Page 208

THE politics of thirteen small communities united to each other only by their common dependence on the mother-country hardly offered an adequate field for the larger kind of statesmanship. The governor's position gave him, of course, a certain opportunity for leadership, but he was mainly confined within the limits of his particular province. Still more distinctly was this true of the popular leaders. Nevertheless, a few efficient governors showed in their restricted field some of the elements of true statesmanship; and among the colonists there were some aggressive and intelligent champions of the popular will.

Probably none of the provincial governors had on the whole so interesting a personality or gave so much evidence of political foresight as Alexander Spotswood, who, with the title of lieutenant-governor, was the actual head of the Virginia administration from 1710 to 1722. Spotswood was a Scotchman by descent, but was born in Tangier, where his father was stationed as an army surgeon.

Page 209

Like several other royal governors of the time, he had had an important military experience, having held the rank of colonel under Marlborough in the Blenheim campaign; yet when he began his career in Virginia he was not quite thirty-five.

From the beginning of his service as governor, Spotswood showed remarkable energy, public spirit, and breadth of interest. He was an active patron of William and Mary College, concerned himself seriously with the supply of ministers for the Virginia parishes, and corresponded with the bishop of London about the best method of improving the general position of the clergy.

Spotswood was also deeply interested in the economic development of his province. Much of the credit for breaking up piracy belongs to him. He also saw the value of the iron-mines, and may be regarded as the founder of the iron industry in Virginia. In its interest he secured from the assembly liberal legislation for the encouragement of German settlers, and tried also to enlist the aid of the home government. His largeness of view was perhaps most clearly shown in the emphasis which he laid upon western exploration. He believed that the French plan of connecting Canada with the Mississippi might be thwarted by pushing the English settlements westward along the line of the James River. A few months after his arrival he sent out an exploring company to the mountains, and in 1706 he personally led an expedition over

Page 210

the Blue Ridge. Two years later he urged upon the English government the desirability of an establishment on Lake Erie.

With all his strong qualities Spotswood was unfortunate in his relations with his associates in the provincial government. He found a local aristocracy strongly intrenched in the council and accustomed to political control. His plans for a reform of the land administration were contrary to their interests and prejudices, and he asserted his prerogative as governor in ways which seemed to encroach upon their constitutional privileges. He also antagonized James Blair, the commissary of the bishop of London. These difficulties were partially overcome, but he was soon after removed from office.

He then retired to his country place at Germanna, on the Rapidan, where he engaged, on a considerable scale, in the manufacture of iron. Here he was visited in later years by his former antagonist in the council, William Byrd, who wrote a charming account of the Spotswood establishment. His public career was not, however, completely closed. As governor he already had done what he could towards the development of the colonial postal system under the act of 1710; and in 1730 he became deputy postmaster-general for America. Finally, on the outbreak of the Spanish war, he received the rank of major-general, and at the age of sixty-four was actively engaged in the work of

Page 211

gathering the colonial forces for an expedition against Carthagena, when his long and varied life was suddenly ended in 1740. His career, taken as a whole, is an admirable example of a royal official identifying himself with American life and sincerely devoted to the solution of its problems.[*]

[* Spotswood, Official Letters, passim, esp. I., Introd., 4-13, 18-42, 163 et seq., II., 70, 295 et seq., 305 et seq.; Bassett, Writings of William Byrd, Introd., 355 et seq.]

Two years before Spotswood's retirement from the Virginia governorship, William Burnet began a short but eventful service in America as governor of New York. Burnet was not so strong nor so picturesque a personality as Spotswood; but the two men were alike in watchful care for English interests in the continental rivalry with France, in zealous assertion of their prerogatives against rival elements in the government, and in the unfortunate antagonisms which marred their official service. William Burnet was a son of Bishop Gilbert Burnet, the famous counsellor of William and Mary and a leading personage in church and state. The son had a university education at Cambridge, supplemented by study abroad, and during his residence in America was recognized as a gentleman of refined and scholarly tastes. Before his appointment as governor he had been in the customs service and had suffered from some unfortunate speculations. In 1720 he succeeded Robert Hunter as governor of New York and held that office until 1728, when his difficulties

Page 212

with the opposing faction became so serious that he was transferred to the government of Massachusetts, which he held until his death in the following year.

Burnet's American career is chiefly notable for two things: his far-sighted policy for the promotion of English influence in the region of the Great Lakes and among the western Indians; and his constitutional conflict with the Massachusetts assembly on the salary issue. Before coming to New York, Burnet had conferred with his predecessor, Hunter, and acquired some knowledge of American conditions. On his arrival he accepted as one of his expert advisers on provincial policy the famous Cadwallader Colden, best known for his History of the Five Indian Nations; and in accordance with Colden's views he adopted two important measures of policy. One was the establishment of a British trading-post and fort at Oswego on Lake Ontario. In 1726 he secured a small appropriation from the assembly for this purpose, but was obliged to supplement this amount by advances from his own purse, for which he was never fully repaid. Burnet hoped that this would prove the foundation of an important English trade with the western Indians, an expectation which seemed to be justified by the attitude of the French, who regarded the new post as a serious menace to their interests and demanded, though without success, that it should be given up.

Page 213

Burnet also sought to check the trade between Albany and Canada, on the ground that it supplied the French with European goods which they used in the Indian trade. Thus, Burnet argued, the merchants were playing directly into the hands of their French rivals. He secured the passage of several acts of assembly prohibiting or restricting this trade, but the opposition at Albany was so strong as to prevent strict enforcement; and several of these provincial measures were disallowed by the crown.

The salary dispute in Massachusetts has already been considered.[*] In this episode, as in his measures relating to Oswego, Burnet showed remarkable steadiness in the face of opposition, and commendable readiness to make financial sacrifices in support of what seemed to him a sound public policy. It may, however, be open to question whether more tact and judgment in dealing with men might not have given him greater success in administration.[**]

[* See above, p. 196.]
[** N. Y. Docs. Rel. to Col. Hist., V., passim; Smith, New York (ed. of 1792), 167 et seq.]

Burnet's place in the governorship of Massachusetts and New Hampshire was taken by Jonathan Belcher, who served for about eleven years. Unlike Spotswood and Burnet, Belcher was a provincial by birth and early training, coming from a mercantile family in Boston and graduating from Harvard College. He had, however, seen something

Page 214

of the outside world, not only in England but in continental Europe, and on his return he took an important place among the merchants and politicians of Boston. His correspondence shows the frequent use of religious phrases after the Puritan manner, with some suggestion of sanctimoniousness.

For many years Belcher was known as a "prerogative" man; but during Burnet's controversy with the assembly on the salary question he identified himself with the opposition, and was presently sent to England as provincial agent to secure a modification of the governor's instructions. The home government refused to yield; but soon afterwards Burnet died and Belcher was sent as his successor, apparently on the theory that he would be more successful in bringing the assembly to terms.

As governor, Belcher had the reputation of being showy in his manner of life, unusually masterful in his dealings with the council, and much inclined to use his power of appointment and removal for personal and political purposes. Though at first popular with both the previously existing parties, he drifted into controversies which aroused bitter an tagonism. On the salary question his instructions were drastic enough; but, on the failure of all attempts at compromise, he finally secured the consent of the Board of Trade to the practical surrender which has already been recorded.[*] On some important

[* See above, p. 197.]

Page 215

issues, however, Belcher held his ground, and during his administration the house was obliged to give up the practice of issuing money from the treasury by simple resolutions. He also held out firmly against new issues of paper money in Massachusetts.

Near the end of his term, Belcher earned his chief title to fame by his fight against the Land Bank party, which then controlled the house of representatives. All persons prominently identified with the bank he marked out for political ostracism, rejecting, in 1740, the speaker chosen by the house, and thirteen councillors, besides removing a number of administrative officers. In the fight for sound money, Belcher had the support of the mercantile interests; but by this time there was a formidable combination of dissatisfied elements. The assembly of New Hampshire was convinced that he had not dealt fairly with that province in its recent boundary controversy with Massachusetts, and charged him with having been influenced by a considerable grant of money made to him by the Massachusetts assembly while the controversy was pending. Various political devices were used against him; and in 1741 he was removed in favor of William Shirley, who was to become so prominent a figure in the last two wars with the French.

Belcher's removal from his New England governments did not close permanently his political career,

Page 216

for he was afterwards appointed governor of New Jersey, where he helped to found Princeton College. In New England he left an unfortunate impression of indirect dealing, insincerity, and self-seeking.[*]

[* Hutchinson, Hist. of Mass. Bay (ed. of 1795), II., 318, 323, 329, 331 et seq.; Belcher Papers (Mass. Hist. Soc., Collections, V., VI.)]

Sir William Keith, the proprietary governor of Pennsylvania (1717-1724), may be taken as a good example of the demagogue in the governor's office. Keith was a Scotchman who had previously served as surveyor-general of customs for the king. Throughout his administration he was notoriously negligent in the observance of his instructionsa serious matter for the proprietors, under the Pennsylvania constitution, which left legislation wholly in the hands of the governor and the representatives. Efforts were made to check him by stringent instructions, requiring him to approve no bill without the consent of a majority of the council. Keith then appealed openly to the people against the proprietary instructions, but this was more than the proprietors would tolerate and he was soon removed.

After his removal Keith entered the assembly and attempted the rôle of opposition leader, apparently with the purpose of breaking down the proprietary government. He subsequently returned to England, where he was consulted by the Board of Trade as an expert on colonial questions. Keith's lack of trustworthiness in private as well as public

Page 217

relations has been recorded for all time by Franklin in his Autobiography; but Franklin, from the point of view of a popular leader, thought that Keith had in the main given good service as governor, especially in the passage of desirable legislation.[*]

[* Shepherd, Proprietary Government in Pa., passim; Proud, Pennsylvania, II., 178 et seq.; Franklin, Works (Bigelow's ed.), I., 76, 83-87; N. J. Docs. Rel. to Col. Hist., V., 245.]

The elective governors of Rhode Island and Connecticut were officers of a wholly different type; for they were themselves of the people, chosen representatives of their neighbors. Their authority was closely limited by the charters, and in theory they were little more than the first among the councillors. Yet as spokesmen for the people in negotiations with the neighboring colonies and with the home government they had important parts to play.

During the first half of the eighteenth century these little republics showed remarkable steadiness in their treatment of their political leaders. Governor Cranston, of Rhode Island, was elected year after year for twenty-eight years; and from 1707 to 1741 Connecticut had only two governors, both of whom died in office. One of these Connecticut governors was Joseph Talcott, whose tenure of office covered the seventeen years from 1724 to 1741; and his career is of interest not because it showed any remarkable statesmanship, but because it is that of a characteristic republican leader.

Page 218

Talcott belonged to one of the old and prominent families of Connecticut, but he had little education of an academic kind. Before becoming governor, however, he served a varied apprenticeship in public employments; first, in the town of Hartford as selectman or townsman, then successively as representative in the assembly, assistant, and deputy-governor. Besides his legislative and executive responsibilities he held various judicial positions extending from that of justice of the peace to judge of the superior court. He performed his share of military service in defending the colony against the Indians, and was also active in the Hartford church. Talcott may therefore be regarded as a typical public servant.

The period of his governorship brought many perplexing problems, some of which involved the essential principles of the Connecticut constitution. During the early years he was engaged in somewhat vexatious correspondence with New York and Rhode Island regarding boundary disputes, but these were settled during his term of office. More serious and perplexing were his relations with the home government. In 1728 came the news that in the case of Winthrop vs. Lechmere, carried on appeal from the colonial courts, the Privy Council had declared invalid the Connecticut law distributing the property of intestates among the heirs.[*] The enforcement of such a decision would have caused

[* Thayer, Cases in Constitutional Law, I., 34-40.]

Page 219

great confusion in the colony, and during the remainder of his life a large part of Talcott's correspondence with the Connecticut agents was made up of arguments in favor of maintaining the long-established local usage. The final issue did not appear until after Talcott's death, when the Privy Council by its decision in the new case of Clarke vs. Toucey, in 1745, practically abandoned the position taken in Winthrop vs. Lechmere.

These negotiations were peculiarly difficult because all communications with the English government served to direct attention to the somewhat exceptional and anomalous position of Connecticut under the charter. It was noted that her laws were not subject to disallowance like those of most colonies, and that there were not the necessary securities for an exact enforcement of the navigation acts. From time to time there was talk of radical parliamentary action, and of a remodelling of the charter, which at the best would place Connecticut on a footing somewhat like that of Massachusetts. In dealing with these threatening proposals, Talcott showed himself diplomatic as well as firm, making minor concessions when necessary, but holding fast in essentials and constantly defending his people from the charges of insubordination and disloyalty.[*]

[* Talcott Papers (Conn. Hist. Soc., Collections, IV., V.), esp. I., chaps. xvii-xviii., 53, 64, 89, 114, 217-229, II., 75-97; cf. Andrews in Yale Review, III., 261-294.]

The constitutional controversies of the provincial

Page 220

governments brought out a few men of real capacity for parliamentary leadership. In the south two such leaders may be mentioned, Charles Pinckney, of South Carolina, and Daniel Dulany the elder, of Maryland. Pinckney was a native South-Carolinian who had been educated in England. On his return he soon took a prominent place as a lawyer, and in 1732 became attorney-general of the province. He held that position, however, only for a short time, and presently became a member of the "Commons House of Assembly," serving as speaker from 1736 to 1740. Though a man of considerable wealth, he identified himself with the house in its struggle with the council for exclusive control of money bills. Before he became speaker he draughted some important resolutions on this subject which were adopted by the house and which claimed for the latter in this respect all the powers of the English Commons. The resolutions were strongly worded throughout and ended with this notable paragraph:

"Resolved, That after the Estimate is closed and added to any Tax Bill, that no additions can or ought to be made thereto, by any other Estate or Power whatsoever, but by and in the Commons House of Assembly."

Pinckney showed himself a man of unusually liberal views by claiming equal rights for Protestant dissenters and entering his protest on the journals against a bill to impose upon them as members of

Page 221

the assembly an objectionable form of oath. He belonged to the second generation of a strong South Carolina family, several of whom played important parts in the later struggle for independence and nationality.[*]

[* McCrady, South Carolina under Royal Government, 173-175, 279; Smith, South Carolina, 116, 296 et seq., 412, 415.]

Dulany was active in the Maryland assembly at nearly the same time. Beginning his career in America as a poor Irish immigrant, he became a considerable landholder and founded an important Maryland family. Like Pinckney, he had a high reputation as a lawyer, being considered in his day the best lawyer in the province.

The chief constitutional question with which Dulany concerned himself was that of the applicability of English statutes in Maryland. Dulany, though holding the office of attorney-general, was also a member of the lower house and accepted the popular theory that the colonists were entitled to all the benefits of English statutes. In 1724 he led the house in demanding that judges should swear to do justice "according to the laws, statutes, and reasonable customs of England and the acts of assembly and usage of this province of Maryland."

The proprietors stubbornly resisted this view, and prolonged parliamentary struggles ensued with a series of able state papers from the lower house, usually draughted by Dulany, who was chairman of the

Page 222

committee on laws. He also wrote a pamphlet in defence of the assembly's position, entitled "The Right of the Inhabitants of Maryland to the Benefit of the English Laws," which doubtless helped to raise the public excitement to the point described by Governor Ogle in 1731, when he wrote that the country was "as hot as possible about the English statutes and the judge's oath." The controversy ended in a compromise which, though not determining the question with precision, was nevertheless regarded as a victory for the lower house. Yet Dulany objected when Bishop Gibson's commissary undertook to apply the same principle to ecclesiastical law and custom.

Dulany subsequently became a councillor and one of the governor's supporters, though he showed his moderation by helping to bring about a reduction of officers' fees. Like Pinckney, he had a distinguished son, Daniel Dulany the younger, who took a prominent part on the colonial side in the great Stamp-Act debate of 1765.[*]

[* Mereness, Maryland, 114-116, 122, 180, 270, 275, 449; Sioussat, Economics and Politics in Maryland, and English Statutes in Maryland (Johns Hopkins University Studies, XXI., Nos. 6, 7, 11, 12).]

Pinckney and Dulany, though parliamentary leaders of the popular party, allied themselves at one time or another with the administration and held important appointments. The middle colonies produced a similar personage in Lewis Morris,

Page 223

of New York and New Jersey, a severe critic of arbitrary government during Governor Cosby's administration, but a man of aristocratic temperament, who afterwards became a royal governor himself and was involved in the usual constitutional controversies with his assembly.

One of the most representative leaders of provincial democracy was Andrew Hamilton, of Pennsylvania, who is notable also because of the intercolonial range of his influence. Hamilton's public career began in the Maryland assembly, and in 1715 a committee of which he was a member framed a code for that province which "remained the law, with little change," during the rest of the colonial era. Already, however, Hamilton had an important practice in Pennsylvania, and in 1717 he became attorney-general of that province. A few years later he entered the assembly, was for several years its speaker, and in 1739 made a valedictory speech in which he congratulated the province on its comparatively democratic forms of government, with officers generally elected by the people or their representatives, and an assembly which sat upon its own adjournments "when we please and as long as we think necessary."

The most memorable incident of his life took place in another province when, in the trial already mentioned, he argued before Chief-Justice De Lancey, of New York, the case of John Peter Zenger. That speech is significant not merely as an incident in

Page 224

the history of the struggle for freedom of the press; but also as a recognition of political principles held in common by Americans of the provincial era.[*]

[* Steiner, in Am. Hist. Assoc., Annual Report, 1899, pp. 251, 260; Proud, Pennsylvania, II., 217.]

In Massachusetts the most important radical leaders of the early eighteenth century were the two Elisha Cookes, father and son, whose careers taken together cover about half a century of provincial politics. The importance of the elder Cooke as an opposition leader has already been noted, and his son was equally conspicuous in the constitutional controversies of the early Georgian period. In 1718 the younger Cooke defended in the house of representatives the right of the colonists to cut pine-trees on their own estates, notwithstanding the prohibition of the royal surveyor of the woods. The house supported him, and in 1720 showed its defiant spirit by electing him as speaker. Governor Shute met the challenge by vetoing the election, and the quarrel which followed prevented the transaction of business during that session. The next house chose another speaker; but Cooke retained his leadership, and the governor, though afterwards sustained in principle by the explanatory charter of 1725, was forced to leave the province.

During Burnet's administration Cooke pursued his father's policy of insisting upon temporary grants; and though under Belcher, to whom he was

Page 225

more friendly, he was willing to make some concessions, he refused to yield the essential principle at issue. The historian Hutchinson, who was just beginning his public career as Cooke's drew to a close, said that he had "the character of a fair and open enemy," and remarked on his unusual success during the earlier part of his career in "keeping the people steady in applause of his measures."[*]

[* Hutchinson, Hist. of Mass. Bay, II., 200, 211, 293, 335, 351.]

During the second quarter of the eighteenth century a few men were rising into prominence who were to play still larger parts in the revolutionary era. In Massachusetts, Thomas Hutchinson, as a representative from Boston in the general court, was already a leader in the fight for sound money against the Land Bank and paper-money faction, and was urging, without effect at first, but with final success, the redemption of the currency in specie. Then, as in later years, he showed his readiness to resist a strong popular movement which seemed to him mistaken.[*]

[* Davis, Currency and Banking in Mass. Bay, II., 168-189; Hutchinson, Hist. of Mass. Bay, II., 352 et seq.]

Franklin also had begun his long and varied career of public service. Born in Boston, he had while still a boy assisted his brother in publishing the New England Courant, and thus seen something of party politics in Massachusetts. His stay in England from 1724 to 1726 gave him a broader

Page 226

knowledge of the world than most of his contemporaries, and before he was twenty he had made the acquaintance of some of the most prominent men of his time both in England and America. In 1729, at the age of twenty-three, he took charge of the Pennsylvania Gazette, which soon became the principal paper of the province; and three years later came the first issue of Poor Richard's Almanac. During these early years he showed that combination of business shrewdness with public spirit which was to distinguish him through life. Before 1740 he had been appointed postmaster at Philadelphia, and had set on foot a number of important public enterprises in the city, including its fire company and its public library.

From the beginning he took a keen interest in provincial politics. In support of the paper-money policy he published in 1729 his Modest Inquiry into the Nature and Necessity of a Paper Currency, which, though not in accord with modern economic views, was above the average level of contemporary publications on that subject. In 1736 he began his long service as clerk of the assembly, and soon be came a recognized leader of the popular party. In 1748 one of the proprietors characterized his "doctrine that obedience to governors is no more due than protection to the people" as "not fit to be in the heads of the unthinking multitude," adding, "He is a dangerous man, and I should be glad if he inhabited another country, as I believe him of a

Page 227

very uneasy spirit. However, as he is a sort of tribune of the people, he must be treated with regard."[*]

[* Franklin, Works (Bigelow's ed.), I., passim, esp. 53-57 146-149, 153, 167-205; Penn, Letter-Book, quoted in Shepherd, Proprietary Government in Pa., 222.]

Page 228

DURING the fifty years after Penn began his colony only two new English provinces were permanently organized in North America; these were Nova Scotia, conquered from the French in 1710, and Georgia, which was carved out of South Carolina in 1732. Placed on the northern and southern frontiers of the British dominions, these two colonies had a considerable political importance; but in point of population both remained insignificant throughout the provincial era. The story of colonial expansion during this period is, therefore, chiefly concerned with the development of the older colonies.

Between 1690 and 1740 the population of the continental colonies increased from something over two hundred thousand to about one million. There was substantial growth in every colony, but the most decided increase came in the middle group. By about the middle of the eighteenth century Pennsylvania outstripped all the older colonies except

Page 229

Virginia and Massachusetts, and in white population she was nearly equal to Virginia.[*]

[* Dexter, Estimates of Population in the American Colonies.]

The important natural increase of population was reinforced in most colonies by a large immigration, partly from England but more largely from Scotland, Ireland, and the continent of Europe. Comparatively few of these non-English settlers came to New England, though there were some French Huguenots and Scotch-Irish. With something of the old exclusive spirit, the later Puritans scrutinized jealously immigrants of alien faith and race, and thus, to the close of the colonial era, New England remained distinctly Puritan and English.[*]

[* Belknap, New Hampshire, II., 30, 71; Proper, Colonial Immigration Laws, 22-34.]

In New York the conditions seemed more favorable for growth by immigration. Its population at the beginning of the eighteenth century was more distinctly cosmopolitan than that of any other colony. The majority of its people were of Dutch descent, though in New York City the Dutch language and the Dutch church lost ground during the next half-century, and the young people came to "speak principally English and go only to the English church." In other counties, like Albany, the Dutch language predominated, and it was difficult to find men sufficiently acquainted with English to serve as jurors. A community so varied in its racial and religious elements was apparently

Page 230

[Map Facing This Page: Part of North America, Simplified from Popple's Map (1733)]

well adapted to attract the foreign immigrant.[*]

[* Kalm, Travels, in Pinkerton, Voyages, XIII., 463, 586; Valentine, Hist. of City of New York, 299.]

This opportunity was lost, however, largely because of the mistaken policy of the provincial authorities. The land legislation of New York was less liberal than that of other colonies, particularly Pennsylvania. The unfortunate experience of some Palatinate Germans who settled in New York during Queen Anne's reign discouraged others of that nationality from coming to New York, and placed the province at a serious disadvantage in the competition with her neighbors to the south.[*]

[* Proper, Colonial Immigration Laws, 38-44.]

During the eighteenth century Pennsylvania was especially attractive to non-English immigrants from Europe. She offered land and citizenship on easy terms, and she adhered more consistently than any other colony to the principles of religious freedom. The result was a volume of immigration which profoundly influenced the subsequent history of the colony and the state.

The first to come in considerable numbers were the Germans. Some of this nationality were among the earliest settlers of Pennsylvania, but their numbers were then comparatively small. The Germans first became important during the second decade of the eighteenth century, partly because of peculiar conditions in the mother-country, partly

Page 231

through the action of the British government, and partly because of the liberal policy of the proprietary government.

The treaties of Westphalia in 1648 failed to secure either the domestic or the international peace of the disintegrating German empire, and thousands of people belonging to various Protestant sects were led to seek refuge from persecution under a foreign flag. The great international wars of Louis XIV.'s reign also left their mark upon the unfortunate border regions of western Germany, especially in the Palatinate, which suffered severely from the French armies.

To these persecuted Protestants the government of Queen Anne and her successors offered protection and religious freedom under the English flag, and the result was an immense immigration to England and her colonies. For their benefit Parliament enacted its first general naturalization law, which, though repealed three years later, gave to large numbers of them the rights of English subjects. A few Palatines were sent to Ireland, but the great majority found their way to America. In 1709 the Board of Trade sent a considerable colony of them to New York, where they were expected to devote their energies largely to the production of naval stores. They were dissatisfied, however, with the plans made for them, and after some serious disagreements with the provincial government, a considerable number of them left New

Page 232

York for Pennsylvania. Others came directly from Europe, and about the same time a considerable body of Swiss Mennonites came into the colony.[*]

[* Proper, Colonial Immigration Laws, 14, 40; Carpenter, in Am. Hist. Review, IX., 293; Kuhns, German and Swiss Settlements of Colonial Pennsylvania, chaps. i.-iii.; N. Y. Docs. Rel. to Col. Hist., V., passim.]

About 1727 the German and Swiss immigration began to assume large proportions, sometimes amounting to several thousand new arrivals in a single year. These immigrants included adherents of various Protestant sects: the Lutherans, the German Reformed, the Mennonites, the Dunkards, and finally the Moravians, perhaps the most attractive representatives of eighteenth-century Pietism.

This strong infusion of alien influences was looked upon with some misgiving, and Penn's secretary, Logan, suggested the danger of the province being transformed into a German colony. It was pointed out that the new-comers frequently squatted on their lands without making regular purchases from the proprietary agents, and that "being ignorant of our language and laws, and settling in a body together," they formed "a distinct people from his Majesty's subjects." A German newspaper was founded at Germantown as early as 1739, and in 1743 another was issued in Philadelphia. In time the Germans became an important factor in colonial politics, uniting with the Quakers to form a conservative peace party in opposition to those

Page 233

who were trying to establish an efficient military system.

Some efforts were made to check the tide of immigration, or at least to regulate it. In 1727 the Pennsylvania council ordered masters of vessels to furnish lists of their passengers, and immigrants were required to declare their allegiance to the king and the proprietor. In 1729 a duty was imposed on the importation of foreigners and Irish servants. The act was repealed almost immediately, but the feeling which prompted the measure evidently persisted. The proprietary governors, however, usually desired to encourage immigration, and in 1755 a bill restricting it was defeated by the governor's veto.[*]

[* Shepherd, Proprietary Government in Pa., 545; Watson, Annals of Philadelphia (ed. of 1857), II., 254-259, 398; Proper, Colonial Immigration Laws, 46-54; [Burke], European Settlements, II., 201.]

More aggressive politically than the Germans were the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians. This immigration first assumed importance a few years after the close of Queen Anne's War, but it developed rapidly during the next two decades. The Scotch-Irish, like the Germans, were not regarded with unmixed satisfaction. During the early years they received liberal terms and were encouraged to form barrier settlements on the frontier. Logan found them as little disposed to pay for their land as some of the Germans had been; they were quoted as arguing that it was "against the laws of God and

Page 234

nature that so much land should be idle while so many Christians wanted it to labour on, and to raise their bread." They were also criticised for their tendency to embroil themselves with the Indians, and this aggressive and warlike spirit made them particularly objectionable to the Quakers, who tried to restrict their political influence by refusing them proportionate representation in the assembly.[*]

[* Logan MSS., quoted in Watson, Annals of Philadelphia, II., 259; Shepherd, Proprietary Government in Pa., 546.]

Many Germans and Scotch-Irish also found their way into New Jersey. One important German settlement in that colony was that of New Brunswick, which by 1750 had two German churches. The strength of the Scotch-Irish element in that colony may be seen in the rapid extension of the Presbyterian church.[*]

[* Kalm, in Pinkerton, Voyages, XIII., 448-450.]

This immigration impressed more strongly than ever upon the middle colonies that complexity in race and religion which had been characteristic of them from the first. Nowhere did this complexity find clearer expression than in the colonial churches. In New York City in the middle of the eighteenth century there were English, Dutch, French, German, and Jewish places of worship, besides a Presbyterian church which was affiliated with the established church of Scotland. Of twelve churches in Philadelphia, noted by Kalm during his stay there in 1749, at least seven represented non-English

Page 235

elements in the life of the colony, including Swedish and German Lutherans, German Calvinists, a Moravian church where services were conducted both in English and German, and the "great house" of the Roman Catholics. Outside of Philadelphia there were several German communities, made up almost if not quite exclusively of members of a single religious body, as in the case of the German Baptists at Ephrata and the Moravians at Bethlehem.[*]

[* Kalm, in Pinkerton, Voyages, XIII., 388, 457, 584; cf. Sachse, German Sectarians of Pennsylvania, passim.]

During the eighteenth century, the southern colonies also sought to encourage immigration, sometimes making religious concessions for this purpose. The French Huguenot immigration, which began some years before the revolution of 1689, continued for several years afterwards, and in Virginia and South Carolina these settlers were numerous enough to form several churches. In spite of their Calvinistic traditions they maintained, as a rule, friendly relations with the established Anglican church, and often united with it. Other Protestant settlers in South Carolina were not so friendly to these refugees, but the early antagonism gradually passed away.[*]

[* Cal. of State Pap., Col., 1693-1696, p. 85; McCrady, South Carolina under Proprietary Government, 180, 181, 233, 239, 304, 319, 323, 339, 374, 391, 404.]

Aside from the French Huguenots, the non-English immigration into the south was comparatively unimportant until the second quarter of the eighteenth century. Then the Scotch-Irish and the

Page 236

Germans began to appear in force in the up-country of Virginia and especially in the Great Valley. In order to develop these settlements on the frontier, the royal government was willing to concede religious toleration. Under the leadership of their pioneer ministers, the Great Valley became, as it is to-day, a stronghold of Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, standing out in marked contrast, sometimes in sharp antagonism, with the Anglican influence of the tide-water.[*]

[* McIlwaine, in Johns Hopkins University Studies, XII., No. iv.]

In South Carolina the overthrow of the proprietary government was followed by vigorous efforts to stimulate immigration. A favorite plan at this period was that of laying out new townships and offering them to communities or groups of settlers. In this way the Scotch-Irish settlement of Williamsburg was formed, with a special guarantee of freedom of worship. Other similar communities were founded by Swiss, German, and Welsh settlers. Here, as in Pennsylvania, the new-comers tended to form on the frontiers communities with sympathies and interests quite different from those of the seaboard. It was not, however, until the period of the last French war that the great Scotch-Irish immigration into the Carolinas took place; and not until then did the mutual jealousy and antagonism of tide-water and back-country become a really important factor in their provincial politics.[*]

[* McCrady, South Carolina under Royal Government, chap. viii.]

A large proportion of the early American immigrants

Page 237

belonged to the servant class. The best of them were the "redemptioners," who sold their services for fixed terms of years in return for their passage money. Both in Pennsylvania and Maryland these white servants formed an important part of the industrial system; and many of them became, after their term of service, prosperous land-owners and useful citizens.

A much less desirable kind of servants were the convicts. Under a parliamentary statute of 1717 certain classes of criminals might at the discretion of the court be transported to the colonies for a term of not less than seven years.[*] It has been estimated that some fifty thousand convicts were shipped from Great Britain and Ireland during the remainder of the colonial period. Maryland has the distinction of receiving more of them than any other single colony, and the convicts there formed the larger portion of the servant class. Several of the colonies attempted to check this introduction of servants, especially that of the Irish Catholics and the convicts. Such restrictive measures were, however, discouraged by the home government and frequently disallowed.[**]

[* 4 George I., chap. xi.]
[** Kahn, in Pinkerton, Travels, XIII., 500; Geiser, Redemptioners and Indented Servants in Pennsylvania; McCormac, White Servitude in Maryland (Johns Hopkins University Studies, XXII., Nos. iii., iv.)]

No other form of immigration during this period had so serious a meaning for the future of the

Page 238

American people as that of the negro slaves. At the close of the seventeenth century the slaves constituted only a small minority of the population in all of the colonies except South Carolina. During the next fifty years this condition was radically changed through the development of the African slave-trade. The Royal African Company, which was chartered in 1672, carried on an increasing trade with monopoly privileges until, in 1698, Parliament admitted private merchants to a share in it. In 1713 the Asiento contract with Spain gave England a larger interest in this branch of commerce, which had the special favor of the crown. Between 1698 and 1707 some twenty-five thousand slaves were probably brought annually from Africa to America, and the number was increased after the Asiento privilege had been secured. The proportion which went to the continental colonies also increased. By the middle of the eighteenth century, there were about three hundred thousand slaves in British North America, so that they had increased at least twice as rapidly as the white population.[*]

[* Du Bois, Suppression of the Slave-Trade, chap. i.]

This negro population was very unequally distributed. On the western shore of Narragansett Bay there was a small slave-holding aristocracy which had an important influence in the social and political life of Rhode Island; but in New England, generally, the negro population was insignificant. Of the

Page 239

middle colonies, New York had the largest proportion of slaves, from one-sixth to one-seventh of the total population. There was even then a decided transition in this respect on passing southward from Pennsylvania into Maryland, where perhaps one - fourth of the people were slaves. In Virginia the proportion was probably about two-fifths, and in some Virginia counties, as well as in South Carolina, the negroes outnumbered the whites.[*]

[* Du Bois, Suppression of the Slave-Trade, chaps. ii.-iv., esp. statistics in notes; Doc. Hist. of N. Y., I., 695; Channing, Narragansett Planters, and Ballagh, Slavery in Virginia (Johns Hopkins University Studies, IV., No. iii. and extra vol.)]

As the slaves increased, their legal status was more carefully defined by legislation, and they were more sharply differentiated from the white servants. Stringent laws were enacted to prevent the intermixture of the races; and a Virginia statute classed negroes, for certain purposes, as real estate. The power of the master over his slave, though not absolute, was very great, especially in the south; in Virginia, for instance, manslaughter, as distinguished from wilful murder, was not punishable if committed by a master upon his slave. The testimony of a negro could not be accepted as evidence except against those of his own race, and special courts were provided for the trial of his more serious offences, "without the solemnitie of a jury."[*]

[* Hening, Statutes, III., 86, 102, 333, 447 et seq., IV., 133; cf. Channing, Narragansett Planters; Ballagh, Slavery in Virginia; Steiner, Slavery in Connecticut (Johns Hopkins University Studies, IV., No. iii., XI., Nos. ix., x., and extra vol.)]

Opinions differed then, as now, regarding the actual grievances of the negro. Burnaby, who visited Virginia in 1759, thought slaves were very harshly treated; while Byrd, a somewhat fair-minded slave-owner, thought they were not worked so hard as the poorer people in other countries, and that cruelty was exceptional. The house-servants of the wealthy planters were doubtless well treated and even trained to a certain kind of refinement and dignity of manner. The conditions of the half-savage field-laborers were quite different, and the constant dread of slave insurrections showed how largely the servile relation depended upon the superior force and discipline of the dominant whites.[*]

[* Pinkerton, Voyages, XIII., 714, 750; Bassett, Writings of William Byrd, xxxv.; Jones, Present State of Virginia (ed. of 1865), 37.]

In the north, the most familiar examples of real or imaginary slave insurrections are the so-called "negro plots" of 1712 and 1741 in New York, in both of which the danger was grossly exaggerated. Both of these "plots" were followed by severe measures of repression; and in the panic of 1741, on rather doubtful evidence, fourteen negroes were burned at the stake and eighteen were hanged. In the southern colonies the large negro population made the danger much more real, and the proximity of hostile Spaniards and Indians was an additional source of embarrassment in South Carolina. The most important actual outbreak took place in South Carolina

Page 241

in 1739; but the prevalent feeling is shown by the elaborate patrol system of the province.[*]

[* N. Y. Docs. Rel. to Col. Hist., V., 341, VI., 195 et seq.; Valentine, Hist. of City of New York, 268-276; McCrady, South Carolina under Royal Government, 183-187.]

The evils of the system were recognized even in the south. William Byrd expressed his sympathy with the efforts of the Georgia trustees to prohibit slavery in their new colony, emphasizing the danger of insurrections and the depressing influence of slave-labor upon the whites. The southern colonies tried to protect themselves from an excessive slave population by a number of acts imposing prohibitory or retaliatory duties; but these acts were frequently disallowed by the crown.[*]

[* Du Bois, Suppression of the Slave-Trade, chap. ii.; Am. Hist. Review. I., 88.]

Some efforts were made to instruct and Christianize the slaves. Eliza Lucas, of South Carolina, who afterwards married Chief-Justice Pinckney, mentions "a parcel of little Negroes whom I have undertaken to teach to read";[*] and considerable efforts were also made to Christianize the negroes. The theory that baptism might work emancipation caused some anxiety at first; but it was expressly denied by provincial statutes and in a formal declaration by the bishop of London. Both in the northern and the southern colonies negroes became members of churches, though their inferior status

[* Journal and Letters of Eliza Lucas, 16.]

Page 242

was marked by their being confined to a special corner or gallery.[*]

[* Hening, Statutes, III., 460; McCrady, South Carolina under Royal Government, chap. iii.]

The ethical aspect of slavery was rarely considered. Though comparatively few slaves were held in New England, this was largely the result of economic considerations, and some of the most prominent and respected merchants of Boston and Newport were deeply involved in the slave-trade. Here and there, however, the moral objection found expression.

In 1688 the Germantown Quakers protested against slave-holding by Friends as contrary to the golden rule and a scandal to the society; and during the next half-century there were similar protests. Nevertheless, many of the Quakers continued to hold slaves, and no positive action was taken against slavery by the "Yearly Meeting" of the society until 1758. Perhaps the finest expression of antislavery feeling during this period was judge Sewall's Selling of Joseph. Without neglecting the economic argument against slavery, he lays the emphasis upon religious and ethical considerations: "These Ethiopians, as black as they are; seeing they are the Sons and Daughters of the First Adam, the Brethren and Sisters of the Last Adam and the Offspring of God; They ought to be treated with a Respect agreeable."[*]

[* Moore, Slavery in Mass., 74-77; Sharpless, Quaker Experiment in Government (ed. of 1902), I., 31; Sewall, Diary, II., 16-20.]

Page 243

As late as 1750 the south had scarcely any real urban centres. In Maryland the seat of government, Annapolis, was hardly more than a village; and Baltimore had hardly a hundred inhabitants. In Virginia, Williamsburg had been made the capital and had some public buildings which attracted attention, but its permanent inhabitants were few. Richmond was not laid out as a town until about the close of this period. Norfolk, at the entrance of Chesapeake Bay, was described by William Byrd in 1728 as having "most the ayr of a Town of any in Virginia." The principal places of North Carolina were mere country villages. South Carolina, alone of all the southern colonies, had a real urban centre in Charleston, which, more than any other town in America, concentrated in itself the economic, social, and political activity of the colony to which it belonged.[*]

[* Winsor, Narr. and Crit. Hist., V., 261-268; [Burke], European Settlements, II., 212, 233; Burnaby, in Pinkerton, Voyages, XIII., 707; Bassett, Writings of William Byrd, 28.]

In the middle colonies two important centres of population grew up at Philadelphia and New York. Philadelphia, in the first sixty years of its history, developed into a town of about thirteen thousand people and was still growing rapidly when Kalm visited it a few years later. Only a few miles away was the thriving settlement of Germantown with its one street, "near two English miles long," and its four churches, two English and two German. The growth of New York was less rapid; in 1703

Page 244

it had about five thousand inhabitants, white and black; in 1741 the number had increased to about twelve thousand, and during this decade it stood next to Boston and Philadelphia. There were no other large towns in the middle colonies; but New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania each had a few other substantial places. Parts of this middle region were so well occupied with Europeans, that according to a contemporary witness, "few parts of Europe are more populous."[*]

[* Watson, Annals of Philadelphia, II., 404; Kalm, in Pinkerton, Voyages, XIII., 395, 406, 449; Valentine, Hist. of City of New York, 217 and App.]

In New England, town life had, of course, been relatively important from the first; and during the first half of the eighteenth century Boston held its place as the most considerable centre of population and trade on the continent, though the number of its inhabitants probably did not much exceed twenty thousand. Second in importance among the New England towns was Newport, which grew very rapidly after the peace of Utrecht. Along the coast from New Hampshire to New York were such considerable port towns as Portsmouth, Salem, New London, and New Haven. In New England even more than in the middle colonies the prosperity of the large towns rested upon what was, according to the standards of that day, a fairly compact surrounding population.[*]

[* Weeden, Econ. and Soc. Hist. of New England, II., 583; Winsor, Memorial Hist. of Boston II., 496, 510, 529.]

Page 245

More important, on the whole, than the formation of a few urban centres was the gradual recession of the frontier. The rapidity of this movement varied greatly at different points along the seaboard, but the final result was a surprise to European observers. One traveller remarked that in most places one might travel "about a hundred and twenty English miles from the seashore before you reach the first habitations of the Indians "; or spend half a year in the seaboard towns without seeing an Indian.[*]

[* Kalm, in Pinkerton, Voyages, XIII., 449.]

On the extreme north the frontier still extended to the coast. Only a few years after the peace of Utrecht another Indian outbreak, inspired by the Jesuit Rale and known as Lovewell's war (1722-1725), checked the advance of settlement north and east. In 1743 the town of Brunswick, in Maine, was one of a little group of exposed frontier settlements and military posts extending only a short distance beyond the Kennebec. In New Hampshire there was a movement of settlers up the Merrimac valley to Concord, and settlements were also formed on the east bank of the Connecticut River. The first English occupation beyond the river, in what is now Vermont, was Fort Dummer, built in 1724, near the present site of Brattleboro. Farther south, the Massachusetts pioneers moved forward after Queen Anne's War across the Connecticut valley into the Berkshire region, first occupied about

Page 246

1725; and the line of settlement was soon carried close to the present western boundary of the state.[*] In New York, the movement into the interior was comparatively slow. In 1740, as in 1690, the population of the province was confined almost wholly to Long Island and to narrow lines of settlement on both banks of the Hudson between New York City and Albany. A few weak German settlements were formed in the Mohawk valley; and on Lake Ontario there was the isolated post of Oswego.

[* Winsor, Narr. and Crit. Hist., V., 127, 181-188; Holland, Western Massachusetts, I., chap. x.; Williamson, Maine, II., 214.]

The rapidly growing population of Pennsylvania made possible a more substantial advance. By 1744 there were considerable settlements of Germans and Scotch-Irish in the Susquehanna valley, including the substantial town of Lancaster. On the upper Schuylkill, Reading had developed by 1752 to a place of one hundred and thirty dwellings; and in 1740 the Moravians advanced the frontier towards the north by the founding of Bethlehem in the Lehigh valley.[*]

[* Watson, Annals of Philadelphia, II., 147-150; Kuhn, German and Swiss Settlements in Colonial Pennsylvania, passim.]

More interesting still was the westward movement in the southern colonies. At the close of the seventeenth century the estate of William Byrd the elder, at the falls of the James, on the present site of Richmond, occupied an isolated frontier

Page 247

position and was exposed to Indian attacks. Within the next fifty years, and especially during the latter half of that period, population moved west and up the great rivers, the York, the Rappahannock, and the James, to the eastern slopes of the Blue Ridge. Finally, the southward course of the Scotch-Irish and Germans from Pennsylvania into the Great Valley beyond the Blue Ridge brought a population which required the organization of new county governments. In 1738 the counties of Augusta and Frederick were organized, both in the territory west of the Blue Ridge.[*]

[* Bassett, Writings of William Byrd, p. xxix.; Hening, Statutes, V., 78.]

In the Carolinas there was a similar development though somewhat later in time. When the first royal governor of North Carolina, Burrington, began his administration in 1731 almost the whole population was to be found close to the coast below the falls of the rivers, from the Roanoke southward to the Cape Fear. Twenty years later Governor Johnston, reporting on the rapid increase of population, especially from Pennsylvania, said that thousands had already come in; they were settling mainly in the west and had nearly reached the mountains. In South Carolina also the back settlements had been only slightly extended before 1730; but during the next decade settlements of Scotch-Irish, Germans, Swiss, and Welsh were made in the middle region between the tide-water and

Page 248

the up-country. Finally, in the fifties, the main stream of Scotch-Irish immigration made its way into the up-country.[*]

[* McCrady, South Carolina under Royal Government, chap. viii.; N. C. Col. Records, III., chap. xii., IV., 1073.]

Page 249

WHILE the older colonies were developing by the help of immigrants from Europe, occasional projects appeared for the organization of new provinces. In 1690 a proposed charter to a new colonizing company was submitted to the attorney-general. It provided for a colony in North America, lying between the thirty-fourth and the forty-sixth degrees of latitude, bounded on the east by the western boundaries of New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia, and on the west by the Pacific. The attorney-general offered no objection, but the plan was never carried out. Soon after the conquest of Acadia another new province was planned between Nova Scotia and Maine, but this project also was dropped.[*]

[* Cal. of State Pap., Col., 1689-1692, p. 761; Hutchinson, Hist. of Mass. Bay, II., 203.]

One of the reasons most frequently urged for new settlements was the formation of a barrier against rival colonizing powers; and the need of such a barrier colony was especially felt on the exposed

Page 250

frontier of South Carolina. Here, in the wilderness now occupied by the states of Georgia and Alabama, the traders and soldiers of England, France, and Spain were competing for the Indian trade and for ultimate political control. Within the present limits of Georgia there had been almost no permanent occupation by white men before the year 1733, but explorers, during the latter part of the seventeenth century, brought reports of Spaniards working mines in the mountainous regions of upper Georgia. The French, too, with their headquarters on Mobile Bay, were reaching out to secure a monopoly of the Indian trade.

To this region the English had already asserted their title by the charter of 1665, which extended the nominal jurisdiction of the Carolina proprietors to the twenty-ninth parallel, several miles south of St. Augustine. This extreme claim was never enforced; but early in the eighteenth century the South Carolina government began to push forward its posts into and beyond the valley of the Savannah. In 1716 Fort Moore was established on the Savannah opposite the present site of Augusta, Georgia. In 1721 Fort King George was established on the Altamaha and garrisoned by a few British regulars. This fort was abandoned in 1727, but another had already been built on the western bank of the Savannah, which was maintained until 1735.[*]

[* Charter in Carroll, Hist. Collections of S. C., II., 39; Smith, South Carolina, 208.]

Page 251

In 1730 a vigorous effort was made to counteract the French influence among the Indians of the hill country by sending Sir Alexander Cuming on a dangerous but successful mission to the Cherokees, which resulted in their acknowledging the English supremacy and promising the monopoly of their trade.[*] Thus when, two years later, the British government renewed its claims to the disputed region by granting a considerable part of it to the Georgia trustees, the step was a natural development from the policy of the previous decade.

[* Winsor, Mississippi Basin, 183; Jones, Georgia, I., 76-80.]

In the final settlement of Georgia this idea of a barrier colony was combined with a distinctly philanthropic motive. The new province should serve as a barrier against foreign attacks and a safeguard of English interests in America; but it was also to be a refuge for the unfortunate. Both of these motives are explicitly stated in the charter of the colony and both are admirably illustrated in the personality and the public career of its founder.

James Edward Oglethorpe was born in 1689, and had therefore reached middle life before his American career began. After a short military service in the English and Austrian armies, he entered the House of Commons in 1722, and, in spite of his prolonged absences in America, he retained his membership for over thirty years. He soon became a conspicuous member and showed the breadth of his public interests by speeches on a variety of

Page 252

Map Facing This Page: Settlement of Georgia (1732-1763)

subjects. He agreed with Walpole's critics in demanding a more aggressive assertion of English interests against the Spaniards, and he objected to a treaty with the emperor, because it failed to secure the Protestants of Germany against religious persecution; he also showed his appreciation of the colonial point of view by opposing the molasses act of 1733. The words attributed to him on this occasion deserved to be remembered: "Our colonies are all a part of our own dominions; the people in every one of them are our own people, and we ought to show an equal respect to all."[*]

[* Wright, Oglethorpe, chaps. i.-iii.; Cobbett, Parliamentary History, VIII., 920.]

The most attractive aspect of Oglethorpe's parliamentary career is his disinterested service in behalf of poor debtors. Not only were honest debtors then generally subjected to the humiliation of arrest and imprisonment, but they were frequently placed at the mercy of jailers who had purchased their appointments and regarded them as investments. Oglethorpe became interested in the reform of this system, and in 1729 he secured from the Commons the appointment of a committee of inquiry. As chairman of this committee he made a series of reports to the house, bringing to light many instances of extreme cruelty and extortion.

Oglethorpe was now convinced of the existence of a large class of honest but unfortunate people who might under the more favorable conditions of

Page 253

a new country, and with a little assistance at the start, be enabled ultimately to stand on their own feet. Public interest had been awakened by the recent investigations, and almost at the same time the surrender of the Carolina charter left the field clear for the founding of a new colony on the southern frontier.

Many prominent noblemen and clergymen agreed to support the enterprise; and in June, 1732, they received a royal charter incorporating them as "the Trustees for establishing the colony of Georgia in America." The objects of the colony were declared to be two: first, the relief of the king's "poor subjects" who in the New World might "not only gain a comfortable subsistence for themselves and families, but also strengthen our colonies and increase the trade, navigation, and wealth" of the kingdom; secondly, the protection of the frontier against the attacks of the savages.[*]

[* Charter, in Poore, Charters and Constitutions, I.; Some Account of the Designs of the Trustees (Am. Colonial Tracts, I., No. ii.)]

The territory of the new colony was defined as that lying between the Savannah and Altamaha rivers and extending from their head-waters westward to the "south seas." An undivided eighth part of this territory was still the property of Lord Carteret, one of the Carolina proprietors who had refused to yield his share in the original Carolina grant. The trustees, however, promptly secured the surrender of Carteret's claim.

Page 254

This charter was a return to the principle of proprietary government. The soil of the colony and the government of its people were intrusted to a private corporation which was to exercise authority over the colonists without reference to any representative assembly. It differs from the older charters, however, in two important respects. In the first place, the enterprise was purely disinterested: members of the corporation were expressly prohibited from receiving any profits from membership or the holding of office, and all the lands of the colony, with any contributions which might be received, were to be held in trust. In the second place, the reserved rights of the crown were more strongly asserted than in any previous proprietary charter. The corporation was required to present annual reports of receipts and expenditures, and all its legislation was to be submitted to the crown for approval. Every new governor had to be approved by the crown and was required to take the oaths and offer the financial securities usually required of royal governors. Even this modified proprietary government was to be temporary, for after twenty-one years Georgia was to become a royal province.

The charter provisions, taken together with the early legislation of the trustees, bring out clearly the benevolent paternalism of the founders. The corporation was authorized to transport foreigners who were willing to become subjects of the crown, and religious liberty was promised to all except "papists."

Page 255

A number of the regulations show the desire of the trustees to protect the moral and economic welfare of the colonists even, if necessary, against themselves. Thus, though the charter allowed one person to hold land up to five hundred acres, the maximum grant was made only to those who transported at least ten persons to the colony. These grants were entailed so that they could not be alienated or divided, and according to the original regulations estates could only pass to male heirs, reverting in the absence of such heirs to the trustees. The purpose of these rules was to protect the settlers against their own improvidence, to prevent the formation of excessively large estates, and to build up a considerable soldier-farmer class.

A logical part of this plan for developing a class of small landed proprietors was the prohibition of slavery. In South Carolina the system of large plantations worked by savage negro slaves had exposed the small white population to serious dangers from slave insurrections. The large number of fugitive slaves protected by the Spaniards and sometimes enlisted in their military service was also a serious annoyance. These dangers the trustees wished to avoid in their new colony; in close contact with the slave-holding plantation system of South Carolina they hoped to establish a new community founded on the opposite principle of free labor. The trustees also imposed important restrictions on trade: no rum was to be imported into

Page 256

the colony, and no trade could be carried on with the Indians without a license.[*]

[* Account Showing the Progress of Georgia (Am. Colonial Tracts, I., No. v.)]

The trustees now set themselves to secure desirable immigrants. They were ready to help the unfortunate, but they did not wish to fill up the colony with recruits from the vicious and degenerate classes. Besides, the funds of the trustees were insufficient to enable them to send over all who wished to take advantage of this opportunity. Hence, a careful sifting process became necessary. By the autumn of 1732, however, about one hundred men, women, and children had been gathered, including men of various occupations: carpenters, bricklayers, and farmers are among those mentioned. Oglethorpe offered to assume the conduct of the colony, and was accordingly appointed its first governor. After a voyage of nearly two months the colonists arrived at Charleston in January, 1733.[*]

[* Ibid.; Jones, Georgia, I., chaps. vi., vii.]

South Carolina was strongly interested in the formation of this new barrier colony, and Oglethorpe and his charges were cordially received. Temporary quarters were provided for the settlers in the frontier port of Beaufort, and both the government and the people showed every disposition to help in putting the new colony on its feet.

In the mean time, Oglethorpe had to undertake

Page 257

the delicate and important task of reaching a satisfactory understanding with the Indians. The eastern part of the new province was mainly occupied by various Creek tribes. With the help of an Indian woman who had married a white trader, Oglethorpe entered into negotiations with the chief of one of these tribes, and secured from him a grant of land near the mouth of the Savannah. With the help of the same chief, a convention of the lower Creek Indians was subsequently held and a treaty of alliance was entered into. The Indians surrendered a tract of land near the coast between the Savannah and the Altamaha, and agreed to have no communication with the French and the Spaniards. These arrangements, subsequently agreed to by the Indians of the back country, were formally ratified by the common council of the trustees, and proved effective in protecting the colony from Indian attacks during the critical period of its early history.[*]

[* Text of treaty in Jones, Georgia, I., 141-144.]

Before these negotiations were completed, Oglethorpe had brought his colonists to the tract ceded by Tomochichi and laid the foundations of the present city of Savannah. By the summer of 1733, the town had been laid out and lands allotted to individual settlers, in regular assignments including a town lot, a garden, and a farm-in all, fifty acres. For the first ten years the land was to be held rent free; but after that an annual rent of two shillings was to be paid. During the early stages of the

Page 258

settlement the inhabitants were dependent upon the common stock; they were governed by Oglethorpe in paternalistic fashion, and for many years the colony had only the most rudimentary political organization.[*]

[* Jones, Georgia, I., 155 et seq.; Account Showing the Progress of Georgia, 44-46.]

In 1734 an important new element was introduced by the coming of the Protestant Germans from Salzburg. These Germans were subjects of the Catholic archbishop of Salzburg, who had been driven by his persecution to seek refuge in various other states and countries, including Prussia and England. In December, 1733, the trustees agreed to transport a considerable number of them to Georgia. They were to receive their passage and allowances for tools, provisions, and seed, and were to have in the province all the rights and privileges of Englishmen. Under the direction of a German nobleman, the Baron von Reck, and of their Lutheran ministers, a company of them came to Georgia in 1734. The chief settlement of the Salzburgers was at Ebenezer, a little north of Savannah on a small tributary of the Savannah River. They soon, however, removed to a new site a few miles away; both the old and the new Ebenezer have long disappeared from the map of the state. The original company was subsequently reinforced by others of the same nationality, most of whom settled in the region between Savannah and Ebenezer.

Page 259

In 1735 a Moravian settlement was begun, but the unwillingness of these people to perform military service made them unpopular and they soon found a more congenial home in Pennsylvania.

By 1741 it was estimated by the secretary of the trustees that at least twelve hundred German Protestants had arrived in the colony. The Germans maintained a distinct community life, whose most striking characteristics as recorded by contemporary observers were the industry of the people, the strong influence of their clerical leaders, and the primitive simplicity of their civil organization. They had for some time no regular court of justice, and their disputes were settled by the ministers in concert with three or four of "the most prudent Elders."

A more aggressive group of colonists came from the Highlands of Scotland. About one hundred and eighty people were sent out in 1735 and formed their first settlement on the north bank of the Altamaha, a few miles above its mouth; the district was named Darien and the first town New Inverness. A fort was constructed here and the colony was afterwards strengthened by new arrivals from Scotland; for the Highlanders, unlike most of the Germans, took an important part in the defence of the frontier.[*]

[* Jones, Georgia, I., chaps. xi.-xiv.; Stevens, Georgia, I., 85-139.]

From the beginning, military and defensive considerations

Page 260

exerted a strong influence on the policy of the trustees. Georgia, more nearly than any of the other North American provinces, approximates the Roman conception of a military colony planted for the defence of the empire. Nowhere does this policy appear more clearly than in the post of Frederica, at the extreme limit of the charter grant, on St. Simon's Island at the mouth of the Altamaha. Beginning in 1736 as a military post, the town and its approaches were laid out with definite reference to defence against the Spaniards. Its people were largely engaged in supplying the soldiers, and when, at the close of the war, the troops were withdrawn the town rapidly declined.[*]

[* Jones, Dead Towns of Ga. (Ga. Hist. Soc., Collections, IV.), No. ii.]

A more substantial and permanent settlement was developing on the northern frontier at Augusta. Here on the Savannah River a fort was established in 1735, and a town laid out which soon became an important centre for the Indian trade, especially with the Cherokees. Besides these principal towns, there were a number of small villages or private plantations in the low country adjoining Savannah and extending southward along the coast towards the Ogeechee. These settlements suffered from unhealthy situations and some of them soon disappeared.[*]

[* Ibid., esp. Nos. iii., vii.; A State of the Province of Georgia (Am. Colonial Tracts, I., No. ii.)]

Page 261

From the outset the young colony was obliged to guard against attack by the Spaniards at St. Augustine, who regarded the Georgians, like the Virginians and Carolinians before them, as mere intruders. The charter grants of Carolina and Georgia constituted a direct defiance of Spanish pretensions; but the challenge was brought closer home when Oglethorpe, not content with his colony at Frederica, established a series of small military posts extending from the Altamaha to the St. John's River, well within the limits of the present state of Florida.

The Walpole ministry strongly desired to avoid war, and in 1736 an English agent was sent to St. Augustine to settle the dispute; conferences were also held by Oglethorpe with some of the Spanish officers. No final agreement could be reached, however, and with threatening language the Spanish agents asserted their claim to all the coast so far north as St. Helena Sound, only a few miles below Charleston.

It was now necessary to make thorough preparation for defence, and Oglethorpe returned to England for this purpose in the winter of 1736-1737. The Spanish government demanded his recall; but in answer to a petition from the trustees, he was authorized to raise a regiment of troops for Georgia, of which he himself was colonel. Some additional regulars were sent directly from Gibraltar, and Oglethorpe was also made commander-in-chief of all the

Page 262

royal forces in South Carolina. He returned to Georgia in 1738 with instructions to maintain a cautious defensive attitude until actually attacked. Then he might adopt any necessary measures whether defensive or offensive.

One of the most essential conditions of success in the conflict with the Spaniards was the good-will of the Indians. This was now endangered, partly by the misconduct of English traders and partly by the intrigues of the Spaniards. To guard against this danger, Oglethorpe undertook, in 1739, a long and dangerous journey into the back country to Coweta, the principal town of the Creek Indians, where he secured a renewal of their alliance with the English.[*]

[* Wright, Oglethorpe, chaps. viii.-xii.; Oglethorpe's letters in Ga. Hist. Soc., Collections, III., 28-43, 55, 81; Stevens, Georgia, I., 145-159.]

Soon after this mission word came to Georgia of the formal declaration of war between England and Spain, brought on chiefly by the increasing friction between English merchants and Spanish customs officials. On the Georgia frontier the chief interest of the war lies in two leading operations, the English attack on St. Augustine and the successful defence of St. Simon's Island against the Spaniards.

In 1740 St. Augustine was believed to be weakened by the want of provisions and by the sending of a part of its naval force to Havana. Oglethorpe proposed to take this opportunity for an offensive

Page 263

movement, and it was agreed that with the help of the South-Carolinians, the Indians, and some vessels of the royal navy, St. Augustine was to be attacked by sea and land. The land forces were to cut off Spanish supplies from the interior and the fleet was to prevent relief by reinforcements from the West Indies. The combined forces arrived at St. Augustine and began a siege; but they failed to work effectively together and the result was a humiliating failure.[*]

[* Jones, Georgia, I., chap. xxi.; McCrady, South Carolina under Royal Government, chaps. xi., xii.]

In the following year Oglethorpe reported that the Spaniards had been strongly reinforced and were planning an invasion of South Carolina and Georgia. Appeals were made to the home government and to South Carolina, but with little effect. Finally, in 1742, the blow fell. A formidable invading expedition was organized, consisting of some four or five thousand men with a considerable fleet, and a landing was effected at the southern end of St. Simon's Island. Oglethorpe had only a few hundred men for the defence of Frederica, but the character of the road which the Spaniards were obliged to take was such that they could be attacked in detail and in disadvantageous positions. These opportunities were effectively used and the attacking army was defeated and demoralized. Overestimating the opposing force, the Spaniards withdrew from the island and the invasion was abandoned.

Page 264

In 1743, Oglethorpe led a retaliatory expedition into the immediate vicinity of St. Augustine, but before the end of that year he returned to England and there were no subsequent military operations of any importance on the Georgia frontier. Though the offensive movements of the English failed to accomplish any positive result, the significant fact of the war was that they had held their ground and could not be dislodged.[*]

[* Jones, Georgia, I., chap. xxii.; Ga. Hist. Soc., Collections, III., 117-155; Gentleman's Magazine, XII., 694-696.]

The early years of the colony were also troubled by internal dissensions, many of which were petty enough. One small affair has gained a certain historical interest because of the subsequent career of one of the persons involved. In 1736 the brothers John and Charles Wesley came to Georgia, John as minister of the Anglican church in Savannah and Charles as Oglethorpe's private secretary. Both the brothers showed at this stage in their careers some lack of tact in their criticism of their neighbors. John Wesley was very popular at the outset, but his aggressive churchmanship soon gave offence; and his attempt to discipline a young woman whom he had himself courted before her marriage provoked so much feeling that he was indicted an a series of petty charges. The case was never brought to trial; but Wesley was convinced that his usefulness in the colony was ended, and shortly afterwards

Page 265

sailed for England after a stay of less than two years in Georgia.[*]

[* Tailfer, True and Historical Narrative (Am. Colonial Tracts, I., No. iv.), 32-39; Jones, Georgia, I., chap. xviii.]

Almost from the beginning there was a considerable element in the colony antagonistic to Oglethorpe, and, indeed, to the general policy of the trustees. Some of the opposition leaders were forced out of the colony; and, taking refuge in South Carolina, they published a vehement criticism of the Georgia government, charging Oglethorpe with arbitrary conduct and emphasizing his failure in the campaign against St. Augustine. Great stress was laid on the misconduct of the "storekeeper" who had been left in charge of colonial affairs during one of Oglethorpe's visits to England, though the trustees had already dismissed the offender from their service. The chief point of historical interest in this partisan statement is the claim that the growth of the colony had been checked by certain principles of economic policy which the trustees regarded as essential; the writers especially emphasize the prohibition of slavery and the restrictions imposed on the alienation of land.

In 1738 over one hundred of the freeholders signed at Savannah a petition to the trustees asserting that unless these restrictions were removed they could not compete successfully with their neighbors to the north. They urged, therefore, that lands should henceforth be granted in fee-simple

Page 266

and that the introduction of negroes "with proper limitations" should be permitted. The Scotch settlers in Darien and the Salzburgers were equally convinced that slavery would be injurious to their interests, and sent in counter-petitions. The trustees rejected the Savannah petition, though they relaxed somewhat the restrictions on the alienation of land. In 1742 the opposition party sent an agent to London, who tried by petition to secure a parliamentary declaration against the policy of the trustees; but the House of Commons voted down a resolution in favor of slavery in Georgia, and the petitioner was reprimanded by the speaker for his "false, scandalous, and malicious charges" against the trustees.[*]

[* Tailfer, True and Historical Narrative; Account (Am. Colonial Tracts, I., Nos. iv., v.); Samuel Quincy's letter, in Hart, Contemporaries, II., 116; Journals of the House of Commons (ed. of 1803), XXIV., 192, 216, 221, 288.]

Nevertheless, the agitation against the policy of the trustees continued. The production of silk and wine, which had been intended to serve as the chief staples of the colony, failed to develop on any considerable scale, and it was believed that, in the production of rice, white labor could not compete with that of negro slaves. It was found difficult also to hold in the colony enough white laborers.

Among those who urged the legalization of slavery were James Habersham, an influential merchant; and the famous missionary, Whitefield, who had founded

Page 267

an orphan house in Georgia and believed that its success had been impaired by the want of negro slaves. In this state of public feeling the prohibition of slavery gradually became ineffective and in 1749 it was finally repealed, though as a precaution against slave insurrections the proportion of negroes to white servants was limited. The other restrictive regulations were also abandoned. In accordance with a vote of the House of Commons the trustees repealed the act prohibiting the importation of rum, and in 1750 the restrictions on the tenure and alienation of land were removed.

After the removal of these restrictions Georgia developed much more rapidly, and a considerable movement of planters from South Carolina began into the so-called Midway District between the Ogeechee and South Newport rivers. These planters brought their slaves with them in such large numbers that a contemporary writer estimated the negroes brought into the colony during the years 1751 and 1752 at nearly a thousand. Thus the low country of Georgia began, in spite of the theories of the trustees, to reproduce in its essential features the social system of South Carolina.[*]

[* Jones, Georgia, I., chaps. xxv., xxvi., xxx.; Stevens, Georgia, II, 262-318.]

The political experience of Georgia was in many respects unlike that of any other English colony. No provision was made in the charter for a representative legislature and none was established under

Page 268

the proprietary government. An assembly which met in 1751 was not authorized to make laws, but only "to propose, debate, and represent to the Trustees."

The superior legislative authority was vested in the trustees, but a large discretion was left to their agents in the colony. At first, Oglethorpe had an indefinite paternalistic authority over the whole province, but a local government was soon organized at Savannah; and in 1741, while Oglethorpe was making Frederica his military headquarters, the colony was divided into two counties, one including the territory extending from the Savannah to a little beyond the Ogeechee, and the other covering all the territory to the southward. Oglethorpe retained direct control of Frederica, but the government of the northern county was intrusted to William Stephens, the former secretary of the trustees, with four assistants. In 1743, on Oglethorpe's final departure for England, the authority of President Stephens and his assistants was extended over the whole province. This arrangement continued until the surrender of the charter and the final institution of the royal government in 1754. After that date the government of Georgia was substantially that of the typical royal province, with its governor and council appointed by the king and its assembly chosen by the people.[*]

[* Account Showing the Progress of Georgia, 45; Stevens, Georgia, I., 216-261, 372, 381-384.]

Page 269

In caring for the religious interests of their province the trustees showed in the main a broad and tolerant spirit. Men of all religious faiths, except that of the Roman Catholic church, were allowed freedom of worship. The population of the colony included Anglicans, Presbyterians, Moravians, Lutherans, Anabaptists, and Jews, the latter sect being sufficiently numerous to rent a room in Savannah for their public worship. Among the most conspicuous and influential men in the colony were the Lutheran ministers, such as Martin Bolzius, who served the religious interests of the German population. With all this variety the Anglican church had the advantage of special official recognition: several of the trustees were well-known Anglican clergymen; with the first company of colonists they sent out an Episcopal chaplain; and with the help of the Venerable Society they maintained a succession of ministers for the church of Savannah, including such distinguished men as John Wesley and George Whitefield.

At the beginning of the revolutionary era Georgia still remained much the smallest and weakest of the thirteen colonies. As late as 1760 it had a population of about ten thousand people, of whom over three thousand were negroes. Its historical significance lies mainly in its advanced position on the Anglo-Spanish frontier.[*]

[* Jones, Georgia, I., 440-449, 541; Stevens, Georgia, I., 319-370.]