Part 32 (2/2)
But Effingham found the people sullen and discontented and the Burgesses more stubborn than ever. The session of a.s.sembly of 1685 was, perhaps, the most stormy ever held in Virginia. The House made a strenuous and successful resistance to a vigorous attempt to deprive it of its control over taxation. In 1662, when the a.s.sembly was dominated by Sir William Berkeley, an act had been pa.s.sed empowering the Governor and Council to levy annually for three years a tax of not more than twenty pounds of tobacco per poll.[973] In 1680 the Council had requested Lord Culpeper to represent to the King the disadvantages of leaving taxation entirely in the hands of the a.s.sembly, hoping that his Majesty would by proclamation revive the law of 1662.[974] The greatest item of expense to the government, they argued, arose from the a.s.sembly itself, ”ye charge of which hath been too often found to be twice as much as would have satisfied all publiq dues”.[975] The matter was presented to the consideration of the Burgesses in 1680, but was lost in the committee room.[976]
The King and Privy Council, although they approved of the levy by the Governor and the Council, did not venture to grant them that power by royal proclamation. They instructed Lord Howard, however, in his commission of 1683, to propose for pa.s.sage in the a.s.sembly a law similar to that of 1662.[977] Accordingly, in 1684, Effingham placed the matter before the Burgesses and told them that it was the King's desire that they give their consent. But they ignored his message, and the Governor could not press the matter at that time. In the next session, however, he became more insistent. ”I must remind you,” he told the Burgesses, ”of what was omitted in ye last a.s.sembly ... that a Law may pa.s.se whereby His Majesty's Governor with ye advice of ye Council may be empowered to lay a levy.”[978] But the Burgesses would not yield. ”The House,” they replied, ”... do humbly signifye to your Excellency, that they can noe waies concede to or comply with that proposition, without apparent and signal violation of ye great trust with them reposed.”[979]
And when Effingham urged them to reconsider their action, they pa.s.sed a resolution unanimously refusing to relinquish this their greatest privilege.
After the prorogation of the a.s.sembly, Lord Howard wrote home his complaints against the stubborn Burgesses. ”Your Lords.h.i.+ps,” he said, ”will ... find their total denyal that the Governor and Council should have any power to lay the least Levy to ease the necessity of soe frequent a.s.semblys.... This was propounded by mee to them before his Majesty's Instructions came to my hand that I should,... but nothing would prevail nor I beleeve will, unless his Majesty's special command therein.”[980]
A long and acrimonious quarrel occurred over the quit-rents. Because of the lack of specie in the colony, it had always been necessary to collect this tax, when it was collected at all, in tobacco. In March, 1662, the a.s.sembly had pa.s.sed a law fixing the rate of payment at two pence a pound, which was then not far from the current price. But the decline in value of the commodity which had occurred since 1662, had resulted in a great diminution in the tax.
In July, 1684, the King wrote Effingham that he had taken over all the rights of Arlington and Culpeper to the quit-rents, and announced it his intention to use them for the support of the Virginia government. He directed the Governor to secure the repeal of the law of 1662 and to forbid all payments in tobacco. ”You must ... impower,” he wrote, ”the Officers of our Revenue to collect (them) ... according to ye reservation of 2s per every hundred acres ... to be paid in specie, that is in Mony.”[981]
As tobacco sold, in 1684, at a half penny a pound, this order, had it been put into operation, would have quadrupled the value of the quit-rents, and increased materially the burdens of the planters. The Burgesses, in alarm, pet.i.tioned the Governor to allow the old arrangement to continue, declaring that the lack of specie made it impossible to comply with the King's order. And they refused to repeal the law of March, 1662.
Displeased at their obstinacy, the King, in August, 1686, nullified the law by proclamation. ”Being now informed,” he declared, ”that several persons goe about to impede our Service ... by imposing bad tobacco upon our collectors at the rate of 2d per llb, under pretence of an Act of a.s.sembly of March 30, 1662, ... Wee have thought fit to Repeal the said Act.”[982]
Even then the Burgesses resisted. At the session of 1686 they pet.i.tioned on behalf of all the freeholders of the colony that the quit-rents should be paid as formerly. To make payment in specie, they declared, would not only be ruinous, but utterly impossible.[983] So angered were they and so determined not to obey, that Effingham found it expedient to consent to a compromise. It was agreed that the tax should be collected in tobacco as before, but at the rate of one penny per pound, which, as Effingham said, was not ad valorum. Thus the only result of this long quarrel was to double the value of the quit-rents, and to add greatly to the burdens of the impoverished and discontented people.[984]
Even more bitter was the contest over the so-called Bill of Ports. This measure was designed to remedy the scattered mode of living in Virginia, by appointing certain places as ports of landing and s.h.i.+pment, and confining to them all foreign trade. Throughout the seventeenth century almost all s.h.i.+pping was done from private wharves. The country was so interspersed with rivers, inlets and creeks, deep enough to float the largest vessels, that ports were entirely unnecessary. Each planter dealt directly with the merchants, receiving English manufactured goods almost at his front door, and lading the s.h.i.+ps with tobacco from his own warehouse. This system, so natural and advantageous, seemed to the English Kings, and even to the colonists, a sign of unhealthful conditions. More than once attempts had been made to force the people to build towns and to discontinue the desultory plantation trade.
In 1679, Culpeper was ordered to propose a law in the a.s.sembly requiring the erection of towns on each great river, to which all foreign trade should be confined. Accordingly, in 1680, a Bill of Ports was pa.s.sed.
”Wee are now grown sensible,” wrote Secretary Spencer, ”that our present necessities, and too much to be doubted future miseries, are much heightened by our wild and rambling way of living, therefore are desirous of cohabitation, in order whereunto in ye late a.s.sembly an Act was made appointing a town in every County, where all Goods imported are to be landed, and all Goods exported to be s.h.i.+pt off. And if this takes effect, as its hoped it may, Virginia will then go forward which of late years hath made a retrograde motion.”[985]
But this attempt ended in dismal failure. In 1681, when the s.h.i.+pmasters came to the appointed ports, they found that no shelter had been constructed for their goods. Thinking the law nullified, or not yet in operation, they traded as usual from private wharves. For this breach of the law, some of them were prosecuted in the colonial courts, to their own great loss and to the inconvenience of many of the planters.[986]
Loud wrangling and bitter animosities resulted throughout the colony, and at length the King was compelled to suspend the law.[987]
In the a.s.sembly of 1685 it was proposed to enact another Bill of Ports.
Accordingly an act was drafted in the House of Burgesses and, in due time, sent up for the approval of the Council. The upper house, after making several alterations, consented to the bill and returned it to the Burgesses. The latter agreed to most of the changes, but struck out a clause restricting the towns to two upon each river, and added an amendment permitting one port to a county.[988] The Council in turn yielded, but inserted a new clause, ”That there should bee ffees ascertained on Goods exported and imported for the support of those Officers which should bee obliged to reside in those Ports”.[989] As ”there was noe room in ye margint to write ye alteration ... it was wrote in a piece of paper and affixt to ye Act”.[990] When the bill came back to the House, Major Robert Beverley, who was again the clerk of the a.s.sembly, acting it would seem upon his own initiative, tore off the paper containing this amendment. The bill then came before the House apparently a.s.sented to without change and was returned by them for the signature of the Governor and the Councillors. Neither Effingham nor any of the Council noticed the omission, and thinking their amendment had been accepted, signed the bill.[991] Thereupon it was engrossed, and sent up for the final signature of the Governor. But Effingham in reading the engrossed copy, discovered the omission, and refused to affix his name to the bill, claiming that it ”was not engrost as a.s.sented to” by him and the Council.[992] ”To which,” wrote the Governor, ”they sent mee word that the Bill could admit of noe alteration or amendment after it was attested by the Clerk of the General a.s.sembly as a.s.sented to, and that it had by that the force of a Law.... I sent them word again that though any bill was a.s.sented to by mee and the Council, yet if I should afterwards perseive it would prove prejudicial ... I had power to refuse the signing of it by vertue of His Majesty's negative voice.... But all would not persuade them out of their obstinacy, nay tho' I offered to lay that Bill aside till His Majesty's pleasure should bee known therein; And to sign all the others.... But nothing would please them but Invading, if not destroying, His Majesty's Prerogative.” The Burgesses declared that they did not contest the Governor's right to the veto, but contended that when once he signed a bill, ”it could not faile of having ye force of a Law”.[993] Effingham, they complained, was claiming a ”double negative Voice”. So angry did they become that they refused to apportion the levy for defraying the public charges, and after many days of bitter contention the Governor was forced to prorogue them.
”I did not disolve them,” he wrote the Privy Council, ”for these reasons. Because if his Majesty shall think fitt to have them dissolved, it will bee soe great a rebuke to them, when done by his Majesty's special command, that I hope it will deter them for the future to bee soe obstinate and peevish.”[994] Accordingly, in August, 1686, the King wrote the Governor, ”Whereas, we have been informed of ye irregular and tumultuous proceedings of the House of Burgesses of Virginia, at their late meeting, the members thereof having ... presumed so far as to raise contests touching ye power of ye Negative Voice ... which wee cannot attribute to any other Cause then the disaffected & unquiet Dispositions of those Members.... Wee have thought fitt hereby as a mark of our displeasure ... to Charge ... you forthwith to Dissolve the present a.s.sembly.”[995]
When this order reached Virginia the a.s.sembly was again in session.
”After I had pa.s.sed the Acts,” wrote Effingham, ”I ordered His Majesty's Letter to bee publickly read to them, and then Dissolved them ... and told them they were the first a.s.sembly which had been soe dissolved and I hoped they would bee the last that should deserve it. I ordered copies of his Majesty's Letter to bee sent to the several County-Courts, that all the Inhabitants might know how displeasing such proceedings were to his Majesty.”[996] ”And now,” he added, ”the public debts being paid,...
I shall not for the future have soe frequent a.s.semblys.”[997]
More damaging to the Burgesses than this rebuke was the loss of the right to elect their own clerk. ”I was severely angry with their Clerk,”
declared Effingham, ”that he durst omit ye least clause, especially soe material an one ... I sent to the a.s.sembly to make him an example for it, But they rather maintained him.”[998] Some months later the King sent orders that Beverley be tried for defacing the records and that he be once more deprived of all offices. Probably because of his great popularity, Beverley was never brought to trial, but he was forced to relinquish his lucrative governmental posts.[999] In May, 1686, Nicholas Spencer wrote the Committee of Trade and Plantations, advocating the appointment of the clerk by the Governor. ”I ... beg leave to present,”
he said, ”how necessary it is ... that the clerk of the House ... bee commissionated by his Majesty's Governour ... and that his salary be appointed unto him out of his Majesty's revenue. This will take off his dependency on his great masters the House of Burgesses, and leave noe room for designed omissions.”[1000] Nothing loath, the King, in August, 1686, wrote Lord Howard, ”Wee ... require you ... upon the Convening of the a.s.sembly to appoint a fit person to execute the Office of Clerk of the House of Burgesses, & not to permit upon any pretense whatsoever any other person to execute ye said Office but such as shall bee soe chosen by you.”[1001]
Accordingly, at the session of April, 1688, the Governor, with the approbation of the Council, appointed Captain Francis Page as clerk of the House.[1002] The Burgesses could but yield, but they told Effingham that the clerk was still their servant and ought to take the usual oath of secrecy. ”I do declare,” replied the Governor, ”it was never my intention nor my desire that the Clerk should be as a spy upon your Actions and to declare to me your private Debates.” It was therefore agreed that he should take the following oath: ”You shall keep secret all private Debates of the said House of Burgesses.”[1003] Despite this, it was quite evident that the House was no longer to be master of its own clerk, and that he was to be in the future, to some extent at least, an emissary of the enemy seated in their midst.
The resolute and vigilant defense of the const.i.tutional rights of Virginia made by the House in this the critical period of her history is deserving of the highest praise, because it was made in the face of vigorous personal attacks by Effingham upon the most active of the members. Every Burgess that voted against the measures proposed by the King or advocated by his Governor, exposed himself not only to removal from office, but to active persecution. As we have seen, Mr. William Sherwood and Colonel Thomas Milner, for forwarding to the Privy Council the address of the Burgesses in 1684, had been dismissed from office.[1004] ”In ye year 1686 Mr. Arthur Allen & Mr. John Smith, who were Burgesses in ye year 1685, were turned out of all imployment Civill & Military to Mr. Allen's great damage, he being a surveyor of land at that tyme.”[1005] I have displaced Allen, wrote Effingham, because he was ”a great promoter of those differences between mee and the a.s.sembly concerning the King's negative Voice ... as not thinking it fitt that those who are peevishly opposite to his Majesty's interest should have any advantage by his favor”.[1006] ”In the year 1688 Mr. William Anderson, a member of ye a.s.sembly in that year was soon after the a.s.sembly by the Governor's order and Command put in ye Common goale and there detained 7 months, without Tryal, though often prayed for, and several courts past in ye time of his imprisonment. Nor could he obtain ye benefit of habeas corpus upon his humble pet.i.tion.... Mr. Charles Scarburgh, a member of that a.s.sembly, alsoe was, soon after ye a.s.sembly, turned out of all imployment and as a mark of his Lords.h.i.+p's displeasure, a command was sent to ye clerk of ye county to raze his name out of ye records as a Justice of Peace.”[1007] ”From whence,” it was declared, ”the people conclude these severities are inflicted rather as a terrour to others than for any personall crimes of their owne, and is of such ruinous consequence that either the public or particular interests must fall, for if none oppose, the country must languish under the severity of the government, or fly into a mutiny to save themselves from starving. If any do appear more zealous in prosecuting the countries complaints they know what to expect. It being observable that none has been thus punisht but those who were forward in the a.s.sembly to oppose the encroachments on the people, and promote the complaint to England, being out of hope of relief on the place.”[1008]
One is inclined to ask, when considering the incessant quarrels of the Governor and the Burgesses, why Lord Howard was less successful than Governor Berkeley had been in gaining an ascendency over the a.s.sembly.
During the Restoration Period the Burgesses had worked in entire harmony with Sir William, even when he advocated the oppressive measures that were so instrumental in bringing on Bacon's Rebellion. Effingham, on the other hand, found himself continually embroiled with the a.s.semblymen, and unable to force them into submission even with rebukes and persecution.
The explanation must be sought partly in the different characters of the two Governors. Berkeley was an abler man than Lord Howard, more tactful, more capable of utilizing the weapons at hand. His method of overwhelming the legislators with favors was more effective in winning their support than intimidation and threats. Moreover, Sir William, himself a Virginian by his long residence in the colony, carried out only his own policies, and by methods that did not openly a.s.sail the charter rights of the people. Effingham, on the other hand, was the instrument of the English King and his Councillors in an a.s.sault upon representative government in the colony. It was but natural that all cla.s.ses, even the wealthy planters, should resist him with stubborn resolution. Nor was it possible for Effingham to control, as Sir William had done, the elections of Burgesses. The opposition of many sheriffs, whose duty it was to preside at the polls, to the administration, the greater vigilance of the House, and the independent spirit of the commons conspired to render the returns more accurate and the House more responsive to the will of the people. Finally, the poor planters found now, what they had lacked during the Restoration Period, cultured and able men to represent them in the a.s.sembly. Without the aggressive leaders.h.i.+p of Major Robert Beverley, Thomas Milner, Colonel Ballard, and other prominent planters, the cause of the people might have been lost.
Even in the Council the commons had one staunch friend--Colonel Philip Ludwell. This restless man, who was unable to work in harmony with any Governor save Sir William Berkeley, sympathized with his old friends of the Green Spring faction in their resistance to Effingham. As early as 1684 he had aroused the Governor's suspicion by arguing in Council ”for the undutiful Address which was sent to his Majesty”,[1009] and during the sessions of 1685 and 1686 it was thought that he was ”an Instrument in Abbetting and formenting those Disputes & Exceptions the a.s.sembly soe insisted on”.[1010]
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