The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1915-07-03

propr1etors and the government at
home bestirred themselves to enforce
the Fundamental Constitutions and
the laws of trade.
1t was no mere perverseness of
temper or mere love of license that
set the colonists so stubbornly against
the plans and the authority of their
governors. It was rather their prac-
teal sense and their knowledge of
their own necessities. Virginia her
self, for all she was so much older,
so staid and loyal, was moved to re- |
volt almost as easily as Albemarle |
and Charlestown when put upon more |
grossly than she could bear. She was |
herself in rebellion at the very time |
the men at Albemarle were openly de-
flying their governor to put into force |
among them the laws which forbade
their trade with the Indies.
Virginians had seen their burdens
and their grievances against the gov
eminent alike of their governor and
of the King grow ominously heavier
and heavier ever since the Restora-
ton, which they had once deemed so
4
dition in which they found themselves
seemed quite intolerable.
Sir William Berkeley was no long
er the manly, approachable gentle
man he had been in the earlier time
OF his first governorship-bluff and
wiful, but neither bitter nor brutal.
The long days of his enforced retire
Iment, while the commonwealth stood
(1652-1660), had soured his temper
and alienated him from the life of the
colony; and he had come out of it to
take up the government again, not a
Vlrg1nlan, like the chief Cavalier
gentlemen about him, who now ac-
counted Virginia their home and
neighborhood, but harsh and arbi
trary servant of the crown and of his
own interests, ready to fall into
rage at the slightest contradiction,
suave only when he meant to strike.
The change was not obvious at
first; but it became evident enough
ere long. The King recommended
mere place hunters and adventurers
to Sir William for appointment in
Virginia, wishing to be rid of them,
or to pay his personal obligations at
Virginia's cost. Sir William put them
in office in the colony, and along with
them his own friends, hnsmen, and
favorites, until councillors, sheriffs,
magistrates, surveyors, customs
clerks, the whole civil service of Vir-
) ginia, seemed body of covetous
placemen who meant to thrive
Z whether justice were done and the
. laws kept or not.
a Nor was that the worst of it. It
was next to impossible for the small
planter, or for any man who did not
' thrive exceedingly, to pay the grow
) ing taxes and the innumerable petty
exactions which were demanded of
a him to pay these men, satisfy the
:. Kings collectors, and maintain the
: expensive government of the COLONY
n The Navigation Acts forbade the
!. colonists to send their tobacco any.
:. where but to England, in English
: ships, and so the English shippers
!. could demand what freight they
! pleased and the English merchant:
; could buy the tobacco at such prices
: as suited them.
The same acts forbade any good!
n to be brought into the colonies ex
J. cept from England, and so the Eng
v lish merchants could exact what they
n chose for the supplies they sent AM
q the shippers could get their return
V freight charges. There was no coin il
j Virginia, or next to none; tobacco it
r self, her principal crop, served a.
q money, and when it was worth it'll
" and the goods it was used to paw TO
e, were worth great deal, it was har,
# to live at all, and poverty seemed
y. thing enacted and enforced.
= The restrictions put upon the car
rying trade had but the other da,
y been made complete in their kind. I
e. 1872 an act for the still "better Sc
If curing of the plantation trade" ha
ID forbidden even a coastwise trad
Is among the colonies themselve,
r, with the English Bermudas, in sugar
to tobacco, cotton, wool, indigo, or an
x other of the enumerated articles q
v the former acts, except they were frs
he SSAA AA1O 11uS idIluS OF PAID at Tn
al port of export the duties levied at tn
81 English wharves,
I'D AS II povery, and heavy taxes t
ne make it the more burdensome. wer
not enough, deep anxiety lest VIII
It ginia should lose even the forms G
t. her liberty was added, and finally wa
IN with the Indians, to make the meas
n ure full to overlooking.
ct 1t was useless to appeal to tn
%, House of Burgesses for a redress {
st grievances, because Sir william
IT, Berkeley would allow no election {
DIV a new House. For fifteen years /
o. kept alive the House which had bee
Id chosen in 1861, at the time of ii
n Restoration. It was made up {
it hearty partisans of the Kings go7
ce eminent, as was natural, having bee