USA > Maryland > Maryland, 1633 to 1776 : being an account of the main currents in the political and religious development of Maryland as a proprietary province > Part 3
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When this intelligence reached Baltimore he immediately had an interview with Father White who had recently arrived in England from the colony, and confirmed his impression of the seriousness of the state of affairs. Though a devout member of the Roman Church, the Lord Proprietor felt that successful government pre- cluded divided sovereignty between church and state. It was neces- sary that all the Maryland colonists, cleric and lay, should alike be amenable to the civil law. He therefore requested the Pope to remove the Jesuit missions from Maryland, a request which was granted, and later arranged with Father More, the Jesuit provincial in England for the surrender by the church of all claims to exemp- tion from the Maryland law, the release of all lands acquired from the Indians, and the recognition that no land grants were to be valid without proprietary sanction. Moreover, no priests were to be sent to the province without the Lord Proprietor's approval.
The" news came upon the priests like a thunder bolt out of a clear sky. Having assured his authority, Baltimore recalled the priests, sent out others and in 1641 issued new conditions of plantation. The latter introduced the English statutes of mortmain into the province, which provided that no land could by held by any corporation, or society, ecclesiastical or secular, without the specific sanction of the government. Meanwhile Governor Cal- vert and Secretary Lewger had won the support of the Assembly and had secured acts of Assembly giving jurisdiction over marriage and testamentary cases to civil officers.
That toleration actually existed may be concluded from the fact that a number of different sects, when driven from their homes came to Maryland. In 1643 when Virginia enacted a law requiring all ministers to conform to the ritual of the Church of England and directing the governor and Council to compel all non-conformists, upon notice to leave the colony, the latter re- quested and obtained permission from the Maryland governor to settle in Maryland. Assured of freedom of worship, of no demands being made upon them save obedience to the laws, fidelity to the Lord Proprietor and the customary quit-rents, they came to
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Maryland and founded the Puritan settlement of Providence on the Severn River.
Following the "Plundering Time" of Claiborne and Ingle (1644-1646) Baltimore decided to allow no basis for future attack upon his government on the pretext that it was Roman Catholic. To that end he appointed William Stone, a Protestant, governor and an equal number of Protestants and Roman Catholics on the Council and introduced the following passage into the governor's oath of office: "I will not by myself nor any person, directly or indirectly trouble, molest, or discountenance any person what- soever in the said Province professing to believe in Jesus Christ, and in particular any Roman Catholic for or in respect of his or her religion or in his or her free exercise thereof within the said Province so as they be not unfaithful to his said Lordship nor molest nor conspire against the civil government established here, nor will I make any difference of persons conferring offices, re- wards, or favors proceeding from the authority which his said Lordship had conferred upon me as his Lieutenant here for or in respect of their said religion respectively, but merely as I shall find them faithful and well deserving of his said Lordship .... and if any other officer or person whatsoever shall, during the time of my being his said Lordship's Lieutenant here without my consent or privily, molest or disturb any person within the province pro- fessing to believe in Jesus Christ merely for or in respect of his or her religion or the free exercise thereof, upon notice or com- plaint thereof made unto me I will apply my power and authority to relieve and protect any person so molested or troubled whereby he may have right done him for any damage which he shall suffer in that kind and to the utmost of my power will cause all and every such person or persons in that manner to be punished. "1
The members of the Council were also obliged to take the first provision of this oath.
In 1649 the Assembly gave its attention to matters of reli- gion. Under the title, "An Act Concerning Religion" the penalty of death was prescribed for anyone denying Christ to be the Son of God, for unbelief in the Trinity, or for blasphemy against any-
Proceedings of the council, 1636 to 1667, page 209 on.
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one of the Trinity. The use of Heretic, Papist, Jesuit, Puritan, and similar terms in an opprobrious sense was forbidden under heavy penalties. Scurrilous remarks in connection with the Virgin Mary, the Apostles and Evangelists were to be punished by fine. "And whereas the enforcing of the conscience in matters of religion hath frequently fallen out to be of dangerous consequence " no person professing faith in Jesus Christ was to be in "any way compelled to the belief or exercise of any religion against his or her consent". Anyone who wilfully wronged another professing faith in Christ on account of his religion was to pay treble dam- ages to the individual wronged and to forfeit twenty shillings. Swearing, drunkenness, unnecessary work or disorderly recreation on Sunday were forbidden.
It may be justly stated that this act failed to provide complete toleration, yet in view of the world tendency of the epoch it was a step of no small importance. Its toleration extended only to a trinitarian form of Christianity. But in comparison with the policy in other parts of the Kingdom of England and its dominions, it was a great improvement. In England persecution of any religious communion except that of the Established Church was enforced by statute; in Massachusetts worship according to the Church of England was forbidden, and in Virginia those who failed to con- form to the English ritual were expelled. In Maryland the form of worship was free at least, and in reality toleration became the settled policy of the province and remained constantly in effect except during such periods as the proprietary charter and author- ity were held in abeyance.
Quakers, persecuted in England and in Massachusetts, in the latter colony even to the extent of being hanged, found Maryland a haven or refuge and came to the Province in large numbers. By the year 1661 there were so many that they held regular meetings in the province. In 1672 George Fox, founder of the sect, visited the Quakers established in Maryland and attended a large meeting at West River, Anne Arundel County, which lasted four days, and later another in Talbot which lasted five days.
Instead of taking the oath of fidelity, they were allowed to take a modified oath, providing for submission to Lord Baltimore's authority and that of his legally constituted government. However
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many refused to subscribe to this agreement and sought to per- suade others who had signed it, to renounce it. They refused to bear arms, take the juror's oath or give evidence in court, and sought to dissuade others from performing such acts. Their interpretation of being "governed by God's law and the light within them, and not by man's law" frequently brought them into conflict with the authorities in the province. Their attitude made the governor and Council feel that it was necessary to issue an order for the banishment of those among them who were insubordinate. Should they afterwards return they were „to be whipped from constable to constable until out of the province." 1 Thurston, one of the Quaker leaders was summoned to appear before the authorities for being in the province after banishment, but on his plea that he had not been out of the province and could therefore not return no judgment for "whipping him out of the province" could be given.
A sect of quietists or mystics, called Labadists, after several forced migrations, finally found a resting place under the govern- ment of Maryland." The founder of the sect, Jean de Labadie, a Frenchman, felt that it was his mission to restore the church to its pristine purity. He had been Jesuit, Calvinist and even held the Quaker doctrine of the inward illumination of the spirit. The property of the sect was held in common and as a part of its communistic ideas, the sect's views on marriage were somewhat unconventional. Peter Sluyter and Jasper Dankers in 1683 brought a number of Labadists from Wiewerd in Friesland, where the sect was then established, and settled on land secured from August Hermann of Bohemia Manor. They lived frugally under the harsh and arbitrary rule of Sluyter until 1698 when the property was divided and Sluyter who had succeeded in having the title to the land made out in his name, retained enough to make him wealthy. Twenty years later the sect seems to have disappeared.
With the overthrow of proprietary authority in 1652 the government of Puritan commissioners immediately reversed the
' Proceedings of the Council, 1636-1667, page 362.
' W. H. Browne, Maryland, History of a Palatinate, pages 133, 134.
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policy of toleration. The first Assembly that met under the Puritan leader, William Fuller, passed a new "Act Concerning Religion". It repealed the act of 1649 and provided that no one of the Roman Catholic faith might be elected to represent the people in the Assembly, and that "none who profess and exercise the popish religion, commonly known by the name of the Roman catholic religion, can be protected in this province by the laws of England formerly established and yet unrepealed ... but are to be restrained from the exercise thereof; therefore all and every person or persons concerned in the law aforesaid are required to take notice." It was further provided that "such as profess faith in God by Jesus Christ, though differing in judgment from the doctrine, worship and discipline publicly held forth, shall not be restrained from, but shall be protected in the profession of the faith and exercise of their religion, so they abuse not this . liberty to the injury of others or the disturbance of the public peace on their part; provided that this liberty be not extended to popery or prelacy nor to such as under the profession of Christ hold forth and practice licentiousness."1 Thus Roman Catholics and members of the Church of England and any sects coming under the heading of "practicing licentiousness" were to be deprived of the free exercise of their religion. But after six years of Puritan rule, Cromwell restored the province to Charles, third Lord Baltimore, with the stipulation that the Toleration Act of 1649 should go into effect and remain so permanently.
Meanwhile the standing of the Protestant clergy in Maryland was deplorable. For more than fifty years the Church of England had no organization whatever in the province and the sole provision for the payment of its clergy was by voluntary gifts. The Lower House, composed almost entirely of Protestants favored the enactment of a law for the maintenance of ministers, but the Upper House, composed of the Roman Catholic office holders would not hear of such a law, and the mere mention of it was sufficient to create stormy opposition from the Upper House. This difference in religious sentiment between the two Houses added an element of discord to the continual conflict of material
' Maryland Archives Proclamation of Assembly, 1637/38, 1664, p. 340.
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interests between the two houses. In 1676 the Rev. John Yeo drew the attention of the Archbishop of Canterbury to the fact that but three clergymen in the province were conformable to the doctrine and discipline of the Church of England. He sug- gested the advisability of imposing a tax for the maintenance of such ministers. The letter was referred to the Bishop of London, thence to Lord Baltimore. The latter stated in reply that three quarters of the province's inhabitants were Presbyterians, Indepen- dents, Anabaptists or Quakers, and that it was scarcely just to tax the majority of the population for the support of a church to which they did not belong.
Yet the tide of events was destined to sweep aside such obstacles as well as the Lord Proprietor's clearly expessed char- tered right to the control of the church in his province. The establishment of royal government in the last decade of the 17th century brought with it a complete change of policy. The first Assembly under the Royal Government passed an act for the establishment in the povince of the Church of England. Each county of the province was to constitute a parish; vestrymen and a board of trustees were to be chosen and directed to build churches in their respective parishes; an annual tax of forty pounds of tobacco was to be imposed on all taxable persons for the support of the clergy of the Church of England. Supplementary acts were passed in 1694, 1695 and 1696. The last one provided "that the Church of England, within the province, shall enjoy all and singular her Rights, Privileges, and Freedoms, as it is now, or shall be at any time hereafter, established by Law in the Kingdom of England: And that his Majesty's Subjects of this Province shall enjoy all their Rights and Liberties, according to the Laws and Statutes of the Kingdom of England, in all Matters and Causes where the Laws of the Province are silent." 1 This act introduced disabilities into the province which had caused many of the settlers to leave England and aroused opposition which was sufficiently strong to effect its disallowance by the king.
The newly established church was weak and without organ- ization. The clergy therefore petitioned the Bishop of London
1 Lower House Journal, July 3-10, 1696.
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for a commissary or suffragan with sufficient power to firmly establish the church. This led to the appointment of Dr. Thomas Bray,-who first spent some time in England securing parochial libraries and inducing ministers to go to the province. After the veto in 1699 of the church act of 1696, he hastened to the province to use what influence he might be able to exert for the passage of another. He was an individual of personality and soon acquired considerable influence over the Assembly. In 1700 a bill was framed and passed in accordance with his ideas but it provided for the use of the Book of Common Prayer in every church or house of public worship in the province. This was opposed by Catholics, Quakers and Dissenters who prevailed upon the king to withhold his approval. During this year Dr. Bray held a visitation in Annapolis, disciplined a number of offenders and gave the church a favorable impulse toward better things. In 1701-1702 a bill drafted by Dr. Bray in accordance with the wishes of the home government passed the Assembly and became law, and remained in force with minor changes until the Revol- ution of 1776.
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This law contained provisions for the local government of the different parishes and for the appointment and induction of ministers by the governor. Ministers could hold but a single charge unless two adjacent parishes agreed to share the services of one. Freedom of worship and from all political disabilities was provided for Quakers and Protestant dissenters.
The English Church and a scheme of organization to carry it on were thus established in the province.
Bray returned to England soon after the passage of the Church Act of 1702 and tried to secure a parliamentary act providing for a suffragan bishop for Maryland. Its success depended upon the willingness of the newly appointed governor, Col. John Seymour, to forego the right of inducting ministers. The latter however felt that it was an effort to clip his authority and refused.
Meanwhile the Protestant clergy were in many cases leading lives of flagrant immorality, and the Assembly felt that some re- straint should be imposed upon them. Accordingly a bill designed to meet the situation was introduced in the Assembly in Novem- ber 1708 and passed both Houses but the governor refused his
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assent for the reason that he had received no instructions from the home government. In 1714 Gov. Hart, who had just arrived in the province, called a meeting of the clergy so that they might become better acquainted with one another. To his chagrin, several members of the vestries of different parishes asked him to hear charges against their ministers. As he had no ecclesiastical author- ity, he declined but wrote to the Bishop of London suggesting the appointment of Jacob Henderson and Christopher Wilkinson as commissaries, one for each shore. This recommendation was favorably acted upon, but the results were unfortunate. The former, tactless and overzealous, quickly aroused widespread hostility. Resentment against him reached a climax when he seized the letters of orders and license of the Rev. Mr. Hall. The latter im- mediately secured a warrant from the governor for their return. A bill was then introduced into the Assembly designed to establish some sort of disciplinary control for the church and clergy but the majority, though Protestants, were not members of the Church of England, and their recent experience had made them wary of conferring such authority. They therefore refused to pass the bill in question.
Shortly after, the Bishop of London, invited the Rev. Mr. Colebatch to come to England from the province for the purpose of receiving consecration as suffragan of Maryland, but the Mary- land Assembly on learning of his proposed action would not permit him to leave.
A bill for reducing the .church tax from forty pounds per taxable person to thirty met with strenuous opposition from the clergy. After its passage Jacob Henderson was sent to England as their agent to secure the disallowance of the act. He was suc- cessful in his mission. At the same time he secured authority to act as commissary in the province. He made visitations, disciplined offenders and deprived one minister of his charge. His authority was then questioned, whereupon he showed his commission from the Bishop of London, as well as a copy of a commission obtained by the latter from George I making him diocesan of the province. But the Bishop's commission was faulty inasmuch as George II. was then King of England and the commission of his predecessor was no longer valid. Henderson was thus left without authority,
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especially as the Bishop of London did not see fit to contest the Lord Proprietor's claims. He therefore ceased his efforts to act as commissary.1
His work in securing the disallowance of the bill of 1728 was promptly undone by the Assembly which passed a new law, providing for the payment of but thirty pounds of tobacco to ministers, the rest to be paid at the rate of one bushel of wheat for forty two pounds of tobacco, one bushel of corn or oats for twenty pounds of tobacco, or one bushel of barley for twenty four pounds of tobacco. This was assented to by the governor and became law.2
Prior to 1747 there was no provision as to the quality of tobacco to be paid the clergy. In general it was of the poorest quality. In 1696 the clergy complained, that their tobacco sold for one quarter to one half of what other tobacco sold for. This condi- tion was remedied in 1747 by the Tobacco Inspection Act which improved the value of tobacco to such an extent that many of the clergy soon came to be very well paid.
But the lack of any competent authority to control the clergy was an insurmountable defect. Charles, 5th Lord Baltimore and Frederick, 6th Lord Baltimore, held tenaciously to their proprietary right to appoint the clergy. Appointments were not made on the basis of character and fitness but were viewed as prizes to be given to friends. Under such conditions clergy of a superior type rarely found their way to the province. Unless a minister enjoyed the friendship of the Proprietor there was no opening for him. Moreover when a minister was once appointed, no agency could remove him. Immorality went unpunished and the standing of the clergy as a natural result was not high.
In 1748 another attempt was made by the Lower House to create a body for disciplining the clergy. But Charles had given instructions against the transfer of his authority in this matter to anyone and the Upper House therefore refused to pass the bill.
In 1768 the Assembly passed a bill to establish a spiritual court composed of the governor, three laymen and three clergy-
1 N. D. Mereness. Maryland as a Proprietary Province, page 450.
2 Ibid., pages 454-455.
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men, but Gov. Sharpe obeyed the Proprietor's instructions and vetoed it. Frederick who had succeeded his father in 1751 had in the second year of his administration ordered the governor to allow nothing to infringe his right of appointing and controlling the clergy. This policy had been consistently followed, but upon the rejection of the bill in 1768 the Lower House declared its determination to pass the bill at every session until it became law.1
This effort met with success in 1771. Every minister was compelled to take several oaths to the government within four months of induction. Otherwise he was to be dispossessed of his position. If absent thirty days uninterruptedly or sixty days in all in a single year he was to be fined £10. Should the vestry lodge complaint with the governor, that its minister was leading a scandalous or immoral life, the governor was to appoint a com- mission composed of himself, if of the Church of England, if not, then the first member of the Council who was, and three ministers actively engaged in the province and three laymen of the Church of England. They were empowered in case of guilt, to admonish, suspend or deprive the offender of his living.ª
The Inspection Act of 1747 was renewed periodically until 1770. At that time the Lower House favored a reduction of fees but the Upper House refused to agree. Neither House would recede from its position, so the governor issued a proclamation continuing the provision of the law of 1701-1702. The people were indignant over this act of the governor and everywhere resisted the collection of the tax. Shortly after some of the lawyers claimed that as the law had been passed by an Assembly chosen under writs of elec- tion and summons issued by King William who died before the Assembly met, and as a new election had not been held under writs of election and summons of Queen Anne, the law was not valid.3 Many individuals refused to pay the tax and lawsuits that resulted were decided by the courts in favor of the people. But in 1773 the Assembly passed an act giving the clergy thirty pounds or four shillings for each individual instead of forty pounds of tobacco and the opposition of the people subsided.
' N. D. Mereness, Maryland as a Proprietary Province, page 452. -
' Ibid., pages 452-453.
3 Maryland Gazette, September 10, 1772.
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During the two last colonial wars between France and Eng- land (1740-1748 and 1756-1763) there had been considerable agitation against the Roman Catholics who were charged with sympathy with the French on account of their religion. Several efforts were made at these times to impose double and special taxes upon the property of Roman Catholics, but such acts were in most cases disallowed by the governor.
On one occasion the Lower House even passed "An Act for the Security of his Majesty's Dominions and to prevent the growth of Popery in this Province" which provided for the confiscation and sale of property belonging the Roman Catholics, the proceeds of which should be used for defending the province against the French.' But it failed to pass the Upper House. After the fourth colonial war this spirit died down throughout the province and thereafter nothing was heard of differences of that kind.
Though questions of religion and toleration had taken much of the time and attention of the people of Maryland, the church itself had exerted comparatively little positive influence in shaping life in Maryland. The Roman Church, though counting many of the richest and most influential families of the province among its members, had not become powerful as an institution. This had been prevented by the original policy of Cecilius. The Protestant sects were so divided and so ineffectively organized as to have little influence. The Established Church, corrupted by the lack of a proper system of appointing ministers and of ecclesiastical dis- cipline enjoyed little prestige.
Yet the failure to esablish in its entirety the church system of the old world had at least a certain compensation in causing the people to look upon themselves as the source of authority, even in matters relating to the church, and thereby led to a strengthening of the tendencies toward democracy and popular government.
1 Lower House Journal, May 30, 1754.
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CHAPTER IV.
FORM OF GOVERNMENT AND INFLUENCES TOWARD DEMOCRACY.
The Maryland charter had centered all power in government in the hands of the Lord Proprietor. He was given the exclusive power of creating offices, filling them and of prescribing their responsibilities and duties. Of the six proprietors but two visited the colony and both for short periods. The third Lord Baltimore spent the years from 1675 to 1684 in the province as Lord Proprietor and the fifth Lord Baltimore spent a year there dur- ing 1732-1733. As it was impossible to administer the colony from England it became necessary to delegate authority to re- presentatives within the province, in the interest of a satisfactory administration.
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