Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 Part 33

Soon after, the Governor's distrust was heightened by two acts of favor shown by Ludwell to leaders of the opposition in the House of Burgesses.

When ordered to oust Major Allen from his surveyor's place, he gave it to "Major Swan, one altogether as troublesom as the other & that only for the use of Allen". Upon receiving information that the King had declared Major Beverley "uncapable of any public imployment ... hee presently gives his Surveyor's place, the best in the Country to his Son".[1011] In the spring of 1686 the Governor made one last attempt to win Ludwell over from the people's cause. "I did," he wrote, "on the death of Colonel Bridger ... give him a collector's place, in hopes to have gained him by it."[1012] But Ludwell, unaffected by this attempted bribery, continued his active opposition to the arbitrary and illegal conduct of the Governor. At last, during the session of a.s.sembly of 1686, there occurred an open breach. "His Lords.h.i.+p flew into a great rage and told ... Ludwell he had formerly made remarks upon him, and that if he did not look the better to himself he should shortly suspend him from the Council."[1013] Early in 1687 this threat was put into effect,[1014] and the troublesome Councillor was for the second time deprived of his seat. But this persecution, which the people believed to be directed against Ludwell for his support of their cause, brought him into great popularity throughout the colony and made him the acknowledged leader of the opposition to the administration. In the elections for the a.s.sembly of 1688 he was chosen by the freeholders of James City county to represent them in the House of Burgesses.[1015]

Effingham, however, would not allow him to take his seat, producing a clause from his commission which forbade suspended Councillors to become members of the a.s.sembly.[1016] Despite this exclusion, Ludwell could and did, by conferences with individual members, influence the actions of the House and lead them in their fight against the Governor.

The most important task that confronted the Burgesses when they a.s.sembled in 1688 was to call the Governor to account for many burdensome fees which he had imposed upon the people by executive order.

First in importance was "a fee of 200 pounds of tobacco for the Seal affixed to Patents & other public instruments".[1017] This the Burgesses considered a tax imposed without the authority or consent of the a.s.sembly, and consequently destructive of the most cherished rights of the people. Moreover, it had, they claimed, deterred many from using the seal and had greatly impeded the taking up of land. They also protested against a fee demanded by the "Master of the Escheat Office of 5 or 1000lbs tobacco", and to one of thirty pounds of tobacco required by the Secretary for recording surveys of land.[1018] "This House," they declared, "upon Examination of the many grievous Complaints ... (have) been fully convinced and made sensible that many unlawful and unwarrantable fees and other dutyes have been, under colour of his Majesty's Royal authority, unjustly imposed ... & that divers new unlawful, unpresidented & very burthensom and grievous wayes & devises have been of late made use of to the great impoveris.h.i.+ng Vexing and utter undoeing of many of his Majesties Subjects of this his Dominion."[1019]

The Burgesses were also deeply concerned at an instance of the unwarrantable use of the royal prerogative. In 1680 an act had been pa.s.sed concerning attorneys. Two years later, before the act had received the royal a.s.sent, it had been repealed by the a.s.sembly. Later the King, by proclamation, had made void the act of 1682, and the Governor had insisted that this revived the law of 1680. Against this, the Burgesses in 1688 entered a vigorous protest. "A Law," they declared, "may as well Receive its beginning by proclamation as such revivall.... Some Governor may be sent to Govern us who under the pretense of the liberty he hath to construe prerogative and stretch it as far as he pleaseth may by proclamation Revive all the Lawes that for their great Inconveniences to the Country have been Repeal'd through forty years since."[1020]

The Burgesses drew up a long paper, setting forth their many grievances, with the intention of presenting it to the Governor. They first, however, requested the Council to join them in their demand for redress.

This the Council with some sharpness, refused to do. We are apprehensive, they replied, that the grievances "proceed from petulent tempers of private persons and that which inclines us the rather so to take them is from the bitterness of the Expressions".[1021] Judging the Governor's temper from this reply of the Councillors, the Burgesses relinquished hope of redress from the executive and determined to pet.i.tion the King himself. An humble address was drawn up, entrusted to Colonel Philip Ludwell and delivered by him at Windsor, in September, 1688, into the hands of James II. Before it could be considered, however, William of Orange had landed in England and King James had been overthrown.[1022]

In the meanwhile a crisis in Virginia had been approaching rapidly. The people felt that their religion, as well as their liberties, was menaced by the rule of James II. In 1685, the King had directed Effingham "to permit a Liberty of Conscience to all persons", that would "bee contented with a quiet and peaceable enjoyment of it, not giving offence or scandal".[1023] The people of Virginia understood well enough that this order was dictated, not by considerations of liberality, but by James' determination to favor the Catholic church. The feeling of uneasiness was increased when, in 1688, Effingham, declaring it no longer necessary for the Burgesses to take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, admitted a Catholic to the a.s.sembly.[1024]

In October, 1688, James sent word to the Governor of the impending invasion of the Prince of Orange and commanded him to place Virginia in a posture of defense.[1025] Immediately the colony was thrown into the wildest excitement, and, for a time, it seemed probable that the people would attempt the expulsion of Effingham. "Unruly and unorderly spiritts," the Governor afterwards testified, "laying hold of the motion of affairs, and that under the pretext of religion,... betook themselves to arms."[1026] Wild rumors spread through the colony that the Papists of Maryland were conspiring with the Senecas to fall upon Virginia and cut off all Protestants in a new Saint Bartholomew's Eve.[1027] The frontiersmen along the upper courses of the Rappahannock and the Potomac "drawing themselves into parties upon their defense", were "ready to fly in the face of ye government. Soe that matters were ... tending to a Rebellion." However, the news of William's easy victory and the flight of James restored quiet to the colony. On February the nineteenth, 1689, the Privy Council wrote the Governor that William and Mary had ascended the throne of England,[1028] and a few weeks later their Majesties were proclaimed at Jamestown with solemnity and thanksgiving.[1029]

The Glorious Revolution was a victory for liberty even more important to Virginia than to England. It brought to an end those attacks of the English government upon the representative inst.i.tutions of the colony that had marked the past ten years. It confirmed to the people the rights that had been guaranteed them, through a long series of patents dating back as far as 1606, and rendered impossible for all time the illegal oppressions of such men as Harvey, Berkeley, Culpeper and Effingham. Other Governors of despotic disposition were yet to rule Virginia--Nicholson, Andros, Dunmore--but it was impossible for them to resort to the tyrannical methods of some of their predecessors. The English Revolution had weakened permanently the control of the British government over the colony, and consequently the power of the Governor.

The advance of liberalism which was so greatly accelerated both in England and in America by the events of 1688 was halted in the mother country in the middle of the eighteenth century. But Virginia and the other colonies were not greatly affected by the reaction upon the other side of the Atlantic. Here the power of the people grew apace, encountering no serious check, until it came into conflict with the sullen Toryism of George III. Then it was that England sought to stifle the liberalism of the colonies, and revolution and independence resulted.

The changed att.i.tude of the Privy Council towards Virginia was made immediately apparent by the careful consideration given the pet.i.tion of the Burgesses. Had James remained upon the throne it is probable that it, like the address of 1684, would have been treated with neglect and scorn. But William received Ludwell graciously, listened to his plea "on behalf of the Commons of Virginia", and directed the Committee of Trade and Plantations to investigate the matter and to see justice done.[1030]

Effingham, who had been called to England upon private business, appeared before the Committee to defend his administration and to refute Ludwell's charges. Despite his efforts, several articles of the pet.i.tion were decided against him, and the most pressing grievances of the people redressed. The "Complaint touching the fee of 200lbs of tobacco and cask", it was reported, "imposed by my Lord Howard for affixing the Great Seal to Patents ... in regard it was not regularly imposed ... the committee agree to move his Majesty the same be discontinued".[1031]

Similarly their Lords.h.i.+ps declared in favor of abolis.h.i.+ng the fee of thirty pounds of tobacco required for registering surveys. The article touching the revival of repealed laws by proclamation was referred to the consideration of the Attorney-General and the Solicitor-General.

These officers gave it as their opinion that his Majesty did have the right, by repealing acts of repeal, to revive laws, but the committee agreed to move the King that the Act of Attorneys should be made void by proclamation.[1032]

This was a signal victory for the Burgesses, but Ludwell, who had personal scores to settle with the Governor, did not let matters drop here. After the lapse of several months he appeared once more before the Committee with charges against Effingham of misgovernment and oppression.[1033] Referring to the quarrel over the Bill of Ports, in 1685, he accused him of exercising "two negative voices". He complained bitterly of his attacks upon those Burgesses that had opposed him in the a.s.sembly, and of his abuse of the power of suspending Councillors. The money arising from fort duties, he said, which had formerly been accounted for to the a.s.sembly, had, during Effingham's administration, "been diverted to other uses". The Governor had established new courts of judicature contrary to the wishes of the people.

These persistent attacks of Ludwell resulted in another victory, for the Committee decided that Effingham should no longer rule the colony. He was not displaced as Governor-General, but he was commanded to remain in England, and to leave the control of the administration to a Lieutenant-Governor. This, doubtless, was not unsatisfactory to Lord Howard, for he retained a part of his salary and was relieved of all the work and responsibility of his office. The Lieutenant-Governors.h.i.+p was given to Captain Francis Nicholson.[1034]

Thus the colony emerged triumphant from the Critical Period. It is true the House of Burgesses had lost many privileges--the right to elect its own clerk, the right to receive judicial appeals, the right to control all revenues,--but they had retained within their grasp that all-important power--the levying of general taxes. And they had gained greatly in political experience. Long years of watchfulness, of resistance to encroachments upon their rights, had moulded them into a body that the most cunning executive could neither cajole nor intimidate. Unmindful of the anger of Governors, the rebukes of Kings, of personal loss, even of imprisonment, they had upheld the people's rights. And their descendants were to reap the reward of their faithfulness. The traditions of ability, probity and heroism established by the men of the Critical Period made possible that long and honorable career of the House of Burgesses and the important role it was to play in winning independence for America.

FOOTNOTES:

[882] Osg., Vol. III, pp. 280, 281.

[883] P. R. O., CO5-1355-334; McD., Vol. V, p. 302.

[884] P. R. O., CO5-1355-313, 334.

[885] P. R. O., CO5-1355-334; McD., Vol. V, p. 302.

[886] P. R. O., CO5-1356; CO391.2-276, 325, 283 to 285.

[887] P. R. O., CO1-43-165.

[888] Hen., II, p. 133.

[889] P. R. O., CO5-1376; Hen., Vol. II, p. 466.

[890] P. R. O., CO5-1355-372.

[891] P. R. O., CO5-1355-375.

[892] P. R. O., CO5-1355-375, 376.

[893] P. R. O., CO5-1355-378.

[894] P. R. O., CO5-1355-385.

[895] P. R. O., CO5-1355-384.

[896] P. R. O., CO5-1376-265.

[897] Jour. H. of B., 1680, p. 1.

[898] Jour. H. of B., 1680, p. 7.

[899] Among the Burgesses were Captain William Byrd, Major Swann, Benjamin Harrison, Colonel Ballard, Colonel Mason, Colonel John Page, Colonel Matthew Kemp, William Fitzhugh, Isaac Allerton, John Carter and Captain Fox. P. R. O., CO5-1376-321.

[900] Jour. H. of B., 1680, pp. 13, 14.

[901] Jour. H. of B., 1680, p. 27.

[902] P. R. O., CO5-1356-125.

[903] P. R. O., CO5-1356-125, 126.

[904] P. R. O., CO5-1356-265.

[905] P. R. O., CO5-1355-361.

[906] Jour. H. of B., 1680, p. 32.

[907] Jour. H. of B., 1680, p. 36.

[908] P. R. O., CO5-1355-388 to 394.

[909] P. R. O., CO5-1355-380; CO5-1376-286.

[910] P. R. O., CO5-1355-396.

[911] P. R. O., CO5-1355-408.

[912] Jour. II. of B., April 1682, p. 4.

[913] P. R. O., CO5-1356-179.

[914] P. R. O., CO5-1356-1, 2.