6. "That twelve men should be chosen, that their fitness for the foundation work might be tried. However, there might be more named; yet it might be in their power, who were chosen, to reduce them to twelve, and it should be in the power of those twelve to choose out of themselves seven, that should be most approved of the major part, to begin the church." These articles-free, like the "plantation covenant of the previous year, from all acknowledgment of allegiance or subjection to the parent country were on the day of their adoption subscribed by sixty-three persons, and soon after by about fifty more. The fifth article, establishing the same condition of franchise as that in force in Massachusetts, may be presumed to have been recommended by the same reasons as had there prevailed. After its adoption, "one man (probably the minister, Samuel Eaton, brother of Theophilus Eaton) "stood up, and expressed his dissenting from the rest in part"; but he did not press his objections.1 The twelve men chosen under the last article, after due time for reflection, elected the "seven pillars," and, after another pause, the "pillars" proceeded Aug. 22. to their office of constituting the body of church members. Next, at a meeting held by them as a "court," all former trusts were pronounced vacated and null; their associates in the church, nine in number, were recognized as freemen; and Eaton, elected by the sixteen as "Magistrate" for a year, and four other persons chosen with him to be "Deputies," were addressed by Mr. Davenport in what was called a charge. A "public 1639. Oct. 25. 1 N. H. Col. Rec., 11-18. — In 1673 was published at Cambridge "A Discourse about Civil. Government in a new Plantation whose Design is Religion." The title-page attributes it to John Cotton. But Dr. Bacon (Thirteen Historical Discourses, &c., 289292) offers strong reasons for believ 2 ing that Davenport was its writer, and that it was composed by him while the question of the New Haven constitution was pending, with a view to satisfy his doubting colleague, Samuel Eaton. 2 It was grounded upon Deut. i. 16, 17. (N. H. Col. Rec., 21). notary," or Secretary, was also appointed, and a "marshall," or Sheriff. The "Freeman's Charge," which stood in the place of an oath, pledged no allegiance to the king, nor to any other authority than "the civil government here established." The little state of Quinnipiack was as yet independent of all the world. 1 It was resolved that there should be an annual General Court, or meeting of the whole body, in the month of October; and "that the word of God should be the only rule to be attended unto in ordering the affairs of government." By the authority thus constituted, orders were immediately made for the building of a meetinghouse, for the distribution of house-lots and pasturage, for precautions against attacks from the savages, and for regulation of the prices of commodities and of labor. And the general course of administration proceeded thenceforward in the same manner as in the earlier well-organized plantations. Like the people of the other settlements, the planters of Quinnipiack claimed the right to choose their company, and at an early moment they passed an order" that none should come to dwell as planters without their consent and allowance, whether they came in by purchase or otherwise."3 In its second year, 1640. they gave their town the name of New Haven.1 Nov. 25. Sept. 1. Distress from want of food was never felt within the limits of the colony of which the foundation had here been laid. Nor did it ever have a war with the natives. It studied to treat them with equity and indulgence. At the same time, it took care to make them understand its vigilance and its power. A straggler of the Pequot tribe, named Nepaupuck, convicted on full evidence of having killed an Englishman at Wethersfield, and of having taken part in the murder of three others in a boat on Connecticut River, confessed the 1639. Oct. 29. crime; and "his head was cut off the next day, and pitched upon a pole in the market-place." 1 The Englishmen at Quinnipiack had not fully arranged their own social system before they began to swarm; and others, of similar sentiments and objects, came presently to seek homes in their neighborhood. Among the newcomers were the Reverend Henry Whitefield; William Leet, destined to act a distinguished part in the colony; and Samuel Desborough, brother of Cromwell's general of that name. A company of two hundred persons, some of them from Quinnipiack, some from Wethersfield, were led by the Reverend Mr. Prudden to a harbor on Long Island Sound, near the mouth of the Housatonic, which they bought of the Indians, of Milford. and, after a year's occupation, called by the name of Milford. Another party, fresh from England, under the conduct of Mr. Whitefield, went somewhat further in the opposite direction, and established themselves, also on the shore of Long Island of Guilford. Sound, at a place named by them Guilford, after the English town from which several of them had come. Leet, then a young man, and Desborough, were of this company. Settlement 1639. Aug. 22. Settlement Sept. 29. The founders both of Milford and Guilford, taking for their model the proceedings at the recent settlement, erected their church and state on a foundation of "seven pillars." It is not known who were the original magistrates of Guilford, the early records being incomplete. At Milford, William Fowler, Edmund Tapp, Zechariah Whitman, John Astwood, and Richard Miles, were elected to be "judges in all civil affairs, to try all causes between man and man, and as a court to punish any offence and misdemeanor." They were to hold office till the next annual court in October,2 and Nov. 20. 1 N. H. Col. Rec., 22–24. 2 Lambert, History of the Colony of New Haven, 92. were probably re-elected from year to year, except Miles, who soon removed to New Haven. Departing from the method of organization which had been pursued in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and Connecticut, the settlement at New Haven, and those which had made it their model, continued, for the present, independent of each other.1 They preferred what, in Greek history, has been called the system of autonomy. Perhaps the incentive to this scheme was an idea of extending to civil institutions the Separatist theory of an absolute independence of churches. 1638. Feb. 9. When the Pequot war had been concluded, the most urgent business demanding the attention of the General Court of the towns on Connecticut River was to defray its expenses (for which purpose a special tax of six hundred and twenty pounds was levied); 2 to make arrangements for future security, including measures for protecting the Indians against everything that might be reasonable ground of offence; and to purchase from them supplies of food till the new fields should become productive.3 These first cares disposed of, the planters of Windsor, Hartford, and Wethersfield met, to constitute a "public state or commonwealth" by voluntary combination, and to settle its frame of government. Their object they declared to be, "to maintain and preserve the liberty and purity of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus which they professed, as also the discipline of the churches, which according government to the truth of the said Gospel was now practised icut. among them; as also, in their civil affairs, to be guided and governed according to such laws, rules, orders, and decrees, as should be made, ordered, and decreed." 4 "4 1639. Jan. 14. Frame of in Connect The instrument framed by them has been called "the 1 "Every plantation intended a peculiar government." (Winthrop, I. 306.) 2 Conn. Col. Rec., 12. 3 Ibid., 11–20. its 1 first example in history of a written constitution, - a distinct organic law, constituting a government, and defining powers." Containing no recognition whatever of any external authority on either side of the ocean, it provided, that all persons should be freemen who should be admitted as such by the freemen of the towns, and take an oath of allegiance to the commonwealth; - that there should be two general meetings of the freemen in a year, at one of which, to be holden in April, should be elected by ballot a Governor (who must be a member of some church), and as many magistrates (not, however, fewer than six), and other public officers, as should "be found requisite"; that at the same times there should be meetings of Deputies, four to be sent from each of the existing towns, and as many as the General Court should determine from towns subsequently constituted;—and that the General Court, consisting of the Governor and at least four magistrates and a majority of the Deputies, should have power to make laws for the whole jurisdiction, "to grant levies, to admit freemen, dispose of lands undisposed of to several towns or persons, to call either court or magistrate or any other person whatsoever into question for any misdemeanor," and to "deal in any other matter that concerned the good of the commonwealth, except election of magistrates," which was to "be done by the whole body of freemen." The Governor was not re-eligible till a year after the expiration of his term of office. In the absence of special laws, "the rule of the word of God" was to be followed.2 Neither the oaths of 1 Bacon, Early Constitutional His- Colony of Connecticut," for an abstract tory of Connecticut, 5, 6. of a sermon deciphered by him from a manuscript in short-hand, preserved in the Library of the Hartford Historical Society. This sermon, preached by Mr. Hooker to the General Court in May, 1638, may probably have been intended to prepare the people for the great step which was soon after taken. Its 2 Conn. Col. Rec., 20-25. The instrument, drawn with great care and knowledge, seems to bear marks of the statesmanlike mind of Haynes, and the lawyerlike mind of Ludlow. I am indebted to my learned friend, Mr. J. H. Trumbull, editor of the "Records of the |