USA > Connecticut > New Haven County > Waterbury > The town and city of Waterbury, Connecticut, from the aboriginal period to the year eighteen hundred and ninety-five, Volume I > Part 54
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Voted : That one of the law books now the property of the town be kept in the town clerk's office.
Voted : To sell the remainder of the law books at public vendue to the highest bidder, and that the additional Acts which shall come out hereafter will belong to the purchasers of said books on their paying one penny per page, the money to be paid into the town treasury for the use of said town.
This public auction was, by the way, not held at the whipping- post, as some have suggested, but at any convenient place chosen by the selectmen. Auctions at the whipping-post were almost ex- clusively those of articles seized on execution and disposed of by the sheriff.
It may be worth while here to select a few statistics showing what was the wealth of Waterbury at this time, thus giving some possible idea of the size of the interests placed in the hands of the selectmen. The grand list of Waterbury in 1779, the year before Watertown secured its independence and took away probably more than half of the population, was £ 38,504. In 1790, ten years after the secession of Watertown, Waterbury's grand list was £ 19,722. In 1784, Waterbury is reported to have had 452 oxen, 1122 cows and heifers, 481 horses, and 60 dogs. In 1794 it had 582 oxen, 1897 Cows
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and heifers, and 635 horses. These figures show but small change in the totals, and indicate that the town was increasing very little in the amount of its live stock.
While, however, Waterbury was apparently standing still, we find indications in the records that business was on the increase. The town meeting of December 29, 1788, appointed fence-viewers, sealers of weights and measures, leather sealers, key keepers and cullers of timber. Four years later we find it recorded that James Smith, Cyrus Lewis and David Norton were chosen packers. Still later there is a minute that the county courts "may appoint suitable persons, not to exceed three, to be inspectors and packers of beef, pork, butter and lard; also to inspect lumber, onions, hay, pot and pearl ashes and fish." The appointment of these new kinds of officials, the introduction into Waterbury public life of new functions, shows that the town is feeling the stirring of new business ambitions and is making ventures in the direction of outside trade. The exporta- tion of pork and beef, if one may use so large and Chicago-like a word as exportation, for whose quality these official inspectors were held to be responsible, was a business which was promoted largely through the push and enterprise of Col. William Leaven- worth (see Volume II, page 235), always a public-spirited citizen. The potash trade, too, was not inconsiderable, and 'Squire Ezra Bronson had a potash yard near the present site of St. John's church. The "cullers" of timber above mentioned had to put their official seals on the hoops and barrel staves which were packed in "shooks" and shipped to the West Indies. Thus it is seen there were possibilities for foreign trade here in Waterbury even before its great manufacturing boom had set in.
And this reminds us that we are approaching a period, the begin- ning of the new century, which early developed those great inter- ests that have since given to Waterbury so conspicuous a position as a New England manufacturing centre. It would be interesting to know, if we only had the information at hand, what effect, if any, was produced here by the great events which were changing the world's history, the French Revolution, the rise of Napoleon, and the wars which altered the map of Europe. But in regard to all this we are left to individual speculation. We do know, however, of the general effect upon the country and on its trade of these events, producing results of local interest. The general situation is thus sketched by Professor Taussig, in his "Tariff History of the United States":
The industrial situation changed abruptly in 1808. The complications with Eng- land and France led to a series of measures which mark a turning-point in the industrial history of the country. The Berlin and Milan decrees of Napoleon, and
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the English Orders in Council, led in December, 1807, to the Embargo. The Non-In- tercourse Act followed in 1809. War with England was declared in 1812. During the war, intercourse with England was prohibited, and all import duties were doubled. The last mentioned act was adopted in the hope of increasing the revenue, but had little effect, for foreign trade practically ceased to exist. This series of restrictive measures blocked the accustomed channels of exchange and production, and gave an enormous stimulus to those branches of industry whose products had before been imported. Establishments for the manufacture of cotton goods, woollen cloths, iron, glass, pottery and other articles sprang up with a mushroom growth. The restrictive legislation of 1808-15 was, for the time being, equivalent to extreme protection. The consequent rise of a considerable class of manufacturers, whose success depended largely on the continuance of protection, formed the basis of a strong movement for more decided limitation of foreign competition.
Here then we have the real beginnings of that tariff controversy which has so long formed an exciting issue, more pronounced at some times than at others, between the two parties in the United States. Into this controversy it would of course be out of place to enter here, but it is interesting to note that it started from this "war boom," thus giving an opportunity for the development of a race of mechanics who have since made New England manufac- turing what it has become, the marvel of the country if not of the world. The history of the birth and growth of Waterbury's manu- facturing interests is told in full in our second volume. Suffice it to say here that Waterbury felt the stimulus which was being applied generally to the thriving towns of Connecticut and New England. It had its woollen mill (which, however, ended in failure) and five clock factories at one time, besides a largely increased trade in buttons. In his sermon entitled "Three-quarters of a Cen- tury; a Historical Retrospect," the Rev. Dr. Joseph Anderson says :
In 1783, according to the grand list, there were in the town of Waterbury four steel and brass clocks, one wooden clock, seven watches, one " riding-chair," twenty ounces and ten pennyweights of silver plate and money at interest to the amount of £33. Judged by these various tests, the condition of our town was low .*
But just at the opening of the century, a few enterprising men began the busi- ness of clock-making, and in 1802 Abel Porter & Co. entered upon the manufacture of gilt buttons. These industries, as you are well aware, increased rapidly in strength and importance; the war of 1812 gave to the button trade, especially a new impulse; machinery was invented for the more rapid production of wares for which a market stood open, and in due time wealth began to flow in. With increasing pecuniary ability, and increasing intelligence, came in the luxuries of a modern civilization. As one reform after another was accomplished in the world without, Waterbury felt the effect of it; and as one invention or discovery after another was
* But does not the fact that the Company school-house or Academy was built in 1784, and that the con - tracts for two new churches were given out in 1794, prove that Waterbury was, on the whole, prosperous, and had not felt greatly the effects of the hard times and the drain of the war which are reported elsewhere ?
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appropriated by society at large, it found its way to this provincial village, estab- lishing a new bond between the mother-town of the Naugatuck valley and the great outside world.
But not only was it a time, as Dr. Anderson has described it, of increased trade and manufacturing, of increased inventions-it was in 1793 that Whitney invented the cotton-gin-but it was also a time of increased enterprise in the way of pushing goods out per- sonally into distant markets. In short, the day of the "drummer" was at hand, or, as he was then known, the peddler. President Dwight, in his "Travels in New England and New York," has given a graphic account of the progress of the peddler, the fore- runner of the modern drummer :
The peddler's load is composed of tinware, pins, needles, scissors, combs, but- tons, children's books, cotton stuffs, a smaller or larger assortment to offer to his customers. A number set out with large wagons, loaded with dry-goods, hats and shoes, together with tinware and the small articles already mentioned. These loads will frequently cost the proprietor from one to two thousand dollars, and are intended exclusively for the Southern and Western States. It is frequently the fact that from twenty to thirty persons are employed by a single house in manufactur- ing and selling tinware and other articles. The workmen, furnished with a suf- ficient quantity of the raw material to employ them for six months, are sent by water in the autumn to Virginia, North and South Carolina and Georgia. They station themselves at some town in the interior, where the employer or agent has a store, well-furnished with such articles as the peddlers require. As the stock of each peddler is exhausted, he repairs to the store for a supply. In this way a large amount of goods are vended during the six or eight months they are absent.
In commenting on the above, A. Bronson Alcott, who was him- self a native of Wolcott and lived there until he was nineteen, notes that "not less than ten peddlers from Wolcott often went south during several seasons. These were mostly employed by a house in Southington." There can be but little doubt that this constant out- going of peddlers from hereabouts to the south and west had an important though probably unnoticed influence on the social char- acter of Waterbury and its vicinity. It is Shakespeare who says that "home-keeping youths have ever homely wits." Experiences in different parts of the country, contact with different customs and modes of thought, even though it were a rude, pioneer way of seeing the world, must have contributed not a little to enlarging the horizon and increasing the broadness of those early drummers or peddlers. And the ideas which they brought home must have proved stimulating to those whom they left behind in the quiet New England environment.
We have already referred to the jealousies and rivalries between states which even went to the extent of hostile tariffs before the
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adoption of the Federal constitution, and to the Embargo act, which in the end proved so strong a stimulus to home manufac- tures, and we cannot leave the period of the war of 1812 without a passing allusion to the Hartford Convention with its famous quasi- endorsement of secession as a remedy in an extreme case. The general hatred of Jefferson in New England, because of his adop- tion of French philosophy, and the (unjust) belief that he favored France rather than England (largely on account of his hostility to England's Christianity), the acquisition of Louisiana, with its addi- tion to the strength of the Southern section overbalancing New England, and the tremendous damage inflicted on New England com- merce by the Embargo act, all combined to bring about the Conven- tion, which was held in Hartford between December 15, 1814, and January 5, 1815. It was called to consider the interests of the New England states in relation to the war with Great Britain. It con- sisted of twelve delegates frem Massachusetts, seven from Connec- ticut, three from Rhode Island, two from New Hampshire and one from Vermont, the delegates from the last two states representing counties. The president of the convention was George Cabot of Massachusetts, and the secretary was Theodore Dwight of Connec- ticut. Besides endorsing various demands on Congress the report which the Convention issued denied "any present intention to dis- solve the Union," but admitted that "if a dissolution should become necessary by reason of the multiplied abuses of bad administration, it should, if possible, be the work of peaceful times and deliberate consent." Although the declaration and demands of the Convention accomplished nothing beyond their endorsement by the legisla- tures of Massachusetts and Connecticut for the consideration of Con- gress, they have often been quoted as proving that the spirit of secession did not originate in the South. It was the taunt of Sen- ator Hayne of South Carolina, regarding the Hartford Convention and the part in it which was taken by Nathan Dane, that called forth perhaps the most eloquent passage of Daniel Webster's cele- brated reply to Hayne.
A subject not second in importance to the effect of the war of 1812 on the business life of the state and of the town was the sub- ject of a new constitution. The position of Connecticut after the Declaration of Independence was an anomalous one. Her consti- tution still continued to be, despite her separation from the British Crown, the charter granted by Charles II. in 1662. This charter, although nominally proceeding from the throne, really proceeded from the people of Connecticut. Its first draft was, as a matter of fact, prepared by the General Court in Hartford. The king was
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petitioned to bestow his royal favor and grace "according to the tenor of a draft or instrument " that the General Court submitted for his formal approval, as is stated in the petition for it. And, as is held in Swift's "System of the Laws of Connecticut," " the appli- cation of the people for the charter and their voluntary acceptance of it gave efficiency to the government it constituted-and not the royal signature." Previous to the granting of the charter, the guar- antee of government rested on the compact which had been entered into between the towns originating the colony, and under whose authority the General Court had been constituted. The fact of separation from Great Britain and of the establishment of an inde- pendent government did not change the status of the charter as the constitution of the state. The General Assembly in October, 1776, after endorsing the Declaration of Independence of July 4, made this additional declaration:
That the form of civil government in this state shall continue to be as estab- lished by charter received from Charles II, King of England, so far as an adher- ence to the same will be consistent with an absolute independence of this state on the Crown of Great Britain.
In the revision of the laws of 1784, in an act containing a decla- ration of popular rights, it is again declared that "the ancient form of civil government contained in the charter from Charles II, King England, and adopted by the people of this state, shall be and remain the civil constitution of this state under the sole authority of the people thereof." These declarations by the General Assembly show that recognition of the charter as a true constitution was as solemnly affirmed by the authoritative representative body of the state as it was possible to affirm it. Still, there were those who called in question its validity as a constitution. As early as 1782, says J. Hammond Trumbull in his "Historical Notes on the Con- stitution of Connecticut," to which we are largely indebted for the facts here used, there appeared a pamphleteer who propounded "A Modest and Decent Inquiry," whether Connecticut had "strictly and properly speaking, any civil constitution." This pamphleteer stated that the declaration made by the General Assembly in 1776 was "looked upon by the more thinking and judicious only as a temporary thing, until our troubles should be over and our inde- pendence acknowleged." When, in 1786, a bill was offered in the House of Representatives to reduce the number of its members, and objection was made that a constitutional question was thus raised which the General Assembly was incompetent to decide, Mr. James Davenport, the author of the bill, declared during the debate: "We have no constitution but the laws of the state. The charter is not
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the constitution. By the Revolution that was abrogated." Mr. Trumbull says, however, that "prior to 1800 the number of those who denied the validity of the act of 1776 and maintained the neces- sity or the propriety of calling a convention to frame a new con- stitution was very small."
This question became soon an issue of politics. The Federalists upheld the doctrine that the Charter was a valid constitution. The Anti-Federalists, or the "Republicans " as they called themselves, or the "Democrats" as their opponents called them, maintained that the Charter was not a valid constitution. The Anti-Federal- ists, or Democrats, by which name we shall hereafter call them, as they thus soon came to be historically known, date their existence as a separate party, according to Mr. Trumbull, from the " Middle- town Convention," of September 30, 1783. This was called to oppose the "Commutation act" by which Congress granted five years' full pay to the officers of the Revolutionary army, in lieu of half-pay for life. The adjourned meeting of this convention, which presented a remonstrance to the General Assembly against the Commutation act, contained representatives from about fifty towns, a majority of all the towns in the state. This shows that from its very beginning the new party had at least a respectable basis for its existence. On the question of ratifying the Federal constitution in the convention of 1788, ratification was carried by about a three-fourths vote, 128 to 40. "This," says Mr. Trumbull, " nearly represents the relative strength of the two parties in Con- necticut at this time and for some years afterwards." Mr. Trum- bull gives a list of the prominent Democratic leaders of this period, including, as he says, " distinguished patriots of the Revolution and men of influence in the General Assembly." In this list are Wil liam Williams of Lebanon, a signer of the Declaration of Inde- pendence, Gen. James Wadsworth of Durham, Gen. Erastus Wolcott of East Windsor, and (a name that is of special interest to readers of this history) Joseph Hopkins, Esq., of Waterbury.
A curious feature of the struggle now beginning is to be found in the sneers levelled at Connecticut conservatism. The fact that Connecticut was so " slow-going " as to rest satisfied with a consti- tution which was a relic of monarchy afforded infinite opportunity for jest to Democratic editors, pamphleteers and orators. These sneers were by no means confined to the state. Mr. Trumbull quotes Cheetham's paper, the Republican Watch-Tower of New York, as saying in its issue of June 17, 1801:
The sentiments of the state [Connecticut] have been marked, as well while a colony as now, with a steadiness that excludes both retrogradation and advance- ment. Like an isthmus, inanimate and immovable, she bids defiance to the
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meliorating progression made on both sides of her. The advancement of political science generated by our Revolution has neither changed her constitution nor affected her steady habits. . A fanatic veneration for a pampered, deluding and anti-Christian priesthood, renders [her people] the dupes of their cunning, and subservient to their power. And the citizens, really honest, but enveloped in superstition, are converted into instruments by the cunning of their priestly rul- ers, to debase themselves and to exalt their oppressors.
In the last clauses of this remarkable tirade the really sensitive spot in the workings of the state government under the charter is at last touched. That tender spot was the irritation over the posi- tion as an established church which was held by the Congregational body. The agitation against the established church, which finally aroused the Episcopalians and the other non-conformists-how odd it seems to apply the term "non-conformist" to the Episco- pal church; but that was its exact status in Connecticut for many years-became in the end strong enough, in conjunction with the issue made against the charter by the Democrats as a party, to overthrow it and bring about the adoption of the constitution of 1818. But this is some years in advance of the publication of the squib from Cheetham's paper above quoted. In the spring election of 1805 the principal issue was a new constitution, but the Federal- ists and supporters of " steady habits " easily carried the day. Soon came the events which led to the war of 1812 and the inauguration of new industries, already described, and for a time the thoughts of the people were diverted from the question of Charter versus con- stitution. The agitation was renewed in 1816, and reached success the following year. The conditions which led to the agitation against the established church, resulting in its overthrow, are thus sketched by Mr. Trumbull:
By a colony law of May, 1697, every town and society was required to provide annually for the maintenance of their minister in accordance with the agreement made at settlement, by a tax levied " on the several inhabitants according to their respective estates." A minister settled by the major part of the householders of a town or society was, by a law passed in 1699, to be accounted the lawful minister of such town or society, and the agreement made with him was declared to be bind- ing on " all of such towns." And when in 1708 the General Assembly, by an act "for the ease of such as soberly dissent from the way of worship and ministry established by the ancient laws of this government and still continuing," extended to all qualified dissenters in the colony the same liberty and privileges granted by the toleration act of William and Mary, it was with the special proviso that this should not be construed "to the excusing of any person from paying any such minister or town dues as are now or shall be hereafter due from them."
In 1727 an act was passed directing that all taxes collected for support of the ministry from members of the Church of England should be paid to the settled minister of that church; and if, in any parish, the amount so paid should be insuf-
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ficient to support the minister, the members of his church were authorized to tax themselves for the deficiency. Two years afterward, similar privileges were granted to Quakers and Baptists. At the revision of the laws in 1784 [the period which we have under consideration] the act of 1708, recognizing " established churches," was . omitted; and in October, 1791, the General Assembly passed "an act securing equal rights and privileges to Christians of every denomination in this state." Every dissenter [meaning Episcopalians, Quakers, Baptists, and others not Congre- gationalists], who should lodge with the clerk of an ecclesiastical society a certifi- cate of his having joined himself to any other than the established denomination was, " so long as he shall continue ordinarily to attend on the worship and ministry in the church or congregation to which he has chosen to belong," exempted from the payment of society taxes for the support of public worship or the ministry. And all churches and congregations of dissenters so formed were empowered to tax themselves for maintaining their ministers, building meeting-houses, etc.
This, it would at first seem, was a sufficient recognition of inde- pendence to satisfy the Episcopalians, Quakers, Baptists and other dissenters. But the mere fact that they had to lodge their certifi- cates with the clerk of a Congregational church in order to escape taxation was regarded by these dissenters as a badge of inferiority and was resented. On the other hand, those who did not belong to any church, and did not care to connect themselves nominally with any, were under the law still liable to be taxed for the support of the established Congregational churches. Episcopalians also had another grievance. The legislature's refusal to grant the powers and privileges of a college to the Episcopal academy at Cheshire, or to grant a charter for a new Episcopal college in Connecticut, especially when contrasted with the generosity of the General Assembly to Yale, made the members of that communion feel very sore toward the existing régime. A measure of conciliation was passed in October, 1816, by which the balances due the state from the United States, on account of disbursements for the general defence in the war with Great Britain, were divided up between the different denominations, the established church getting a third, the Episcopal Bishop's fund a seventh, and Yale college a seventh. But this division pleased nobody and the irritation was not allayed. In 1794, the Episcopal society here in Water- bury was strong enough to give out contracts for the building of a new church. The questions, then, which agitated the Episcopalians and other dissenters in the rest in the state must have aroused no little feeling here in Waterbury.
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