Colonial America and the
Character of Colonial Charters
Teaching American History
Asbury Park, New Jersey
Alan Gibson’s Email
Agibson@csuchico.edu
Why Study the Puritans and
Pilgrims Today?
• Illuminates the American Character and our
National Identity– We have traditionally turned to
the Puritans and Pilgrims to explain ourselves as
a people and our national character or what we
often call “American Exceptionalism.”
• The Puritan Work Ethic: Contrast contemporary
Americans’ conception of a job with the Puritans’
conception of “a Calling.”
• The Dark Side of the Puritans and Pilgrims –
Intolerance, Superstition, and Repression
Why Study the Puritans?
(continued)
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•
•
•
The Settlement of America is also a source of a number of concepts
and metaphors that constitute a dimension of our collective memory.
We say that we are a “Chosen People,” a “City on the Hill,”and “A
Redeemer Nation.” But contrast this with Malcolm X’s famous
statement: “We didn’t land on Plymouth Rock. Plymouth Rock landed
on us”
Provides an avenue for discussing the claim that “America as a
Christian Nation Founded on Christian Principles.” Is this True? What
Does This Mean? What Are its Political Implications?
Provides an Avenue for Discussing the Origins of Religious Freedom
in America and for Debating the Proper Relationship of Church and
State
Provides an avenue for discussing the character of groups who
separate from society to seek purity. Under persecution and
surrounded by others who are different, common bonds are more
easily forged and maintained. But once separation takes place, it is
necessary for authority, hierarchy, and discipline to be introduced.
Compare and contrast the Puritans and the Beat Generation.
Why Study the Puritans?
(continued)
• Provides an Avenue for Discussing the Origins of Religious
Freedom in America and for Debating the Proper Relationship
of Church and State
• Provides an avenue for discussing the character of groups who
separate from society to seek purity. Under persecution and
surrounded by others who are different, common bonds are
more easily forged and maintained. But once separation takes
place, it is necessary for authority, hierarchy, and discipline to
be introduced. Compare and contrast the Puritans and the Beat
Generation.
• Provides a challenge to the idea that American society is based
only on the liberal principles of John Locke. Much of the
political thought of early America is communitarian, not
individualistic.
The Transformation of the Story of
the Settlement of North America
• In the past, the story of “American Exceptionalism” has
often been told as a celebratory and narrowly confined
narrative of the creation of a new people in a new land.
The settlement of North America, according to this story,
was the upbeat story of English colonists who fled
religious persecution and came to new land seeking and
securing prosperity and liberty, planting the seeds of
democracy, and gaining the character traits that we
associate with Americans (individualism, equalitarianism,
and acquisitiveness) when confronted with this new
continent.
Partial Truths in the Old Story
• By 1640, the great majority of free colonists
were better fed, clothed, and housed than their
contemporaries in England where about half of
the people lived in destitution.
• Colonial America did not have nobles and
aristocrats in comparison with Europe. More
people participated in politics in the colonies,
especially those without wealth. In a sense, the
seeds of democracy were sewn in the colonies.
• Many of the colonists did flee Europe to avoid
religious persecution, especially the Puritans.
The New Story
Beginning in the 1960s and accelerating (though
not without resistance), a new story of the
settlement of North America has been told. Now
scholars emphasize the diversity of the peoples
engaged in settlement, the multiplicity of
nations acting, the disease and difficulty of the
endeavor, and the exploitation and cruelty of
these people to each other. Finally, scholars
have emphasized the paradoxical and
ambiguous character of the development of
democracy and liberty (especially religious
liberty) in colonial America.
The Diversity of Settlement (Red,
White, and Black)
• Native Americans included literally
hundreds of linguistically distinct people.
• The Africans who were brought to America
in the slave trade were from many different
tribes including Ashanti, Fulani, Ibo,
Malagasy, Mandingo, and Yoruba.
The Diversity of “English”
Colonists: Who Came?
• There were many varieties even of “English” colonists (including
Finns, Dutch, Welsh, Scots, Scots-Irish, Germans, Swedes, and
French Huguenots).
• Who voluntarily came to North America in the 17th century?
• Religious Dissenters
• Second, third, and fourth sons of Aristocrats
• Indentured Servants
• Adventurers and Entrepreneurs (John Smith, Sir Walter Raleigh)
• Criminals – many facing death penalties.
• “We’re Americans. We have been kicked out of the Best Countries in
the World.”
The Diversity of English Colonists:
Why Did They Come?
•
•
•
•
•
Freedom to create their own religious communities
Opportunity
Profit
A place to be more significant that in Europe
The British Government and Joint Stock Companies
supported settlement of the North American continent
because they sought a) a short route to the Pacific and
to India b) extensive mineral wealth c) to quell discontent
and enhance the status quo in England by exporting
portions of the society that were outcasts or supported
change.
Diversity (summarized)
• Most broadly, the American colonies presented
an example of an “unprecedented mixing of
radically diverse peoples - African, European,
and Indian - under conditions stressful for all.
The colonial intermingling of peoples – and of
microbes, plants, and animals from different
continents – was unparalleled in speed and
volume in global history.”[1]
•
[1] Alan Taylor, American Colonies, xi.
The Multiplicity of Nations
with Territorial Ambitions
in North America
In addition to the British, the Spanish, the Russians, and the French
were also empire builders in North America. Russians colonized
Alaska; the French colonized in the Great Lakes and Quebec; the
English colonized not only on the east coast but also in Hawaii; the
Spanish colonized Florida and migrated from settlements in what is
now Mexico north into what is now the United States. Obviously,
when all of these nations and nationalities are considered, settlement
did not take place only from Europe to the east coast of North
America or even only east to the west, but west to east across the
Bering Strait, north from Latin America, and south from the Canadian
territory. The contest between foreign powers for control over the
North American territory is of course integral to the study of American
history.
The Impact of Disease on the
Settlement and Demographic
Transformation of North America
European settlers brought diseases into North America which the
Indians’ immune system was unable to fight and thus they died in
the thousands. This precipitated a huge demographic
transformation. In 1770, there were about 1.6 million Native
Americans on the North American continent and about 330,000
Europeans and Africans. By 1800, there were about 1.1 million
Natives Americans, many of whom now lived west of the Mississippi
and 5.5 million Europeans and Africans. Disease also killed
thousands of “English” colonists. The North American continent was
settled literally in a race to replace dead colonists and Indians with
living colonists. As a result of these massive deaths, “between 1492
and 1776, North America lost population, as diseases and wars
killed Indians faster than colonists could settle.” (Alan Taylor,
American Colonies)
The Difficulty of Settlement
• Many Native American tribes were nomadic and
lived by foraging, farming, hunting, and fishing.
Unlike the English colonists, they knew how to
survive on the North American continent.
Furthermore, many of the early attempts at
settlement were entrepreneurial ventures by
men who did not plan on farming and foraging.
Many colonists relied on the generosity and help
of Native Americans for food and starved in
times of shortage. E.g. “The Lost Colony of
Roanoke.”
Cruelty Between the Diverse
Groups and Within Them
• Brutality between Native peoples and colonizers was the rule, not
the exception. Periods of cooperation and shared “thanksgiving”
celebrated in our national myths were unfortunately not common.
Indians and colonists were also brutal to members of their own
group. Punishments for violations of laws were extremely harsh and
meant to set an example. One man who was convicted of stealing
two pints of oatmeal to allay his hunger was punished by having a
long needle thrust into his tongue to prevent him from ever eating
again. He was then chained to a tree and starved to death as a
lesson to other colonists. Some English colonizers went off to live
with the Indians and were welcomed by them if they brought guns or
tools. If recaptured by the colonists, the colonists who had
abandoned the settlement were often tortured before being put to
death.
Systems of Exploitation (Slavery
and Indentured Servitude)
The relative prosperity of the English colonists in
comparison to their English contemporaries resulted
primarily from the shortage of labor and shortage of land
on the North American continent. With labor scarce and
land plentiful, free colonists were not forced to work for
others and were eventually able to secure relative
prosperity. But the colonists prosperity was achieved, in
part, by taking lands from Native Americans.
Furthermore, the very conditions that made for the
relative prosperity of the colonists – the scarcity of labor
– led to the importation of unfree laborers by the
thousands.
Indentured Servitude
• More than half the European immigrants to the colonies
prior to the American Revolution were indentured
servants. Many were criminals. Others were poor,
orphans, or debtors. Indentured servants signed
contracts for right of passage to North America for four to
seven years labor. Skilled laborers might be able to
negotiate a better contract. Indentured servants were
under the control of a master who could discipline them
with force. They were usually not allowed to marry or
have children. Many indentured servants fled their
masters. Indentured servitude was a system of labor, not
of apprenticeship.
Slavery
• Slavery was first introduced into American
in 1619 at Jamestown. A black labor force
was introduced gradually into the colonies
and with the increase came the
development of raced based justifications
for slavery. In 1640, there were 150 blacks
reported in Virginia. In 1650, about 300. In
1680, 3000 and in 1704 about 10,000 at
the time that the white population was
80,000.
Slavery (continued)
• Black slavery became the colonists’ answer to the labor shortage
and chattel slavery evolved out of the limits established for
indentured servants and concerns about the foreignness of African
Americans. Initially, the differences between indentured servitude
and slavery were not clear cut, but sometime in the 17th century this
changed. At first, the slave was thought of as a laborer of the lowest
denomination. Nevertheless, at some point, unlike European
settlers, blacks became expected to labor for life. Then slave codes
-governing the conduct of slaves - were introduced. As the institution
evolved, the offspring of slaves were also automatically bond for life
for service. Conversion to Christianity was once a path to freedom,
but this was eliminated. Racially mixed marriages were forbidden.
The slave was not by the beginning of the 18th century simply the
servant of the lowest denomination but something qualitatively
different.
The Foreignness of
Colonial Society
(Church and State)
Colonial society was foundationally different than the
world that we live. It contained a different understanding
of the relationship of church and state. There was, as
Michael Zuckerman has put it, “totalitarianism of true
believers.“ The “Peaceable Kingdoms” of the colonial
period were not theocracies (priests did not rule), but
rather communities of religious uniformity in which
taxation was used to support the Christian religion, there
was compulsory church attendance, the criminalization
of sin, political control of doctrine and clergy, and
exclusion of political participation for non- believers.
Foreignness continued
(the Individual and Society)
Colonial society contained a different
understanding of the relationship of the
individual to society. In these colonial
societies, rights were not conceived of
spheres of autonomy and liberties carried
duties with them. The needs of the few
and the one were subordinated to the
needs of the many.
Foreignness continued
(Law and Government)
Colonial society contained a different
understanding of the purpose of law and the
ends or goals of government. Laws and
constitutions were designed to enforce belief
and to prohibit behavior that is deemed to be
unworthy of God. Puritans believed that if they
did not punish sinners, God would punish them.
In assessing the ends and character of
government, many colonists reasoned that
government was a gift from God and was his
creation. It must therefore be view as an
instrument to serve God.
The Ambiguity and Paradoxical
Quality of Colonial America
• “Democracy” grew up alongside slavery and in context of religious
authority (particularly in the form of the New England town meeting
and the congregational organization of churches).
• The conditions that allowed for prosperity for the free colonists – the
abundance of land and the need for laborers – eventually led to the
importation of thousands and thousands of slaves.
• Religious toleration grew from the splintering of biblical
commonwealths. Many colonists had come in search of religious
liberty, but did not intend to grant it. They came to promote their
religious orthodoxy and avoid the imposition of someone else’s
religious orthodoxy. Religious toleration expanded only as
dissenters fled and created their own colonies and (later) as
diversity (at least among Protestant groups) expanded and made
religious orthodoxy difficult to impose.
• Finally, the colonists had unprecedented freedom in the New World.
Who was to regulate them? But this freedom came at the expense
of terror, insecurity, and insularity.
The Settlement of the
North American Continent
St. Augustine: The First Permanent
Settlement in North America
• The Spanish colonized St. Augustine, Florida in 1565
and Sante Fe, New Mexico in 1607. In colonizing what is
now Florida, the Spanish sought to establish forts to
lodge attacks against French pirates who had cut the
revenues of the Spain in half. In Florida, Pedro
Menendez de Aviles, a Spanish naval officer, formed the
colony of St. Augustine. This was really the earliest
permanent settlement in what would become the territory
of the future United States. Spain eventually turned to
Spanish missions manned by Christianized Native
Americans to fortify their holdings in the New World.
But...
the United States evolved out of British
American settlements. "The importance of
Jamestown,” James Horn has stated, “is
understated. The United States evolves out of
British America--they are 13 British Colonies,
and if you trace back that line of development, it
takes you back to Jamestown. Without British
America you don't get a United States as it
emerges in 1776, a polity based on British
institutions, religion, commerce, language. None
of that happens.“
James Horn, historian and Jamestown scholar
The English
Experiments:
Jamestown,
Massachusetts Bay,
and Plymouth
Jamestown
We are still celebrating the 400th
anniversary of Jamestown. Led by William
Kelso, archeologists have discovered the
original triangular fort and settlement
which is now a site of excavation. They
have also discovered Werewocomoco –
the home of Powhatan and probably the
place of the dramatic act in which
Pocahontas saved John Smith’s life.
Chronology of Jamestown
• 1606 – The Virginia Company – a government chartered private
company which sold stock in its exploration venture – was formed to
settle a colony in North America.
• December, 1606: Three vessels left England for Virginia. They were
the Susan Constant, the Godspeed, and the Discovery.
• They landed at Chesapeake Bay on April 26, 1607.
• 1607-1609 - John Smith in charge
• 1609 - John Smith returns to England and the next winter (16091610) is the “starving time.”
• 1610 – After the winter of 1609-1610, the remaining colonists
decided to return to England. As they began the voyage back,
however, they encounter other ships heading toward the colonies.
These ships contained the new governor of the colony, Lord De La
Ware, who order the original colonists to return to the settlement.
Chronology of Jamestown
• 1610 – After the winter of 1609-1610, the remaining colonists
decided to return to England. As they began the voyage back,
however, they encounter other ships heading toward the colonies.
These ships contained the new governor of the colony, Lord De La
Ware, who order the original colonists to return to the settlement.
• 1613 – Pocahontas captured by the colonists. She converts to
Christianity. A period of relative peace between the colonists and the
Native Americans begins.
• 1614 – Pocahontas weds John Rolfe
• 1617 – Pocahontas died in England
• 1617-1624 – Violence between the tribes of the Powhatan
Confederacy and the colonists is intense.
• 1624 - The colonial charter is revoked by the King.
• 1646 - In 1646, the first treaty between the Native Americans and
the English colonists is signed.
Jamestown (Who were the
colonists and what did they seek?)
The colonists, at least according to John Smith, included a large proportion
of “gentlemen.” This has traditionally been used to suggest that they would
not work and to thus explain the difficulties encountered in the settlement,
including starvation and political conflict. Recently, however, historians have
concluded that the Virginia Company had heard from the members of the
Roanoke colony before they were lost that the Indians would trade food for
copper. Thus, few men were sent to the colony who had either the training
or inclination to farm. Instead, the Virginia Company sent men who were
specialists in finding and exploiting the minerals and natural resources of
the new world. These men apparently worked diligently to preserve the
colony, but lacked the necessary expertise. The colonists were sent to find
gold, silver, and mineral wealth, the lost colony of Roanoke, a quick route to
the Orient, and a cash crop of some sort (experiments were made with
creating perfumes but tobacco became the colonies’ cash crop quickly after
it was introduced into the colony by John Rolfe in 1612). Incidentally,
women did not come to Jamestown until 1619 (17 years after the settlement
of this colony). They were sold to their husbands for the cost of
transportation.
Jamestown (Disease and Famine)
One hundred and four people began the journey from England, but only 38
were alive nine months later. In December 1609, replacements brought the
number back to 220 colonists, but after the winter only 60 remained alive.
Between 1607 and 1622, the Virginia Company transported some 10,000
people to the colony but only 20 percent of them remained alive. In the
second year, 440 of the 500 settlers died. In the three year period from 1619
to 1622, 3000 of 3600 of the settlers sent died. Disease, famine, and
violence with Indians accounted for the early deaths. Recent studies have
suggested that biological evidence suggests that the period surrounding
1607 was the period of the worst drought in 800 years in this area. The
winter of 1609-1610 is known by historians as the “starving time.”
Jamestown was settled on the banks of the James River on a pennisula 60
miles from the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. This was done to shield the
colonists from Spanish warships, but it placed the fort and settlement near a
swamp and millions of mosquitoes that gave the colonists malaria. Many
colonists also died from drinking brackish water which seeped into the wells
that they dug.
Jamestown (Captain John Smith)
•
•
As the famous story suggests, John Smith was integral to the
survival of the colony. Smith was a great adventurer even before he
came to America. He had fought and been captured in Turkey and
had walked over 2000 miles in Russia. Smith was the “strategist,
drill master, interpreter, provisioner, mapmaker, naturalist, and
negotiator with the Indians” for the colony[1] From shortly after the
arrival in 1607 to 1609, Smith commanded the colony and made the
colonists work six hours a day in the fields. Some of the colonists
hated Smith for making them work. He stayed in America only three
years and was wounded in a gunpowder accident and returned to
England to heal.
[1] Edmund S. Morgon and Marie Morgan, “Our Shaky Beginnings,”
New York Review of Books, April 26, 2007. 21-25.
Pocahontas
Pocahontas act of saving John Smith’s life was probably an act in which his
life was spared so that he could become a member of the Powhatan tribe
and the English settlers could be integrated into the Powhatan empire.
Powhatan seems to have had designs for the English and to have seen a
purpose in establishing them as members of the tribe. In this ceremony,
Pocahontas (whose name means something like “brat,” “little wanton,” or
“favorite daughter” in the Powhatan language) was given the power to admit
Smith to the tribe or to allow him to be killed. Her intervention established
him as her brother in the tribe. We do not know if they truly had a love
relationship, but she was probably only between 10 and 14 years old. Smith
incidentally did not write about this event until seventeen years after it had
taken place. In 1613, the colonists captured Pocahontas. She accepted
Christian conversion, took the name Rebecca, and married a colonist
named John Rolfe in 1614. She was eventually taken to England to serve
as a symbol of peace and cooperation and as an advertisement for the
Virginia Company and a symbol that the Natives could be civilized. She died
of disease at 21 while in England.
Jamestown (Relationship of the
colonists and the Indians)
•
•
•
Intermittent violence characterized the relationship of the colonists with the
Algonquian Native Americans they found in Virginia. Many of the colonists
expected the Indians to feed them or at least to trade iron and copper for
food. They viewed themselves as civilized, Christian, and superior in arms
and armor. Sometimes the Indians traded colonists food for copper and iron
tools, but the problem with expecting to be feed by the Indians was that they
often had little excessive food and if pressured for food they sometimes
reacted violently. In one incident, colonists came to the Indians for food and
seventeen were slaughtered and maize was symbolically stuffed in their
mouths.
The colonists tried to capture the Indian chief Powhatan (his real name was
Wahunsonacock) by luring him into their settlement but he declined their
invitations. John Smith was of course captured once by the Indians.
The English at times lashed out against the Indians in violence. In 1610,
Captain George Percy surprised an Indian village and killed sixty five
inhabitants. He took the wife and children of the chief prisoner, then headed
back to Jamestown by boat. In the course of their return, they threw the
children overboard and shot them as they tried to escape. When they
returned to Jamestown, the chief’s wife was also executed.
Jamestown and the Evolution of
Democracy
Jamestown convened the first legislative
assembly in British North America in 1619
(the same year as slavery was introduced
into the colony). The General Assembly
was formed following orders from the
Virginia Company to establish a uniform
government over the colony.
Dissolution of Jamestown
• From 1610 to 1622 the colony became
marginally self -sustaining. A generous policy of
land inducements gave anyone who came or
sponsored someone who did 50 acres. By 1624,
the company’s charter was finally revoked and it
became a dependency of the crown. The
Virginia company went bankrupt, the colony was
attacked by the Powhatan tribe, and James I
became feed up with the company and the
colony. By 1624, 8500 people have tried to settle
in Jamestown and only 1275 still survived.
Jamestown (“The Laws: Divine,
Moral, and Martial”
• These codes organized the community into quasi-military corps
committed to compulsory service on common projects and subject to
severe penalties for failure to work or share military obligations. The
sets of codes in this body of law mandate Christianity and provide
severe penalties for dissent and non-compliance. They require
mandatory church attendance. Blasphemy is punishable on the first
offense by whipping, second offence (having a dagger thrust
through your tongue), and third offense (death). And you thought
contemporary three strikes laws were tough. The number of capital
crimes and the severity of the punishments are shocking to modern
sensibilities. The laws regulate trade (they forbid trade by
individuals, not the colony with Indians), hygiene, the use of tools,
care for homes, the manner in which bakers can make bread. Many
of these laws have to do with preserving scarce equipment and
resources. Publicly “doing the necessities of nature.” Sodomy and
adultery were punishable by death. Fornication was punishable by
whipping on the first offense and on the third offense by whipping
three times a week.
The Plymouth
(Plimoth)
Colony
Early Chronology of
Plymouth Colony
• November, 1620 – The Mayflower anchors at
Provincetown.
• December, 1620: Explorers encounter the
Native Americans (the Wampanoag) on Cape
Cod.
• October, 1621 (?): Harvest celebration after a
particularly difficult winter leads the colonists to
create a harvest celebration. Ninety
Wampanoag men hear the celebration and join
it.
The Pilgrims
• The Pilgrims were one of a series of “separatist” groups who first
appeared in England in the 1570s. They were determined to break
with the Anglican church and to form a pure and primitive church.
They believed that the Latin finery of the ceremonies of the Anglican
church prevented the lay person from a real communion with Christ.
They wanted the Bible published in English, for hymns to come
directly from scripture, and in general opposed church hierarchy and
grandeur. As a result of these positions, they lived on the fringe of
English society and were often persecuted. Under a 1559 Act of
Uniformity in Britain, everyone was required to attend official Church
of England services. Conducting unofficial services, which they did,
was punishable by imprisonment, fines, and even death. Pilgrims
were also followed and watched by government officials.
The Pilgrims first moved to Leiden
to avoid Religious Persecution
The Pilgrims first moved to the famously tolerant nation of Holland to
worship as they pleased. This move, in itself, proved to be
harrowing. Pilgrims were arrested trying to leave England. In one
dramatic escape to Holland, the women and children of the group
were literally left on the dock because English officials arrived at the
time that the men had boarded but the women had not. Moving to
Holland worked in a sense, but the Pilgrims faced a number of
problems there. Some had difficulty finding adequate work; others
found the language and culture too foreign. William Brewster
became embroiled in a religious debate that led James I to ask
government officials in Holland to call for his arrest. He had to go
into hiding. Furthermore, there was concern of impending war
between the Netherlands and Spain. Mostly, however, the Pilgrims
worried about their future as a people if they stayed. Their young,
they feared, would not maintain their religious identity unless they
could grow up free from influences that were not so much corrupting
as erosive of their cultural identity.
The Decision to come
to North America
Various hardship, fears of war, and concern with cultural
extinction led the Pilgrims to plan to come to North
America. This is also a long, dramatic story. James I
would not grant them a charter because he would not
recognize their religion. Still, he allowed them to obtain a
patent for land north of the Jamestown settlement from a
group of “Adventures” who sought to make money from
their trip. This group thought that the Pilgrims might
provide cod to England. The Pilgrims needed supplies
and a boat to get to North America. The Pilgrims thus
indentured themselves to an investment group. Still, the
details of this indenture changed and there was no clear
cut agreement when they left.
Plymouth
•
•
In July 1620, 102 individuals and about 20 to 30 crew members– about half
Pilgrims (Leiden separatists), others “strangers” - set sail for North America
from Southampton, England on the Speedwell and the Mayflower. The
group included three pregnant women (one gave birth at sea and named
her daughter “Oceanus”). The Mayflower had been rented for them by the
investment group that was financing their voyage. It was a large merchant
vessel listed as having a capacity or rating of 180 tons or, in other words,
capable of holding 180 cast barrels of whine called “tuns.” The Pilgrims
bought the Speedwell but had to abandon it when it proved to be
unseaworthy. It was probably deliberately sabotaged to induce its resale at
a bargain price. Only one passenger died on the voyage. The Mayflower
traveled some 2700 miles at 2 miles per hour for 66 days. They spotted
Cape Cod on November 9, 1620 and debarked off at Providencetown on
November 11. By the spring of 1620, half of them had died.
(For a vivid depiction of a transatlantic journey see Richard Hofstadter,
America At 1750: A Social Portrait.)
“First Encounter”
The colonists saw Native Americans during
their early days, but their first substantial
encounter was a surprise attack by the
Indians, perhaps precipitated by colonists’
thefts of Indian corn bins and plundering of
their grave sites. The place where this first
encounter took place is still called “First
Encounter” Beach.
Relationship of the Pilgrims to the
Native Americans of the Region
The colonists and the Indians did not,
however, have a simple relationship of
hatred. The colonists grew to love and
respect Massasoit and never forgot the aid
that he provided in the first year of their
efforts to create a colony.
Plymouth
Still, although desperately difficult, life in
Plymouth was not as difficult as in
Jamestown. The population of the colony
rose steadily. To 390 by 1630 to 549 by
1637 and then to 1360 by 1657. By 1657,
divisions became to occur in the people.
Unlike the original generation, they were
not bound entirely by the same beliefs. A
government structure arose, but it was
very primitive.
The Mayflower Compact
• The Mayflower Compact was signed in the
saloon on the Mayflower by 41 of the 101
passengers. Only nine of the adult men aboard
did not sign. On one level, it is simply an
arrangement to obey the laws by these
voyagers. Some of those who signed it were
Separatists and some Separatists did not sign it.
It is the oldest surviving compact based on
popular consent. It was established a
government based on civil consent, not divine
decree.
Mayflower Compact versus the
United States Constitution
• The Mayflower Compact lists four purposes for
government:
• a) honor God b) Advance the Christian Religion c) honor
the King d) better ordering of the people. Stability or
order.
• Compare these to the purposes listed in the United
States Constitution of 1787:
• “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a
more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic
Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote
the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty
to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish
this Constitution for the United States of America.”
Plymouth (William Bradford)
• William Bradford was the governor of the
colony for some 30 years. His book, Of
Plymouth Plantation is our central source
of information on Plymouth colony.
Plymouth (Life in the Colony)
• The church was obviously the center of life of the
community and having it unfettered by the regulations of
the English government was monumentally important to
the Pilgrims. Overall, the colony was a modest success,
but it was a financial disaster for the investment
company. The Pilgrims tried to send fish, fur and other
commodities home to pay off their original debt, but the
company went bankrupt. The Pilgrims nevertheless paid
off their debts. The freemen came together to elect a
governor (Again, Bradford served thirty terms.) and a
group of assistants.
The Puritan
Experiment at
Massachusetts Bay
The Puritan Experiment:
Massachusetts Bay
• In the 1530s, Henry VIII rejected the Catholic Pope to
become the head of an independent Church of England.
Henry VIII wanted famously to be granted an annulment
to wed Anne Boulen, but the pope refused to grant it.
After waiting seven years, Henry VIII simply formed his
own church the Church of England and became its head.
When Henry VIII formed the church of England, all
Englishmen became members of the Church of England.
“Because the monarch led the official church, religious
dissent smacked of treason as well as heresy.” (Taylor,
p. 160) Dissenters were subject to intense scrutiny,
condemnation, and punishment.
•
The Puritan Experiment (continued)
• But a number of dissenting religions existed that
believed that the break with the Catholic church had not
been drastic enough in England, that the Protestant
Reformation remained incomplete in England, and that
the Anglican church was really only a revised Catholic
church. Unlike the “Separatists” who settled Plymouth
colony, Puritans sought the sought the purification of the
Anglican church through the elimination of much of its
doctrine and ceremony. Puritans sought to elevate the
local congregation over the distant, hierarchical church
and they sought to establish “the spiritual equality of all
godly men.” (Taylor, p. 164) The ultimate goal of the
Puritans was to form a church in the colonies that would
eventually transform the Church of England in England.
Puritan Doctrine
• Specifically, Puritans took issue with two aspects of Anglican
doctrine
• 1) They believed that grace was given by God not through the
church but rather by an unmediated experience between God and
an individual. They therefore wanted to seek God by reading the
Bible directly, forming prayer groups, and heeding learned and
zealous ministers. They did not believe that they need a church as a
mediator with God.
• 2) Anglican doctrine held that on Earth it was impossible to separate
those on who Grace was bestowed from those who were not
destined for heaven. Puritans disagreed. They believed that signs
and tests could be devised to separate the elect from unredeemed
humanity and that it was best to confine church membership to the
elect. Mostly, this involved a story of conversion - a story of
transformation from sinner to grace. But eventually fewer and fewer
individuals - in Massachusetts Bay at least - felt comfortable
engaging in this ritual.
Puritan Doctrine (continued)
• The Puritans (and the Pilgrims) believed in
an elect that was predestined. This belief,
however, did not lead them to believe that
they should do nothing to secure salvation.
It motivated them instead to obsessively
search for signs that they were among the
elect. They were an intensely self –
reflected and absorbed people.
The Chronology of the Settlement
of Massachusetts Bay
1628 – English Puritans send out an advanced party to build a
settlement on Cape Ann, north of Boston.
1629 – Group of Puritans obtain a charter that became the
Massachusetts Bay Company. Unlike other charters that stipulated
that a Board of Directors and a Chairman stay in England and
answer to King’s authorities in London in an annual board meeting,
this charter neglected to mention where the board of governors
would meet. The Puritans were thus free to create their own
autonomous government without monarchial oversight.
1629 - Charles I dissolved Parliament and placed even greater
restrictions on religious dissenters. The Puritans decided to resettled
in North America.
April 7, 1630, four ships with four hundred people set out from England
across the stormy Atlantic. They arrived two months later. Eventually,
one thousand came in the first wave.
John Winthrop
•
•
•
•
From an established family
Educated at Trinity College
Studied law in his 30s
Converted to Puritanism at some point in
his youth or early adulthood.
• Winthrop sold all of his possessions and
led “the Great Migration.”
Winthrop (continued)
• Right before he set out, Winthrop wrote an essay that
laid out the main reasons why sincere Christians should
consider moving to the New World. The first four reasons
were: 1. To carry the gospel to the New World, to bring
the fullness of the Gentiles into the kingdom of God. 2.
To escape God's judgement that was coming upon the
corrupt churches of Europe. 3. To help solve the
problems of overpopulation and poverty in England,
where human life was being devalued and people were
regarded as less valuable than horses and sheep. 4. To
obey the Great Commission and Genesis 1:28, which
says, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth
and subdue it."
The Puritan Experiment in
Massachusetts Bay
• Shortly after landing at Salem, Winthrop
suggested resettlement to the areas
surrounding Boston. The first year was
very difficult and approximately a quarter
of the initial settlers died. Food was scarce
so Winthrop sent his son back to England
and used his personal finances to buy
food. The resupply ship arrived just as the
last reserves from the trip across had run
out.
The Religion of the Puritans
•
•
•
The historian David Harlan, characterizing the view of the famous American
historian Perry Miller, has characterized American Puritanism as:
“A severe and even terrifying religion, it offered to the eyes of the faithful a
dark and searing vision of the fault that lies within. It was a kind of grim
poetry, a somber and elegant mediation on the power of blackness. But it
was also a redemptive discipline, a way of thinking about ourselves, even of
transcending ourselves. And it was an indispensable guide for sojourners in
the wilderness, counseling, as it did, perpetual doubt and the good that may
come of a broken heart. If it demanded harsh and unrelenting selfinterrogation, it also knew the dangerous deceptions of self-reliance; if it
reminded us that we are all “strangers and pilgrims on earth,” it also made
us see those around us as fellow suffers.”[1]
[1] David Harlan, “A People Blinded From Birth: American History according
to Sacvan Bercovitch,” The Journal of American History, 78 (December,
1991), p. 949.
The Religion of the Puritans
• Puritans saw the hand of God in every act. If bad
happened, then they must have done something to
cause it. Immorality had to be punished, lest the
colonists provoke God’s wrath. Drawing upon the Old
Testament as well as the English common law, the
Puritans criminalized immorality, including breaking the
Sabbath, worshiping idols, blaspheming the name of
God, and practicing magic. The most sensational cases
involved bestiality and witchcraft. In 1642, the New
Haven authorities suspected George Spencer of
bestiality when a sow bore a piglet that carried his
resemblance. He confessed and they hanged both
Spencer and the unfortunate sow.
Witches
Witches were considered Satan’s recruits.
They were a product of a belief system
that ruled out chance and stressed to a
frightening degree the hand of God in the
affairs of men. If bad happened,
somebody have caused it.
The Religion of the Puritans (the
Puritan Work Ethic)
• Puritans were characterized by their simple piousness, literacy, and
a zeal for doing. Work was a calling, not a profession whose goal
was to earn money. “God sent you onto this world as unto a
Workhouse, not a Playhouse.” Doing was given a special place in
their philosophy (even though they believed that they could only
achieve salvation by Grace). They were an once an entrepreneurial
and pious people. Their desire for material success, their belief that
it required sacrifice to achieve material success, and their belief that
God would reward them for their labor were inseparably linked. “The
Puritans worked with a special zeal to honor their God and to seek
rewards that offered reassurance that God approved of their efforts.”
(Taylor, p. 159) There was a kind of tension within these beliefs.
Prosperity was read as a sign of God’s favor, but the accumulation
of wealth could never be an end in itself.
The Religion of the Puritans
(continued)
Dissent was not welcome. Baptists,
Quakers, Anglicans, and Catholics need
not apply. Puritans emigrated to New
England to realize their own ideal of a
uniform society - and certainly not to
champion religious toleration and
pluralism. All dissenters were given, in the
words of one Massachusetts Puritan, “free
Liberty to Keep Away From Us.”
Roger Williams
Dissent, however, arose from within the church in
the persons of Roger Williams and Anne
Hutchinson. Williams believed that the Puritans
had not separated enough from the Anglican
and Catholic churches. He was accused of
heresy and fled south from Massachusetts Bay
to found what would become Providence, Rhode
Island. Williams believed that “forced religion
stinks in God’s nostrils.” Rhode Island became a
haven for religious toleration and diversity.
Baptists, Lutherans, Methods - all Protestant
sects saw it as a place to settle.
Anne Hutchinson
(American Jezebel)
• Anne Hutchinson was a fiercely independent woman of
Massachusetts Bay who was put on trial for heresy. Hutchinson
claimed the power of prophecy and led prayer meetings in her home
that attracted hundreds of followers. She suggested that most of the
ministers and magistrates of the colony were godless hypocrites
dangerous to the souls of their congregants and the survival of the
colony. A Puritan minister described her as a “woman of haughty
and fierce carriage, of a nimble wit, and active spirit and a very
voluble tongue, more bold than a man.” Considering her a threat to
social order and especially to the subordination of women to men,
Winthrop and his council rebuked her, “You have stepped out of your
place, you have rather been a husband than a wife, and a preacher
than a hearer, and a magistrate than a subject.”
Hutchinson (continued)
Hutchinson challenged Puritan orthodoxy on the
relationship of “justification” and “sanctification.” This
dispute is quite intricate. Justification was the infusion of
divine grace. Sanctification involved moral conduct,
including Christian behavior, piety, even prayer. This was
a debate about the relative relationship of grace versus
works (not faith versus works) to salvation. Hutchinson
was put on trial and defended herself - quite successfully
- in a dramatic trial. But eventually, she blurted out that
her knowledge of God was “an immediate revelation.”
She suggested that she had a proximity to God that was
unique. This was considered heresy and she was
banished from the colony.
The Puritans and the Development
of Democracy in America
• Upon arrival in 1630, the town developed political assemblies of the
original heads of households. Within four years of settlement, a
more elaborate structure developed. There was a governor (for thirty
years it was Winthrop), a board of directors (seven or eight) who
served as advisors and freemen composed of the adult heads of
households. There was also a “General Court” composed of all of
the freemen that voted on many matters of importance (essentially
giving advice to the governor.) By 1632, the freemen choose the
governor and the board of directors, but the governor and the broad
of directors had the ultimate right of decision. Still later, the freemen
broke off and formed an assembly that was given an independent
voice. Eventually, the concurrence of both the assembly and the
governor was necessary to enact law. Finally, a court system
developed and a system of laws based on the principles of common
law was established.
“The Laws and Liberties of
Massachusetts”
• The preamble described the theological
ideas on which the colony was founded.
There were numerous citations to scripture
and law was said to come from God, not
man. “The Laws and Liberties’ is a
constitution in the sense in which we often
think of one today: it establishes a
government complete with a Bill of Rights.
“The Laws and Liberties of
Massachusetts”
• “The Laws and Liberties” also provided for
punishments for crimes and, like “The
Laws: Divine, Moral, and Martial” from
Jamestown, it criminalized sin. Capital
offenses included: Worshiping any God
but Christ, being a witch, Blaspheme,
murder (except in self-defense), bestiality,
homosexuality, adultery, theft, being a
false witness against another, sedition,
cursing your parents, and rape.
“The Laws and Liberties of
Massachusetts”
• “The Laws and Liberties of Massachusetts” was also a
document of Puritan identity and a vehicle for
establishing religious orthodoxy. For example, being an
Ana - Baptist was punishable by banishment from the
colony. Ana - Baptists did not believe in infant baptism.
But this body of law precluded preaching against infant
Baptism. No Jesuit was allowed into the colony. One of
the most famous laws forced parents to educate their
children (to teach them to read); and forced everyone to
learn the Catechism. One law forbade playing
shuffleboard in houses of entertainments to prevent
idleness.
“The Laws and Liberties of
Massachusetts”
• It is regressive by our standards, but progressive
compared to its time. There are 16 capital
crimes listed, though over 200 capital crimes are
list in common law. Each of the capital crimes is
justified with a passage from Scripture.
• Capital offenses include: Worshiping any God
but Christ, being a witch, Blaspheme, murder
(except for self-defense), bestiality,
homosexuality, adultery, theft, being a false
witness against another, sedition, cursing your
parents, and rape.
Colonial Charters:
Some Generalizations
•
Colonial charters were, in some sense, simultaneously covenants,
compacts, “constitutions,” and “bills of rights.” They were covenants
and compacts because they were one of the means by which the
English defined themselves as a people. They were “a people’s
attempt at self-interpretation.” They established shared meanings
that allowed them to act as a people and to answer basic political
questions about who they were as a people, what qualities they
sought in leadership, and what standards they would use to judge
themselves.[1] Most broadly, colonial charters used basic symbols in
the Judeo- Christian tradition and are statements of sectarian
identity (Anglican in Virginia, Pilgrim and Puritan in New England).
•
[1] See the preface and introduction in Donald S. Lutz ed., Colonial
Origins of the American Constitution: A Documentary History
(Indianapolis, IN.: Liberty Fund, 1998), xv-xl. Quote is from page xv.
This handout is based Lutz’s discussion.
Colonial Charters:
Some Generalizations
• These charters were also “constitutions” or statements of
the form and organization of the government and the
substance or content of the fundamental law. They were
constitutions in the sense that they established a) the
organization or form of the government and b) the
fundamental laws which both prescribed and proscribed
behavior. The most vivid and interesting characteristic of
the colonial charters as statements of fundamental law is
that they criminalize sin. Colonists sought to legislate
morality and punished immoral behavior severely.
Colonial Charters:
Some Generalizations
Finally, colonial charters were statements
of basic English liberties. They codified
basic liberties protected in common law.
They seem remarkably regressive to us,
but they were progressive in many ways.
For example, the number of capital crimes
was greatly reduced in colonial America
over the mother country.
Strategies for Making the Study of
Colonial America More Interesting
• Use of Novels and Plays: The Crucible, The
Scarlet letter, and The Last of the Mohicans, and
The Prairie.
• Use of Biography and “Great” Men and Women:
Anne Hutchinson, Roger Williams, John
Winthrop, Captain John Smith, Powhatan,
Pocahontas, and William Bradford.
• Jill Lepore, The Name of War: King Phillip’s War
and the Origins of American National Identity.
Analysis of how we talk about war.