trine of conformity to royal commands and parliamentary enactments even when these were injurious to colonial interests. There were many other causes leading to the feelings and expressions of independence common to New England. One of these was the habit of New England people of working with their own hands; labor was honorable as well as necessary. The fundamental character of the citizen of New England was his respect for honorable work. He was an industrial as well as a political being. Slavery did not prosper in New England, although it was introduced there. Vermont alone of all the American colonies had no slaves during its entire history. But king and parliament opposed the idea that the New England colonies should in any way govern themselves. This ill-feeling increased rapidly toward the close of the eighteenth century, and was a prominent cause of the Revolution. The New England people, however, were quite as intolerant as many of the people of the South. They refused Roman Catholics the rights of freemen; they restricted those rights to church-members of their own peculiar faith; they even persecuted men and women of opinions different from their own. But after a century of experience they began to see that the rights of men and women were not to be construed according to the notions of New England people. By the time the French and Indian War was over the people of New England had become more liberal in their views. The Declaration of Independence was written by Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, but it was defended by John Adams of Massachusetts. The two colonies and their people were learning the lessons of political wisdom in the same schoolAmerican experience.

91. New York.-In New York the Dutch West India Company began a settlement along the Hudson River, but the province soon came under English control. The only permanent political effect of the Dutch settlement was the

creation of several vast landed estates along the Hudson and the Mohawk rivers, which caused some anti-rent troubles in the first half of the nineteenth century. New York was largely settled from New England, and was the first colony to illustrate the law of population in this country, that the people of the East have become the people of the West-a great social fact of government. New York was destined to lead all the American States in this westward movement. The laws of New York were modelled after those of New England. The town became the political unit. The freemen of the town chose the overseers and the other officers of the town. The overseers made local laws. The parish had no political significance in New York, as it had in Virginia and in Massachusetts. Industrial and commercial interests early directed the customs and the laws of the province. The harbor of New York has received the opinions as well as the commerce of the world. The tripartite government was familiar to the experience of the colony, and with the exception of the union of Church and State the civil affairs of New York were modelled after the already established jurisdictions to which the people of Massachusetts and of Virginia were subject. The royal governor, the two houses of assembly, the appointed courts of justice, distinguish the colony but slightly from the Northern or from the Southern type. Industrial prosperity from its earliest history caused New York to organize a compact and self-sustaining colonial life, which had the effect almost of independence, if not of separation from the remaining colonies. But the people of the colony were always accustomed to choose their local officers and the members of their lower house of assembly. There was up to the Revolution an increasing dissatisfaction in New York with the policy of England in attempting to restrict the industrial rights of the colonies.

92. Pennsylvania was a proprietary government with a legislative assembly elected by the people. An execu

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tive council to assist the governor was also elected, but it did not constitute an upper house as in Virginia. This colony was the only one in America in which the system of having two legislative houses did not prevail. The electors and the officers of the province from 1703 until 1776 were required to profess their belief in certain religious doctrines and to possess property and pay taxes. The people found the proprietary government burdensome, and gladly joined in the Revolution. The system of local government that gradually grew up in Pennsylvania continues in substance to the present day. The township became the unit of measure; the county entrusted its interests to three commissioners; the assembly passed local laws. Pennsylvania was little influenced by New England. It stood geographically and politically between the independence and industry of New England, and the ideas growing out of the union of Church and State, and the system of slavery prevailing in the South. In Pennsylvania labor was honorable, slavery was legal, and the spirit of independence was slow but strong. Like New York, the material interests developed very early, and gave to the colony an industrial character which as a State it has long maintained.

93. Delaware and New Jersey became royal provinces with a government similar to that of New York. Electors were required to be land-owners and to profess certain religious doctrines. The people became dissatisfied with the restrictions upon their rights, and were among the first of the colonies to advocate revolutionary measures. The interests of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware were industrially sufficiently alike to group these colonies together, and they assumed a character peculiar to themselves. The parish was distinctly felt as a social and political force in the South; the township was so felt in New England. But in the Middle colonies the rural character of Southern life and the marine interests that almost dominated New England life had no