"The Birthplace of American Independence, 1687"
that time, where they were aided and assisted by eminent political and religious leaders, careful to ward off the attacks of those who eagerly strove to curb the liberty of the American Puritans. Time and again did these zealous London friends furnish assistance, and, even when Parliament sent over its own Commissioners, the Massachusetts General Court contrived to baffle all attempts at subjugation until the final annulment of the famous Charter in 1684.
We can but admire the statesmanship shown by the hardy republicans of the Colony in tenaciously clinging to their own interpretation of their liberal Charter. It is, indeed, enough to assert that, as the sturdy Cromwellians in England, men of almost exactly the same faith, demonstrated to the world at large the tremendous power of the people, so the progressive and liberty-loving Puritans of Massachusetts Bay demonstrated, to the little world on its side of the Atlantic, the real value of the large share of independence enjoyed by them before their Charter was annulled by the British Court of Chancery, June 21, 1684.
Threatening clouds now began to appear. The British Government demanded that all of the old Colonial laws should be amended and reformed, that all new ones must provide one and one-half years for the scrutiny of the home Government, and that the Governor and principal officers should be appointed by the Crown.
During the fifty years of home rule the New England Colonists had made remarkable progress. They had been confederated together in 1641 for mutual protection against Indian raids. Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven had thus united with Massachusetts, and here we find the germ of our national confederation of a later date. These communities were bound together by almost the same ties of religion. However, the others were much more liberal and moderate than was Massachusetts, and they did not bring upon themselves so much of the hatred and fury of their British rulers as did Massachusetts Bay. They did not feel the loss of their Charters at the end of this period so seriously as did the larger Colony, and in the great struggle of 1687–1689 the brunt of the contest fell almost entirely on Massachusetts.
A dozen years prior to the annulment of the Charter Massachusetts Bay had gone through with a terrible struggle with the Narragansett and other Indians, who, under the lead of the barbarous Philip, caused the death of over five hundred persons. These Indians burned over five hundred houses and utterly destroyed thirteen towns. They brought the frontier to within forty miles of Boston and within fifteen miles of Ipswich. One-half a million dollars was the financial cost, all of it borne in New England mostly by Massachusetts, and, at the end
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