302 XV. EMIGRANTS TO NEW NETHERLANDS. CHAP. The hurricane of persecution, which was to sweep Protestantism from the earth, did not spare their seclusion; mothers with infants were rolled down the rocks, and the bones of martyrs scattered on the Alpine 1656. mountains. Was there no asylum for the pious Wal19. denses? The city of Amsterdam offered the fugitives a free passage to America, and a welcome reception was prepared in New Netherlands for the few who were willing to emigrate. Dec. The persecuted of every creed and every clime were invited to the colony. When the Protestant churches in Rochelle were razed, the Calvinists of that city were gladly admitted; and the French Protestants came in such numbers, that the public documents were sometimes issued in French as well as in Dutch and English. Troops of orphans were sometimes shipped for the milder destinies of the New World; a free passage was offered to mechanics; for "population was known to be the bulwark of every state." The government of New Netherlands had formed just ideas of the fit materials for building a commonwealth; they desired "farmers and laborers, foreigners and exiles, men inured to toil and penury." The colony increased; children swarmed in every village; the new year and the month of May were welcomed with noisy. frolics new modes of activity were devised; lumber was shipped to France; the whale pursued off the coast; the vine, the mulberry, planted; flocks of sheep as well as cattle were multiplied; and tile, so long 1 Albany Records, iv. 223. Lam- so many. On a later occasion, 6 4 2 Albany Records, xiv. 233; iv. 425, 461; xviii. 295. 3 Ibid. xviii. 35; viii. 143. 6 Ibid. iv. 91, 73, 92, 260, 326. Vander Donk, c. xiv. AFRICANS IN NEW NETHERLANDS. 303 XV. imported from Holland,' began to be manufactured CHAP. near Fort Orange. New Amsterdam could, in a few years, boast of stately buildings, and almost vied with 1664 Boston. "This happily-situated province," said its inhabitants, "may become the granary of our Fatherland; should our Netherlands be wasted by grievous wars, it will offer our countrymen a safe retreat; by God's blessing, we shall in a few years become a mighty people." Thus did various nations of the Caucasian race assist in colonizing our central states. The African also had his portion on the Hudson. The West India Company, which sometimes transported Indian captives to the West Indies, having large establishments on the coast of Guinea, at an early day introduced negroes 1626. into Manhattan, and continued the negro slave-trade without remorse. We have seen Elizabeth of England a partner in the commerce, of which the Stuarts, to the days of Queen Anne, were distinguished patrons; the city of Amsterdam3 did not blush to own shares in a slave-ship, to advance money for the outfits, and to participate in the returns. In proportion to population, New York had imported as many Africans as Virginia. 1664. That New York is not a slave-state like Carolina, is due to climate, and not to the superior humanity of its founders. Stuyvesant was instructed to use every exertion to promote the sale of negroes. They were imported sometimes by way of the West Indies, often directly from Guinea, and were sold at public auction to the highest bidder." The average price was less than 1 Albany Records, xiv. 21; iv. 93; iii. 2. 2 Ibid. xviii. 193. 3 Ibid. viii. 383. 4 Ibid. xxii. 308, 244; xviii. 116, 272, 299; xiii. 340. 4 5 8 5 Albany Records, iv. 371. 6 Ibid. iv. 2; viii. 14. The Rec- 304 FIRST STRUGGLE FOR THE POWER OF THE PEOPLE. XV. CHAP. one hundred and forty dollars. The monopoly of the traffic was not strictly enforced; and a change of policy sometimes favored the export of negroes to the English The enfranchised negro might become a colonies.1 3 With the Africans came the African institution of abject slavery; the large emigrations from Connecticut engrafted on New Netherlands the Puritan idea of popular freedom. There were so many English at Manhattan as to require an English secretary, preachers who could speak in English as well as in Dutch, and a publication of civil ordinances in English. Whole towns had been settled by New England men, who, having come to America to serve God with a pure conscience, and desiring to provide for the outward comforts and souls' welfare of their posterities, planted New England liberties in a Congregational way, with the consent, and under the jurisdiction of the Dutch.* Their presence and their activity foretold a revolution. In the Fatherland, the power of the people was unknown; in New Netherlands, the necessities of the colony had given it a twilight existence, and delegates from the Dutch towns, at first twelve, then perhaps 1642. eight in number, had mitigated the arbitrary authority of Kieft. There was no distinct concession of legislative power to the people; but the people had, without a teacher, become convinced of the right of resistance. 1644. The brewers refused to pay an arbitrary excise: "Were Aug. 18. we to yield," said they, "we should offend the eight men, and the whole commonalty." The large proprietaries did not favor popular freedom; the commander 1644. of Renselaer Stein had even raised a battery, that "the 1 Albany Records, iv. 333, 172, 371, 456 ; xix. 26; xi. 35. 2 Ibid. xxii. 331. But compare ii. 242. 3 Albany Records, iv. 74. FIRST STRUGGLE FOR THE POWER OF THE PEOPLE. 305 XV. canker of freemen" might not enter the manor; but CHAP. the patrons cheerfully joined the free boors in resisting arbitrary taxation. As a compromise, it was proposed 1647. that, from a double nomination by the villages, the governor should appoint tribunes, to act as magistrates in trivial cases, and as agents for the towns, to give their opinion whenever they should be, consulted. Town-meetings were absolutely prohibited.1 to Discontents increased. Vander Donk and others were charged with leaving nothing untried to abjure what they called the galling yoke of an arbitrary gov- 1649 ernment. A commission repaired to Holland for 1652. redress; as farmers, they claimed the liberties essential 1650. to the prosperity of agriculture; as merchants, they protested against the intolerable burden of the customs; and when redress was refused, tyranny was followed by its usual consequence-clandestine associations against oppression. The excess of complaint obtained for New Amsterdam a court of justice like that of the 1652. April metropolis; but the municipal liberties included no 4. political franchise; the sheriff3 was appointed by the governor; the two burgomasters and five schepens made a double nomination of their own successors, from which "the valiant director himself elected the board." The city had privileges, not the citizens. The province gained only the municipal liberties, on which rested the commercial aristocracy of Holland. Citizenship was a commercial privilege, and not a political enfranchisement. It was not much more than a license to trade. 5 306 CHAP. XV. FIRST STRUGGLE FOR THE POWER OF THE PEOPLE. The system was at war with Puritan usages; the Dutch in the colony readily caught the idea of relying 1653. on themselves; and the persevering restlessness of the Nov. people led to a general assembly of two deputies from to each village in New Netherlands; an assembly which Stuyvesant was unwilling to sanction, and could not prevent. As in Massachusetts, this first convention' sprung from the will of the people; and it claimed the right of Dec. deliberating on the civil condition of the country. Dec. "The States General of the United Provinces "— such was the remonstrance and petition, drafted by George Baxter, and unanimously adopted by the convention" are our liege lords; we submit to the laws of the United Provinces; and our rights and privileges ought to be in harmony with those of the Fatherland, for we are a member of the state, and not a subjugated people. We, who have come together from various parts of the world, and are a blended community of various lineage; we, who have, at our own expense, exchanged our native lands for the protection of the United Provinces; we, who have transformed the wilderness into fruitful farms,-demand, that no new laws shall be enacted but with consent of the people, that none shall be appointed to office but with the approbation of the people, that obscure and obsolete laws shall never be revived."2 Stuyvesant was taken by surprise. He had never had faith in "the wavering multitude;" and doubts of man's capacity for self-government dictated his reply. "Will you set your names to the visionary notions 1 The original is Lantdag. Dutch Records, 2. 2 Albany Records, ix. 28-33. I have selected and compressed the prominent points. Every word will, I trust, be found to be sanctioned by the Dutch originals. Of course |