USA > Washington DC > Washington DC > A new and comprehensive gazetteer of Virginia, and the District of Columbia > Part 77
USA > Virginia > A new and comprehensive gazetteer of Virginia, and the District of Columbia > Part 77
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Failing in this, it was manifest that the company was not to be . brow. beaten into submission to his dictation, and he only considered how the charter of the company might be revoked, with the least violation to the laws of England. To effect this with plausible decency some allegation of improper conduct was to be made, and some proof ferreted out. The first" .of these objects was effected by two long petitions by members of the Roy: al faction in the company, setting forth at full length every evil which had accrued to the colony, from its earliest establishment to that hour, and charg. ing all upon the mismanagement of the company. For many of these charges there was too much truth, and the faulis of the company could be easily seen after the accidents had happened, but whether they were not necessarily incidental to the situation of things in Virginia, or they might have been avoided by the king or a corporation differently constituted, are questions difficult to answer; but these petitions contained, mingled with these truths, a great proportion of glaring falsehood as to the physical and moral condition of the colony. They had been prepared and presented with great secrecy; but the company contrived to obtain copies of them; and refuted their slanders by the most irrefragible testimony, many facts be- ing in the cognziance of the members themselves, and others established by the evidence of respectable persons who had long resided in Virginia. This mass of evidence was laid before the king, in the vain hope, that he might be induced to disregard the petitions; but part of his object was now gained, the charges were made, the next step was to procure a semblance of proof; for this purpose in a few days, in answer to the prayer in one of the petitions, he issued a commission under the great seal, to seven persons to enquire into all matters respecting Virginia, from the beginning of its set. tlement.
The better to enable these commissioners to conduct their investiga- tions, by an order, of the privy council, all the records of the com. pany of whatsoever nature were seized, the deputy treasurer was imprison- ed, and on the arrival of a ship from Virginia, all the papers on board were inspected.
The report of these commissioners has never transpired, but it was with- October, 1623, out doubt, such as the king wished and expected; for by an order in council he made known, that having taken into his princely consideration, the distressed state of Virginia, occasioned by the' ill-government of the company, he had resolved by a new charter, to ap- point a governor and twelve assistants to reside in England ; and a govern-
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or and twelve assistants to reside in Virginia; the former to be nominated by his majesty in council, the latter to be nominated by the governor and assistants in England, and be appointed by the king in council; and that all proceedings should be subject to the royal direction. This was a return at one step to the charter of . 1606. The company was called together to consider upon this arbitrary edict, under an alternative similar to the one given to witches upon their trial; if they could swim with a heavy weight about their necks, they were burned as guilty, if they sunk and drowned they were acquitted; the king gave the company the privilege of accepting his proposition and resigning its charter, or of refusing and having the charter annulled.
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The company which had refused to gratify the king in the choice of its officers, was less disposed to comply with this suicidal requisition. The astounding order was read over three several times before they could conr vince themselves that their ears informed them correctly of its purport. At length the vote was taken and one hundred and twelve votes were against the relinquishment, and twenty-six, the precise number of the king's . fac- tion, in favor of it. The company asked further time for a more deliberate decision, as there had not been sufficient notice, few members were present, and it was one of those matters of importance which could not be decided, by the terms of their charter, except at a regular quarterly meeting; but the council would not listen to the proposition, ordering the company to. meet again in three days, and give a clear, direct and final answer. In obedience to this order an extraordinary court was summoned, and the ques-" tion of surrender submitted to their consideration, upon which only nine of the seventy present voted in its favor; an answer was returned that they . would defend their charter. The knowledge of these proceedings transpi .: ring produced a shock to the credit of the company, which palsied for the, time the spirit of commercial enterprise; to remedy this evil the privy .. council declared that the private property of every one should be protected, and secured by additional guarantees if necessary; that: they should pro- ceed with their regular business; and all ships bound for Virginia should sail. To endeavor to discover something more authentic against the com- pany than his secret conclave of commissioners had yet been able to obtain, Oct. 24, 1623, the king now thought proper to send John Harvey, John
Pory, Abraham Piersey, Samuel Matthews, and John Jef- ferson, as commissioners to Virginia. "To make more particular and dili. gent enquiry touching divers matters, which concerned. the state of Virgi- nia, and in order to facilitate this enquiry, the governor and council of Vir- ginia were ordered to assist the commissioners in this scrutiny, by all their, - knowledge and influence."*
The commissioners early in the ensuing year arrived in the colony. In 1624 all of this controversy between the king and the company, the colony not supposing its chartered rights were likely to be violated by either party, and feeling little interest in the discussion of rights which belonged entirely to others, which they never supposed that they were to possess; had acted with entire neutrality, and cared little whether they were to be un- der the general superintendence of the courts of the company, or a council chosen by the king, so long as they could regulate their own affairs by their' . own General Assembly.t
* Burk I. 272.
t The king and company quarrelled, and by a mixture of law and force, the latter" were ousted of all their rights, without retribution, after having expended £100,000
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In such a mood would the commissioners have found the colony; and General Assembly, had they not procured copies of the two slanderoun pe- titions, in spite of all the precautions of the king and the secrecy of his council and commissioners. Although they felt little interest in the con- troversy, they felt great interest in defending themselves from defamation; and their country from false and malicious representations, well calculated to disparage and depreciate it in the estimation of those, with whom they. Feb. 20, 1624, wished it to stand fairest. . In six days from their meeting they had prepared spirited and able answers to these peti- tions; declaring in their preamble, "that they holding it a sin against God and their own sufferings, to permit the world to be abused with false re- ports, and to give to vice the reward of virtue,-They, in the name of the whole colony of Virginia, in their General Assembly met, many of them having been eye-witnesses and sufferers in those times, had framed out of their duty to their country, and love of truth the following answer given to the praises of Sir T. Smith's government, in the said declaration."
They next drafted a petition to the king, which with a letter to the privy council and the other papers, were committed to the care of Mr. John Poun- tis, a member of the council, who was selected to go to England to repre- sent the general interests of the colony before his majesty and the privy- council; and whose expenses were provided for by a tax of four pounds of the best merchantable tobacco for every male person sixteen years of age; who had been in the country for one year. This gentleman unfortunately died on his passage. 'The letter to the privy council marks very strongly the value which they set even at that early day upon the right of legisla- ting for themselves, the principal prayer in it, being "that the governors may not have absolute power, and that they might still retain the liberty of popular assemblies, than which, nothing could more conduce to the public satisfaction, and public utility."
A contest of wits was commenced between the commissioners and the Assembly. The former under various pretexts withheld from the latter a a sight of their commission, and the other papers with which they had been charged, and the governor and the Assembly thought proper to preserve an " equal mystery as to their own proceedings. "In this dilemma . Mr. Pory, . who was one of the commissioners, and who had been secretary to the: company, and discharged from his post for betraying its councils to the earl of Warwick; now suborned Edward Sharpless, a clerk of the council, to give him copies of the proceedings of that body and of the Assembly .: This treachery was discovered, and the clerk was punished with the loss of: his ears; whilst an account was sent home to the company, expressive of the greatest abhorrence at the baseness and treachery of Pory .. The com- missioners finding their secret manœuvering defeated, next endeavored, by the most artful wheedling, to induce the Assembly to petition the crown for !: a revocation of the charter. In reply to this the Assembly asked for their
in establishing the colony, without the smallest aid from the government. King James suspended their powers by proclamation of July 15, 1624, and Charles I. took the government into his own hands. Both sides had their partisans in the colony; but in truth the people of the colony in general thought themselves little concerned in the dispute. There being three parties interested in these several charters; what passed between the first and second it was thought could not affect the third. If the , king seized on the powers of the company, they only passed into other hands, without . increase or diminution, while the rights of the people remained as they were. Jeffer-' son's Notes on Va., pa. 152-3. -
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authority to make 'such a proposition, which of course they could not give without betraying their secret instructions, and were compelled to answer the requisition in general terms and professions. The Assembly took no farther notice of the commissioners; but proceeded with their ordinary le- gislation.
Thirty-five acts of this Assembly have been preserved to the present time, and exhibit with great strength, the propriety and good sense with which men can pass laws for the regulation of their own interests and con- cerns. One of these acts establishes at once in the most simple and intelli- gible language the great right of exemption from taxation without represen- tation; it runs in these words :- " The governor shall not lay any taxes or impositions upon the colony, their lands or commodities, other way than by the authority of the General Assembly, to be levied and employed as the said Assembly shall appoint."-By a subsequent act it was declared that the governor should not withdraw the inhabitants from their private labors to any service of his own, upon any color whatsoever, and in case the public service required the employment of many hands, before the holding of a General Assembly, he was to order it, and the levy of men was to be made by the governor and whole body of the council in such manner as would be least burthensome to the people and most free from partiality. To encourage good conduct, the old planters who had been in the colony since the last arrival of Gates, were exempted from taxation or mili- tary duty. Many acts of general utility were passed; the members of the Assembly were privileged from arrest; lands were to be surveyed and their boundaries recorded, which is no doubt the origin of our highly beneficial recording statutes; vessels arriving were prohibited from break- ing their cargoes until they had reported themselves; inspectors of tobacco were established in every settlement; the use of sealed weights and mea- sures was enforced; provision was made for paying the public debt, " brought on by the late troubles;" no person was, upon the rumor of supposed change and alteration, to presume to be disobedient to the present government, or servants to their private officers, masters or overseers, at their uttermost perils.
Wise regulations were likewise made to prevent surprises by the In- .dians; every house was to be fortified with palisadoes; no man should go or send abroad without a party sufficiently armed, or to work without their arms, with a centinel over them; the inhabitants were forbidden to go aboard ships or elsewhere in such numbers as to endanger the safety of their plantations; every planter was to take care to have sufficient arms and ammunition in good order; watch was to be kept by night; and no planter was to suffer powder to be expended in amusement or entertainments. To promote corn-planting, and ensure plenty of provision, no limit was fixed to its price; viewers were appointed to see that every man planted a suffi- ciency for his family, and all trade with the savages for corn was strictly prohibited.
Having thus given a specimen of colonial spirit, and colonial legislation, we return to the little intrigues of James, who was striving by every means in his power to become possessed of the control of the colony; partly to gratify his love of arbitrary authority and of money, and partly to gratify his royal self-complacency by framing a code of laws, for a people with whose character and condition he was utterly unacquainted, and who from the specimens recently given appeared to be fully competent to the manage-
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ment of their own affairs, without the dictation or advies of this royal guar- dian; who while he displayed the craft without the talent of a Philip, aspired to the character of a Solon. The recent acts of the king led to a solemn council of the company on the state of their affairs, in which they confirm- ed by an overwhelming majority the previous determination to defend their charter, and asked for a restitution of their papers for the purpose of pre- paring their defence. This request was pronounced reasonable by the at- torney general, and complied with. Whilst these papers were in the hands of the company, they were transcribed, and the copy has been fortunately preserved, and presents a faithful record of many portions of Virginia his- tory which it would be otherwise impossible to elucidate .*
The king had caused a quo warranto to be issued against the company Nov. 10, 1625 soon after the appointment of his commissioners to go to Virginia, and the cause was tried in the King's Bench, in Trinity Term of 1624. A cause which their Royal master had so much at heart could not long be doubtful with judges entirely dependent upon his will for their places; it is even credibly reported that this important case, whereby the rights of a powerful corporation were divested, and the possi- bility of remuneration for all of their trouble and expense forever cut off, was decided upon a mere technical question of special pleading!"
In the mean time the commissioners had returned, and reported very fa- vorably of the soil and climate of Virginia, but censuring deeply the con- duct of the company,-recommending the government of the original char- ter of 1606, and declaring that a body so large and so democratic in its forms as the company, could never persevere in a consistent course of poli- cy, but must veer about as the different factions should prevail. In this it must be admitted that there was much truth, and all hopes of profit having for some time expired, and the company only being kept up by the distin- guished men of its members, from patriotic motives and as an instrument of power for thwarting the king, in which capacity its prosent unpopulari- ty rendered it of little use,-it was now suffered to expire under the judi- cial edict, without a groan. The expiration of the charter brought little immediate charge to the actual government of the colony,-a large com- mittee was formed by the king, consisting principally of his privy council, to discharge the functions of the extinct company ; Sir Francis Wyatt was reappointed governor, and he and his council only empowered to govern "as fully and amply as any governor and council resident there, at any time within the space of five years last past:" -- which was the exact period of their representative government. The king in appointing the council in Virginia, refused to appoint embittered partisans of the court faction, but formed the government of men of moderation.
So leaving Virginia free, whilst his Royal Highness is graciously pleas- ed to gratify his own vanity in preparing a new code of laws to regulate her affairs, we pass on to a new chapter.
* Burk, pa. 274-5. Stith compiled his history principally from these documents.
t Note to Bancroft, pa. 207. Stith, pa. 329, 330, doubts if judgment was passed. The doubt may be removed. "Before the end of the same term, a judgment was de- clared by the Lord Chief Juitice Ley, against the company and their charter, only " upon failer or mistake in pleading." See a Short Collection of the most Remarkable Passages from the Original to the Dissolution of the Virginia Company. London, 1651, pa. 15. See also Hazard V, I. pa. 19; Chalmer's, pa. 62; Proud's Pennsylvania, V. I. pa. 107. 2
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CHAPTER IV.
PROGRESS OF THE COLONY FROM THE DISSOLUTION OF THE LONDON COMPANY, TO THE BREAKING OUT OF BACON'S REBELLION IN 1675.
Accession of Charles I.,-Tobacco trade,- Yeardley governor, -- his com- mission favorable-his death and character,-Lord Baltimore's recep- , tion,-State of religion,-legislation upon the subject,-Invitation to . the Puritans to settle on Delaware bay,-Harvey governor,-Erior with regard to his early administration,-Dismemberment of the colo- .ny,-Grant of Carolina and Marylaud,-probable cause of discontent, -Harvey deposed-restored,-Wyatt governor,-Acts of the Legisla- ture improperly censured, -Berkeley governor,-Indian relations,- Opechancanough prisoner-his death,-Change of government in Eng- land,-Fleet and army sent to reduce Virginia,-Preparation for de- fence by Berkeley,-Agreement entered into between the colony. and the! . commissioners of the commonwealth,-Indian hostilities,-Matthews elected governor,-Difficulties between the governor and the legislature -adjusted,-State of the colony and its trade,-Commissioners sent to England,-The Restoration, -- General legislation.
THE dissolution of the London Company was soon followed by the death March 27, 1625. of James, and the accession of his son Charles I. The king troubled himself little about the political rights and privileges of the colony, and suffered them to grow to the strength of estab- lished usage by his wholesome neglect ; whilst he was employed in obtaining a monopoly of their tobacco. This valuable article, the use of which ex- tended with such unaccountable rapidity, had early attracted the avidity of king James. The 19th article of the charter of 1609 had exempted the company, their agents, factors and assignees from the payment of all sub: sidies and customs in Virginia for the space of one and twenty years, and from all taxes and. impositions forever, upon any goods imported thither; or exported thence into any of the realms or dominions of England ; ex- cept the five per cent usual by the ancient trade of merchants .* But not :: withstanding the express words of this charter, a tax was laid by the farm- ers of the customs in the year. 1620 upon the tobacco of the colony .; which was not only high of itself, but the more oppressive because it laid the- same tax upon Virginia and Spanish tobacco, when the latter sold in the' market for three times the price of the former. In the same year, the same prince was guilty of another violation of the charter in forcing the com: pany to bring all of their tobacco into England; when he found that a portion of their trade had been diverted into Holland, and establishments made at Middleburg and Flushing. The charters all guaranteed to the colony all of the rights, privileges, franchises, and immunities of native born Englishmen, and this act of usurpation was the first attempt on the part of the mother country to monopolize the trade of the colony. The next year the king, either his avidity being unsatisfied, or not liking .the
* Henning St. at L. v. I. p, 34.
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usurped and precarious tenure by which his gains were held, inviegled the Virginia and Somer's Isle's company into an arrangement, by which they were to become the sole importers of tobacco; being bound however to import not less than forty nor more than sixty thousand pounds of Spanish varinas, and paying to the king in addition to the six pence duty before paid, one- third part of all the tobacco landed in the realms. The king on his part was to prohibit all other importation and all planting in England and Ire- land; and that which was already planted was to be confiscated.
When the company petitioned Parliament to prolong its existence in opposition to the efforts of the king, they failed,-but that portion of their petition which asked for the exclusive monopoly of tobacco to Virginia
and the Somer Isles, was granted, and a royal proclamation Sep. 29, 1624. ", issued accordingly ; whether this exclusiveness was under- stood with the limitation in the previous contract between the king and the two companies, it is impossible to say, as- the original documents are not accessible to the writer .* But the probabilities are greatly against the limitation.
Charles had not been long on the throne before he issued a proclamation April 9, 1625. confirming the exclusive privileges of the Virginia and Somer Isles, tobacco, and prohibiting a violation of their, monopoly, under penalty of censure by the dread star-chamber. This was soon followed by another in which he carefully set forth the forfeiture of their charter by the company, and the immediate dependance of the colony . upon the crown ; concluding by a plain intimation of his intention to be- come.their sole factor.
Soon after this a rumor reached the colonies that an individual was in treaty with the king for an exclusive contract for tobacco, one of the con- ditions of which would have led to the importation of so large an amount of Spanish tobacco as would have driven that of the colonists from the market ; the earnest representations of the colony on this subject caused an abandonment of the scheme, but in return the colony was obliged to excuse itself from a charge of trade with the lower countries, and promise to trade only with England.t But the king's eagerness for the possession of this monopoly was not to be baffled thus; he made a formal proposition to the" colony for their exclusive trade, in much the same language as one trades- man would use to another, and desired that the General Assembly might be convened for the purpose of considering his proposition. The answer by the General Assembly to this proposition is preserved.>
March 26, 1628. It sets forth in strong but respectful language the injury which had been done the planters by the mere report of an intention to subject their trade to a monopoly ; they state the reasons for not engaging in the production of the other staples mentioned by the king; and dissent from his proposition as to the purchase of their tobacco, demanding a higher : price and better terms of admission, in exchange for the exclusive monopo- ly which he wished.t
In the mean time the death of his father rendered 'it necesary for Sir'
Francis Wyatt to return to Europe to attend to his private affairs, 1626. and the king appointed Sir George Yeardley, his successor. This
* Burk, I. 291, and Bancroft 1, 206-quoting Smith, Cobbeit's Parliament. Hist, and Hazard. :
+ Burk's Ancient records-Burk, V. 2. 19.
# Hening, vol. 1. 131.
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was itself a sufficient guarantee of the political privileges of the colony, as he had had the honor of calling the first colonial assembly : but in addition to this his powers were like those of his predecessor, limited to the execu- tive authority exercised by the governor within five years last past. These circumstances taken in connection with the express sanction given by Charles to the power of a Legislative Assembly with regard to his prof- fered contract for tobacco sufficiently prove that he had no design of inter- fering with the highly-prized privilege of self-government enjoyed by the colonists: and fully justifies the General Assembly in putting the most favor- able construction upon the king's ambiguous words announcing his deter- mination to preserve inviolate all the "former interests" of Virginia, which occur in his letter of 1627 .*
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