USA > South Carolina > The history of South Carolina under the proprietary government, 1670-1719, V.1 > Part 29
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1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 192.
2 Coll. Hist. Soc. of So. Ca., vol. I, 215, 216 ; Colonial Records of No. Ca., vol. I, 545.
3 Hewatt's Hist. of So. Ca., vol. I, 144.
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a scheme of the new Governor to turn to his private advan- tage the emoluments of the Indian trade.1
Upon the death of Blake, Joseph Morton, as the eldest Landgrave present, was entitled to the administration under the Fundamental Constitutions, and whether these Constitutions were or were not binding, a majority of the Council then present elected Morton until the pleasure of the Proprietors could be known. But James Moore, who was one of the body. objected to Morton's election upon the ground that he was ineligible, as he held an office under the King, i.e. Judge of Admiralty. To this objection it was answered by Mr. Morton's friends. "That it did not appear by the charter. the Proprietaries can empower any one to try persons for acts committed out of their dominions which is necessary for a judge." And that as it was necessary that some one in the colony should possess the power, it should not disqualify Mr. Morton from being Governor as well while he was Judge. The objection, however, prevailed. Morton was set aside, and Moore was chosen. Morton complained to the Proprietors, but their Lordships did not interfere in his behalf.2 Indeed, they had themselves, the year before, expressed surprise that Morton, holding the commission as Judge of Admiralty, should have taken another, though from the King ; 3 and were probably not displeased that he had suffered for it without their own action. Morton does not appear ever to have been a favor- ite with the Proprietors. They had made him a Land- grave and Governor in 1682 for bringing out a number of immigrants, but they had been very curt to him in their communications, and had soon sent out a stranger to
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 192.
2 Oktmixon, British Empire in Im., vol. I, 474 ; Carroll's Coll., vol. HI, 41% : Hist. Sketches of So. Cu. (Rivers), 194.
Public Records of So. Ca., vol. IV, 100.
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relieve him. He had before been chosen by the Council in an emergency, upon the retirement of Governor West in 1685, but had again been promptly relieved by the Proprietors, who sent out Colleton instead in 1686. Had the Proprietors known that Moore had been endeavoring to betray their interests to the King through Randolph, they may perhaps have overlooked Morton's taking a commission from his Majesty, and have allowed him to serve for a while as Governor for a third time.
Moore is said at this time to have been in great debt and pecuniary want. and determined if possible to improve his desperate circumstances during his lease of power, which he apprehended would be of but short duration. He designed. therefore, to make a considerable profit out of the Indian trade while he had the opportunity, and for the purpose had a bill brought into the Assembly for regulating that business, which, had it passed, would have given him a mo- nopoly. But Trott, by his astuteness, saw at once through the scheme and. for purposes of his own, defeated it. Upon this. Moore, finding the Assembly not amenable to his designs, dissolved it.
A new Assembly was called and every exertion was made to control its composition. The election took place in November, 1701. and the dissenters of Colleton County charged that unqualified aliens, i.e. French Protestants, strangers. paupers, servants, and even free negroes, were allowed to vote. As soon as the Assembly met. peti- tions were presented by the defeated candidates praying to be heard against the validity of the Sheriff's returns. The Assembly, most of whom were incorruptible. and ap- parently not under Moore's control, promptly resolved to enter into an immediate investigation. To prevent this they were prorogued from time to time. Being sum- moned in April, 1702, the busiest time with planters. they
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met and adjourned till the 5th of May. This Governor Moore angrily imputed to a greater regard to private than to the public welfare, and prorogued them till August.1
In the intervals reports were circulated that Colonel Daniel had instigated Moore to proclaim martial law if the Assembly should continue to exhibit a refractory spirit, and when the Assembly met recrimination immediately be- gan. If the public welfare had required their counsels, why had the Governor through pique prorogued them till August? Was it that he designed to menace them with coercion ? "Oh, how is the sacred law profaned." it was said, " when joined with martial! Have you forgotten your honor's own noble endeavor to vindicate our liberties when Colleton set up his arbitrary rule ?" ?
Before the prorogation of the Assembly, Mr. Trott and Mr. Higginton had been appointed a committee to super- vise the last set of Constitutions sent out by the Proprietors with Colonel Daniel. On the 10th of August, 1702, these gentlemen made this incoherent report : 3 --
" That the constitutions of which we are to consider make and set up an estate different and distinguished from the Lords Proprietors, and the Common's House without whose consent no law shall or may be enacted, which is called in the said constitutions the upper house, consisting of the Landgraves and Casiques who being created by their Lordships' second letters patents are also a middle state between the Lords and the Commons; which constitution we cannot find that it anywayes contradicts the said Charter.
" We find that the 22d article in the said Constitutions manifestly in- terferes with our Jury aets now in force ; That all other articles in the constitutions are as neare and agreable as may be to the said charter or at least no wayes repugnant to it."
In this inconsistent and contradictory report, Trott
.. 1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 196. 2 Thill.
3 Statutes of So. Ca., vol. I, 11 ; MISS. Journal.
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points out that the Constitutions made and set up an estate consisting of Landgraves and Caciques, called an Upper House, without the consent of the Commons House, without which no law could be enacted under the charter; and yet reports that the committee cannot find that the Constitutions anyways contradict that instrument. That one of the articles of the Constitutions interfere with the jury acts : but all other articles are as near and agreeable to the charter as may be, or at least not repugnant to it. What is the meaning of this? The implication is that if the Constitutions are inconsistent with the jury act, the Constitutions must give way : and yet, though contradict- ing the charter in setting up a third estate without the consent of the Commons, they are not repugnant to it.
This was his formal report ; but the dissenters of Colle- ton, in an address. complained to the Proprietors that when the House came to consider the Constitutions. " they were opposed by Mr. Trott & Mr. Howes and others, the said Governor's creatures & several reflectory words used by the said Trott & Howes concerning them, exposing the constitutions as ridiculous and void in themselves ; thereby endeavoring (notwithstanding Your Lordship's care of us) to keep the people in an unsettled condition, that from time to time they might the more easily be imposed on by them." 1
It is as difficult to suppress a smile upon reading the address of the dissenters of Colleton on the one hand, as upon reading the sophistical report of Trott on the other. Trott's insincerity was equalled by that of the address. Could the Proprietors really believe that the dissenters were now in earnest in desiring the imposition of the Fundamental Constitutions, which they had so persistently
1 " Address of Members of Colleton Co.," Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), Appendix, 457.
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resisted, and which Constitutions, while professing religious freedom, prescribed that the General Assembly should take care of the building of churches and the public maintenance of divines of the Church of England. " which being the only true and orthodox, and the national religion of all the King's dominion, is also of Carolina," etc.
The proceedings of the House upon the reports are scarcely less contradictory than the report itself. The day after it had been presented, the House entered into a debate upon it. and ordered the Constitutions themselves to be read. Then the question was raised as to the effect of the deaths of the Proprietors who had signed them. "The question is put whether the house is of opinion that the constitutions now before us are valid, being enacted by us since severall of the proprietors are dead who signed the same. C'arried in the affirmative."1 It is not easy to understand this entry, as none of the Constitutions had ever been enacted by the Assembly; and but one of the Proprietors who signed the last set brought out by Colonel Daniel had since died, i.e. the Earl of Bath. It was then "ordered that the said constitutions be read again, and de- bated paragraph by paragraph to morrow morning." They were accordingly so read and debated the next day, Sep- tember 1, whereupon the House refused to order them to a second reading.2
When Sir Nathaniel Johnson was made Governor the year after, he was instructed to obtain, if he could. the assent of the Assembly to such parts of the Constitutions as he should deem advisable. But nothing more was done in the matter, and this was practically the last of the famous Fundamental Laws proposed by Locke. except the occasional appointment of Landgraves or Caciques.
In the midst of these discussions the doors of the As-
1 Statutes of So. Ca., vol. 1, 42. 2 Ibid.
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sembly were suddenly closed. and when they were opened. an act was passed for raising the sum of £2000 for carry- ing on an expedition against St. Augustine, "and for appointing the number of men and ships to be made use of, and the manner and method of going against the said place."1 Our only account of what took place in this secret session is that given in a paper from which quota- tion has already been made, purporting to be a " Repre- sentation and Address" of several members returned for Colleton County and other inhabitants of the province, "and signed by 150 of the principal inhabitants." The paper is an address to the Lords Proprietors, complaining of the Governor generally, and especially of their treat- ment in a riot which ensued upon the withdrawal of the Colleton members from the Assembly. It is loosely and crudely drawn. is inaccurate in its statements, and reck- less in its imputations of motives. Oldmixon, the author of The British Empire in America, however, unhesitatingly adopts its account, and warmly espouses its cause; and in this he has been followed, more or less, by other histo- rians.2 But, though claiming to be a churchman, Old- mixon was a member of the Blake family, as a tutor, and was a thorough partisan of the interest of which that family was the head.
The address charges that the expedition was set on foot by the Governor and his adherents for no other purpose than catching and making slaves of Indians for private advantage ; that for this purpose the Governor had be- fore granted commissions to Anthony Dodsworth, Robert Mackoone, and others to kill, destroy, and capture as many Indians as they possibly could, the profit and produce of
1 Statutes, vol. II, 18 ?.
2 British Empire in Am., vol. I. 476 ; Hewatt's Frist. of So. Ca., vol. I, 152; Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 123.
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which capture of Indians were to be turned to the Gov- ernor's private account. That if any one in the Assembly undertook to speak against the expedition, and to show how unprepared the colonists were at that time for such an attempt, he was reviled and affronted as an enemy and traitor to his country.1
It is not at all improbable that the debate in the Assem- bly was conducted with warmth, and caused great excite- ment. It may well be imagined that strong and bitter words were used against those who were opposing the ex- pedition, especially if in their opposition they had been bold enough to impute the motives to the Governor. with which they afterwards charged him in their address to the Proprietors. We remember how bitterly all the colonists had resented the suppression by Colleton of the expedition in 1686. as contrary to the honor of the English nation. They had been prevented and forbidden, at that time, from an attempt upon the Spanish post, because it was said Eng- land and Spain were nominally at peace. But that reason did not now exist. "Queen Anne's War" had actually begun, and that alone presented an opportunity of striking a blow at that pestilential spot held by mongrel Spaniards. as a constant threat to the provinces.
But the cause of war upon St. Augustine at this time was much greater and more immediate than the mere fact of hostilities between England and Spain ; and that cause was not alluded to in the address of the Colleton party. In the report of a committee of the Commons upon Ogle- thorpe's expedition, made forty years after the events we are now considering, a sketch is given of two previous invasions of Carolina from St. Augustine, and in this sketch we find the occasion of the present movement against that place. From this report it appears that in
1 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. ( Rivers), Appendix, 456.
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1702, before Queen Anne's declaration of war was known in the province, the Spaniards had formed the design again to fall upon the Carolina settlement by land at the head of 900 Apalatchee Indians. The Creek Indians, in friendship with the Carolinians, coming to a know- ledge of this intended invasion, informed the traders, but not before the Spaniards' expedition was on its march. The Carolina traders, instead of retreating, however, roused the Creeks to resistance and, collecting 500 men, headed them, and went out to meet the invaders. The hostile parties met one evening on the side of Flint River, a branch of the Chattahoochee, in Georgia. In the morning just before daybreak, at an hour when Indians were accustomed to make their attacks, the Creeks, stirring up their fires, drew back at a little distance. leaving their blankets by the fires in the order in which they had slept. As was expected, the Spaniards and Apalatcheans, coming to the attack, ran in and fired upon the blankets, whereupon the Creeks, rushing forth from their retreat, fell on them. killed, and took the greater part, entirely routing them.1 It was upon this provoca- tion and renewed invasion by the Spaniards, that it was deemed best to take the offensive and to endeavor, if possible, to wipe out this constant source of menace and danger to the province.
Rivers suggests that it is reasonable to suppose that there was some connection between this affair and the charge against the Governor of granting to irresponsible persons the power to set upon Indians who were not in open hostility against the colonists.2
Whatever opposition to the expedition was made in the Assembly was soon overcome, and £2000 were voted to
1 Carroll's Coll .. vol. II, 348.
2 Hist. Sketches of So. Ca. (Rivers), 199, 200.
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