
secretary, positively refusing to let them have the perusal of them; and
that as they had always used their utmost endeavour in the faithful
service of the queen, and for the benefit of the country; so they should
still continue to do it with all the dispatch they were capable of. Here
we part with lord Cornbury's administration.1

Here also we part with his opponent S. Jenings; his indisposition continued
about twelve mouths, and then finished his life: His many services have
occasioned him to be often mentioned: His profession of religion was that
of the people called quakers; he was early an approved minister among
them, and so continued to his death; common opinion, apt to limit this
sphere of action, will however allow general rules to have their
exceptions, as instances now and then, though perhaps but rarely, occur,
where variety of talents have united in the same individual, and yet not
interfered; such, the accounts of those times (stripp'd of the local
uncertainties of faction and party) tell us, was the circumstance with
regard to Jenings; that his authority, founded on experienc'd candour,
probity, and abilities, enlarged opportunities, rendered him not in one
capacity or to one society only, but generally useful: It is mentioned,
that he was of an obliging, affectionate disposition, yet of a hasty warm
temper; that he notwithstanding managed it with circumspection and
prudence, so that few occasions escaped to the disadvantage of his
character, or of any cause he engaged in; that he saw the danger to which
his natural impetuosity exposed him; knew his preservation lay in a close
attention to his cooler prospects, and diligently guarding in that spot,
experienced the benefit in many trying events; that his integrity and
fortitude in all statious, were acknowledged; that his judgment was the
rule of his conduct, and by what can now be gathered, this seems to have
been but seldom injudiciously founded; that alive to the more generous
emotions of a mind formd to benevolence and acts of humanity, he was a
friend to the widow, the fatherless and the unhappy; tender,
compassionate, disinterested, and with great opportunities left but a
small estate; that abhorring oppression in every shape, his whole conduct
discover'd a will to relieve and befriend mankind, far above the
littleness of party or sinister views; that his sentiments of right and
liberty, were formed on the revolution establishment, a plan successfully
adapted to the improvement of a new country, or any country; that he was
notwithstanding all this sometimes thought stiff and impracticable, but
chiefly on account of his political attachments; yet that there were
instances, where better knowledge of his principles, and the sincerity
with which he acted, totally effaced those impressions, and left him
friends where none were expected: Much of his time, we have seen, was long
devoted to the publick, with a will to be useful, occasious were not
wanting; West-Jersey and Pennsylvania,2 and New-Jersey after the
surrender, for near twenty eight years successively, were repeated
witnesses of his conduct in various capacities; he studied peace, and the
welfare of mankind; but in some instances met with ungrateful returns; and
tho' his endeavours did not altogether succeed to his mind, he survived
personal accusation, in a great measure, with respect to himself; and as
to the publick, just lived long enough to see it emerging from an
unpromising state of litigation and controversy, to more quiet than had
been known for many years: His three daughters, (who were all the children
he left) intermarried with three brothers, of the name of Stephenson,
whose posterity now reside in New-Jersey and Pennsylvania.3

In the latter end of this year [1708] was a new return of members of
assembly; their names were:

For the Eastern division:Thomas Gordon, speaker; Thomas Farmer, Elisha
Parker, John Royse, John Harrison, Benjamin Lyon, Gershom Mott, Elisha
Lawrence, John Trent, William Morris, Enoch Machelsen, Eldridge.

For the Western division: Thomas Gardiner, Thomas Raper, Hugh Sharp,
Nathaniel Cripps, John Kay, John Kaighn, Richard Johnson, Nathaniel
Breading, Hugh Middleton, John Lewis

This assembly met, but upon the new governor's arrival, was dissolved.

1 At a council held at Amboy, 28th of March, 1708. The petition of Edward
viscount Cornbury, late governor of this province; setting forth, that he
had due to him, sundry sums of money, for which he desired warrants, to
enable him, if the revenue of this province was not able to pay the same,
he might demand the same of her majesty, was read, and dismissed.

"Lord Cornbury, (says a writer, well informd in his character) was no less
obnoxious to the people of New-Jersey, than to those of New-York: The
assembly of that province, impatient of his tyranny, drew up a complaint
against him, which they sent home to the queen.

"Her majesty graciously listened to the cries of her injur'd subjects,
divested him of his power, and appointed lord Lovelace in his stead;
declaring, that she would not countenance her nearest relations in
oppressing her people.

"As soon as my lord was superceded, his creditors threw him into the
custody of the sheriff of New-York; and he remained there 'till the death
of his father, when succeeding to the earldom of Clarendon, he returned to
England.

"We never had a governor so universally detested, nor any who so richly
deserved the publick abhorrence; in spite of his noble descent, his
behaviour was trifling, mean and extravagant.

"It was not uncommon for him to dress himself in a woman's habit, and then
to patrole the fort in which be resided; such freaks of low humour exposed
him to the universal contempt of the people; but their indignation was
kindled by his despotick rule, savage bigotry, insatiable avarice and
injustice, not only to the publick, but even his private creditors; for he
left some of the lowest tradesmen in his employment unsatisfied in their
just demands." Hist. of New-York, p. 116. He died in 1723. See notes in
the Art. Law. Hyde, E. of Rochester, Biogr. Brit.

2 He lived some years, and bore several important offices in Pennsylvania.

3 See various accounts herein, beginning A.D. 1680.