COLONIAL GOVERNMENT, Propri etary. The 16th and 17th centuries constituted a period of financial and economic wealcness in the English government and the proprietary colony was one of its results. When the Eng lish began their colonization enterprises the monarchy had to a great extent thrown off the evil influences of the feudalistic system, but its organization had not been brought to a state that would permit it entirely to dispense with feudalistic precedents. Hence the mon archy granted to individuals or groups of in dividuals extraordinary privileges in the hope and expectation that extraordinary returns would accrue to the go'vernment. Under the grant of 1584 by Queen Elizabeth to Sir Walter Raleigh, after a royalty of one-fifth of the gold and silver found had been paid to the Crown, the rights of the Crown amounted to little or nothing unless Raleigh or his assigns should "robbe or spoile by sea or by lande or do any acte of unjust or unlawful hostilitie to any of our subjects.* Power was given to Raleigh "to correct, punish, pardon, governe, and rule . . . as well in causes capital or criminall, as civil, both marine and other, . . . according to such statutes, lawes and ordinances as shall bee by him . . . devised or established.* The early grants were made to individuals but when these showed themselves incapable of producing results without outside assistance, those aiding the enterprises were included in the grants. The chartered company was an established fact in the commercial world and accordingly, when serious attempts at colonization were made, it was natural that an experiment was tried by giving collective proprietorship to the members of such a company. Since the collective proprietors would not possess the influence of a court favorite, the London and Plymouth charter of 1606 vested the supreme government in a council resident in England and named by the king, with ordinances and laws given under his signed manual; while the subordinate jurisdiction for the conduct of affairs in the colonies was committed to a council resident in America which was to act in accordance with the king's instructions. This system did not prove feasible and under the new Virginia charters of 1609 and 1612 full control of the colony was in effect given to the company, the stockholders choosing the supreme council from among their own mem bers and the power to legislate and govern the colony being made entirely independent of the king. The quarterly courts managed affairs in England while the governor looked after company interests in the colony. For a time harmony prevailed in the colony but abuses of pciwer and position by the governor, the growth of settlements and the lacic of any voice in the government led the colonists to demand a representative assembly, which convened at Jamestown 30 June 1619. Moreover the pat
entees in England began to quarrel among themselves, whereupon in 1624 the Crown can celed the charter of the Virginia Company and appropriated to itself the fruits of the labor of private individuals, thus establishing the first royal province in the country.
In 1632, therefore, when granting to Lord Baltimore the province of Maryland, the Crown returned to the practice of maldng individual grants and endeavored to reproduce in Amer ica the County Palatinates of Europe. Upon Baltimore and his heirs was conferred absolute proprietorship of the soil. The governmental powers bestowed are involved in some obscurity. On the one hand, the proprietor was given all the powers possessed, then or previously, by the bishop of Durham. Of itself, this was a very comprehensive grant, for the authority exercised in this northern palatinate by the dig nitary mentioned was little short of absolute. The effect of the grant was materially lessened, however, by subsequent clauses in the charter which imposed large limitations. Thus the laws and ordinances of the colony must not be repugnant to the laws of England; the laws must receive the consent of the freemen of the province; and no interpretation of the charter involving any impairrnent of the allegiance due the king should be permitted. Still it may be said that the independent powers of the pro prietor were very extensive. They included the malang of war and peace, the appointment of all officers, the enforcement of martial law, the pardoning of offenders and the conferring of titles of nobility. An interesting provision was that no tax should be levied by the Crown on any person or on any goods in the colony. The proprietor possessed full power to deter mine the colony's government. Baltimore planned the government to consist of a gov ernor, a council, appointed by the proprietor, and a primary assembly in which any freeman of the province might be present to speak and vote. With the growth of population the hold ing of a primary assembly became impracticable and in 1639 the assembly was made up mainly on the representative principle, with the hun dred as the electoral area. In 1647 the assembly was divided into two chambers, the lower con sisting of the elective burgesses, the upper of the councillors together with persons specially summoned by the proprietor. The suffrage, at first restricted, was broadened until the colony came to be rather more democratic than Vir ginia. Likewise the system of land tenure, originally aristocratic and based on the prin ciple of large semi-feudal estates, was modified until Maryland, as compared with all the other southern colonies, became a region of numerous small freeholders.