USA > Pennsylvania > Pennsylvania, colonial and federal : a history, 1608-1903, Volume One > Part 25
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At the suggestion of Penn, the Governor of New York, in making peace with the Five Nations, extended it to the other English colonies ; and on April 23, 1701, Penn made a treaty with the king of the Susquehanna Minquas or Conestoga Indians and three chiefs of the same, and with the king of the Shawanees and two chiefs of the same, and with the brother and agent of the emperor of the Onondagas of the Five Nations and certain chiefs of the Ganawese (Conoys) or Piscataways, then dwelling on the north bank of the Potomac; under this treaty the people of those tribes while living near Penn's government should have the privi- leges of his laws, they owning the authority of the Crown of Eng- land and of said government, and should not permit any strange Indians to settle on the western side of the Susquehanna or on the Potomac, nor any other Indians anywhere in the province with- out the Proprietary's consent, and no person should trade with these Indians without a license under the Proprietary's hand and seal, but the Potomac Indians could settle on any part of the Potomac river "within the bounds of this province." Moreover, the Conestoga Indians did ratify the sale which had been con- firmed the year before by two of the Conestoga chiefs of lands about the Susquehanna, and guaranteed the good behavior of the Potomac Indians. In Evans's time the Ganawese, reduced in number by sickness, were allowed to remove to Tulpehocken, the Schuylkill Indians guaranteeing their good behavior. Penn sub- mitted to the Assembly in August, 1701, a royal letter asking for £350 sterling as a contribution for erecting forts on the frontier of New York. The Assembly replied postponing the considera-
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tion in view of the great sums of money lately assessed in taxes and the arrears of quit rents, and asking Penn to represent the present conditions to the King, and assure him of their willing= ness to acquiesce in his commands as far as their religious per- suasions would permit. Seven members from the Lower Counties signed an address, hoping that they would not be required to contribute for forts abroad before they were able to build any at home, they not being able to furnish themselves with arms and ammunition, "having consumed our small stocks in making to- bacco."
Penn was called to England by a proposition in Parliament to annex all proprietary governments to the Crown. Another Assembly excused itself from complying with the request for con- tribution to the New York forts. A subscription was started for his benefit, to be collected by Samuel Carpenter. On Octo- ber 28, 1701, he signed the Charter of Privileges under which the government of Pennsylvania and Delaware was carried on until the Revolution. It began with a declaration that no inhab- itant confessing and acknowledging "one Almighty God, the Cre- ator, Upholder and Ruler of the World," and professing him- self obliged to live quietly under the civil government, should be molested or prejudiced because of conscientious persuasion or practice, nor compelled to do or suffer anything contrary to re- ligious persuasion, and that all ""who also profess to believe in Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the World," should be capable to serve the government in any capacity, they solemnly promising, when required, allegiance to the King and fidelity to the Pro- prietor and Governor, and taking certain attests. An Assem- bly was to be chosen annually on the first day of October, con- sisting of four persons from each county, or more at any time, as the Governor and Assembly should agree, to meet at Philadel- phia on the fourteenth of that month, unless the Governor and Council-only twice was there any mention of a council in the document-should appoint another place, and to make laws to.
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Copy of one of Celeron's Leaden Plates
Engraved especially for this work from a print in possession of Dr. W. J. Holland
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Suspension and Restoration of Government
be confirmed by the Governor and to have all the other powers of an assembly usual in any of the King's plantations in America. On such election day the freemen should choose two persons to nominate for sheriff and two for coroner in each county, and the Governor should commission one of them for three years. The county justices should nominate three persons for clerk of the peace, and the Governor should commission one of them dur- ing good behavior. No person should be obliged to answer any matter relating to property except in the ordinary courts of justice, unless appeals should be appointed to the Governor and Council. No person should be licensed by the Governor to keep a house of public entertainment except those recommended by the justices of the county in open court, the said justices being empowered to forbid any person upon misbehavior from keeping one. The estate of a suicide should descend as if he had died a natural death, and there should be no forfeiture to the Gov- ernor upon any accidental killing. No law should change or di- minish the effect of the charter except by consent of the Gover- nor and six-sevenths of the Assembly, but the clause for liberty of conscience should remain without alteration inviolable for- ever. A postscript provided that if within three years from date, by the declaration of a majority of the representatives of either the province or the territories on the Delaware, both should no longer be united in one Assembly, each county in the province should have at least eight representatives and the town of Philadelphia two in future. On the same day a new charter, dated October 25, was signed for the city of Philadelphia, mak- ing Edward Shippen mayor; and a commission of property was issued to Edward Shippen, Griffith Owen, Thomas Story, and James Logan. Moreover, the Proprietary issued a commission bearing the same date as the charter of privileges to a new Council of State, consisting of Edward Shippen, John Guest, Samuel Car- penter, William Clark, Thomas Story, Griffith Owen, Phineas Pemberton, Samuel Finney, Caleb Pusey, and John Blunston.
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They were to consult and assist the Proprietary, if in the colony, and his deputy or Lieutenant-Governor, for the time being; and in case of the latter's decease or incapacity, to exercise all the powers, jurisdiction, and authority conferred upon Penn by the charter of King Charles. They were to hold office during the Proprietary's pleasure, and their number could be increased by
Washington's Hill
On this hill near Waterford, Washington camped while on his journey through the Alle- gheny Valley to investigate the French settle- ments in 1753. The French prevented his pro- ceeding further. Photographed especially for this work by Hon. John P. Vincent
the Lieutenant-Governor, who could choose the President, other- wise the first named should take the chair. On October 30, Penn introduced to the Council the Lieutenant-Governor whom he had chosen, Andrew Hamilton, who held the postoffice for the colo- nies, and had been Governor of New Jersey. David Lloyd pre- pared a charter of property, which was taken down to New Cas- tle as Penn was embarking, October 31, and after some argu- ment signed by him, with an order for Governor Hamilton to keep it, and have the great seal affixed, if he did not hear to the
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contrary within six months. In April, the vetoing notification came. Penn had sent after him 114 laws passed during his stay, to be submitted to the King for approval. It will be no- ticed that by the charter of Charles II the laws passed by the Proprietary and people could be made void by the King within six months after presentation to him if declared by the King in Coun- cil inconsistent with his sovereignty or lawful prerogative. As a matter of fact every law had to commend itself to those who had charge of trade and plantation affairs, and frequently half the work of a session of the Assembly had to be done over again to obviate the objections of those in London through whose hands it passed. The Proprietary was often blamed for the delay or failure in securing the allowance of an act. The laws which the first Proprietary had enacted during his second visit remained some time before the Attorney-General for want of a large fee. At last he reported them, and caused the rejection of a great many.
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CHAPTER X.
PENN'S LIEUTENANT-GOVERNORS
T HE first Proprietary was designed never to return, and Penn- sylvania became the estate of an absent landlord, and the bailiwick of a deputy. In the choice of the latter, the titular Governor was rarely, if ever, fortunate. After the term of Thomas Lloyd a Quaker was never chosen, possibly because it was neces- sary for the Crown to confirm the appointment, and that the ap- pointee should qualify by oath, and participate in military affairs. To persons of distinction, like some of the contemporary heads of neighboring colonies, the office was not an attractive one. The salary, in early times necessarily small, was never sufficient to tempt any one high in the world. The dignity of being lieuten- ant under a family of commoners was almost invisible to those who would have accepted a governorship directly under the Crown. The power, dependent at first upon an Assembly tena- cious of its rights, became, as King and Proprietary added to their regulations, so circumscribed as to chafe upon any man of spirit. On the other hand, the responsibility might have been capital in the days when there was any doubt of the legality of Quaker courts trying for murder, and when the province must have been sur- rendered on demand because of the non-resistance of the popu- lation ; and afterwards, when penal bonds came to be exacted for compliance with the orders of superiors, the responsibility was financially heavy.
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Hamilton served about eighteen months, until his death, April 26, 1703, when the Council, with Edward Shippen as President, took his place. Hamilton, making proclamation of the declara- tion of war, exhorted his hearers to enlist, and soon afterwards appointed as captain of the Philadelphia company, George Low- ther, a lawyer, of a good Yorkshire family. The drums beat through the town, but Lowther found at the field only a few, and those inconsequential people. Before the second muster, which was the last, the idea got abroad that these recruits were to be marched to Canada, and the anti-Quakers concluded that for them to form a militia was a sure way of enabling the Quakers to retain the government, as the impossibility of having a militia had been the chief argument in favor of depriving them.
The royal confirmation of Hamilton's appointment did not arrive before he died. The jail of Philadelphia being full of alleged murderers and felons, he appointed a special commission to try them; but the jurymen, from doubts of the validity of his acts, would not serve in a matter of life and death. The regular Provincial Court opened a few days afterwards. The Quaker judges were in the majority, and notwithstanding the protest of the other judges, who left the bench, and with another prosecuting attorney in place of John Moore, the Attorney-General, who re- fused, proceeded without either oath or affirmation by judge, jury, or witnesses, but with only the attest required by the provincial law. One woman was found guilty of murded, and sentenced to be hung, but Hamilton's illness prevented his signing the death warrant. A man was convicted of manslaughter, and burnt in the hand. The inhabitants not of Quaker views were frightened, as they felt themselves at the mercy of witnesses not restrained by reverence for an oath. Quarry, it appears, did his best to spread, if he did not start their fears. Penn in England defended the Qua- kers' course; said it was not to be expected that founding a new country they should have no more rights than they left in Eng- land, and should be obliged to withdraw from juries. Mean-
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while an order from the Queen was being carried to Pennsylva- nia, requiring all persons in judicial or other office to take the oath directed by the law of England or the affirmation allowed by it to Quakers, and all persons who were in England obliged and willing to take an oath to be admitted to do so by the officers or judges in Pennsylvania and the lower counties, in default whereof their proceedings should be null and void. Penn ad- vised his people to disregard this, as conflicting with the laws established by virtue of King Charles's charter.
The inhabitants of New Castle, Kent, and Sussex, not being of the sects opposed to taking oaths or bearing arms, were restive under Quaker control; but it was really at the motion of the Pennsylvania assemblymen that, in 1702, a separation in the leg- islature took place, and was permanent. Quarry urged the Lords of Trade to have those counties placed directly under the Crown, which had never granted to Penn the government of them; and he said that the only title Penn had to such government was the old act of union, which the people had been cajoled into passing. In subsequent history, the Assembly of these "lower counties" generally followed the wishes of the acting governor. By acci- dent, which Quarry tortured into a design, there was no mention of the lower counties in the commission to the Council.
Of the three Lieutenant-Governors next in order, the first was dissolute; the second, deranged; and the third, dishonest. One beat the watchman, but is chiefly remembered for getting up a false alarm to scare the Quakers, another for kicking the judges at New Castle, and the last, the one of noble lineage, for sending young and poor Ben Franklin to London on the false promise of letters of credit. The first Proprietary, immediately on hearing of Hamilton's death, nominated the son, twenty-six years of age, of an old friend, and there was no delay in receiving the royal approbation, or in entering the security. A clause was inserted in his commission making void all laws he should enact without the personal assent of the Proprietary. This proviso the Council
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Penn's Lieutenant-Governors
unanimously declared illegal without annulling the commission. Lieutenant-Governor John Evans arrived 12 mo. 2, 1703-4, in company with the Proprietary's oldest son, William Penn, Jr. The representatives of the people were nettled by Evans's at- tempt, which was futile, to bring about a reunion of the province and lower counties in Assembly, and by his asking a reconsidera- tion of the refusal of the Assembly of Pennsylvania to contribute to the New York forts; so there began with the first Assembly a quarrel which embraced the Proprietary, as the latter, who had not yet received the taxes and gifts for his benefit, desired the people to come to his relief by assuming the support of all branches of the government, and asked moreover for the payment of the 200l. which he owed for Hamilton's salary. The Assembly, of which David Lloyd was Speaker, adjourned for weeks at a time on account of the fair, the harvests, etc .; and in the intervals, when for a few days there was a sitting, excused itself again from contributing to the forts in New York, and instead of levy- ing taxes, passed laws for securing and confirming the privileges of itself and the city corporation, and the rights of private indi- viduals. One of these bills did not receive Evans's consent, be- cause it included the right of the Assembly to sit upon its own adjournment, and he was advised that Penn had never given up the power of prorogation and dissolution. Evans by proclama- tion declared void the proceedings of the courts where the Queen's order as to oaths had not been complied with, and so vice went unpunished. He organized a militia, promising to those who enlisted exemption from the duty of watch and ward, which the corporation of Philadelphia imposed upon the citizens. When some of the militiamen declined to watch, the constables, under order of their superiors, reported the names to the mayor's court, and, probably to the satisfaction of the Quakers, soldiering with- out pay being a thankless task, very few appeared at the next muster. Then by advice of the Council, the Lieutenant-Governor by proclamation repeated the exemption. One evening hard
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words were exchanged at a tavern between the militia officers and the watchmen, and the next night William Penn, Jr., was there when the watch came around, and assisted in beating off the custo- dians of the peace. The heir apparent was duly presented for the offense with his comrades; which he took in such high dudgeon that he soon went back to England, selling his manor, and so being able to face his creditors. Jenkins in his "Family of William Penn" points out that this was not the street brawl in which Evans was engaged, where the mayor, recorder, and Joseph Wilcox, an alderman, came to the assistance of the watch- men, and the Lieutenant-Governor, making himself known, was beaten by Wilcox more severely for having given such occasion for scandal. On this latter occasion Griffith Jones was mayor ; on the former, Anthony Morris. He with his aldermen re- monstrated that by the proclamation "many of the good people of the city were much discouraged." Evans replied: "Too many of those good people you mention are such as oppose a militia, not from any principle against it, but through an uneasi- ness to see anything done under the present administration that may recommend us and the Proprietor's affairs to the Crown." So the proclamation was not recalled. Just before the adjourn- ment of the Assembly, a committee was appointed by it to ad- dress the Proprietary in plain terms. The result was the setting forth in a "most virulent, unmannerly invective," prepared by David Lloyd, of a number of complaints, beginning with claus- es in the Governor's commission inconsistent with the charter and the negligence of Penn in procuring the royal assent to most necessary bills, and then proceeding to the injustice practiced by the surveyors, the office of Surveyor-General having been vacant since 1701, and the failure of the commissioners of property to give lands in exchange for those lost by adverse title. This was enclosed in a letter to Friends in England known to be enemies of Penn, asking them to oblige him to do justice, saying that the vilest of men were let into the judiciary, and speaking of "the
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condition this poor province is brought to by the late revels and disorders which young William Penn and his gang of loose fel- lows he accompanies with are found in." The writing of such a letter caused some little reaction ; but the contest was continued by the Assembly elected after the address was written. In speak- ing of Evans, William Biles, member from Bucks county, whom Logan calls "that pestiferous old man," announced, "He is but a
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Franklin's device and motto published in the Pennsylvania Gazette at the time of the Albany Congress of the Colonies, 1754
boy : he is not fit to be our Governor. We'll kick him out. We'll kick him out." Whereupon the indignant officer sued Biles for slander, and demanded that the Assembly expel him. This it de- clined to do; and accordingly it was dismissed, June 23, 1705. Owen, Pusey, and Hill of the Council prepared a letter to the Proprietary, declaring their abhorrence of Lloyd's paper, and as- suring him of their readiness to support all the charge of govern- ment. It was signed by the great mass of the Friends, now stirred up in favor of their comrade and patron; and it was made effectual by an energetic political canvass, resulting in the choice
I-23
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of members of Assembly well affected towards the Proprietary, among them being Shippen, Carpenter, Pusey, and Hill of the Council. There was only one member not a Quaker. An act for the collection of quit-rents secured to Penn that source of income, and the appropriation of 800/. out of a 21/2d. per l. tax and about 6ool. from an impost on liquors settled the trouble about the Lieutenant-Governor's salary and the other public charges. A number of the laws rejected by the Queen were re-enacted, duly modified. The Pennsylvania method now used of suing out a mortgage was then put in the statute books.
There never was in Pennsylvania, during the colonial period, to our knowledge, any molestation or interruption of the liberty of Jews, Deists, or Unitarians, the first named, in fact, becoming well represented in Philadelphia, and at an early date, David Franks and others of them being taken into its fashionable circle ; therefore it is interesting chiefly as an evidence how generally the Quakers in 1705 accepted Athanasian orthodoxy that, while the frame of government of 1701, as we have seen, guaranteed lib- erty of conscience to all who confessed and acknowledged "one Almighty God, the Creator, Upholder, and Ruler of the World," and made eligible for office all who believed in "Jesus Christ the Saviour of the World," the act concerning liberty of conscience passed by this Assembly having only one non-Quaker member, established as the religion of the land Christianity and belief in the Bible, by these words: "Almighty God being only Lord of conscience, author of all divine knowledge, faith, and worship, who can only enlighten the minds, and convince the understanding of people; in due reverence to His sovereignty over the souls of mankind; and the better to unite the Queen's Christian subjects in interest and affection, Be it enacted that no person now or at any time hereafter dwelling or residing within this Province who shall profess faith in God the Father and in Jesus Christ his only Son and in the Holy Spirit, one God blessed for evermore, and shall acknowledge the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New
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Testament to be given by Divine inspiration, and when lawfully required shall profess and declare that they will live peaceably under the civil government, shall in any case be molested or preju- diced for his or her conscientious persuasion, nor shall he or she be at any time compelled to frequent or maintain any religious worship-place or ministry whatsoever contrary to his or her mind, but shall freely and fully enjoy his or her Christian liberty in all respects, without molestation or interruption." To anticipate, in Sir William Keith's time, Rev. Richard Welton, D. D., having come to Christ Church, Philadelphia, after receiving consecration as a bishop privately through the Scotch non-jurors, was threat- ened with molestation chiefly for political reasons; when he prayed for the King without naming George, so as to leave it open whether the Stuart was not the lawful sovereign, Keith shut up Christ Church, and Welton, summoned to England, went to Portugal, and died in Lisbon. When in Patrick Gordon's time, a Roman Catholic chapel was erected, that Lieutenant-Governor thought that the laws of Parliament required him to suppress it, but, there being no desire to do this, it was postponed pending a decision by the British government as to whether the immunity granted by Pennsylvania law did not protect the religious follow- ers of the Pope. During the French war, official suspicion and popular feeling were strong against those who had the same re- ligion as France, and after Braddock's defeat, a mob attacked the Roman Catholics in Philadelphia, but Quakers protected them.
Obtaining a verdict for 300/. against Biles, whom the Yearly Meeting also condemned for such language, Evans was appealed to by the Assembly to forgive him, and promised the committee to notify them if he had cause to do anything further ; but Biles. coming to town on this assurance, the Lieutenant-Governor, after shaking hands with him, had him arrested, and notified the com- mittee afterwards. The old man lay a month in jail, receiving every attention from "our good women," as Logan calls them ; then Evans, finding no money was to be obtained. released Biles.
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