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CHAPTER XIII

ECCLESIASTICAL RELATIONS IN THE LATER PROPRIETARY PROVINCES

In New England the uniformity of the population in nationality and culture was reflected in its religion. Nearly all of the communities which occupied that region were organized according to the same religious type. That, in fact, was the distinctive characteristic of the section, from which the other qualities of its people proceeded. Among the colonies it was the home, the citadel, of English Independency. That can be affirmed of it with even greater truth than it can be said of the eastern counties in England. The settlement of southern New England proceeded from a single impulse; those who participated in and at the same time controlled it were of a similar mental and moral type; their enterprise gave rise to institutions which closely conformed to a single type.

The proprietary provinces, on the other hand, were of varied origin and did not occupy a distinct section. They were peopled, not only by Englishmen, but by men of Scotch, Welsh, Dutch, French, Swedish, German, Swiss, and even Jewish, origin. Interspersed among the Swedes were some Finns and Poles. The Jews came largely from Portugal, and made New York their residence and the centre of their trade. Only a part of the inhabitants of these provinces became colonists from religious motives. Economic motives predominated among them.

The forms of their religious faith were even more varied than their nationalities. The English nationality contributed men of Catholic and Episcopalian faith, Independents, Baptists, and Quakers. The Dutch were mainly of the Reformed communion, as were also the French. The Swedes

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were Lutherans, while a part of the Dutch were organized somewhat late as a Lutheran church in New Amsterdam. Some Scotch Presbyterians settled in South Carolina and in East Jersey. The Palatines and Swiss of New Berne in North Carolina were of the German Reformed faith, but their strength was seriously weakened by the ravages of the Tuscarora Indians. During the period of which we are now speaking the German migration had just begun, and only faint indications of the volume which it was to attain after 1710 had yet appeared. The Scotch-Irish immigration, greatly strengthening the Presbyterian element in the population, belongs also, in the main, to the later period. The later German immigrants filled up eastern and central Pennsylvania, and somewhat changed the composition of population in New York; while the Scotch-Irish overflowed into the western parts of all the colonies south of Pennsylvania.

During the seventeenth century New York and the settlements along the Delaware exhibited the greatest diversity of nationalities and faiths. For this reason they were in some respects most typical of the nation that was to be. Governor Andros reported¹ in 1678 that there were Presbyterians,—meaning chiefly the Dutch Reformed communion,—Independents, Quakers, and Jews in the province, but the first two were most numerous and substantial. There was one Anglican church, maintained by the duke and located in the fort, at which his chaplain officiated and which was attended by the officials and garrison. Eight years later, when New York had become a royal province, Governor Dongan described² the situation in words which convey a clear idea of the variety of sects and at the same time of the widespread religious indifference. “Here bee not many,” he said, “of the Church of England; few Roman Catholicks; abundance of Quakers preachers, men and Women especially; Singing Quakers; Ranting Quakers; Sabbatarians; Antisabbatarians; some Anabaptists some Independents; some Jews; in short of all sorts of opinions there are some, and the most part, of none at all.” No contrast could be greater than that between the religious condition of a

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population like the one which Dongan described and that of the Puritan colonies of New England.

Considered from the standpoint of geographical distribution, the Catholics were to be found in Maryland and in very limited numbers in New York. Even in Maryland they were in the minority, though their social position was relatively high and their influence greater than their numbers would indicate.¹ Adherents of the English Church appear in small numbers in all the provinces. In Maryland they gained slowly on the Catholics, but during the seventeenth century scarcely exceeded them. In South Carolina² the earliest settlers and those who came from Barbadoes were of that faith, constituting an important part of the population of Berkeley county and living along the banks of the Ashley and Cooper rivers. A few of the early emigrants from Virginia into North Carolina³ may have been Anglicans, but not one local Episcopalian church existed in that part of the province during the period of which we are speaking. Anglicans were practically non-existent both in Pennsylvania and West Jersey. In East Jersey the only Anglicans in early times were those who were immediately connected with the governor’s family, together with other proprietary officials. We hear of no Episcopalian clergyman in that province until 1698, when one was settled at Perth Amboy.⁴ In New York the Episcopalian element was somewhat stronger, but it was confined almost wholly to the government circle in New York city and to the region afterward included in Westchester county. It is stated that in 1680 Bishop Compton could find only four ministers of the Church of England in North America, and that of these only one or two had been regularly sent over.⁵

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The remaining population of all these provinces consisted of Protestant dissenters and those who were indifferent to all religion. The dissenters fall into two main classes, the followers of the tenets of John Calvin and the Quakers. The Lutherans were a comparatively small body, found chiefly in New York city, on the Delaware, and in South Carolina.¹ In Maryland, Anne Arundel county was settled by Puritans who had removed from Virginia, and they proved themselves to be a very aggressive and disturbing element in the population. Nowhere else outside of Massachusetts did the militant quality in Puritanism show itself so clearly. In South Carolina, Huguenots, Presbyterians, Congregationalists, and Baptists could be found in all the settled parts of the province, but they were most numerous on the Santee and the Edisto. In the northern part of the province no more definite trace of them can be discovered at this period than of Episcopalians. In the provinces farther north dissenters of this type were to be found in small numbers in the settlements on the lower Delaware, but chiefly in East Jersey and New York. In the last-named provinces they constituted by far the chief religious element in the population. They comprised, not only the Dutch of New York and the Scotch Presbyterians of East Jersey, but the Puritans or Congregationalists of the Long Island towns and of that fringe of settlements which had been founded by New Englanders in northern New Jersey.

As early as 1660 a certain Quaker element could be found in all these provinces. In Maryland, South Carolina, and New York it was small and unimportant. In East Jersey it became quite strong under the twenty-four proprietors, a majority of the first twelve on that board being Quakers. At Perth Amboy and Woodbridge Quaker meetings were regularly held after 1686.² But the strongholds of Quakerism were West Jersey, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina. The preaching of Quakerism, as we have seen, began in North Carolina in 1672, Edmundson and George Fox himself being the missionaries. By 1676 the Society of Friends was organized there. In 1689 a quarterly meeting was begun,

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and in 1703 the first meeting-house was built.¹ At the close of the seventeenth century the Quakers were the only strong religious body in the province. In West Jersey they constituted practically all the population, while in Pennsylvania² about one-half the population were Quakers.

In view of these facts the great preponderance of dissent in all the later proprietary provinces becomes evident. If, in addition, we consider the religious faith of the founders of these provinces and of their officials, a considerable diversity will also appear, as well as a great divergence between the faith of proprietors and officials and that of the people of their provinces. It is true that New York was originally founded and governed by those who in the light of English law were dissenters, but who at the same time were the disciples of the recognized faith of the Netherlands. Maryland was founded by a family of Catholic recusants. West Jersey and Pennsylvania were both settled and governed by dissenters. The same is true of the three Lower Counties, and of East Jersey while it was under the management of the twenty-four proprietors. But an Anglican minority was either present in these provinces from the beginning or developed in them with the lapse of time. The original proprietors of the Carolinas, with the exception of Shaftesbury, were Anglicans, and the officials whom they appointed to reside within their province were for the most part of that faith. Later, Blake, a dissenter, and Archdale, a Quaker, became members of the board. In South Carolina the officials had the support of a part of the population which was socially important. In North Carolina that support, during the seventeenth century, was totally lacking. In Maryland adherents of the English Church slowly won their way to official positions under a Catholic proprietor. Governor Stone, who received his appointment in 1642, was an Anglican. After that time adherents of the English Church shared the office with Catholics. Though the proprietor of New York was a Catholic, his appointees, until the time of

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Thomas Dongan, were Anglicans, and special recognition was given to that communion by the English officials in the province. A very few Catholics held office under James II as king. The first proprietors of New Jersey were Anglicans, and so were their leading appointees; but the English Church lost even official support after the division of the province. That support its adherents could never expect to have in West Jersey or Pennsylvania, or in East Jersey after 1682.

With the exception of the Quakers and the Baptists, all the inhabitants of these provinces retained a belief in a connection of some sort between church and state, in a regulation by law of the relation between sects, in the bestowment of privileges upon some one sect, in the public maintenance of the clergy and the exercise by the civil power of a share in their appointment, in the maintenance of a close connection regulated by law between education and religion. This belief was inherited from the systems of the Old World. The proprietors of these provinces, however they might differ, shared it as a common inheritance. Among both colonists and proprietors it, however, varied in intensity from the zeal shown by the Puritans of Maryland, or by Lord Granville among the Carolina proprietors, to the quietism of the Palatines, or the indifferentism of Shaftesbury or of some of the Calverts. All had been reared under the state-church system of Europe, and none had reached the broad doctrine of liberty which Roger Williams was proclaiming. The conditions, however, as between province and province, varied to such an extent that the ecclesiastical system of each must be largely peculiar to itself. Outside the Quaker provinces this was formulated wholly or mainly by the proprietors and their officials. In some cases it was distinctly the result of an effort on their part to satisfy the needs of the province, in others it was simply an expression of their own preferences. The variety of faiths among the colonists and the desire to attract immigrants, however, precluded any successful attempts to establish systems of uniformity, and thus to uphold one confession to the exclusion of all others. It was equally impossible to make religion a condition of active citizenship. In other words, a broad and tolerant

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ecclesiastical policy was the only practicable one, and to this the legislation of the provinces tended. In order to show what their ecclesiastical systems were, brief reference will be made to each of the provinces in turn.

The king in the charter of Maryland gave to the proprietor the patronage and advowson of all the churches within his province, together with the license to found churches and chapels, and to cause the same to be dedicated “according to the ecclesiastical laws of our kingdom of England.” This clause, together with the requirement that the provisions of the charter should be interpreted in such a way that God’s holy and true Christian religion and the allegiance due to the king and his successors might not be injured and weakened, did not essentially differ from statements which appear in other charters of the time.¹ Had the grantee been a communicant of the Church of England, they would have been at once interpreted as implying the right to establish that church in the province. But a special significance was given to the terms by the fact that the Maryland grantee was a Catholic, and therefore could not intend to establish the English Church. The language, however, admitted of his using discretion, and the second Lord Baltimore, with tact and skill, took full advantage of the opportunity for freedom of action which was thus afforded.

The Calverts were Catholics of the moderate or Gallican type. There is no proof that they were ever disposed to labor actively for a Catholic restoration in England, or for an interpretation of papal supremacy which would seriously menace the independence of the English nation. They were diplomatic by nature and were forced specially to cultivate this quality in the management of their colonial interests, because of their exceptional position as Catholic proprietors.

While, of course, they were ready to profit by a large Catholic migration from England, should such occur, it was from the first their endeavor to secure Protestant as well as Catholic settlers. When they began to seek for colonists,

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they found recruits chiefly among those who were discontented with the ecclesiastical conditions in England. On the first ships that came over, the majority of freemen were Catholics, and the majority of servants were Protestants. The officials were instructed¹ to cause all rites of the Roman Catholic religion on shipboard to be celebrated as privately as might be, to instruct the Catholics to refrain from all open discussion of religious subjects, and to treat the Protestants with as much mildness and favor as justice would permit.

After Maryland was reached this rule was carefully observed, though Catholic services were publicly held, and the affairs of the province were administered by Catholics. Any hopes which Lord Baltimore may have entertained that a large Catholic emigration from England would follow were disappointed, and the Protestant component among the population of his province came to exceed more and more the number of the Catholics. This fact, even if the proprietor had not been a Catholic, would have necessitated the toleration of certain varieties of religious faith. The fact that the proprietor was a Catholic made this doubly necessary, and committed the Calverts to toleration as a necessary course of policy. They did not adopt it as a theory, like Roger Williams; they did not carry it to the extent of recognizing absolute freedom of thought and action. They followed the policy up to a certain limit, because it was the only system under which a Catholic proprietor of an English province in the seventeenth century could act. But owing to the relations which existed with Virginia and to the settlement of Anne Arundel county by Puritans, the maintenance even of this policy was rendered for a time impossible, and the province was filled with civil broils.

Before, however, these events developed the proprietor was given an opportunity to define his relations with the Catholics in the province, and it was done in such a way as to show most clearly that he did not intend to depart from the ancient principles of ecclesiastical law as they were understood by Englishmen.

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The three Jesuit priests who were sent to the province with the first colonists,—Andrew White, Thomas Copley, and John Altham,—as the result of their missionary work among the natives, had come into a position where, to the grants of land which had been made in their behalf by the proprietor, they might add still larger purchases from the Indians. This raised the question, whether the Society of Jesus should be allowed to accumulate estates of indefinite extent in the province. The priests also,¹ in strict accordance with the principles of the canonists, claimed that the canon law extended by its own authority to the province, and hence that the clergy in Maryland were entitled to all the rights and to all the exemptions from lay jurisdiction which the church anywhere enjoyed. This implied² that the clergy should be exempt from lay taxation and from the jurisdiction of lay courts, should be entitled to the right of sanctuary, and to jurisdiction over marriage and wills. On these questions the burden of English opinion, even during the middle age, had been unfavorable to the claims of the canonists, and with those claims it had finally broken in the reign of Henry VIII. The proprietor met the question in thorough English fashion.

He appointed John Lewger his secretary and sent him to the province in 1637. Lewger was an Oxford man, who had once been a Protestant but had later been converted to Catholicism. He was an able man of affairs, and was well acquainted with the law and history of this question. He began to prove wills and grant letters of administration. From the assembly in 1638, though the majority of its membership was probably Catholic, acts were procured guarantying the supremacy of the common and statute law in all important relations. The priests, though summoned to this body, absented themselves on the plea of sickness. Father Copley³ now wrote to the proprietor, complaining that Mr. Lewger held that the church was not entitled to any privileges except those which were granted to it by the commonwealth. He asked that the privileges which it

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claimed might be granted, and in particular that the priests might freely live and work among the Indians. With these demands Thomas Cornwallis, councillor and captain and the richest planter in the province, expressed his sympathy.

These representations and others which came to him from Maryland roused the proprietor to take vigorous action in defence of his right as a secular lord. More legislation was procured from the assembly, and an appeal was taken through Father Henry More, the English provincial of the Jesuit order, to the authorities at Rome. While this was pending Baltimore wrote to Governor Calvert¹ that he believed that the Jesuits were planning his destruction, and, if they could not accomplish it through the English, would call in the aid of the Indians. “If the greatest saint upon earth,” he continued, “should intrude himself into my howse against my will, and despite of mee with intention to save the souls of my family, but withal give mee just cause to suspect that he likewise designed my temporall destruction, or that being already in my howse doth actuallie practise it, although he perhaps do manie spirituall goods, yet certeinlie I may and ought to preserve myself by the expulsion of such an enemy, and by provideing others to do the spirituall good he did. . . . For the Law of nature teacheth us that it is lawfull for every man in his owne just defence, vim vi repellere.”

But the fears of Baltimore were not to be realized. The appeal called forth from Rome a renunciation of all the claims which the Jesuits had made, the lands which they had procured from the Indians were released to the proprietor, while it was acknowledged that no valid grants could exist in the province unless they were derived from him. It was also agreed that no Jesuit priest should thereafter be sent to Maryland. Those who had been there were recalled and their places taken by secular priests. In 1641 new conditions of plantation were issued,² by which all the provisions of the English statutes of mortmain were put into force in Maryland. Thus an interesting crisis in the history of this province was passed, and it was brought fully into line with the traditions of English development.

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Only a brief interval elapsed between this event and the outbreak of the civil war in England. It found government in Maryland in the hands of Catholics, and no act of toleration yet passed. A Protestant opposition now speedily developed, and of this Claiborne and Ingle availed themselves for the purpose of overthrowing the government. Their plans were facilitated by the absence from the province of Governor Calvert, who, since Lord Baltimore had been placed under bonds not to leave the kingdom, had found it necessary to consult him in England. While he was away affairs, amid much confusion, drifted toward Protestant control. In England parliament was with difficulty kept from causing the rights of the proprietor over the province to be forfeited. This, however, was prevented, and in 1648 the proprietor appointed William Stone, a Protestant, to be governor, and associated with him a council the majority of whose members were Protestant. A clause was inserted in the governor’s oath¹ which declared that he would not molest in the free exercise of his religion any one who believed in Jesus Christ, especially if that person was a Roman Catholic, and moreover if he kept the peace and was faithful to the lord proprietor; he would also punish any who did so interfere with the exercise of religious liberty. This clause contained the substance of Lord Baltimore’s views concerning the ecclesiastical policy which it was necessary at that time to follow in his province. The gist of it was this, that all believers in the doctrine of the Trinity should enjoy freedom of worship, provided they kept the peace and remained faithful to the proprietor. No provision was made for the toleration of Quakers, Jews, or Unitarians, or in fact for any type of opinion other than that to which Catholics, Anglicans, Presbyterians, and Independents could subscribe. A toleration such as this, of certain definite forms of belief, provided their adherents kept the peace, does not differ in principle from the policy which had generally been pursued by European governments, and was far removed from absolute religious freedom.

But the oath simply imposed a condition upon the provincial

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executive. So important was the issue that it merited embodiment in statutory form, and for this reason Lord Baltimore now sent over the bill which, when passed, became the famous act of toleration of 1649.¹ This act simply elaborates the principle set forth in the governor’s oath, and the oft-quoted passage near the close of the law reproduces with much exactness the phraseology of the oath itself. The text of the act is mainly occupied with denunciations of heavy punishment against those who should deny the doctrine of the Trinity, or utter reproachful words against any one of the persons composing it, against the Virgin Mary, or the Evangelists, or Apostles.

The profanation of Sunday was also forbidden. The application by way of reproach to any inhabitants of the province, or to any who should visit it for trade or any other purpose, of the terms “heretic,” “schismatic,” “idolater,” “popish priest,” “roundhead,” “separatist,” or the name of any sect used in contempt, was forbidden on penalty of fine or whipping and imprisonment. The evident purpose of these enactments was to check the use of intemperate language, which otherwise might provoke breaches of the peace. It was essentially a police law, broadened somewhat in its bearings by the declaration, “whereas the enforcing of the conscience in matters of Religion hath frequently fallen out to be of dangerous Consequences in those commonwealthes where it hath been practiced . . .” It is clear that this statute originated from motives of political expediency, and that it was intended to meet specific conditions as they then existed in Maryland, with slight regard to freedom of thought as a universal principle.

While Lord Baltimore was perfecting the plan which he hoped would effectually prevent outbreaks of religious animosity in his province, an element was added to its population which was destined soon to defeat his purposes. This was the Puritans who, in order to escape from interference with their worship in Virginia, removed to Maryland and there settled Providence, later called Annapolis. The fact that the proprietor was willing to admit these settlers indicates

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the extent to which he subordinated religious preferences to a desire for the improvement of his province. But the Puritans presently objected to the oath of fidelity because it contained the words, “true and absolute proprietor,” and other similar expressions. A still more fundamental objection in their eyes to a permanent recognition of the government which had sheltered them was the fact that its authority was exercised by a Catholic, an adherent of the power of antichrist.

Therefore, upon the triumph of the cause of the Independents in England and the renewal by Claiborne of his attacks on the rights of Lord Baltimore, the Puritans joined in an effort to overthrow the power of the proprietor. On this occasion Claiborne acted as one of the commissioners who were appointed by the commonwealth government in England for the reduction of the plantations within the Chesapeake to submission. Before this show of authority Governor Stone and his council were forced to yield, and in 1654 a de facto government was established under the supervision of the Puritan commissioners. One of the acts of the first assembly over which the Puritans had control was the passage of the law withdrawing protection from the Roman Catholics, though the worship of other sects who accepted the doctrine of the Trinity was to be tolerated. Under this law, for a period of about four years, the Puritans were able to exclude those who had admitted them to the province from the protection of the laws.

But at the end of that time the government in England from which the commissioners had originally derived their authority began to collapse, and the proprietor was able to regain his rights. As the act of 1649 had never been repealed, its authority was held immediately to revive. Lord Baltimore also issued a solemn declaration that he would never assent to its repeal.¹ On this basis, from and after 1660, the system of religious toleration in Maryland was continued. Quakers, as early as 1658, were permitted to subscribe instead of taking the oath of fidelity. The subsequent refusal of some of them to bear arms in time of danger,

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to take the jurors’ oath or give testimony in court, and their insistence that they were governed by the inner light rather than by man’s law, led in 1659 to the issue of a severe order¹ against them. But it was not necessary to enforce it, at least on any considerable scale.

As the period of the Restoration advanced, the number of sects within the province somewhat increased, and all enjoyed a full degree of practical toleration. Of the mildness of the proprietary rule in this regard there can be no doubt. But the proportion borne by Catholics among the total population steadily diminished, till they were estimated to constitute not more than one-twelfth. The adherents of the Church of England were about twice as numerous as the Catholics, while the remaining three-fourths of the inhabitants were claimed by the other sects. At the same time, however, the Anglicans were asserting more exclusive claims at home, and the feeling which this induced was reflected within the small body of its clergy in the colonies.² In 1676 the first demand for “some established support for a Protestant ministry” was sent to the Archbishop of Canterbury by a resident Anglican clergyman in Maryland, accompanied with a complaint of the godlessness of the colony. That led to a hearing before the privy council, at which Lord Baltimore was able to show that a sufficient number of churches for the accommodation of the people had been provided by voluntary contributions, and that four Anglican clergymen were then laboring in the province. He had, however, to admit that the adherents of his own faith were few, though of wide toleration and generally peaceful relations among the sects there could be no doubt. But with the revival of Protestant zeal which preceded the English revolution, the position of a Catholic proprietor appeared more anomalous. The outcry against “popish plots” which was heard in England was reechoed in Maryland, and indications multiplied that even Lord Baltimore’s policy of toleration could not bring permanent quiet to his province.

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The policy of the Carolina proprietors looked steadily toward the establishment of the English Church within their province, though with large liberty for dissenters. By royal charter they, like Baltimore, received the patronage of all churches and chapels within the province, the same to be consecrated according to the ecclesiastical laws of England. This they interpreted as authority for the establishment of the English Church. But the charter also granted to the proprietors right to issue indulgences and dispensations to dissenters and their worship, provided the recipients of these favors were peaceable and loyal. This, because of the remoteness of the province, was thought to be “no breach of the unity and conformity established in this nation.”

The sentiment of the charter on the point referred to was repeated by the proprietors in the Declarations and Proposals of 1663, and in the Concessions and Agreement of 1665.¹ In the former they promised as ample freedom in religious matters as would-be colonists should desire. In the latter they declared, almost in the words of the royal charter itself, that no one should be molested or punished for differences of opinion or practice in matters of religion, provided they did not disturb the civil peace. It is true that a Massachusetts Puritan might have approved this declaration, but he would have interpreted the clause about disturbing the civil peace much more strictly than did the Carolina authorities, or the magistrates of any of the later proprietary provinces. The view of the proprietors respecting the charter and the limits of the proposed establishment in Carolina was expressed in the next clause. This was intended to empower the assemblies to provide for the appointment of as many ministers as they saw fit, and also for their maintenance, “Giving Liberty besides to any person or persons to keepe and maintayne what preachers or Ministers they please.”

Essentially the same ideas appear in the Fundamental Constitutions,² where they are elaborated and receive certain peculiar additions. It was imposed as a duty upon the parliament to care for the building of churches and the maintenance

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of clergymen of the Church of England, “which being the only true and orthodox, and the national religion of all the King’s dominions, is so also of Carolina, and therefore it alone should be allowed to receive public maintenance by grant of parliament.” This well expresses the natural thought of all adherents of the English Church concerning the ecclesiastical policy which it was proper to exercise toward the dominions. The establishment of the church within the colonies, however, might or might not be accompanied by acts of uniformity. In this case, as in all others which arose subsequent to the Restoration, the maintenance of uniformity was expressly disclaimed. It was provided that any seven or more persons, agreeing in religion, might constitute a church or profession to which they should give some distinguishing name. The names of the persons so uniting, together with the terms of admission and communion, should be inscribed in a book, and this should be kept by the register of the precinct where they resided. By signing such a book a person became a member, and by striking out his name he would cease to be a member of said communion. Under these conditions any religionists who acknowledged a God and the obligation of public worship could enjoy full liberty of conscience. The kissing of the book, or the holding up of the right hand, or any other proper form, might accompany the administration of oaths. But atheists were to be wholly excluded from the estate of freeholders or active citizens within the province. One provision of the Constitutions even went so far as to exclude from the protection of the law all persons above seventeen years of age who had not become members of some church or profession. The framers of this document seem therefore to have intended to create an externally religious community in which many forms of worship might coexist, but within which those who denied the existence of a God or the obligation of public worship should not be tolerated.

It was the intention of the proprietors that the Fundamental Constitutions should be enforced in the northern as well as the southern part of the province. But it is only necessary to refer to the almost total lack of religious worship

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in the Albemarle region, save that of the Quakers, during the first thirty years of the colony’s existence in order to show that the provisions of this document concerning religion were never executed. Even in the southern part of the province no effort was ever made to outlaw the godless. But at the same time the Constitutions set forth the ideal which was cherished by the proprietors, and which at last was measurably realized within the province.

Provision was not made for a church or a resident clergyman in the Ashley river settlement until after 1680,¹ when the town at Oyster Point was laid out. Then the site of the present St. Michael’s church, Charleston, was reserved. On this the church then called St. Philip’s was built, but how soon thereafter a minister began regularly to officiate there it is impossible to state. It is known that a clergyman of the establishment was in the colony in 1689, for he was fined and imprisoned by Governor Colleton for preaching what the latter considered to be a seditious sermon. In 1696 the Rev. Samuel Marshall became rector of St. Philip’s, but died of yellow fever three years later. He was succeeded by the Rev. Edward Marston. By that time another Episcopal clergyman was officiating at Goose Creek, a settlement on a branch of the Cooper river, and which was later organized as St. James’ parish. Those were the only Episcopal churches in South Carolina at the beginning of the eighteenth century. But the Anglican population was steadily increasing, and in point of wealth and social position it may be considered the equal of its rivals. According to the best estimates it comprised at the beginning of the eighteenth century nearly one-half of the total population of the southern part of the province.

By 1690, or earlier, a church consisting of Presbyterians and Congregationalists, with some French Protestants, had been organized in Charlestown. In the same town a French Protestant church had been founded by 1693. A Baptist church was organized at the same place in 1699, or 1700, while a Quaker meeting was begun there about 1696.² Another

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French Protestant church had been founded on the Santee, and a group of settlers of the same faith had gathered at Goose Creek.¹ Recognition was specially given to the growing body of French Protestants by the statute of 1697. This, though immediately referring to aliens, provided that all Christians, papists excepted, should enjoy full and undisturbed exercise of their consciences, so long as they kept within the professed rules of their religion.

In South Carolina, in 1704, occurred the notable attempt of the period, in a colony outside of New England, to limit the suffrage by a religious test. It was at a time of strong Tory reaction in England, when the High Churchmen there were making their first attempts to pass the bill against occasional conformity. Lord Granville, who at this time was lord palatine in the board of Carolina proprietors, was a High Churchman and strongly favored the policy of his party. Sir Nathaniel Johnson, who was then governor of South Carolina, sympathized with his views, and was ready to cooperate in a plan to exclude dissenters from the legislature of South Carolina. His influence, with that of Nicholas Trott, the chief justice and most astute politician in the province, sufficed to carry the council for the measure. Colonel William Rhett, who as commander of the armed vessels of the province had recently helped to protect Charlestown against an attack of a combined French and Spanish force, supported the same cause. Job Howes, the surveyor-general, was also a member of the official clique. This body of men was resolved to get control of the lower house, a majority of whose members had hitherto been dissenters, and secure its coöperation in the passage of laws which should strongly favor the Anglicans.

Though until a few years previous to the time of which we are speaking a clear majority of the inhabitants of South Carolina had been dissenters and opponents of church establishment, that situation had now somewhat changed. The change had been caused by the immigration of French Huguenots and their practical identification with the Anglicans. The German Lutherans maintained a similar attitude toward

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the adherents of the English Church. Though in name dissenters,¹ they were not really such, and the persistent opposition of the Presbyterians and Independents to the extension of the suffrage to all who were not native-born Englishmen shows that they realized the fact. The delay of public business which was caused by this struggle, and that at a time when the province was menaced by foreign invasion, furnished to the governor and his Church of England friends additional excuse for the measure of proscription to which they now committed themselves.

The assembly which was elected in 1703, with the help, as it was charged, of every Frenchman in Craven and Berkeley counties, was still in existence. Job Howes was chosen as its speaker. In the spring session of 1704 a bill was introduced providing that thereafter all who were chosen members and took their seats in the commons house of assembly must within one year have publicly received the sacrament according to the rites of the English Church or have generally conformed to its worship. If the sacrament had been received, proof of the fact must be submitted in the form of a certificate signed by the minister who administered it and supported by the oath of two credible witnesses. Those who had not received the sacrament within the time prescribed must by oath or solemn profession declare that they usually attended the services of the Church of England, and for a year had not communed with any other church or congregation. The latter provision was probably intended to meet the case of some of the supporters of the bill who, it was said, never received the sacrament anywhere. If any person failed to qualify as the sacrament prescribed, it was further provided that the candidate who had received the next highest number of votes should be entitled to the seat.

In the laws prescribing the qualifications of members of the English House of Commons there was no precedent for a measure of this kind, for, as has been correctly said, the corporation act of Charles II only affected the borough members,² and that remotely. No serious attempt was ever made in England to exclude nonconformists from parliament.

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It was natural then that the bill, because of its extreme character, should arouse strong opposition in the commons house. It was attacked on the ground that it violated the chartered rights of the colonists, though really the charter had nothing to say about the organization or membership of the legislature. But the effective argument was urged against the measure, that it was “not proper for the inhabitants of the colony at this time.” It was opposed by some of the Churchmen of the province, and notably by the Rev. Edward Marston, the incumbent of St. Philip’s, Charlestown. In sermons he violently opposed the measure and abused its supporters.

The bill finally passed,¹ though by a majority of only one in the lower house. The struggle over it was then transferred to England. But before its fate there was decided, the violence of Marston’s attack on the government party, coupled with his persistence, caused the passage of an act which, in addition to establishing the Church of England and organizing a parish system in South Carolina, provided for a lay commission for the trial of ecclesiastical causes.² The leading members of the government clique were designated in the act as members of the commission. This measure struck at the very foundations of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and its passage was therefore indefensible. But a certain excuse for it was furnished by the fact that a clergyman who held the principal living in the province, by his violent conduct had made his presence there intolerable, and yet no one had power to remove him. The most that could be done was to deprive him of his salary, and that the legislature was not slow in accomplishing. Viewed from this standpoint, the act embodied the desire of many of the colonists that, in the absence of the proper ecclesiastical authority within the colonies, laymen should have the right of removing, but not degrading, incumbents whose character or work was unsatisfactory. By less direct means the same thing was often attempted, and sometimes accomplished, by parishioners in the colonies where during the

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colonial period. Episcopalian ministers were settled. In Jamaica and in other royal provinces such powers were both claimed and exercised by the governors. In South Carolina the same object was sought through a lay commission.

At the time when the two acts in question were passed, John Ash had been sent to England by the dissenters of South Carolina as their agent. He was instructed to lay their grievances before the proprietors and, if possible, secure redress. But, before he had progressed far with his mission, Ash died. Joseph Boone was then sent as his successor, being specially instructed also to protest against the church act. When he arrived in England excitement over the occasional conformity bill was at its height, and the supporters of the Established Church were strongly insisting both upon its perils and its claims. Before the board of proprietors Boone met with no success at all. Lord Granville would scarcely listen to arguments against the acts. He cast his own vote and that of the minor, Lord John Carteret, in their favor. Craven and Colleton supported him. Archdale, the Quaker, opposed them. The other proprietors appear to have taken no action. But a majority of the votes cast were in favor of the acts, and they were thus approved.

Boone now turned to the House of Lords. He was himself a merchant, and had the support of several London merchants who were interested in trade to the Carolinas. The Whig majority among the Lords was in sympathy with the general purposes of the merchants. It had, moreover, been strengthened by the Whig victory at the recent election, and was further encouraged by the continued successes of Marlborough on the continent. Boone and his associates now submitted a memorial¹ to the House of Lords, in which, though they were supporting the cause of dissenters in South Carolina, they championed the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Bishop of London. The Lords, owing to the press of business at the end of the session, were unable to deal thoroughly with the question. But they took up the cause of the petitioners and addressed the queen, asking

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her to relieve the province of the oppression under which it lay. The acts were now referred by the privy council to Northey and Harcourt, the law officers of the crown. They reported that the acts in question were inconsistent with that very elastic clause which found a place in all the royal charters, requiring that laws in the colonies should be consonant to reason, and not repugnant to the laws of England.¹ The crown, in their opinion, should require the proprietors and assembly to declare them null and void. They were ready, also, to use the affair as a pretext on which to institute judicial proceedings for the recall of the Carolina charter.

But to this step two objections presented themselves. One arose from the fact that not all the proprietors had approved the acts, and the justice of punishing the entire board for an offence committed by a part of its members was doubtful. In addition to this, certain members of the board of Carolina proprietors were peers, and the query arose whether the filing of an information against them might not be thought a breach of the privileges of the peerage. These considerations furnished a sufficient excuse for dropping the plan of judicial proceedings, though the informations were already in course of preparation. But, taking advantage of the weakness of the board, its lack of unanimity on the question at issue, its desire to avoid quo warranto proceedings, the queen ordered it to have the measure repealed. Instructions in accord with this command were duly forwarded by the proprietors to the governor.

Governor Johnson, accordingly, in his speech before the general assembly at the opening of the first session of 1706, recommended that the acts be repealed, though he urged that a clause be introduced disenabling Marston from being a minister in Charlestown. The small majority by which the laws had been passed had already been changed into a minority, and no difficulty was found in passing the act of repeal during the session of November, 1706.² That was immediately followed by the enactment of a law establishing the Church of England within the province. Under this

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law South Carolina was divided into ten parishes, of which Charlestown formed one, Berkeley county contained six, Colleton county, two, while the French on the Santee in Craven county formed the tenth parish. The act also provided for the building, at the public expense, of six churches and six houses for the rectors, for the laying out of glebes and churchyards, and for the payment of salaries to the rectors. Rectors, as provided in the act of 1704, were to be chosen by the inhabitants of the several parishes who were of the Church of England. The introduction of the parish system was completed by provisions for the annual election of vestrymen and church wardens by the freeholders of the parishes who were of the Church of England. Under this system, and supplied with clergymen by the Bishop of London and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, South Carolina continued to exist until the Revolution.

In explaining the origin of the so-called Cary’s rebellion it has been necessary, in an earlier chapter, to refer at some length to the ecclesiastical affairs of North Carolina. In this connection the briefest possible reference to the changes which took place there in the early years of the eighteenth century will suffice. The northern, as well as the southern, part of the province was influenced by the contemporary religious movement in England. In 1701 the adherents of the English Church in North Carolina, though greatly in the minority, secured the passage of an act which provided for the organization of parishes, laying out of glebes, building of churches, and the support of ministers by a public levy on all tithables. This expenditure was to be met by a poll tax. In Chowan precinct a vestry was at once formed, and the first house of worship in North Carolina was built. Two other churches were also built. Though this project had been started within the province itself, the opposition to it was strong, and the Quakers had prepared to repeal the law in the assembly of 1703. But this was not necessary, as the proprietors disallowed the act on the ground that £30 per year—the sum provided by the law—was insufficient for the support of the clergy.

The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel had now

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begun to send missionaries into North Carolina. Blair, Gordon, Adams, and later the worthless Urmston, were sent. The first three labored hard, but amid great obstacles, natural and social, for the spread of their system of faith. But the work outside of Pasquotank precinct proceeded very slowly; in most regions it made scarcely any progress. The general ignorance and indifference of the people, the strength of the Quakers, and the activity of certain irregular itinerant preachers presented hindrances which it was wholly beyond the power of a handful of Anglican missionaries to overcome. This was the situation when Lord Granville, Governor Johnson, and their supporters sought to establish the church in South Carolina.

It was the desire of these men to extend a similar policy to North Carolina. Daniel, who was appointed by Johnson in 1704 as deputy governor of North Carolina, was an important agent in this work. Soon after his appointment, under the title of the “vestry act,” the law of 1701 was in substance reënacted. But again the act was passed with great difficulty and by a majority of only one or two votes. When, as we have seen, Edmund Porter as the agent of the Quakers of North Carolina accompanied John Ash to England, it is probable that one of his errands was to file a protest against the approval of the “vestry act.” His effort to secure the removal of Governor Daniel—which was successful—may well have been undertaken with a view to prevent the enactment, in the northern province, of other measures like those which the South Carolina clique were attempting to embody in law. Whether the “vestry act” was disallowed we are not informed. But it is not probable that it was enforced, for the province was soon after thrown into confusion, partly at least by the dispute concerning the administration of oaths to Quakers. This developed into Cary’s rebellion as it was in its early stage.

The second stage of this conflict, in which arms were actually resorted to, was reached in 1711, soon after the arrival of Governor Hyde. The outbreak at that time was doubtless occasioned by the passage of a severe sedition law and also of another act for the establishment of the English

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Church in the province. This, like all the earlier acts on the subject, has been lost. But in a letter of the missionary Urmston¹ the statement is made that it provided for a vestry of twelve men in every precinct, and required them to choose church wardens. To the church wardens was given power to purchase glebes, build churches and ministers’ houses, provide maintenance for them, and see that parishes were supplied with clergymen who should be approved by the Bishop of London. This law apparently remained in force after the restoration of quiet in the province, and under it the church maintained a somewhat feeble existence till the close of the proprietary period.

The ecclesiastical system to which the Dutch in New Netherland had been accustomed provided for the establishment of the Dutch Reformed Church. The secular head of the establishment, occupying the position which was held by the government in the Netherlands, was the West India company. The Amsterdam chamber appointed clergymen, schoolmasters, comforters of the sick, and sent them to the province. The full procedure can be traced in the case of the Rev. Hermanus Bloem, who was settled at Esopus.² The Rev. Everardus Bogardus resigned after a violent quarrel with Director Kieft and the council. Had he reached home alive, charges against him might have been heard.³ The company prescribed, rather than paid, the salaries of clergymen, depending on the people of their charge to furnish mainly or wholly their support. But the company looked to the Classis of Amsterdam to recommend candidates, and from its nominees appointments were made. Correspondence was regularly maintained between the Classis and the clergymen who labored in the province, and they were subject to its ecclesiastical control.⁴ As the number of

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clergymen sent to the province was few, the right of choice of the local churches was restricted. They, however, exercised it within limits, and were facilitated in doing so by the fact that they provided most of the support.¹

The company at first proposed that freedom of worship should be granted to dissenters, and this position it never expressly abandoned. But in the Freedoms and Exemptions of 1640 it declared that “No other Religion should be publicly admitted in New Netherland except the Reformed,”² and during Stuyvesant’s administration the lines were drawn with considerable strictness against some forms of dissent. So extensive were the powers of the director and council that this might be done, notwithstanding the expression of liberal principles on the part of the company. During the middle period of the history of the province the desire to conciliate English colonists doubtless contributed quite as strongly toward a liberal policy as did any views or traditions concerning toleration. But as the year 1660 was approached and passed, fear of English encroachment, as well as the irritable nature of Stuyvesant, occasioned his severity.

In the course of the entire period of Dutch rule the company sent thirteen ministers to New Netherland. The right to consent to the establishment of churches, as well as to present to livings when provided, was claimed by the company. The right of presentation it sought to exercise in the patroonships, as well as elsewhere, though the patroons and heads of colonies were expected to provide for the support of their ministers and schoolmasters.³ This resulted in a controversy between the company and Van Rensselaer, when in 1642 the latter appointed the Rev. Megapolensis as the minister at Rensselaerswyck. The company⁴ insisted on the right of appointment, and this was denied by the patroon. Finally the company had to be content with approving the

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appointment under protest, the patroon reserving his rights in the case. The question never came up again, and the same clergyman, after dismissal from service in the patroonship, long held a living in New Amsterdam.

When New Netherland became New York the control of the West India company over the church in the province ceased. The relationship of that church, however, with the Classis of Amsterdam continued and was not appreciably modified by English rule. In the articles of surrender provision was made that the Dutch should enjoy liberty of conscience and retain their church discipline. This was especially guarantied to the people at Albany and on the Delaware. In the “Conditions for New Planters,” which Governor Nicolls published immediately after occupation, the statement was made that liberty of conscience should be allowed, provided such liberty was not converted to licentiousness, or the disturbance of others in the exercise of the Protestant religion.¹ In the presence of a conquered population, the English component of which consisted wholly of Protestant dissenters, no other course was possible.

Though the province had never been formally divided into parishes, that system was assumed by the English to be virtually existing. In the Duke’s Laws provision was made for the building of churches in all parishes where they did not already exist, and for the appointment of two of the town overseers to act as church wardens. All ministers who desired to officiate within the province must submit to the governor proof that they had received ordination from some Protestant bishop or minister within the British dominions or within the dominions of some foreign prince of the Reformed religion. This statement, of course, included ministers of the Dutch Reformed Church, of the Lutheran Church, and those who had received ordination in New England. They were to be supported, and the cost of building and repairing churches met, by public levies, to which levies all inhabitants should contribute, as they did toward the maintenance of the state. The ministers should preach every Sunday, pray for the

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king, queen, and members of the royal family, administer the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper at least once a year, baptize the children of all Christian parents who should present the same, and celebrate marriages after due publication of the banns. It was the duty of the church wardens to prevent the disturbance of religious meetings, and to present for punishment persons who were guilty of profaneness, Sabbath-breaking, drunkenness, and gross immorality. The method of filling pastorates or livings was to be election and presentation by the inhabitants who were freeholders, and induction by the governor.

It is evident that the provisions of the Duke’s Laws were wisely adapted to the conditions of the province. They guarantied toleration to the large Protestant sects which existed within it, placing them all on an equality, while the government retained a certain control over the appointment and maintenance of the entire body of the clergy. The officials were required to see to it that there was a church in every town, but the law did not specify the Protestant sect to which it should belong. The provisions concerning the sacraments involved a considerable deviation from New England usage, and went much farther than the broadest of halfway-covenant men would have been willing to go. The power which was given to the governor to instruct ministers and to pass on their credentials, if the Anglicans should become sufficiently numerous in the province or in any section of it, might conceivably be used to further the interests of that communion. Under a Catholic proprietor, however, that was scarcely to be thought of.

In the so-called Charter of Liberties,¹ which was enacted by the legislature in 1683, the ecclesiastical system of New York under the proprietary regime was correctly described as one whereby all the churches of the great Protestant sects within the province were “privileged Churches, and have been so established and confirmed by the former authority of this Government.” The civil government was the head of every church within the province, and the time had not come when it was possible for it to show a decided preference

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toward any one of them. In the act just referred to the inhabitants of Long Island were really guarding themselves against such possibility, as well as against the action of ministers, by the provision that contracts with ministers which had been made by two-thirds of the inhabitants of any town should stand.

But though the natural tendency of the great majority of the English officials would have been to favor the Established Church of England, conditions both at home and in the province made that impossible during the proprietary period, or indeed until after the English revolution. The number of Anglicans in the province, though slowly increasing, was still too small to justify steps intended to secure special privileges for them. For more than thirty years after the English conquest the only place where the English Episcopal service was celebrated within the province of New York was the church in the fort, and the officiating clergyman was the chaplain of the garrison. The building was the first Dutch church, and its congregation permitted the English to use it, after their own morning service was ended.¹ This being the case, the government was called upon to deal almost exclusively with dissenters.

The position of the Lutherans was at once improved by the advent of the English. The persecution which they had suffered under Stuyvesant, ending in the banishment of their minister, came to an end. Governor Nicolls, in December, 1664, granted liberty to the Lutherans of the province to send for a minister.² The Rev. Jacobus Fabricius was sent over, and received from Governor Lovelace permission to officiate. He was first settled at Albany. But in that town reckless speech apparently brought him into conflict with the Dutch Church and magistrates,³ and the governor was forced to suspend him, though he was allowed to preach in New York city. He soon became involved in a quarrel there, and was sent to the Delaware. While in that region he fell twice

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into the clutches of the law, the last time under a charge of riot. This was after the beginning of Andros’s administration, and Pastor Fabricius was again suspended from his functions. Meantime the Lutherans had built a church in New York city, and with another pastor peacefully enjoyed their worship both under the English government and during the period of the Dutch restoration.

Throughout the administrations of Nicolls and Lovelace the most friendly relations were maintained between the government and the Dutch Church. In New York city the church wardens were annually reëlected. The assistance of the government was also regularly given toward raising the support for the ministry there. In 1671 the Dutch Church in New York city was authorized by an order in council to lay taxes on the congregation for the support of the ministers and the poor.¹ In 1670 the governor, in response to a request from the officers of the church and the city, declared that to such acceptable minister as they should call from Holland he would guaranty the payment of a salary of a thousand guilders, a house rent free, and a supply of firewood.² At its sessions in 1672 and 1675 the court of assizes by special order reimposed the obligation on all inhabitants of towns to contribute by special rates for the support of the ministry.³

When Andros became governor of the restored English province in 1674, the Duke of York had proclaimed his adherence to the Catholic faith. It was natural that his instructions to the new governor should not have the Protestant ring which sounded in earlier utterances, and particularly in the Duke’s Laws. “You shall permit,” he declared, “all persons of what Religion soever, quietly to inhabitt within y^e precincts of your jurisdiccon, without giveing them any disturbance or disquiet whatsoever, for or by reason of their differring opinions in matters of Religion,” provided they keep the peace.⁴ This statement was broad enough to embrace

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Catholics, Quakers, and other sects then considered dangerous and extreme. It was the duke’s declaration of indulgence to his province, and was less restricted in words than was the famous law of the other Catholic proprietor, Lord Baltimore.

But the duke appointed a rigid Anglican to govern his province, and some tendency on his part to favor his own communion presently became apparent. The first case which came up, in which religion was to an extent involved, illustrates rather the imperious methods of Andros than his attitude toward dissenting sects. When, in the spring of 1675, a proclamation was issued requiring that the Dutch who intended permanently to reside in the province should take the oath of allegiance, some appeared before the mayor of New York city and asked that the governor would confirm to them their freedom of religion and assure them that in time of war they should not be pressed into service. The latter request was the same in intent as that which nearly a century later to such an extent determined the fate of the so-called neutral French in Acadia. The former request was suggested by the fact that, when the oath of allegiance was administered in 1664, Governor Nicolls issued a declaration assuring the Dutch that the liberties guarantied to them in the articles of capitulation would in no way be imperilled by it. But Andros ordered the oath to be taken without qualification or explanation. Eight prominent burghers of New York, among whom were Steenwyck, Van Brugh, De Peyster, and Bayard, then petitioned Andros that they might be allowed, either to take the oath as it had been administered by Nicolls, or be permitted to sell their estates and remove elsewhere. This petition was not only rejected, but its signers were imprisoned as factious men who were trying to raise a disturbance against the government. After a hearing before the council they were laid under heavy bonds to appear for trial before the court of assizes. Bayard was actually tried,¹ found guilty, and all his lands and goods

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were adjudged to be forfeited to the king. A record exists of the issue of an order to a constable to seize them, but of its execution no entry has been found. The accused petitioned the States General for relief, and the matter was brought to the attention of the Duke of York by the Dutch ambassador. Andros was reminded of the desire of the proprietor that the Dutch should be treated with all the gentleness which was consistent with honor and safety. There apparently the matter rested, and the case was not further pressed against the accused.

But another event soon occurred which had a bearing more distinctly ecclesiastical. That was an attempt of the governor to exercise the right of induction to a living in the Dutch church. Nicholas Van Rensselaer, a younger son of the first patroon, and one who had been attached to the Stuarts and their cause since the time of their exile, came over with Andros. He had been ordained in the English Church, and is said to have received ordination also in the Netherlands. He was recommended by the Duke of York to be made minister of one of the Dutch churches of New York or Albany, when there should be a vacancy. The governor in 1675 inducted¹ Van Rensselaer into a living at Albany, as assistant of Dominie Schaats. This was done without recognition by the Classis of Amsterdam. Because of this irregularity in the procedure, Dominie Niewenhuysen forbade Van Rensselaer to baptize children in his church in New York city, and denied the legality of his induction. Niewenhuysen was summoned before the council, and there, while admitting the validity of ordination by an English bishop, claimed that no one could legally officiate as pastor of a Dutch Reformed congregation until he had sworn fidelity to the church of the Netherlands. This was accepted, and after Van Rensselaer had solemnly promised to conduct his ministry in accordance with the Reformed Church of Holland, the case was dismissed and the induction allowed to stand.

About a year after Van Rensselaer began his ministrations at Albany he was arrested on complaint of Jacob

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Leisler and Jacob Milborne, afterward to be so famous, for using certain “dubious words” in a sermon. The share taken by Dominie Schaats in this prosecution would indicate that the expressions were regarded as false and heterodox. On appeal the case was heard before the governor, council, mayor and aldermen, and ministers of the city of New York. It was by them determined to refer the case back to the magistrates and church officers at Albany, by whom, after another hearing, a reconciliation was effected between the two ministers. But only a year later Andros was forced to suspend his protégé¹ because of his evil and scandalous life. The first attempt of an English governor to induct a pastor in the Dutch Church thus resulted in conflict and ultimately in failure.

In 1679 Andros, through the complaisance of the Dutch clergy, was able to procure the ordination of a minister by a classis of the province, and the confirmation of this act by the Classis of Amsterdam.¹ The minister who was thus ordained was Peter Teschenmaker, and the scene of his labors was to be the settlements along the Delaware river. This act was exceptional, and was not repeated while New York remained a colony. In no other colony does anything like it seem to have occurred. Since no attempt was made to use it as a precedent, it cannot be regarded as indicating in any special way a tendency of the civil power under Andros to encroach on the liberties of the church.

Of interference on the part of the magistrates with the officers of churches on Long Island, whether Dutch or English, very little evidence appears. Occasionally the aid of the government was invoked to enforce the payment of rates for the support of a minister or to settle a dispute about the location or erection of a church.² As each community readily supplied itself with a church building and settled a minister, the governor was given little or no opportunity to exercise the authority in such matters to which he might have considered himself entitled under the Duke’s Laws.

By the proprietors of New Jersey the same degree of religious freedom was guarantied at the outset as was contemplated

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in the Carolina Concessions and Agreement of 1665. The assembly might provide for the appointment and support of ministers, but others had the same right as well, and no one was to be molested because of his religious faith so long as he kept the peace.¹ The varied origin and belief of the settlers within that province insured a faithful observance of the rule. The influence of Quakers in the southern and eastern parts of the province, with the declaration of principles contained in their concessions, confirmed the tendency beyond the possibility of change. The language of the West Jersey Concessions on this point was: “That no Men, nor number of Men upon Earth, hath power or Authority to rule over Men’s Consciences in religious Matters, therefore it is consented, . . . that no Person or Persons whatsoever within the said province, . . . shall be any ways upon any pretence whatsoever, called in question, or in the least punished or hurt, either in Person, Estate, or Priviledge, for the sake of his Opinion, Judgement, Faith or Worship towards God in Matters of Religion. But that all and every such Person and Persons, may from Time to Time, and at all times, freely and fully have, and enjoy his and their Judgments, and the exercise of their Consciences in Matters of Religious Worship throughout all the said province.”²

The reference to the same subject in the Fundamental Constitutions of East Jersey, issued in 1683,³ reveals the influence of the Scotch Presbyterian element among its board of proprietors. In this document the free benefits of liberty were extended only to those who confessed and acknowledged one almighty and eternal God; nor was liberty to be granted to avow atheism or irreligiousness, or to indulge in stage plays, masques, revels, or similar abuses. No one should be admitted to the great council or the common council, or to any place of public trust, who did not profess faith in Jesus Christ. In the act of 1698 which set forth the rights and privileges of inhabitants of East Jersey, the statement was made⁴ that those who professed faith in

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God by Jesus Christ, his only Son, should not be molested for any difference of opinion on religious subjects. The qualifications, however, were specified that this liberty should not be used to licentiousness, and that it should not extend to Roman Catholics who presumed to worship according to forms prohibited by the laws of England. When, in the following year, the proprietors of East Jersey offered certain conditions on which they would surrender their powers of government to the crown, they insisted that there should be no religious qualification whatever for office, and that no one should be deprived of any civil right on account of religion. Two years later, however, the proprietors of both East and West Jersey,¹ speaking jointly on the same subject, expressed a willingness to restrict office-holding to Protestants. But there is no evidence in the laws or history of New Jersey, or of either of its divisions, during the proprietary period that religious tests in any form were ever enforced. An establishment was never a subject of discussion.

William Penn was undoubtedly one of the most powerful advocates of religious liberty who appeared in the seventeenth century. The influence in its favor which by his zeal and manifold activities he exerted on his contemporaries was far greater than that of Roger Williams. But Penn was less a pioneer in the cause than was Williams, and the temper of the age in which Penn lived was slightly more favorable to the message of freedom than was that of the generation which was contemporary with the great civil war. The utterances of Penn himself respecting the project of founding a province in America—“his holy experiment”—clearly reveal his purpose. “I went thither,” he wrote to Roger Mompesson, “to lay the foundation of a free colony for all mankind, more especially those of my own profession, not that I would lessen the civil liberties of others because of their persuasion, but screen and defend our own from any infringement on that account.² This implied that, while his immediate object was to provide a refuge for members of his own sect, people of other types of faith would be freely admitted. An example of his method

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of procedure, as applied to Anglicans, appears in the charter which Penn procured from the king. The only clause in that document which referred to matters ecclesiastical provided that when as many as twenty inhabitants of the province should apply in writing or through an agent to the Bishop of London for the appointment of one or more clergymen to minister to them in Pennsylvania, the appointees should be allowed to settle in the province without hindrance or opposition. The liberty which was enjoyed by the communicants of the English Church in organizing themselves and procuring ministers it was Penn’s intention that all other distinctively Christian sects should enjoy.

But Quakers everywhere insisted that the society on which the political structure rests should be Christian in type. Penn himself was not indifferent to the religious belief of those who were to hold office in his province. In the first Frame of Government and in the so-called “Great Law,” both of which set forth Penn’s ideas, believers in one God were designated as the class who should not be molested because of their faith or worship. The Frame of Government contained the requirement that all officials within the province and members of the general assembly should be persons who professed faith in Jesus Christ. This was confirmed by act of assembly in 1682; and had Romanists appeared to demand the benefit of the law, it must have been extended to them in common with Protestants. Provision was made that Sunday should be observed, while looseness, irreligion, and atheism were not to be allowed, under pretence of conscience, to creep into the province.¹ These principles, however, suited well the conditions of the province, and, during the time when they were in force, the Lower Counties on the Delaware were annexed, and provision was made by law for naturalizing the Dutch and Swedish inhabitants of the region who had already become subjects of England.

It thus appears that, though Penn laid no restriction on the right of public or private worship, he did impose upon office-holders a religious test. The Quaker province was never free from a restriction of this kind. When, in 1693-1694,

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Penn’s rights of government were suspended and Governor Fletcher of New York was appointed to administer the affairs of Pennsylvania, another important step was taken in the same direction. Fletcher was required¹ by his commission to administer to all who should be chosen members of the general assembly the oaths and tests prescribed by acts of parliament. The act here referred to was the famous toleration act of William and Mary, and the oaths and tests which it prescribed were directed against the claims of the pope to temporal supremacy, against the doctrine of transubstantiation, the mass, the worship of saints, and the Virgin Mary, and involved also a profession of belief in the Trinity and in the inspiration of the Scriptures. In England they were intended to secure to certain dissenters the privilege of public worship. But in Pennsylvania they were made to serve a most important political object. They, or the equivalent declaration, were imposed not only on all members of the legislature, but Fletcher interpreted the powers which were bestowed upon him as governor of New York and its dependencies as authority for administering the same tests to all officials. Pennsylvania he was ready to consider as a dependency of New York. Thus vanished all possibility of Roman Catholics holding office, or in fact enjoying political rights, in Pennsylvania.

It is true that, because Romanists formed no appreciable component of the population, the practical effect of those requirements was slight. Still, they are important as indicating tendencies which, under the influence of the home government, were operative even in a Quaker province. In this connection it should also be borne in mind that by his charter Penn was required to submit all the acts of his legislature to the crown for its approval.

The system of tests which had been introduced by Fletcher did not disappear with his retirement. Provision was made for their continuance in the so-called Markham’s Frame of Government of 1696. But this, as we believe, never received the approval of the proprietor, and we are certain that its

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provision concerning tests was not in harmony with his views. When Penn returned to the province he caused an act to be passed in the Lower Counties in which belief in Jesus Christ was the only religious qualification which was prescribed either for voters or office-holders. In 1700 an act was passed by the legislature of Pennsylvania which reaffirmed the provisions of the act of 1682 concerning freedom of worship, but contained nothing on the subject of official tests.¹ This, however, was disapproved by the queen in council.² Penn in the Charter of Liberties of 1702 reaffirmed to the full extent his doctrine of religious liberty, but again extended full political rights only to those who professed belief in Jesus Christ. We have no proof that this charter was ever submitted to the privy council. At any rate, its provisions on the subject in question were ignored by the home government and by later governors of Pennsylvania. In 1702 the queen issued an order that all who held public offices in the colonies should take the oaths and subscribe the declaration required by the act of toleration. After some objections these conditions were accepted, not only for officials but for members of the legislature, and the law of the province was brought into harmony with them. The system of religious tests which was thus established in Pennsylvania continued until the Revolution.