80

CHAPTER IV

VIRGINIA AS A PROPRIETARY PROVINCE. THE ADMINISTRATIONS OF SANDYS AND THE EARL OF SOUTHAMPTON

The Argall incident contributed toward an important change in the administration of the company. It strengthened the resolve of Lord Rich to remove the merchants Smith, Johnson, and their friends from its control. This for the time was favorable to the prospects of Sir Edwin Sandys, who by his ability had risen to be the leader among those in the company who favored a liberal policy toward the plantation. With him were associated the Earl of Southampton, Lord Cavendish, who was also at the head of the Somers Islands company, John and Nicholas Ferrar, and many other prominent and able men. Sandys and his associates were also closely identified with the so-called “country party,” the opposition in parliament. There they worked against the corrupt policy of favorites, undue Spanish influence, monopolies and impositions, and strove to counterbalance in all ways the large power of the crown. This fact brought them into opposition to Sir Thomas Smith and Alderman Johnson, who at this time identified themselves to an extent at least with the court. Sir Thomas Smith, who was already well advanced in years, accepted the office of a commissioner of the navy. He had already served for ten years in succession as treasurer of the London company. These facts, together with his many other interests, caused him to decline reëlection for the year 1619, and to desire that his accounts might be audited and fully adjusted before he died. His wish was gratified by the company, the friends of Rich and Sandys cooperating toward the result. Sandys was elected treasurer, with John Ferrar as deputy in the place of Alderman Johnson. The auditors were set to work

81

on Smith’s accounts, but they found them so defective and intricate¹ as to make it impossible to disentangle them. As late as 1623 Smith was urging their settlement, but it was then declared to be an impossibility, and no proof is extant that they ever were cleared up. Though apparently the transfer of control from Smith to Sandys was made with ease, it laid the foundation for prolonged strife. The attitude of Sandys toward Argall, combined, it is probable, with many other causes, soon broke the temporary union with the Rich or Warwick faction, and formed a natural alliance² of the latter with Smith and Johnson. As time passed their union with the court became more intimate, and all important measures of the company came to be affected not only by the struggle between these factions, but by English politics as well. The complications, however, to which this led belong to another division of the subject. It remains at this point to trace the policy of the Sandys-Southampton party in so far as it immediately affected the colony.

In general it may be said that it involved no radical departure from that followed by the company during the later years of Dale’s administration and after the recall of Argall. It emphasized the best tendencies of that policy, expanding and improving upon it in various ways, and introducing more vigor and system than apparently had characterized the earlier methods of the company. The records show that Sir Edwin Sandys was an almost ideal administrator, and not a little of his wisdom appears in the fact that he fully recognized the merit of Gates and Dale.³ Sandys at the outset devoted himself to the task of reclaiming “the public” or company’s land from the exhausted condition in which Argall had left it. This he considered the root or body of the tree, and private plantations the branches.⁴ In pursuing his object he sought in all directions for tenants with whom to people it. He advertised for laborers and

82

artisans. He applied to the mayor of London for one hundred apprentices, twelve years of age and over. The king threw his plans into some confusion by insisting that he should find homes in Virginia for an hundred dissolute persons from the capital. After considerable delay and negotiation provision was made for a part or all of them. Domestic cattle and supplies of all kinds were bought and shipped. The settlement of private plantations, as well as the improvement of the public land, was also encouraged. During 1619 the company sent out eight ships, ranging from seventy tons burden to one thousand tons, and carrying 871 colonists. Three hundred were sent the same year by private adventurers. Though about three hundred died that year in Virginia, the energy of the company far more than made good this loss. Of those sent to the colony the great majority were servants, lists of whose names, with the contracts into which they entered with their masters, were kept by the company. They received free transportation to Virginia, were furnished with food for one year, also with apparel, cattle, tools, and weapons. The tenants on the public lands were expected to return to the company one-half of their annual product, and to remain in its employment for seven years. After that time the tenant could renew the contract, or receive an estate in fee simple as a dividend.

In connection also with the encouragement of emigration a strong effort was made to diversify the industry of Virginia. Of those who were sent out in 1619, one hundred and fifty were ordered to devote themselves to the production of iron, others were instructed to build saw-mills, “divers skilful vigneroons” were sent to develop and cultivate vineyards; directions were given for the sowing of hemp and flax and for the cultivation of the silk-grass of the region, which made good cordage; the production of silk was also encouraged, while the Poles already in the colony were sent back to the work of making pitch and tar, potash and soap ashes. The production of grain was everywhere encouraged. This policy was continued as long as the company existed, and the prosecution of it was the chief task of the treasurer and his associates. They continued to be managers of a

83

productive enterprise. Virginia was still the company’s plantation, and, in spite of all that could be done, the returns from it came chiefly in the form of tobacco.

But the introduction of free tenancy and the development of private plantations in addition to the company’s land was all the time changing the nature of the colony and preparing the way for its transition from the plantation to the provincial type. This change had begun with Dale, and was continued under Yeardley in 1619. Yeardley’s instructions mark an epoch in the history of the transition. As Dale acted under the authority of Sir Thomas Smith and his associates, and since Yeardley’s instructions were prepared before Smith and Johnson left office, due credit should be given to them for a share in the work. The system of joint management of land and trade was never intended to be more than temporary, an arrangement devised to meet the needs of the colony in its earliest stage, and when the conditions were ripe for its abandonment, Sir Thomas Smith put no obstacles in the way. It was by virtue of instructions given to Yeardley not long before Smith left office, that the system of reserves from the unoccupied domain for various public purposes was instituted.¹ One thousand acres were reserved for the maintenance of the ministers of the gospel, three thousand for the support of the governor, ten thousand for the endowment of a college, twelve thousand for the use of the company itself. The first three reserves were located on the north side of the river, between Henrico and the Falls, while the company’s reserve was divided into four apportionments of three thousand acres each, one of which was located near each of the four settlements along the river. As other offices were created by the company, additional reserves were made for them. It was for the peopling and improvement of these reserves that Sandys and his successors labored. The reserve for the college was, for example, a prominent object of Sandys” care. One of his first acts after assuming office² was to procure an order from the company for the expenditure of some £1500 for the settling and improvement

84

of this land. His plan was to send fifty tenants to it, who should be entitled to one-half the product of their labor, while the other half should go for the maintenance of tutors and scholars. Among the tenants should be a number of artisans. A ship should be hired by the company partly for their transportation, which, on its return voyage, for a freight of four pence per pound, would bring back all the company’s tobacco. A special committee was appointed to take charge of this business, while, pursuant to orders from the king, application was made to the bishop to have collections taken in the dioceses of the kingdom for the support of the college.¹ Some gifts were received for this purpose. Later,² George Thorpe was appointed superintendent of the college land.

Another form of grant which appeared at this time and played an important part in the development of Virginia till after the dissolution of the company³ was the sub-patent issued to private societies. The earliest of these were issued in 1618, when several gentlemen of the company in order to strengthen the colony united into societies and offered to establish plantations at their own cost. By combining their shares, or purchasing additional ones, the associations thus formed entitled themselves to very large grants of land in Virginia, and to a corresponding increase of those on later divisions. It was the intention of the company that the grantees should settle and improve the tracts in person, or send tenants and servants for the purpose. In some cases, but not in all, this was done. As the policy tended to absorb rapidly the available land and also to destroy the unity of the province, it was viewed with some distrust by the company. The first private plantation thus granted was Southampton or Smith’s Hundred, consisting of two hundred thousand acres, and located near the mouth of the Chickahominy river. Within this some three hundred tenants were settled. Shortly after other grants were made to “Argall and his associates,” “Hamor and his associates,” “Martin

85

and his associates.” Of these the last, known as Martin’s Plantation or Hundred, and the only one of the three to be developed, was situated at Martin’s Brandon, on the south side of the James river. The grantee was Captain John Martin, who had been connected with the fortunes of the colony from the outset. The grant contained eighty thousand acres. In 1619, through Sir John Wolstenholme, application was made to the company¹ that Martin’s Hundred, in consideration of losses which it had recently sustained, might receive a share of land in Virginia for every £12, 10s. which it had spent. This, it was said, would encourage the association to send out fifty more men. But for various reasons Sandys opposed the request, and no record appears of its being granted.

Before the close of 1619 we learn of the existence of Captain Lawne’s plantation and Captain Warde’s plantation.² In 1620 four additional patents were granted to similar associations,³ among them being one to Captain John Bargrave, one to Captain John Ward, and one to John Berkeley Esq., and their associates. Entries of other, though in most cases smaller, grants appear at intervals thereafter⁴ till the close of the company’s existence.

The grantees were permitted, till the government of the colony should be systematized, to issue orders for the regulation of their servants and business, provided they were not repugnant to the laws of England.⁵ Care was, however, exercised lest members should be added to the societies without the consent of the company, and lest the managers of the private plantations should run a too independent course in trade or promote faction in the colony.⁶ They occupied a position within the colony analogous to that of manors, and bore a similar relation to the development of its local institutions. When the first assembly met, John Martin

86

claimed all the privileges of a manorial lord in England, but he was forced to submit to the general regulations of the company. In 1622, on the occasion of his petitioning with others for concessions in the so-called “king’s forest,” he was sharply reproved by the company¹ for having made his territory a receptacle for bankrupts, vagabonds, and other disorderly persons who, with other enormities, had occasioned public complaint. Testimony to this effect, and to the effect that Martin had resisted the officers of the colony, was received at the time. Two months later Martin petitioned again that his patent might be amended and those provisions removed which were injurious to the colony or which transcended the powers that should be conveyed by such a grant. He was advised to surrender his patent and take out a new one. This he at first refused to do, but later consented and delivered it up in open court to be cancelled. Order was then given that a new one should be made out before the next quarter court, and it was duly issued.² This was in accordance with a regulation upon which the company had always acted, and which had recently been reduced to writing,³ that none but the company in quarter court could grant land, the functions of the governor in the premises being wholly ministerial. The grantee or chief officer of a private plantation or hundred was known as its commander, and these grants appear to have had a semi-military organization. This they seem to have retained till about the time of the dissolution of the company. During that time, as the result of settlement, they became not merely grants, but localities or local units. In consequence of that, soon after Virginia became a royal province, they were merged on the one side among the large estates and on the other among the institutions of local government which were slowly unfolding in Virginia.

The issue of patents for large private plantations, or manors, was only one step in the transition from the joint stock system, as applied to land, to individual ownership. Another and more important one was the successive divisions

87

of the unoccupied land of the province among the settlers and adventurers. The former had contributed by their persons, the latter by their purses, and with the beginning of Yeardley’s term as governor they began to receive their dividends in the form of land. The regulation of the company provided that, for each share of £12, 10s., or its equivalent, one hundred acres of land should be granted on the first division. On the second division a tract of equal size should be bestowed, provided the first grant had been sufficiently peopled. The system of head rights was also introduced, by virtue of which for every person who, before midsummer, 1625, should be transported into the colony and remain there three years, the planter or adventurer at whose expense he came should receive fifty acres on the first division and fifty more on the second division. The system of head rights played a prominent part in the settlement of Virginia, and of the other provinces as well, for generations to come, and by it the supply of the colonies with a due proportion of servants was insured. As an additional inducement to private settlers it was ordered that those who received their bills of adventure before midsummer, 1625, should be free from the payment of quitrents. Those issued later than this date were subject to that obligation. As the result of successive divisions and the multiplication of private grants, large and small, the unoccupied land of the province gradually became the property of individual freeholders. Those who possessed the smaller estates worked them themselves with the aid of a few laborers or servants. The larger grantees employed many servants,—or later, slaves,—and in some cases leased their estates partly or wholly to tenants.¹

So long as the company continued to exist, its reserves and those of its officials and beneficiaries, with their troops of servants and tenants, constituted an important feature of the land system of the province. But the Indian massacre of 1622 blasted the project for a college, while on the dissolution of the company its lands were divided and became absorbed into the general land system of the province. By

88

that time also the province had reached a permanent, self-supporting basis. It was no longer dependent on “supplies” in the earlier and technical sense of the word. General indolence, of which John Smith and Dale complained, disappeared with the advent of the system of individual estates. The province also outgrew unusual visitations of disease and famine. The development of energy which accompanies competition, applied mainly in this instance to the production of tobacco, furnished the inhabitants of the province with such European goods as they needed. The necessary agricultural products they themselves raised or in later times imported from neighboring colonies. Viewed from the institutional standpoint, the significant fact is that the province had now come to possess, so far as the whites were concerned, a system of tolerably free labor, and on this system of freeholders and free tenants the political structure of Virginia was erected.

But the disappearance of the system of joint land ownership was not followed by the immediate abandonment of common trade,¹ though a change was made in its management. Until the time of which we are speaking, the business of furnishing supplies for the colony and marketing its products had been carried on at a heavy loss. Since the company had controlled the magazine, this loss had fallen upon the entire body of stockholders. Owing to the exhaustion of funds thus produced, in 1616 a private association was formed among the adventurers for the purpose of carrying on this trade. It was known as the Society of Particular Adventurers for Traffic with the People of Virginia in Joint Stock. Through this the business of the magazine was managed until 1620. Subscribers to it held separate meetings, while its affairs were regularly administered by a director and committee of five councillors. Its accounts were passed upon by the auditors of the company. The cape-merchant acted as the factor of the associates in the colony. Ships were sent out at intervals, which were

89

loaded with miscellaneous commodities intended for sale at fixed prices to the colonists. The ships brought back tobacco and sassafras, bought also at fixed rates. They thus performed the functions of the earlier supplies, and it was intended that the monopoly of trade should be secured as fully to the magazine in the one case as in the other. During Argall’s administration, however, this was impossible for the reason that, in violation of orders, he allowed the masters and seamen of vessels, as well as the settlers, to traffic freely in the products of the colony, thus destroying the market for the imports brought over by the “magazine.” Adventurers in the private plantations also enjoyed the right of marketing their products and procuring their own supplies from England. It was also possible through official influence for a private trader now and then to secure admission to Virginia. According also to a law of the first assembly, if the supplies in the magazine did not include some desired article which was recognized as a necessity of life, it might be purchased from any one who offered it for sale. Because of these limitations of the monopoly, the cape merchant suggested that the system of fixed prices be abolished and he be permitted to barter goods for tobacco on such terms as he could make. But his suggestion was not approved. He was therefore limited in his sales to a profit of twenty-five per cent on the original cost of the goods, and in his purchases was required to pay 3s. per pound for the highest grade of tobacco and 18d. for the lowest. In order to insure the honesty of the cape-merchant, he was required to prepare two vouchers for each transaction, one of which was deposited with the governor.¹ Between 1620 and the dissolution of the company the magazine was kept supplied by a succession of particular associations united in temporary joint stock, the adventurers throughout struggling not only against the attempted competition of outsiders, but against the declining price of tobacco. With the establishment of Virginia as a royal province the system of joint trading through a magazine entirely disappeared, and private initiative,

90

regulated by English and provincial law, took its place.

The multiplication of settlements by the company, the founding of private plantations, and the general abandonment of joint management of the land, opened the way for the development within the province of an administrative organization and a political system. Political conditions and forces begin thus to take their place beside those of an essentially commercial and economic character. To this phase of the transition of the years 1618 and 1619 it is now necessary to turn our attention.

The development of local institutions in Virginia was the immediate result of the settlement of Henrico and its adjacent posts and of the establishment of the private plantations. The former were in origin agricultural settlements and military outposts; the latter were of the same nature, but were private jurisdictions and hence germinal manors. So far as the settlements, both public and private, had churches and were the residences of clergymen, they were, on the ecclesiastical side, germinal parishes. Soon after the founding of Henrico and its neighboring settlements, they begin to be variously designated as corporations, cities, boroughs, hundreds. Bermuda,—later Charles City,—Henrico, and Jamestown were known as cities, and reference is made to certain of their inhabitants as members of the corporation. The private settlements, as well as some of the public, were known as hundreds, or plantations, or by some strictly local designation, as Martin’s Brandon, Argall’s Gift. During the administration of Argall, or a little later, extensive districts adjacent to Henrico, Charles City, James City, and Kecoughtan—the four original settlements along the river—were joined with them under the general designations of “corporations.”¹ The Corporation of Henrico included all settlements on both sides of the James river from Farrar’s island westward; that of Charles City all from Farrar’s island to the mouth of the Chickahominy river; that of James City from the mouth of the Chickahominy possibly to Elizabeth river or its neighborhood; that of Kecoughtan,

91

from the bounds of the James City corporation to the bay. Within these were included all the towns, hundreds, and plantations, whether public or private, within the colony. The corporation of Henrico was only one borough, though it contained the district settlements of Henrico, Coxendale, and Arrahattock. The corporation of Charles City contained five boroughs: that consisting of the old plantations of Bermuda Hundred, Sherley Hundred, and Charles City, and in addition Smith’s Hundred, Flowerdieu Hundred, Martin’s Brandon, Captain Warde’s Plantation. The corporation of James City contained four boroughs: James City, Argall’s Gift, Martin’s Hundred, Captain Lawne’s Plantation. The corporation of Kecoughtan was then only one borough. With the growth of local subdivisions the distinction between the town, or original settlement, and the province appears with great clearness. Jamestown was once town and colony combined. It can now no longer be mistaken for the colony, and appears simply as the chief town, the residence of the governor, the place where the council meets, the port to and from which trade chiefly proceeds.

It was not necessary that the administrative development of the colony should have proceeded farther at that time. For an indefinite period its affairs might have been administered through a governor and council. It was possible to guarantee the private rights of the free planters through such administrative and judicial powers as might have been bestowed upon those officials. More than this the planters could not legally claim, and even on this basis a system much less rigid than that of the Lawes Divine and Martiall could have been developed. But the Sandys-Southampton party, which in 1618 secured control of the company, was in strong sympathy with the parliamentary opposition in England. It also wished, as soon as possible, to remove from both company and colony the effects of the misgovernment of Argall. As a condition of further growth, it favored the total abandonment of the monopolistic policy of Sir Thomas Smith and the merchants, with the plantation type of colony that accompanied it. It favored the establishment under due restrictions of private plantations, the encouragement of

92

emigration to the colony on a larger scale, the granting of land under easy conditions, the largest possible freedom of trade. It desired to elicit to the fullest extent the cooperation of the colonists with the company in this work. In order to secure this it was resolved in 1618 by the general court of the company that there should be an equal and uniform government in the colony, consisting of “two supreme councils.”¹ One of these was the governor and council, chosen and appointed by the company in England. The other should be the general assembly, which should consist of the council of state and two burgesses chosen by the planters from each “town, hundred, or other particular plantation” in Virginia. An instruction to this effect was sent out with Governor Yeardley, which resulted in the meeting of the first Virginia assembly at the close of July, 1619.

The burgesses,² or elected members of this body, were twenty-two in number, returned from the eleven boroughs, hundreds, or plantations, to which reference has already been made. By this means the union of the localities as parts of one colony government was assured. The representatives met with the governor and council in a joint assembly, presided over by the secretary of the colony, John Pory, who was chosen speaker. The place of meeting was the church at Jamestown, the governor and council occupying the choir, as they did during service, and the burgesses the body of the church. The speaker sat in front of the governor, and thus was accessible to both components of the assembly. Burgesses were admitted on showing their credentials and taking the oath of supremacy. Some hesitation was shown about admitting the two representatives from Captain Warde’s Plantation, because he had founded a settlement without authority from the company. But in view of his past services to the colony in fishing and trading and on his promise to procure legal authority for his settlement before the next assembly, he and his associates were admitted.

A more extended controversy occurred over the seating of

93

the burgesses from Martin’s Brandon. The patent which Captain John Martin had procured from the company for this plantation exempted him from all services for the colony save in war against a foreign or domestic enemy, and guaranteed to him rights as ample as those enjoyed upon any of the manors in England. Martin was also accused of trading with the Indians without license. The burgesses from Martin’s Brandon were ordered to return till such time as Captain Martin should appear before the assembly. When he came he promised to abandon independent trading, and gave security for good conduct toward the Indians; but he refused to consent to any change in his patent. Therefore his burgesses were excluded, and the assembly petitioned the company that it would examine Martin’s patent, and if it found any of its provisions inconsistent with the due uniformity and equality of laws, that they might be corrected.

After the burgesses had been duly seated, the business of the session was taken up. The attitude taken by the assembly revealed a suggestive combination of initiative with subordination. As classified by the speaker, the business consisted in a consideration of the instructions which had been issued to the governors since the orders brought over by Yeardley and called the “great charter,” for the purpose of ascertaining what provisions of these “might conveniently putt on the habite of laws”; what laws might be passed on the initiative of the assembly itself; what petitions might properly be sent to the company in England. The speaker in his report of the proceedings was careful to state that their object in examining the “charter” and instructions was not “to correct or controll anything therein contained; but onely in case we should finde aught not perfectly squaring with the State of this Colony, or any law, which did presse or binde too hard, that we might by waye of humble petition seek to have it redressed.” Two committees were appointed to examine the orders sent by Yeardley, while the governor and the rest of the assembly examined the earlier instructions.

The consideration of Yeardley’s orders resulted in the following petitions to the company: That the grants of land

94

made to the ancient planters be confirmed, so that they might not be disturbed by any grants now or later to be made to others; that colonists be sent to occupy the company’s land belonging to the “four incorporations,” and tenants for the ministers” glebes situated therein; that the ancient planters, both those who had come at their own cost and at that of the company, might receive their second, third, and later divisions of land in as large and free manner as any other planters; that a sub-treasurer might be appointed to reside in the colony and collect the company’s rents there in kind, so that the inconveniences of payment in England might be obviated; that workmen might be sent to erect a college, and that the name Kecoughtan might be changed. The assembly then proceeded to enact into laws a number of the company’s instructions relating to the morals and religion of the colonists, the civilizing of the Indians, the encouragement of grape, silk, and hemp culture, contracts with tenants and servants, and the maintenance of the magazine. To these were added a number of enactments initiated by the members of the assembly itself, regulating dealings with the Indians, religious observances, trade and morals within the colony. This, together with the trial of a civil suit involving the claim of Argall to certain payments, and a criminal suit in which Henry Spelman was charged with using to Opechancanough words calculated to degrade Governor Yeardley in the eyes of the Indian chief, comprises all the business done by the assembly. Admitting fully the right of the company to disallow the acts, the assembly requested that they might be regarded as in force till report of their rejection should come from England, and also that in due time the assembly might be authorized to disallow orders of the company’s court, as it was empowered to reject acts of assembly. Thus early something like legislative equality with the court of the company in England was sought.

Several entries appear in the records of the company during the spring and summer of 1620, which reveal the fact that the acts of the general assembly had arrived and were under consideration. As was to be expected, Sir Edwin

95

Sandys carefully perused them, and “found them in their greatest part to be very well and judiciously carried and performed.” On April 8 he moved that a committee be appointed “to draw them into a head and to ripen the business,” that it might be submitted to a quarter court, with which body exclusively lay the power of approval or rejection. The committee was appointed, and at a later date, because they found their task “intricate and full of labor,” received an extension of time. Their report should have come before the quarter court of midsummer, 1620, but no reference to it appears in the journal of that session. Nor has any reference been noted to the subject thereafter in the records, and it cannot, therefore, be positively affirmed that the acts of this first legislature ever received the approval of the company.¹

When, in July, 1624, Sir Francis Wyatt, who had been appointed as Yeardley’s successor, was about to depart for Virginia² an instruction with provisions concerning an assembly similar to those issued to Yeardley was given to him. This body was given free power to treat, consult, and conclude concerning the public weal of the province on “all emergent occasions,” and also to enact such general laws and orders for its government as from time to time should appear necessary. In addition the promise was held out that, after the government of the province had become well framed and established, no orders of the court of the company should bind the colony unless ratified by its general assemblies. The time for the issue of this concession never came, but had it come Virginia would have enjoyed greater liberty than was ever promised by the crown or by any other English proprietor. It would have stood from the outset on the basis which was ultimately claimed by the colonies in 1776, and would have been forever freed from the binding force of instructions. But it remained only a benevolent promise, and is to be classed, with the many assertions of full legislative competence made by colonial assemblies, as suggestive claims rather than sober statements of fact. The instruction to Wyatt, which gave to the

96

governor the casting vote in council and judicial tribunal and the negative voice in assembly, which required the observance in administrative and judicial concerns of the forms of English law, and which were largely concerned with affairs of land and trade, expressed much more clearly the spirit of the British colonial system than did the promise which implied a contractual relation between colony and proprietor. The transition of a community within a decade from a state of subjection, such as that portrayed in the writings of Smith, or in the Lawes Divine and Martiall, to a condition such as that suggested by the promise of the company, would awaken surprise in any age of the world, and most of all, perhaps, in the seventeenth century.

Near the close of 1621 the second assembly in the history of Virginia was held. Its acts have not been preserved, but from the hints which have come down concerning them we know that they related only to immediate needs of the province, and especially to the introduction of the silk culture and that of other staple commodities in which the company was interested. In March, 1624, the last assembly of proprietary Virginia met. A list of what are probably brief outlines of thirty-five acts and orders which it passed has been preserved.¹ Several of these related to the fostering within the province of religious worship according to the forms of the English Church, and to the organization of the plantations and other local settlements into parishes. Provision was also made for monthly courts at Charles City and Elizabeth City for the punishment of petty offences and the trial of suits which did not involve more than one hundred pounds of tobacco. These courts should consist of the commanders of the localities where they met, and of such others as the governor and council should commission as judges, the commanders to be the quorum, and sentences to be given by majority vote. The right of appeal to the governor and council was reserved. By this law the foundation of local government in Virginia was laid. Provision was made for a capitation tax of ten pounds of tobacco to meet the general expenses of the province. But at the same

97

time the general assembly affirmed its control over the taxing power by forbidding any taxes to be laid on land or commodities in the province except by its authority, and by requiring that they should be levied and employed as it should direct.