WEBVTT NOTE 47. Struggles Over Other State Governments 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.000 Volume 4, Chapter 47, Struggles Over Other State Governments 2 00:00:07.000 --> 00:00:18.000 If radicalism was to have its greatest triumph in Pennsylvania, this was not to be matched in Massachusetts, the birthplace of American radicalism. 3 00:00:18.000 --> 00:00:26.000 As we have seen, Massachusetts had taken a considerable turn rightward after the Revolutionary War began. 4 00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:33.240 For one thing, it could for a while fall back on its old charter rather than having to precipitate 5 00:00:33.240 --> 00:00:41.600 a bitter internal struggle to dislodge a Britain-oriented assembly, as happened in Pennsylvania. 6 00:00:41.600 --> 00:00:49.000 For another, its major radical leaders had either shifted sharply rightward, John Adams 7 00:00:49.000 --> 00:00:55.920 and Hancock, or else lost their sharpness of purpose, Sam Adams. 8 00:00:55.920 --> 00:01:03.480 But even so, the Adamses remained the bulwark and focus of the Decentralist and Left faction 9 00:01:03.480 --> 00:01:06.560 in the Continental Congress. 10 00:01:06.560 --> 00:01:12.540 Only the Berkshire Constitutionalist in far western Massachusetts had developed a domestic 11 00:01:12.540 --> 00:01:17.020 radicalism comparable to the dominant Pennsylvania Left. 12 00:01:17.020 --> 00:01:22.780 In some respects, the Berkshire Constitutionalist surpassed them. 13 00:01:22.780 --> 00:01:27.760 As Berkshire and Hampshire counties in western Massachusetts continued to live in a state 14 00:01:27.760 --> 00:01:34.760 of quasi-anarchy, however, pressure began to erupt throughout the state in the fall 15 00:01:34.760 --> 00:01:43.260 of 1776 for a regularized constitution, especially after independence had been declared. The 16 00:01:43.260 --> 00:01:50.380 old existing charter was now an anachronistic reminder of British rule. Massachusetts radicalism 17 00:01:50.380 --> 00:01:57.260 and began to emerge again as Concord, Boston and numerous Worcester towns joined to urge 18 00:01:57.260 --> 00:02:04.120 a constitutional convention unmistakably separate from the regular legislature. 19 00:02:04.120 --> 00:02:10.000 Many towns also pioneered in another vital democratic innovation, the right of the people 20 00:02:10.000 --> 00:02:16.640 themselves to vote in a referendum on any constitution that the legislature or a special 21 00:02:16.640 --> 00:02:18.800 convention might adopt. 22 00:02:18.800 --> 00:02:24.640 The Massachusetts General Court, however, backed by the majority of the towns, turned 23 00:02:24.640 --> 00:02:30.800 down a move to allow the people to elect a constitutional convention, and formed itself 24 00:02:30.800 --> 00:02:35.460 into a convention to write a constitution for the new state. 25 00:02:35.460 --> 00:02:41.880 In the considerable newspaper discussion in the summer of 1777, regarding the form that 26 00:02:41.880 --> 00:02:48.620 the new constitution should take, two different points of view were taken by Cletus and by 27 00:02:48.620 --> 00:02:51.460 by Faithful Friend. 28 00:02:51.460 --> 00:02:59.700 On the left, Pletus urged a government that is easy, simple and cheap, and thus elective 29 00:02:59.700 --> 00:03:07.020 in all branches, having a unicameral legislature and based on universal manhood suffrage. 30 00:03:07.020 --> 00:03:12.620 He attacked the conservative tendency to reintroduce the British political system without Great 31 00:03:12.620 --> 00:03:14.000 Britain. 32 00:03:14.000 --> 00:03:20.400 We debase ourselves in reintroducing the worst parts of British rule. The plain question 33 00:03:20.400 --> 00:03:27.400 is, are we fighting and lavishing our blood and treasure to establish the freest and best 34 00:03:27.400 --> 00:03:35.200 government on earth, or are we about to set up a formidable court interest? The origin 35 00:03:35.200 --> 00:03:40.800 and essence of government is in the people. Therefore, let us keep the staff in our own 36 00:03:40.800 --> 00:03:48.320 on Hands. Faithful friend, in Frank Rebuttal, took up the traditional conservative theme 37 00:03:48.320 --> 00:03:54.680 of total distrust of the people and of the justice, or the capacity of individuals to 38 00:03:54.680 --> 00:04:01.320 run their own lives. Instead, such power must be surrendered into the hands of a ruling 39 00:04:01.320 --> 00:04:08.400 oligarchy, who apparently suffer from no such incapacity, and who would presumably be checked 40 00:04:08.400 --> 00:04:15.560 sufficiently by periodic elections. Thus, the stuff of power never was nor never can 41 00:04:15.560 --> 00:04:22.960 be in the nature of things in the people's hands. As a people, we have no power in our 42 00:04:22.960 --> 00:04:30.160 hands. We can safely exercise, but of choosing our guardians once a year. We are not fighting 43 00:04:30.160 --> 00:04:36.180 for this or that form of government, but to be free from arbitrary power, and the iron 44 00:04:36.180 --> 00:04:58.180 The Constitution reported by the General Court in the spring of 1778, after a sharp struggle, was shaped by such conservatives as Robert Treat Payne, Thomas Cushing and John Adams. 45 00:04:58.180 --> 00:05:05.180 It was a highly conservative document, and was angrily rejected by the towns of Massachusetts, 46 00:05:05.180 --> 00:05:11.180 voting under universal manhood suffrage by an overwhelming majority of 5 to 1. 47 00:05:11.180 --> 00:05:15.180 Boston rejected the Constitution by a similar majority. 48 00:05:15.180 --> 00:05:22.180 The towns of Lexington, Concord and Beverly demanded a special constitutional convention, 49 00:05:22.180 --> 00:05:34.180 and Lexington, Westminster, Brookline, Lennox and other towns made it clear that they would reject any constitution that did not have a Bill of Rights. 50 00:05:34.180 --> 00:05:43.180 The town of Mendon in Worcester County in the interior of the state was typical in its libertarian objections to the Constitution. 51 00:05:43.180 --> 00:05:49.180 It attacked the heavy property qualification for voting for governor or upper house, 52 00:05:49.180 --> 00:05:55.300 House, the veto power of the small upper house over the lower, the absolute power of the 53 00:05:55.300 --> 00:06:02.260 governor to command the militia, and the continuation of the congregational establishment in the 54 00:06:02.260 --> 00:06:09.880 state. The nearby town of Sutton also attacked the absence of provisions against legislative 55 00:06:09.880 --> 00:06:16.740 corruption and the absence of any provision for abolishing slavery. Sutton also urged 56 00:06:16.740 --> 00:06:23.740 and a popular referendum voting on all legislation and extending the vote to Negroes. 57 00:06:23.740 --> 00:06:31.740 As might be expected, the most radically libertarian rebuffs to the proposed Constitution of 1778 58 00:06:31.740 --> 00:06:34.740 came from Berkshire and Hampshire counties. 59 00:06:34.740 --> 00:06:41.740 Thus, the town meeting of Greenwich, Hampshire, rejected the Constitution because it replaced 60 00:06:41.740 --> 00:06:44.740 popular rule by oligarchy. 61 00:06:44.740 --> 00:07:05.740 It entirely divests the good people of this state of many of the privileges which God in nature has given them, and which has been so much contended for, and gives away that power to a few individuals which ought forever to remain with the people inviolate. 62 00:07:05.740 --> 00:07:28.540 Specifically, Greenwich denounced the powers of the governor and the upper house and called for a unicameral, annually elected assembly, the election of the civil and military officers by the people, and the annual election of all judges and officers of each town and county by the voters of the respective areas. 63 00:07:28.540 --> 00:07:51.540 When the Constitution of 1778 was thus overwhelmingly rejected, the conservatives were content to peg along on to the old charter, but the Berkshire constitutionalists persisted in refusing to recognize this regime and in keeping the county courts closed until a constitution should be established. 64 00:07:51.540 --> 00:07:57.700 They even threatened to secede from Massachusetts. When the General Court tried to reopen the 65 00:07:57.700 --> 00:08:05.140 Berkshire Courts itself in the spring of 1779, a determined crowd prevented the judges from 66 00:08:05.140 --> 00:08:13.540 holding court, successfully defying the state of Massachusetts. Thus, by 1779, conservatives 67 00:08:13.540 --> 00:08:20.580 and radicals in Massachusetts were still locked in an inconclusive struggle. Neither had yet 68 00:08:20.580 --> 00:08:25.940 triumphed and a state constitution had not yet been adopted. 69 00:08:25.940 --> 00:08:32.300 The radical principles of the Pennsylvania Constitution proved to be far more influential 70 00:08:32.300 --> 00:08:39.380 in Vermont, a state precariously and uniquely emerging in rebellion against conservative 71 00:08:39.380 --> 00:08:43.400 New York, one of the United States of America. 72 00:08:43.400 --> 00:08:50.960 At the west side town of Dorset at the end of July 1776, Articles of Association had 73 00:08:50.960 --> 00:08:56.820 been approved, declaring loyalty to the newly proclaimed United States, but indicating 74 00:08:56.820 --> 00:09:03.560 that the Grant lands were a separate district, unenthusiastic about being incorporated into 75 00:09:03.560 --> 00:09:05.120 New York. 76 00:09:05.120 --> 00:09:11.200 The Articles were approved by the separate Grant towns east and west of the Green Mountains, 77 00:09:11.200 --> 00:09:17.520 And the New York State Convention resumed New York's old harassment of the grant settlers, 78 00:09:17.520 --> 00:09:22.000 insisting on rent payments to the New York land grantees. 79 00:09:22.000 --> 00:09:29.440 In response to this renewed threat, delegates from 44 towns, east side and west side, met 80 00:09:29.440 --> 00:09:34.160 together for the first time at Dorset on September 25. 81 00:09:34.160 --> 00:09:39.880 They boldly declared the grants a separate district and abolished any New York laws still 82 00:09:39.880 --> 00:10:04.880 and organized a militia under this grant land convention. The grant lands were to be a separate state. A committee was appointed to ask Congress for admission to the Confederation. At the same time, a covenant was proposed to be signed by all adult males in Vermont, reciting the grievances against New York and pledging loyalty to this convention. 83 00:10:04.880 --> 00:10:34.880 Approval and endorsement of the Covenant by Westsiders was almost unanimous. On the East side, a majority of the citizens had approved. Hence, another meeting of the Vermont Convention in mid-January 1777 proclaimed to the Grant lands a new and separate state, named New Connecticut. The Convention drew up a Declaration of Independence modeled after that of the United States, except that New York's 84 00:10:34.880 --> 00:10:41.800 State, rather than King George, was the major target. It also proclaimed the vital principle 85 00:10:41.800 --> 00:10:48.640 that unorganized territories be permitted to form their own governments. Protest against 86 00:10:48.640 --> 00:10:55.000 independence emerged from the leaders of the long-time pro-New York towns in the southeast 87 00:10:55.000 --> 00:11:01.600 corner of New Connecticut. But even Brattleboro, at the center of the protest, found that its 88 00:11:01.600 --> 00:11:07.800 This pro-New York Committee of Safety could not muster a quorum and was falling into disuse 89 00:11:07.800 --> 00:11:14.600 and that pro-independence insurgents had seized the town jail and forced the New York appointed 90 00:11:14.600 --> 00:11:16.800 sheriff to resign. 91 00:11:16.800 --> 00:11:26.240 New York further alienated Vermonters by reconfirming all royal land grants in its new state constitution. 92 00:11:26.240 --> 00:11:31.760 At this point, Dr. Thomas Young, one of the authors of the Pennsylvania Constitution, 93 00:11:31.760 --> 00:11:38.480 began to bombard the grateful new Connecticut leaders with letters and suggestions for a 94 00:11:38.480 --> 00:11:39.480 constitution. 95 00:11:39.480 --> 00:11:45.120 In particular, he sent them as a model a copy of the Pennsylvania Constitution. 96 00:11:45.120 --> 00:11:50.480 He even persuaded them to change the name of the new state to Vermont in commemoration 97 00:11:50.480 --> 00:11:52.400 of the Green Mountains. 98 00:11:52.400 --> 00:12:01.320 In the summer of 1777, undaunted by Congress's refusal to recognize its independence, Vermont 99 00:12:01.320 --> 00:12:06.600 adopted a constitution modeled after that of Pennsylvania. 100 00:12:06.600 --> 00:12:12.760 As might be expected from this highly democratic and individualistic state, lacking the incubus 101 00:12:12.760 --> 00:12:21.120 of a landed or financial oligarchy, the constitution was far more radical than even its model. 102 00:12:21.120 --> 00:12:40.120 It included two great milestones. In its Bill of Rights was contained the outright abolition of slavery, the first such state action, as well as the abolition of all adult bondage, including indentured service. 103 00:12:40.120 --> 00:12:47.120 The other breakthrough was the establishment of universal manhood suffrage, another first. 104 00:12:47.120 --> 00:12:59.120 On the other hand, the most illiberal feature of the Vermont Constitution was its insistence on a Protestant test oath for holding public office. 105 00:12:59.120 --> 00:13:09.120 Boldly but precariously, Vermont, not recognized or admitted by Congress, was now an independent republic. 106 00:13:09.120 --> 00:13:17.120 Menaced by Burgoyne's army and by New York's covetousness, Little Vermont soon was rent from within. 107 00:13:17.120 --> 00:13:23.120 The turbulent East Side towns were split into five brawling factions. 108 00:13:23.120 --> 00:13:26.120 The Vermont Group, loyal to the New State. 109 00:13:26.120 --> 00:13:33.120 The York Party of the extreme South East, agitating for acquisition by New York. 110 00:13:33.120 --> 00:13:38.120 The New Hampshire Party, encouraged by New Hampshire President Mechek Weir. 111 00:13:38.120 --> 00:13:45.280 Weir, a pro-Massachusetts group headed by Charles Phelps of Marlboro, and the Imaginative 112 00:13:45.280 --> 00:13:51.840 College Party, which owed ideological allegiance to Dartmouth's college radicals John Wheelock 113 00:13:51.840 --> 00:13:54.440 and Basiliel Woodward. 114 00:13:54.440 --> 00:13:59.240 The Dartmouth group urged the split of Eastern Vermont and Western New Hampshire from their 115 00:13:59.240 --> 00:14:05.120 respective states, and their union into a new state centering on the Upper Connecticut 116 00:14:05.120 --> 00:14:06.120 River. 117 00:14:06.120 --> 00:14:12.480 Actually, this was quite a sensible plan, as East Side Vermont had geographically more 118 00:14:12.480 --> 00:14:18.000 in common with Western New Hampshire than it had with West Side Vermont. 119 00:14:18.000 --> 00:14:24.240 Soon, the New Hampshire and college parties formed an alliance, a coalition precipitated 120 00:14:24.240 --> 00:14:31.760 by a petition from 16 Western New Hampshire towns rebelling against taxes and conscription 121 00:14:31.760 --> 00:14:35.320 directed from Portsmouth and the Eastern towns. 122 00:14:35.320 --> 00:14:40.440 They asked to be included in Vermont, and the East Side towns greeted their request 123 00:14:40.440 --> 00:14:47.200 with enthusiasm, threatening to secede from Vermont and form the new College State if 124 00:14:47.200 --> 00:14:51.800 Vermont refused admission to these western New Hampshire towns. 125 00:14:51.800 --> 00:14:58.200 The West Side leaders, fearing a loss of their power and the enmity of New Hampshire, managed 126 00:14:58.200 --> 00:15:01.560 to stall the Vermont Assembly's acceptance. 127 00:15:01.560 --> 00:15:09.240 By June 1778, however, the several Vermont towns voted overwhelmingly to admit the New 128 00:15:09.240 --> 00:15:16.440 Hampshire petitioners, and to the plaudits of a jubilant east side, the 16 river towns 129 00:15:16.440 --> 00:15:19.320 were admitted to Vermont. 130 00:15:19.320 --> 00:15:25.280 At the same time, a convention at Brattleboro of southeastern Vermont towns compounded the 131 00:15:25.280 --> 00:15:32.320 New Republic's Problems by proclaiming their refusal to obey Vermont law and their adherence 132 00:15:32.320 --> 00:15:37.960 to New York. New Hampshire now threatened war and immediately petitioned Congress to 133 00:15:37.960 --> 00:15:44.800 take action against Vermont and her own seceding towns. Justice was certainly on the side of 134 00:15:44.800 --> 00:15:51.060 allowing the western New Hampshire River towns to join Vermont, but the big battalions were 135 00:15:51.060 --> 00:15:56.680 were on the side of the New Hampshire State. Colonel Ethan Allen, newly released from an 136 00:15:56.680 --> 00:16:03.240 English prison, was quickly sent to Congress and persuaded it to delay judgment. The great 137 00:16:03.240 --> 00:16:11.020 confrontation on this issue came at the October 1778 meeting of the Vermont General Assembly. 138 00:16:11.020 --> 00:16:16.160 A furious struggle ensued between the West Side leadership, which warned that the entire 139 00:16:16.160 --> 00:16:21.920 Our United States would crush Vermont unless the New Hampshire towns were relinquished, 140 00:16:21.920 --> 00:16:28.920 and the Eastsiders and the towns themselves, which bravely clung to the union of both banks 141 00:16:28.960 --> 00:16:35.960 of the Connecticut River. The Westsiders won at the last minute, ejecting the river towns 142 00:16:35.960 --> 00:16:42.640 from Vermont, at which the great bulk of the Eastsiders walked out and threatened secession 143 00:16:42.640 --> 00:16:45.880 to form the college state. 144 00:16:45.880 --> 00:16:51.920 Radicalism was also triumphant in Georgia, where it was led by artisans and others in 145 00:16:51.920 --> 00:16:59.640 the Liberty Society of Savannah, by back country farmers and by such wealthy planters as Button 146 00:16:59.640 --> 00:17:04.160 Gwinnett, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. 147 00:17:04.160 --> 00:17:12.280 The temporary constitution of April 1776 was succeeded by a similar permanent constitution 148 00:17:12.280 --> 00:17:23.280 The Legislature was unicameral and any hint of executive or oligarchic judicial rule was systematically checked in advance. 149 00:17:23.280 --> 00:17:32.280 A governor and council were chosen by the legislature for brief terms and had no veto power and negligible executive power. 150 00:17:32.280 --> 00:17:40.280 The judges were to be chosen by the legislature and were removable at any time. Court fees were strictly limited. 151 00:17:40.280 --> 00:17:49.280 An important libertarian and democratic feature of the Georgia Constitution was the elevation of the powers of juries. 152 00:17:49.280 --> 00:17:59.280 Special jurors were to be judges of law as well as of fact, and were to exercise judicial review on interpreting the Constitution. 153 00:17:59.280 --> 00:18:08.280 In this way, judicial oligarchies would be kept strictly subordinate to the cross-section of the people embodied in the juries. 154 00:18:08.280 --> 00:18:15.960 and the juries entail in primogeniture those hallmarks of feudalism were abolished and 155 00:18:15.960 --> 00:18:21.960 nearly all local officials were to be elected by the local communities themselves. 156 00:18:21.960 --> 00:18:26.640 Here was a radical constitution to rank with Pennsylvania and Vermont. 157 00:18:26.640 --> 00:18:32.760 A conservative element was the restoration of a property qualification for voting amounting 158 00:18:32.760 --> 00:18:38.880 According to a valuation of 10 pounds with higher qualifications for representatives. 159 00:18:38.880 --> 00:18:43.480 With respect to religion, voting was limited to Protestants. 160 00:18:43.480 --> 00:18:49.120 The Anglican church was disestablished and clergymen were barred from being members of 161 00:18:49.120 --> 00:18:51.200 the legislature. 162 00:18:51.200 --> 00:18:58.000 Voting was established by secret ballot and legislative representation was to be by population. 163 00:18:58.000 --> 00:19:04.680 No longer would Savannah and the coast be allowed to dominate the back country. 164 00:19:04.680 --> 00:19:11.920 During the winter of 1776-77, the conservative South Carolina legislature, apparently eager 165 00:19:11.920 --> 00:19:18.440 to scotch Georgian radicalism, proposed a merger between the two states, but the Georgians 166 00:19:18.440 --> 00:19:21.040 angrily refused. 167 00:19:21.040 --> 00:19:28.480 South Carolina came under an ultra-conservative constitution of March 1776 under the aegis 168 00:19:28.480 --> 00:19:31.680 of the large planter aristocracy. 169 00:19:31.680 --> 00:19:38.160 The conservative Rutledge's and Henry Lauren's were the effective rulers of the new state. 170 00:19:38.160 --> 00:19:44.120 The radicals, led by Christopher Gadsden and William Henry Drayton, led a drive for reform 171 00:19:44.120 --> 00:20:07.120 This new constitution was considerably more liberal. The president lost his veto power, the upper house was now elective, and suffrage was extended to those owning property equivalent in value to 50 acres of land. 172 00:20:07.120 --> 00:20:18.120 However, property qualifications for office holding remained enormous, and apportionment still weighed heavily in favor of the low country planters. 173 00:20:18.120 --> 00:20:27.120 In an important liberal step, the Anglican church was disestablished and all sects declared equal before the law. 174 00:20:27.120 --> 00:20:36.120 But, on the other hand, Protestantism in general was declared the official religion of the state, and churches were subject to state control. 175 00:20:36.120 --> 00:20:43.320 The ultra-conservative President John Rutledge tried to veto the new constitution, but he 176 00:20:43.320 --> 00:20:46.040 was forced to retire from his post. 177 00:20:46.040 --> 00:20:52.580 The radicals were unexpectedly deprived of political victory when Gadsden abandoned the 178 00:20:52.580 --> 00:20:59.220 radical camp in exchange for the vice presidency and later the lieutenant governorship of the 179 00:20:59.220 --> 00:21:07.220 Allowing Rutledge to return in late 1778 to be the first governor under the new Constitution. 180 00:21:07.220 --> 00:21:18.220 Gadsden's split with his mass base became apparent when he extended the deadline for taking the mass test oath of loyalty to the American cause. 181 00:21:18.220 --> 00:21:28.220 The radical mechanics of Charleston had zealously been imposing the oath and causing the departure of many Tories into English territory. 182 00:21:28.220 --> 00:21:47.220 The Radical Mechanics rioted against him in early June 1778, and from then on, the spokesmen for radicalism were the leaders of the June riot, Dr. John Budd, the lawyer Henry Perrineau and the lawyer and merchant Joshua Ward. 183 00:21:47.220 --> 00:21:59.220 In North Carolina, a furious struggle in April 1776 between radicals and conservatives over a constitution had resulted in deadlock. 184 00:21:59.220 --> 00:22:05.220 The elections of October were fought furiously and riots abounded in the back country. 185 00:22:05.220 --> 00:22:13.220 The best known leaders of the state, such as Gabriel Johnston and William Hooper, were firmly in the conservative camp. 186 00:22:13.220 --> 00:22:22.220 John Adams' ultra-conservative Thoughts on Government was widely circulated in the state and became the handbook of the conservative cause. 187 00:22:22.220 --> 00:22:32.220 Hooper attacked democracy and called for the near perfection of the British Constitution, under which the selected few could rule. 188 00:22:32.220 --> 00:22:40.220 Hooper was livid about the Pennsylvania Constitution and the danger of a similar document emerging in North Carolina. 189 00:22:40.220 --> 00:22:51.720 Typical expressions of radical sentiment were the instructions to the convention delegates by Mecklenburg and Orange counties, widely separated back country districts. 190 00:22:51.720 --> 00:23:02.720 The Mecklenburg instructions were written by John M. Alexander and Waitstill Avery, drafters of the seminal Mecklenburg Resolves of 1775. 191 00:23:02.720 --> 00:23:06.720 The Orange instructions were drafted by Thomas Burke. 192 00:23:06.720 --> 00:23:18.720 These instructions made clear that supreme power belongs to the people and that any representatives have only strictly subordinate and inferior power. 193 00:23:18.720 --> 00:23:26.720 Mecklenburg asked its representatives to be as democratic and anti-aristocratic as possible. 194 00:23:26.720 --> 00:23:37.720 The radical program favored separation of powers, but not the atoms in separation of creating agencies unaccountable to the electorate. 195 00:23:37.720 --> 00:23:53.720 The radical means were such devices as the abolition of plural office-holding, frequent elections, unicameralism or popular election of any upper house, local election of county officials and so forth. 196 00:23:53.720 --> 00:24:03.720 In short, the checks and separations were to be exercised by the people themselves, not by a newly created autarkic organ of government. 197 00:24:03.720 --> 00:24:14.720 Other prominent radical leaders were Thomas Person, a wealthy landowner and former regulator leader of Granville County in the interior, 198 00:24:14.720 --> 00:24:22.720 John Penn, also of Granville County, and Willie Jones of Halifax County, one of the wealthiest men in the state. 199 00:24:22.720 --> 00:24:30.720 On the other hand, Willie's brother, Allen, also a wealthy landowner, was one of the leaders of the right wing. 200 00:24:30.720 --> 00:24:37.480 The newly elected Provincial Congress of North Carolina finally passed a constitution on 201 00:24:37.480 --> 00:24:46.120 December 18, 1776, that embodied a compromise between right and left forces. 202 00:24:46.120 --> 00:24:51.560 The legislature was to be bicameral, but both houses and the governor were to be elected 203 00:24:51.560 --> 00:24:53.120 by the people. 204 00:24:53.120 --> 00:24:57.080 The executive, furthermore, had little power. 205 00:24:57.080 --> 00:25:02.480 Many court judges were to be elected by the people of the counties themselves, all taxpayers 206 00:25:02.480 --> 00:25:08.320 could vote for the assembly, and all householders paid poll taxes. 207 00:25:08.320 --> 00:25:14.640 Qualifications for the Senate were a bit more restrictive, 50-acre freeholders, but not 208 00:25:14.640 --> 00:25:16.840 substantially so. 209 00:25:16.840 --> 00:25:24.120 Plural office-holding was abolished, ensuring a democratic separation of power, and entails 210 00:25:24.120 --> 00:25:27.720 and Imprisonment for Debt were abolished. 211 00:25:27.720 --> 00:25:34.120 And even though only Protestants could hold public office, the Anglican Church was disestablished 212 00:25:34.120 --> 00:25:37.220 and no other put in its place. 213 00:25:37.220 --> 00:25:42.920 On the other hand, property qualifications for becoming representatives or senators were 214 00:25:42.920 --> 00:25:48.120 substantial and quite large for the office of governor. 215 00:25:48.120 --> 00:25:54.080 Human Action continued to discriminate against populous towns and counties, that is, largely 216 00:25:54.080 --> 00:26:00.880 against the Piedmont in favor of the Tidewater areas. Justices of the peace, the keystone 217 00:26:00.880 --> 00:26:07.560 of despotic local oligarchies in the South, continued to be appointed by the governor 218 00:26:07.560 --> 00:26:13.940 and were exempt from the laws against plural office-holding. Also appointed by the state 219 00:26:13.940 --> 00:26:20.700 were local sheriffs, coroners and constables, so the local courthouse rings continued in 220 00:26:20.700 --> 00:26:22.140 business. 221 00:26:22.140 --> 00:26:28.940 The radicals headed by Willie Jones in person soon proved able, for the most part, to control 222 00:26:28.940 --> 00:26:36.300 the new North Carolina legislature, and Thomas Person continually urged lower taxes and a 223 00:26:36.300 --> 00:26:39.380 lower salary for the governor. 224 00:26:39.380 --> 00:26:45.420 The tightly-knit Maryland Oligarchy passed a highly conservative state constitution in 225 00:26:45.420 --> 00:26:54.000 November 1776, but with some concessions to the radicals in the western part of the state. 226 00:26:54.000 --> 00:27:00.020 The high property qualifications were made very slightly lower than before. 227 00:27:00.020 --> 00:27:04.680 Property requirements for the top officeholders were, of course, much higher than that. 228 00:27:04.680 --> 00:27:10.960 The Anglican Church was disestablished, although room was left for a general tax for support 229 00:27:10.960 --> 00:27:17.740 of all Protestant sects. Other liberal provisions were strong prohibitions against plural office 230 00:27:17.740 --> 00:27:23.080 holding by members of the legislature, election of sheriffs by the people of the counties 231 00:27:23.080 --> 00:27:31.360 themselves, rotation in office, and an end to poll taxes. A new and extremely conservative 232 00:27:31.360 --> 00:27:37.360 The alternative way of selecting the Senate, however, was instigated by Charles Carroll of Carrollton. 233 00:27:37.360 --> 00:27:47.360 The members were to be chosen for five-year terms by an elected electoral college who would choose 15 senators from among themselves. 234 00:27:47.360 --> 00:27:57.360 Interim vacancies would be filled by the Senate itself. Thus the Senate was to be virtually unchecked by popular control. 235 00:27:57.360 --> 00:28:09.360 This reactionary measure drew the later praise of such presumably moderate conservatives as Jefferson and Madison, as well as from such ultra-conservatives as Alexander Hamilton. 236 00:28:09.360 --> 00:28:20.360 It influenced the U.S. Constitution in the indirect election of senators, and perhaps in the Presidential Electoral College as well. 237 00:28:20.360 --> 00:28:38.360 Agitation from the western counties and from Anne Arundel County near Baltimore for liberalized suffrage, the latter for votes to all native-born freemen, was beaten back, ensuring unshaken control of the state by the oligarchy. 238 00:28:38.360 --> 00:28:49.360 Moves for local election of militia officers by their men and for local elections of justices of the peace and county clerks were also defeated. 239 00:28:49.360 --> 00:29:03.360 Neighbouring Delaware also came under the control of the conservative forces, although its constitution, passed in September 1776, was moderately conservative and undistinctive. 240 00:29:03.360 --> 00:29:19.360 Independence advocate Caesar Rodney, the man who saved the day for Delaware's vote on independence, was defeated as delegate to the Constitutional Convention, at which the lead was taken by the opponent of independence, George Reid. 241 00:29:19.360 --> 00:29:26.480 The Constitution established a powerful council as upper house with the right to veto legislation. 242 00:29:26.480 --> 00:29:32.640 A privy council was to be elected by the legislature to advise the similarly elected president 243 00:29:32.640 --> 00:29:34.040 of the state. 244 00:29:34.040 --> 00:29:40.840 A Christian test oath was required of all legislators, but any religious establishment 245 00:29:40.840 --> 00:29:46.480 was forbidden and clergymen were barred from civil office. 246 00:29:46.480 --> 00:29:50.860 The further importation of slaves was also forbidden. 247 00:29:50.860 --> 00:29:57.240 The most distinctive feature of Delaware's constitution was its formulation by a special 248 00:29:57.240 --> 00:30:03.120 constitutional convention, separate from the ordinary legislature. 249 00:30:03.120 --> 00:30:09.400 Delaware was the first state to adopt this procedure of making constitutions. 250 00:30:09.400 --> 00:30:16.000 In New Hampshire, the radicals, predominant in the western towns, objected bitterly to 251 00:30:16.000 --> 00:30:24.960 to the conservative temporary constitution of early 1776 and agitated for a new constitution. 252 00:30:24.960 --> 00:30:30.680 The abolition of property qualifications and of the upper house veto and provision for 253 00:30:30.680 --> 00:30:39.360 fair proportionate representation, lower taxation and a bill of rights were some of their demands. 254 00:30:39.360 --> 00:30:47.120 We have seen that these western towns decided to secede and join Vermont, only to be finally 255 00:30:47.120 --> 00:30:49.120 rebuffed. 256 00:30:49.120 --> 00:30:54.280 Radical polity in New Hampshire was seen in the unique provision of election of delegates 257 00:30:54.280 --> 00:31:01.280 to the Continental Congress by the voters themselves rather than by the legislature. 258 00:31:01.280 --> 00:31:08.640 Finally in 1778, a convention was called and a constitution proposed the following year, 259 00:31:08.640 --> 00:31:14.480 But the provision that three-fourths of the voters had to ratify the new constitution 260 00:31:14.480 --> 00:31:16.400 ensured its defeat.