CHAPTER XX.
SETTLEMENT OF NEW JERSEY.—THE QUAKERS.
Two months before the surrender of New Netherlands to the English, the Duke of York made over the land embraced by his patent, lying between the Hudson and the Delaware, to Lord Berkeley and Sir George Carteret, both proprietaries of Carolina. In compliment to Sir George Carteret, who, as governor of the Isle of Jersey, had been the last commander to lower the royal flag in the civil wars, this territory was called New Jersey.
The proprietaries immediately published terms of colonisation, or, as they called them, “concessions,” offering fifty acres of land to each settler, and the same quantity for each servant or slave, at a quit-rent of one-halfpenny per acre, and the same to all indented servants at the expiration of their term of servitude. No quit-rent, however, was to be demanded until 1670.
Already in 1663, before this grant to Berkeley and Carteret was known, several puritan families from Long Island had purchased a considerable tract of country from the Indians and formed a settlement on Newark Bay. A few Swedish farmers also remained scattered here and there, besides old Dutch settlers, all considering themselves legalised possessors of their land. When, therefore, two years afterwards, Sir Philip Carteret arrived as proprietary governor, he found sturdy settlers ready and resolved to oppose his claims to their portion of the soil; hence much discord and difficulty arose.
The only Indian inhabitants of New Jersey were tribes of the Delaware, the most peaceful of all the aborigines, and who readily conceded their claims to the country on very easy terms to the settlers. As regards this Delaware portion of the Indian people, so different in character to all the other tribes, we must be allowed a moment’s interruption to relate how, according to their own tradition, this difference arose. It appears that, in old times, long and grievous wars were carried on between the Iroquois and the Delawares, until both nations were in danger of annihilation. On this the Iroquois sent to the Delawares, saying, “it is not profitable that all nations should be at war with each other, or this will at length cause the ruin of the whole Indian race. We have, therefore, considered a remedy. One nation shall be the WOMAN. She shall make no war, but she shall speak words of peace, to heal the disputes of those who are walking in foolish ways. The men then shall hear and obey the woman.” The Delawares consented to this remedy. A council was called, and again the Iroquois spoke: “We dress you in the woman’s long habit; we give you oil and medicines, and a plant of Indian corn, with a hoe. To your care we commit the great belt of peace and chain of friendship.”
But even if this tradition may be fiction, it nevertheless is well known that the Delawares were greatly respected and honoured by many tribes, and that the term “grandfather” was applied to them, though grandmother, one would think, would have been more appropriate. This assumed relationship, however, may have reference to the good Delaware sagamore, Tamenend, who lived in their tradition as King Arthur in ours.
Philip Carteret landed at the settlement on Newark Bay, to which the name of Elizabethtown, in honour of Lady Carteret, the wife of the proprietary, was given, and which was established as the seat of government. Wishing to attract steady settlers from the New England colonies, Carteret announced that “puritan liberties were warranted a shelter on the Raritan;” and an association of church-members from New Haven emigrated thither immediately. “With one heart they resolved to carry on their spiritual and town affairs according to godly government,” and proceeded to elect officers among themselves, excluding all from political rights who could not claim church-membership. This, though not in accordance with the intentions of the proprietary, was not interfered with. Emigrants were attracted, not only from New England, but from Great Britain. The climate was mild and salubrious; the soil fertile; and the vicinity of the older settlements prevented the danger of distress to which earlier settlers were exposed; besides which, no hostility was to be feared from the peaceful natives. A combination of circumstances thus rendered New Jersey especially promising for colonisation.
All went well till 1670, when the demand for quit-rent would commence. The first settlers claimed exemption on the plea of having purchased their lands prior to the Duke of York’s grant, from the natives, whose right to the soil was stronger than that of any English monarch whatever. So urged the earlier settlers, and many of the later ones set up the same plea, and the payment of quit-rent was refused. Disorder and disaffection prevailed, and that to so great an extent that, in 1672, Philip Carteret was deposed, and James Carteret, a frivolous young man, the natural son of the proprietary, was elected in his place.
Opposition was vain. Governor Carteret hastened to London, leaving John Berry as his deputy. The proprietaries determined to bring the colony to order, remodelled their “concessions,” and abridged the power of the people. The Duke of York expressed his dissatisfaction, and the king fixed a time within which the quit-rent should be paid. But other changes were at hand, which now for the moment turn our attention again to New York.
The settlers of New Netherlands had very willingly placed themselves under British rule, in the hope of advantages which would thence accrue, but the new government conceded very little to the province. The governor, and the council of his own appointment, were possessed of the executive and higher judicial power; of popular rights there were none. Once only an assembly was held at Hempstead, on Long Island; but the governor, finding that “factious republicans” abounded, held no second.
In 1667, Nichols retired from office, and was succeeded as governor by Lord Lovelace. If Nichols’ administration had been unsatisfactory, that of his successor was still more so. The very Swedes and Finns, said to be the most patient of all emigrants, were roused to resistance. Lord Lovelace’s system of government may be comprised in his own words: “the method for keeping the people in order is severity, and laying on such taxes as may give them liberty for no thought but how to discharge them.” An arbitrary tax was therefore imposed of ten per cent. on all exports and imports. This roused the colony, which, by its now eight established towns, protested against the imposition of taxes by the governor and council, they themselves having no voice whatever in the matter; but their protest was called “scandalous, illegal, and seditious,” and ordered to be burnt by the common hangman before the town-house of New York.
The government of the Duke of York was hated for its despotism, and the contempt and disregard which it ever showed towards the popular interest; when, therefore, in 1673, war broke out again between England and Holland, the first opportunity was taken to surrender to its former possessors. Lovelace, who was absent at the time of the surrender, was sent to England in the Dutch fleet. “The colonists for the most part,” says Hildreth, “were not greatly dissatisfied with the change. The local magistrates on Long Island mostly swore allegiance to the Dutch. The people of New Jersey, where a government could hardly yet be said to exist, were prompt to follow the example, as were also the settlements on the Delaware. For a moment the province of New Netherlands revived.” But only, as it were, for a moment; in fifteen months the re-establishment of peace restored the possession of New York to the English.
The duke, having obtained from his brother a new grant, sent out Major Edmund Andros as governor; and the Dutch authorities quietly surrendered the province once more. The inhabitants prayed to have an assembly, but their prayer was not granted, though some concessions were allowed. Nor was the desire of the three eastern towns of Long Island to be permitted still to remain attached to Connecticut, indulged. They were severed from that province, and a claim was put forth by New York for the whole territory as far as Connecticut River. This, however, was so stoutly resisted by the troops sent out under Captain Bull, at Saybrook, when Andros appeared there with several sloops of war, intending to enforce his purpose, that he finally abandoned the attempt, remarking jocularly, that such a Bull as had there met him deserved to have his horns tipped with gold. But though defeated in this instance, he was more successful with regard to the territory lying between the Kennebec and the Penobscot, which, during the Dutch supremacy, had been held by Massachusetts, and now was reclaimed by Andros. “Exclusive of this district of Sagadahoc, and of the settlements west of the Delaware, consisting of two Dutch and two Swedish villages, and the islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard, now called Duke’s County, the province of New York contained twenty-four towns and villages, of which the sixteen on Long Island were arranged in three counties. The city of New York, at that time far inferior to Boston, had about 350 houses, and some 3,000 inhabitants. The very centre of the present city was a farm, which had been the company’s and was now the duke’s. The entire population of the province amounted perhaps to 12,000 or 15,000. The value of the annual exports was about £50,000. The exports were wheat, tobacco, beef, pork, horses, lumber, and peltry. The mercantile fleet counted three ships, eight sloops, and seven boats. Even on the island of Manhattan agriculture was the chief occupation. The manners of the people were simple. There were few servants, and very few slaves; yet the distinction of ranks, especially among the Dutch, was very marked. There was no good will between the Dutch inhabitants and the immigrants from New England; and the English towns on Long Island still cherished the hope of being restored to Connecticut, in whose popular institutions they longed to share.”[8]
We now return to New Jersey, which, on the ratification of peace between England and Holland, again reverted to the English proprietaries. Berkeley, however, sold his share for £1,000 to John Fenwick and Edward Byllinge, both Quakers. The Quakers, holding opinions in advance of their age, and carrying out those opinions into practice, were persecuted everywhere, more or less, in the New World as in the Old; and now, therefore, that they numbered among their brethren men of wealth and influence, they purchased for themselves a district where “Friends” might find a safe asylum, and the “Holy Experiment of a Christian commonwealth might be tried.”
The “Holy Experiment” of the Quakers, and the “Grand Model Constitution” of Locke and Shaftesbury, were two extremes. In them intellectual pride and worldly wisdom were exhibited on the one hand, and on the other the philosophy of Christianity. The quakerism of Fox and Penn and Barclay was simply Christianity as Christ and the apostles promulgated it; it was that wisdom and truth which ancient philosophers, sages and poets of all nations acknowledged and sought after, and which modern philosophers and poets—Descartes and Bacon and Coleridge and Wordsworth and Emerson—have taught, and are teaching, and to which the present age is listening and growing wiser by so doing. But quakerism rose in an age of excitement, and the absurdities and extravagances of fanaticism threw a disrepute over the grandeur and sublimity of the doctrines which it taught, and which its disciples were ready to seal with their blood. Of all sects who have arisen since the days of the apostles, none comprehended the enlightening and ennobling truths of Christianity so fully as the Quakers. None comprehended Christianity in its broad universality as they. The “light and the truth,” which they declared were like God’s natural gifts of air and sunshine, given to all alike, rich or poor, bond or free, learned or unlearned, Christian or savage, man or woman,—were the immortal prerogatives of humanity. In this doctrine of the universality of the “inner light,” the Quaker regarded all men as equal by creation. “God discovers himself to every man,” says Penn;—“every mortal truth exists in every man’s and woman’s heart as an incorruptible seed,” says Barclay. “The Bible alone, the Quaker maintained, only enlightened those to whom it was conveyed; but the whole human race was illumined by this inner light. It was ever present in the human breast, to warn, to counsel and to console. The inner light shed its blessings on woman equally with man.” “It redeems her by the dignity of her moral nature, and claims for her the equal culture and the free exercise of her endowments. Woman is man’s companion, according to the Quaker, in his intellectual and moral advancement; woman, as a human being, has equal rights with man.”
All men, the Quaker argues, are equal; and he bows not down to his fellow-man, but to God alone, and says thee and thou to all, nor uncovers his head in token of obeisance to any.
“George Fox declares,” says Bancroft, in his able summary of quakerism, “that he saw his doctrine in the pure openings of light without the help of any man. But the spirit that made to him the revelation was the invisible spirit of the age, rendered wise by tradition, and in a season of revolution excited by the enthusiasm of liberty and religion. There is a close analogy between the popular revolutions of France and England. In France the same symbols and principles reappeared, but more rapidly, and on a wider theatre. The elements of humanity are always the same. The inner light dawns upon every nation, and is the same in every age; and the French Revolution was a result of the same principles as these of George Fox gaining dominion over the mind of Europe. They are expressed in the burning and often profound eloquence of Rousseau; they reappear in the masculine philosophy of Kant.
“Everywhere in Europe were the Quakers persecuted. In England, the general law against Dissenters, the statute against Papists, and special statutes against themselves, put them at the mercy of any malignant informer. They were hated by the church and by the Presbyterians, by the peers and by the king. During the Long Parliament, in the time of the protectorate, at the Restoration, in England, in New England, in the Dutch colony of New Netherlands, everywhere; and for long wearisome years they were exposed to perpetual dangers and griefs. They were whipped, crowded in jails among felons, kept in dungeons foul and gloomy beyond imagination, fined, exiled, sold into colonial bondage. Imprisoned in winter without fire, they perished from frost. Some were victims to the barbarous cruelty of the jailor; twice George Fox narrowly escaped death. The despised people braved every danger to continue their assemblies. Hauled out by violence, they returned. When their meeting-houses were torn down, they gathered openly on the ruins. They would not be dissolved by armed men; and when their opposers took shovels to throw rubbish on them, they stood close together, ‘willing to have been buried alive, witnessing to the Lord.’ They were exceeding great sufferers for their profession, and in many cases fared worse than the worst of their race. They seemed, indeed, to be as poor sheep appointed to the slaughter, and as a people killed all day long, abused and suffering, who went forth weeping and sowed in tears.”
And now this oppressed and persecuted people were about to have a land of refuge in the wilderness. In March, 1674, shortly after George Fox’s return to England after that visit to his friends in America of which we have spoken, and perhaps at his suggestion, Lord Berkeley sold his share of New Jersey to Fenwick and Byllinge; and the following year, Fenwick, with a large number of Friends’ families, set sail in the Griffith, and ascending the Delaware, landed at a place which he called Salem, for it indeed seemed the “dwelling-place of peace.”
Byllinge having become embarrassed in his circumstances, assigned his share of the province to William Penn and two others, still Quakers, and their earliest care was to obtain a division of the territory between themselves and Sir George Carteret, so that they might be able to carry out their own views of independent government. New Jersey was therefore divided, Carteret receiving the eastern portion, which was called East New Jersey, and Fenwick and his friends the western, or West New Jersey.
The Quakers, like the pilgrim fathers of the Mayflower, prepared the fundamental law of the colony even before they took possession, so that from the first they were under the guidance of an enlightened legislation. The quaker proprietaries, in their “Concessions,” “laid a foundation,” to use their own words, “for after ages to understand their liberty as Christians and as men, that they may not be brought into bondage but by their own consent; for we put the power in the people.”
The fundamental laws of New West Jersey were published in March, 1677, and afford a striking contrast to “the Grand Model” of Carolina. They insured entire freedom of conscience, enacting that no person, at any time or in any way, should be called in question or suffer damage or detriment on account of religious opinion. Government was to be administered by a general assembly elected by ballot; every citizen being capable either of electing or being elected. Every member of the assembly was to be paid one shilling a day by his constituents, “that he may be known as the servant of the people.” The executive power was vested in the commissioners appointed by the assembly, and the people themselves chose justices and constables; the judges were to be appointed by the assembly. Trial by jury was established; and, that “all and every person in the province, by the help of the Lord and these fundamentals, may be free from oppression and slavery, it was enacted, that no man could be imprisoned for debt; courts were to be managed without attorneys or counsellors; the native was to be protected by the laws; and the orphan to be educated by the state.”
Two emigrating quaker-companies were commenced in England, one in London, the other in Yorkshire. Thomas Olive and others went out as commissioners to superintend the colony till a permanent government was established; and in 1677 about 400 colonists went out, and purchasing land from the Indians, established themselves at Burlington, on the Delaware—these being, probably, Yorkshire Friends—and a tent covered with sail-cloth furnished them with a place for their religious worship. The Indians, those peaceful Delawares, received them as friends, and rejoiced in the prospect of dwelling in perpetual amity with them. “You are our brethren,” said the sachems, “and we will live like brothers with you. We will have a broad path for you and us to walk in. If an Englishman shall fall asleep in this path, the Indian shall pass him by, and say, he is an Englishman; he is asleep, let him alone. The path shall be plain; there shall not be in it a stump to hurt the foot.”
All went well with the colony, when a difficulty arose between them and Andros, the agent of the Duke of York, who still possessed Delaware, and who demanded customs of all the ships which ascended that river to New Jersey. The Quakers refused to pay them; and the duke, to whom they made their remonstrance, agreed to refer the question to Sir William Jones, an eminent lawyer of that day.
We must give a few clauses from their remonstrance, to show the straightforward and manly spirit of the quaker colonists:—
“An express grant of the powers of government,” say they, “induced us to buy the moiety of New Jersey. If we could not assure people of an easy, free and safe government, liberty of conscience and an inviolable possession of their civil rights and freedoms, a mere wilderness would be no encouragement. It were madness to leave a free country to plant a wilderness, and give another person an absolute title to tax us at will.
“The customs imposed by the government of New York are not only a burden but a wrong. The King of England cannot take his subjects’ goods without their consent. This is a home-born right, declared to be law by divers statutes.
“The land belongs to the natives; of the duke we buy nothing but the right of an undisturbed colonisation, with the expectation of some increase of the freedoms of our native country. We have not lost English liberty by leaving England.
“The tax is a surprise to the planter; it is paying for the same thing twice over. By this precedent we are assessed without law, and excluded from our English right of common assent to taxes. Such conduct has destroyed government, but never raised one to true greatness.
“Lastly, to exact such interminable tax, and to continue it after repeated complaints, will be the greatest evidence of a design to introduce, if the crown should ever devolve upon the duke, an unlimited power in England.”
Such plain speaking as this was worthy of the men who bowed and bared the head only to God. Their arguments established their cause. Sir William Jones decided that the duke had no claim to the tax.
In East Jersey also, Andros attempted to exercise, on behalf of the duke, the same arbitrary power, and here also was he opposed. But the measures which he took to enforce obedience were of a more violent character. He sent soldiers to seize Carteret, the governor, who was taken in his bed, and carried prisoner to New York. He summoned a special court for his trial, himself being judge, and though the jury persisted in returning a verdict of acquittal, he was still detained a prisoner.
The result of the decision in favour of the Friends of West Jersey led to the formal relinquishment of all claim to the territory or government by the Duke of York; and shortly afterwards a similar release was made by him on behalf of East Jersey, when that province also became an independent jurisdiction.
In 1681, Jennings being appointed governor of West Jersey, the first legislative assembly was convened, and laws were enacted based on the Quakers’ view of religion and morality. By their laws, all distinctions of faith, wealth, or race, were rejected; it was the universal humanity for which they legislated. For the expenses of their government £200 were levied, to be paid in corn, skins, or money. The salary of their governor was £20 a year; they prohibited the sale of ardent spirits to the Indians; and in all criminal cases, excepting treason, murder and theft, the person aggrieved had the power to pardon the offender.
The state of West Jersey presented a picture of a practical Utopia; its laws were based on the broadest principles of Christianity and faith in an improved and improvable humanity; it was an experiment in human virtue, and bore the test. The few hundred souls who commenced it, the little band of Friends, grew soon into thousands, and God’s peace rested on them like a visible blessing, under which they, the meek and longsuffering, literally began to possess the earth with an overflowing measure of joy. A kindly and pleasant intercourse commenced now between the Friends on each side the Atlantic; the cup of the oppressed and persecuted ran over with blessings!—“Friends,” wrote George Fox, and others, in a spirit of loving admonition, “Friends that are gone to make plantations in America, keep the plantations in your hearts, that your own vines and lilies be not hurt. You that are governors and judges, eyes you should be to the blind, and feet to the lame, and fathers to the poor; that you may gain the blessing of those who are ready to perish, and cause the widow’s heart to sing for gladness. If you rejoice because your hand hath gotten much; if you say to fine gold, Thou art my confidence, you will have denied the God that is above. The Lord is ruler among nations; he will crown his people with dominion.”
The first trouble which West Jersey knew, was that Byllinge, the original proprietary, claimed the right to appoint the deputy-governor; this led to some dispute, but was finally settled by such alteration in the constitution as enabled them to choose their own governor; after which all went well.
On the death of Sir George Carteret, the patentee of East Jersey, this portion of his estates was offered for sale, and William Penn and eleven others, in 1682, became the purchasers. But East Jersey, settled principally by Puritans, presented a different character to the western portion of the province. On the change of proprietaries, Robert Barclay, one of twelve Scotch proprietaries, several of whom were not Quakers, and who were now associated with the first twelve, was appointed governor for life; but he never assumed office himself, appointing Rudyard as his deputy. Great numbers of Scotch emigrants, principally from Aberdeen, Barclay’s native county, removed to East Jersey. Rudyard was succeeded as deputy-governor, in 1684, by Gawin Laurie, a Scotch Quaker and merchant of London, who endeavoured, but in vain, to establish a commercial capital at Perth Amboy, on Raritan Bay, to rival New York.
Thus were the Quakers firmly established in the New World; like the Puritans of New England, whom they equalled in stability and every sterling quality of character, they took deep root wherever they fixed themselves. We must now follow them to the other side of the Delaware, where William Penn is at this very time planting his colony of peace.