USA > New York > Courts and lawyers of New York; a history, 1609-1925, Volume I > Part 16
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4. The opening sentence is significant. "We acknowledge," it reads, "a paternal government which God and Nature have established in the world . to which we consider ourselves bound by His Word, and therefore submit." But the remonstrants contended that "It is contrary to the first intentions and genuine principles of every well-regulated government, that one or more men should arrogate to themselves the exclusive power to dis- pose at will, of the life and property of any individual; and this by virtue,
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reply, defended the appointive system. "He would not permit the election of magistrates (to) be left to the rabble." "Your prayer is extravagant," he said, "you might as well claim to send delegates to the Assembly of their High Mightinesses themselves. Directors will never make themselves respon- sible to subjects."
But the convention continued in session, and on December 13 defended their action by an appeal to the "law of Nature," by which all men might "associate and convene together for the protection of their liberty and their property." This brought upon them the wrath of the hot-tempered Governor. Magistrates alone, and "not all men," he declared, are author- ized to assemble to discuss public questions. "We derive our authority from God and the Company, not from a few ignorant subjects, and we alone can call the inhabitants together," Stuyvesant would have them realize. "Such manners and forms of meetings, such insults, unprovoked affronts and con- tempt of the supreme authority, the Director and Council were bound to resist, yea to punish," were almost his last words to the delegates. He ordered the latter to disperse forthwith, "on pain of an arbitrary correction."5 And he wrote to the
or under pretense, of a law or order which he might fabricate, without the consent, knowledge or approbation of the whole body, their agents or repre- sentatives. Hence the enactment in manner aforesaid of new laws, affect- ing the commonalty, their lives and property, which is contrary to the granted privileges of the Netherlands government, and odious to every free-born man; and principally so to those whom God has placed under a free state, in newly settled lands, who are entitled to claim laws not tran- We scending but resembling, as near as possible, those of Netherland.
humbly submit that it is one of our privileges, that our consent, or that of our representatives, is necessarily required in the enactment of such laws and orders." The remonstrance further recited that officers and magistrates were appointed in many places contrary to the law of the Netherlands, and several without the consent or nomination of the people; also that obscure laws enacted "without the approbation of the country, by the authority alone of the Director and Council, remain obligatory."
5. "The old laws will stand. Directors and Council only shall be the lawmakers; never will they make themselves responsible to the people. As to officers of government, were their election left to the rabble, we should
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Dutch towns, urging them to send no delegates to any later conventions.
There was, however, still one course open to the delegates. They forwarded a remonstrance to the Amsterdam Chamber.6 Le Bleeuw being chosen as the bearer of this appeal to the West India Company. Alas! He was destined to find the attitude of the Company unsympathetic. Indeed, he was for- bidden to return to New Amsterdam, and the directors cen- sured Stuyvesant for lack of vigor in handling the "ring- leaders of the gang."7 They declared it to be "the height of presumption in the people to protest against the government."
However, out of all this agitation, a small but definite ad-
have thieves on horseback and honest men on foot." And, with that, we may imagine, the Governor stamped his wooden toe.
The people shrugged their shoulders. "We aim but at the general good," said they. "All men have a natural right to constitute society, and to assemble to protect their liberties and property."
"I declare this assembly dissolved," Peter retorted. "Assemble again at your peril ! The authority which rules you is derived not from the whim of a few ignorant malcontents."-Hawthorne's "History of United States," Vol. I, p. 114.
6. In substance, this petition read :
"The States General of the United Provinces are our liege lords. We submit to the laws of the United Provinces; and our rights and privileges ought to be in harmony with those of the Fatherland, for we are a province of the State, and not a subjugated people. We who have come together from various parts of the world, and are a blended community of various lineage, who have at our expense, exchanged our native lands for the protec- tion of the United Provinces; we, who have transformed the wilderness into fruitful farms, demand that no new laws shall be enacted without the con- sent of the people, that none shall be appointed to office without the appro- bation of the people, and that obscure and obsolete laws shall never be re- vived."
7. .. the West India Company spluttered with indignation. "The people be d-d!" was the sense of their message. "Let them no longer delude themselves with the fantasy that taxes require their assent."-Haw- thorne's "History of United States," Vol. I, 114.
7. The directors wrote to Stuyvesant that the complaints of the citizens was unreasonable, and that they had nothing to object to in his administra- tion of affairs, except, indeed, that he was too lenient in his dealings with these seditious persons ; that he "ought to have acted with more vigor against the ringleaders of the gang, and not have condescended to answer protests with protests." They commanded him now to punish them as they de- served, and especially those delegates from Gravesend, the Englishmen Baxter and Hubbard .- Bryant's "History of United States," Vol. II, 150.
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vantage did come to the people.8 Stuyvesant was instructed to extend the system of local magistracies. He was also ordered to appoint another than the schout-fiscal of the prov- ince to be the city schout of New Amsterdam. From time to time, therefore, Stuyvesant established burgher government in other settlements, but was still able to keep the city schout- ship in his own hands, for Kuyter, whom he had appointed to the New Amsterdam court, was murdered by Indians before he could take office ; hence, Schout-Fiscal van Tienhoven con- tinued as city schout, to the end of his term, his successor as fiscal also acting as city schout until 1660, when the offices were finally separated.
As to the incorporation of the towns, or the granting of some measure of local government in the inferior courts es- tablished, it appears that Breuckelen Court of Schepens was enlarged from a bench of two schepens to one of four schepens in 16548a ; Midwout (Flatbush) was made a municipality with
Baxter and Hubbard escaped to New England, but were again in Gravesend two months later, and were then arrested actually as they were raising the English flag and reading a proclamation, "declaring Gravesend to be subject to the laws of the Republic of England." They were im- prisoned for many months.
8. The December Convention was afterward held to be illegal by the Director, on the ground that these villages (Amersfoort, Breukelen and Midwout) did not have courts, which could alone legally appoint delegates. There is no reason to doubt the sincerity of the Director in stating (that it was his intention to grant the villages courts of justice at the next election) this to be his purpose, particularly as he did subsequently grant
courts of justice to the villages named. . . The concession of local gov- ernment, however, was extorted from the Director by the Conventions of 1653 .- Werner, in the "New York Civil List and Constitutional History of the Colony and State of New York," 1888 ed., p. 38.
8a. Director-General Kieft, in 1646, was informed that the inhabitants (of Brooklyn) had organized a municipality at their own expense, to which they had given the name of Breuckelen after the village on the Vecht in their home province of Utrecht. He indorsed their proceedings and gave them the municipal privileges they asked in a proclamation issued in June of that year. They were to elect two schepens, with full judicial powers as at home. . . . In 1654 Governor Stuyvesant gave Breuckelen and the adjacent towns of Midwout and Amersfoot a larger number of schepens .- See "History of Long Island," (1925), p. 50-51.
C.&L .- 11
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right to a court of three schepens; and Amersfoort was ac- corded like status in the same year. In 1661 Boswyck (Bush- wick) and New Utrecht were added to the Dutch towns on Long Island which were given burgher government. They were grouped in one district, known as "the five Dutch towns," and served by one schout, who lived in Breuckelen and attended court sessions in each of the towns. New Haar- lem was accorded local government in 1660, and Bergen, the first town in New Jersey, received recognition in 1661. To the English towns on Long Island were added Jamaica (then known as Rutsdorp), and Newtown (or Middleburgh), the former organizing its first court of schepens in 1656, and the latter in 1659. Before Dutch rule finally passed from New Netherland, by the Treaty of Westminster, in 1674, inferior courts were in operation in the following towns and villages outside of New Amsterdam: Fort Orange, Willemstadt, Schenectady, Wiltwyck, Swaenenburgh, Hurley, Marbletown, Breuckelen, Midwout, Amersfoort, New Utrecht, Boswyck, Middleburgh, Flushing, Hempstead, Rutsdorp, Oyster Bay, Huntington, Seatalcot, Southampton, Easthampton, South- old, Haarlem, Westchester, Mamaroneck, Fordham, Eastches- ter, Staten Island.
Thus, out of the seemingly unsuccessful convention, so arbitrarily dissolved by Stuyvesant, in 1653, grew the seed of popular government in New York. "In these, the closing days of the years 1653, there dropped from the wide-spreading branches of the ancient Aryan oak a wonderfully symmetrical acorn; and from this acorn there sprang the beautiful Amer- ican oak under which we are gathered."9 Certain indications that it was growing are to be found in the political changes in New Netherland in the last decade of Stuyvesant's adminis- tration.10 And despotism was finally given its deserts in
9. Werner, in "New York Civil List," 1888 Ed., p. 40.
10. The time had now come to disintegrate the feudal shell in which the seeds of liberty in New Netherland were enclosed, in order that they might
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New Netherland as it has ever been in the evolution of civili- zation.11 When a British fleet appeared off New Amster- dam, in August, 1664, and demanded the surrender of the fort, the Governor thought of his "subjects," the people of New Netherland. He sent for all military help that was possible from Fort Orange, and appealed to the farmers to rally to the defence of the capital. Fort Orange ignored the requisition,
germinate and freedom have a chance to grow. Charles II landed at Dover May 26, 1660. Connecticut was consolidated in April, 1662, under a charter confirming its established system. The English towns on the western end of Long Island, in 1663, entered into negotiations with the view to submission to its government, and a descent was made on Midwout (Flatbush), to compel its inhabitants to unite in a war against Manhattans. This led to a convention of delegates appointed by the magistrates of the loyal towns, which met at New Amsterdam July 6, 1663, and engaged to maintain an armed force for public protection. Another convention assembled Novem- ber Ist, pursuant to a call of Director Stuyvesant, made at the request of the magistrates of New Amsterdam, which addressed a remonstrance to the Amsterdam directors, setting forth the imperiled condition of the province, arising from the wars with the Indians and the English. Stuyvesant, on the 15th, accepted the terms of Connecticut, by which Westchester was ceded to it, and the English towns were left to themselves. These towns now entered into a "Combination" to manage their own affairs, and elected John Scott as their President. On the 27th of February, the sheriffs and magistrates of the Dutch towns assembled at Midwout and adopted a remon- strance to the Amsterdam directors, setting forth the outrages committed by Scott. At the request of the magistrates of New Amsterdam a General Assembly of delegates for all the towns and colonies was now called. This provincial diet was convened on the plan established by the Provisional Order of 1650, and it met on the 10th of April, 1664. The Director stated that the West India Company had expended 1,200,000 guilders in the gov- ernment of the province, over and above the revenues it had received there- from, and asked that supplies be voted for the general defence. This was refused, and then the Diet adjourned for one week, to consider the pro- priety of again appealing to the home government. Meantime, a military force arrived, with instructions to check the English, reduce the revolted villages and replace the removed magistrates ; but it was utterly inadequate for the purpose. When the Diet reassembled, therefore, it advised that peace be made with the Indians, and decided that it would be useless to en- force the orders of the Amsterdam directors over the English towns. Connecticut therefore extended its authority over them, and in September Stuyvesant surrendered to Richard Nicolls, deputy of the Duke of York, who encouraged the people to believe that their liberties were to be at least as great as those enjoyed in New England .- Ibid, pp. 44-45.
II. "Let them no longer delude themselves with the fantasy that taxes require their assent" (replied the West India Company directors in 1654). With that they dismissed the matter from their minds. Yet even then the
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and the farmers refused to come. All he could muster were about one hundred soldiers, the garrison at New Amsterdam, disreputable and of mean purpose. They were not loyal to Stuyvesant, nor to their own countrymen, the Dutch. They looked forward hopefully to the confusion which would attend the surrender. "Now we hope," they cried, "to pepper those devilish traders who have so long salted us; we know where booty is to be found, and where the young women live who wear gold chains." Stuyvesant was forsaken even by his son, who was among that "tumultuous assembly" of citizens of New Amsterdam who met in Stadt Huys, and signed a remonstrance, demanding the surrender of the city by Stuyve- sant. So, on Monday morning, the 8th of September, 1664, there marched out of Fort Manhattan, on the Beaver Street side, "at the head of the poltroons who knew where the young women lived who wore gold chains, the stern old wooden- legged soldier who would rather have been carried out a corpse to his grave." With his passing the feudal system of government in New York expired. It cannot be stated, how-
Writing was on the wall. The flouted people were ripe to welcome Eng- land; and England, in the shape of Charles II, who had at last come into his own, meditated wiping the Dutch off the Atlantic seaboard. It availed not to plead rights; Lord Baltimore snapped his finger's. Lieutenant- Governor Beekman, indeed, delayed the appropriation of Delaware; but Long Island was being swallowed up, and nobody except the Government cared. The people may be incompetent to frame laws; but what if they decline to fight for you when called upon? If they cannot make taxes to please themselves, at all events they will not make war to please anybody else. If they are poor and ignorant, that is not their fault. The English fleet was impending; what was to be done? Could Stuyvesant but have multiplied himself into a thousand Stuyvesants he knew what he would do; but he was impotent. In August, 1664, here was the fleet actually anchored in Gravesend Bay, with Nicolls in command. "What do they want?" the Governor asked. "Immediate recognition of English sovereignty," replied Nicolls, curtly ; and the gentler voice of Winthrop, of Boston, was heard advising surrender. "Surrender would be reproved at home," said poor Stuyvesant, refusing to know when he was beaten. He was doing his best to defeat the army and navy of England single-handed. But the burgo- masters went behind him and capitulated, and-Peter to the contrary for four days more notwithstanding .- New Amsterdam became New York .- Hawthorne's "History of the United States," Vol. I, pp. 114-115.
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ever, that the settlers fared much better under English gov- ernance for a while. Taxation without representation was again to be the cause of town resolutions. These were char- acterized as seditious by the English governor, Colonel Love- lace, but they had bearing on the loyalty of the colonists when the enemy again appeared. However, this is material for review in a subsequent chapter.
The delegates to the memorable conventions of 1653, out of which so much eventually came, were as follows :
Convention of November 26, 1653: Martin Cregier and Paulus Leendertsen van der Grist, of New Amsterdam; George Baxter and James Hubbard of Gravesend ; John Hicks and Tobias Feaks, of Flushing; and Robert Coe and Thomas Hazard, of Newtown. Johannes la Montagne and Cornelis van Werckhoven, members of the Governor's Council, also attended.
Convention of December 10, 1653: Arent van Hattem, Martin Cregier, Paul L. van der Grist, William Beeckman, Peter Wolphertsen van Couwenhoven, of New Amsterdam; George Baxter and James Hubbard, of Gravesend ; John Hicks and Tobias Feaks, of Flushing; Robert Coe and Thomas Hazard, of Newtown; William Wasborn and John Seaman, of Hempstead ; Thomas Spycer and Elbert Elbertsen (Stooth'f), of Flatlands; Frederick Lubbertsen and Paulus van der Beecq, of Brooklyn; Thomas Swartwout and Jan Strycker, of Flatbush.
The next convention was that of 1663, the delegates being from the loyal Dutch towns, the purpose of the convention being the consideration of means of maintaining an armed force for the defence of the province. The delegates were :
Paul L. van der Grist and Jacob Strycker, of New Am- sterdam ; Simon Jansen and Roelof Martensen, of Flatlands ; William Wilkins and Charles Morgan, of Gravesend; Fred- erick Lubbertsen and Peter Pietersen van Nes, of Brooklyn;
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John Strycker and Hendrick Jorissen; of Flatbush; Rutger Joosten and Jacob Pietersen, of New Utrecht.
The meeting was at New Amsterdam on July 6. Another convention was held on November I of that year, 1663, at New Amsterdam, and at it a remonstrance addressed to the Amsterdam directors of the West India Company was ap- proved and signed; it protested against the lack of military support received from Holland, and emphasized the danger to the settlements and settlers by enemy attack, Indian as well as English. The names of the delegates to this November convention have, however, not been found.
Delegates of the five Dutch towns of Long Island met again on February 27, 1664, at Flatbush, to protest against the outrages of Scott, and to decide upon the sending of delegates to Holland to represent to the States General and the West India Company the distressed state of the country. The as- sembled delegates were:
Adriaen Hegeman, Elbert Elbertsen (Stooth'f), Pieter Claessen and Roelof Martensen Schenck, of Flatlands; Wil- liam Bredenbent and Albert Cornelissen Wantenaar, Teunis Gysbertsen Bogaert, and Thomas Ver Donck, of Brooklyn; Hendrick Jorissen, William Jacobsen van Boerum and Jan Snedicker, of Flatbush ; Jacob Pietersen, Balthazar Vosch and Francis de Bruyn, of New Utrecht; Peter Jansen de Witt and Barent Joosten, of Bushwick.
On April 10, 1664, a general assembly of delegates of all the Dutch towns and colonies was convened, to consider the grave predicament of New Netherland, and to ascertain the will of the people of all parts of the province. It resulted in the convention refusing to vote supplies for the general de- fence. After an adjournment of a week, the delegates re- solved that it would be unwise to oppose the will of the Eng- lish towns to finally pass out of the jurisdiction of New Netherland. This decision was reached despite the arrival of a military force from Holland, "with instructions to check
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the English, reduce the revolted villages, and replace the removed magistrates."
This was the last convention held during the governor- ship of Stuyvesant. It was, indeed, the first General As- sembly called regularly under the plan of the Provisional Order of 1650, too late to be of any value. The delegates were :
Jeremias van Rensselaer, president, and Dirck van Schel- luyne, of Rensselaerwyck; Cornelis Steenwyck and Jacob Backer, of New Amsterdam; Jan Verbeeck and Gerrit Slech- tenhorst, of Fort Orange; Thomas Chambers and Gysbert van Imbroch, of Wiltwyck; Daniel Terneur and Johannis Ver- veelen, of Haarlem; David de Marest and Pierre Billou, of Staten Island; William Bredenbent and Albert Cornelisson Wantenaar, of Brooklyn ; Jan Strycker and William Guilliam- sen, of Flatbush ; Elbert Elbertsen Stoothof, Coert Stevensen van Voorhees, of Flatlands; David Jochemsen and Cornelis Beeckman, of New Utrecht; Jan van Clef and Gysbert Teuni- sen Bogaert, of Bushwick; Engelbert Steenhuysen and Her- man Smeeman, of Bergen.
In the brief period (1673-74) of the return of the Dutch government to the former New Netherland two conventions were held. The first was held at Jamaica on September 4, 1673, the delegates being from the eastern towns, Englishmen who gathered to confer with the Dutch commanders. The representatives were Thomas James, of Easthampton; John Jessup and Joseph Reyner, of Southampton; Thomas Hutch- inson and Isaac Arnold, of Southold; Richard Woodhull and Andrew Miller, of Brookhaven; Isaac Platt and Thomas Skid- more, of Huntington.
In March, 1674, the last convention under Dutch govern- ment was held, the matter of more urgent concern being plans of defence against a combined New England attack. At the convention were :
The burgomasters of New Orange; Jacob Strycker and Francis Bloodgood, representing the Dutch inhabitants of
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Flushing, Jamaica, Newtown and Hempstead; Tennis Gys- bertsen Bogaert and Jeronimus Rapalie, of Brooklyn; Roelof Martensen Schenck and Coert Stevensen van Voorhees, of Flatlands; Jan Strycker and Anke Jansen, of Flatbush ; Joost Kockuyt and Hendrick Barentsen Smit, of Bushwick; Hen- drick Mattysen Smack and Cryn Jansen, of New Utrecht; Claes Barentse and Caspar Steynmits, of Bergen.
In that month, by the Treaty of Westminster, the cession of New Netherland to the English was finally made, though New Amsterdam did not hear officially of it until July of that year, 1674. Then the Dutch colonists had to bow to the in- evitable, though when the first rumor reached them in May, the New Netherlanders had vowed, in their wrath, that no demand or authority "of the States or Prince" should make them surrender again. In their brief experience under Eng- lish rule they had found that English governors could be just as arbitrary and despotic as Dutch12; and they vowed that they would keep their territory "by fighting, so long as they could stand with one leg and fight with one hand." How-
12. The English courted favor by liberal treatment of their new de- pendants on the western shore of the Hudson; whatever the Dutch had re- fused to do, they did. The Governor and Council were to be balanced by the people's representatives; no more arbitrary taxation. . . . By such inducements the wilderness of New Jersey, assigned to Berkeley and Car- teret, was by
peopled Scots, Englishmen, New Englanders and Quakers. . .
Manhattan did not get treated quite so well. The Governor had everything his own way, the Council being his creatures, and the justices his appointees. The people were permitted no voice in affairs, and might as well have had Stuyvesant back again. After Nicolls had strutted his term, Lord Lovelace came, and outdid him. His idea of how to govern was formulated in his instructions to an agent: "Lay such taxes," said he, "as may give them liberty for no thought but how to discharge them." .
He attempted to levy a tax for defence, and was met with refusal; the towns of Long Island had not one cent either for tribute or defence. His lordship swore at them heartily, but they heeded him not; and he found himself in the shoes of the ousted Dutch Governor, in another sense than he desired. And then was poetic justice made complete; for who should appear before the helpless forts but Evertsen with a Dutch fleet! New York, New Jersey and Delaware surrendered to him almost with enthusiasm, and the work of England seemed to be all undone .- Ibid., pp. 115-116.
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