Page 126 - American Stories, A History of the United States

clash of Political cultures
4.1

4.4 Why were eighteenth-century colonial assemblies not fully democratic?
4.2
t he political history of the eighteenth century illuminates a growing tension 4.3

within the empire. Americans of all regions repeatedly stated their desire to
replicate British political institutions. Parliament, they claimed, provided a
model for the American assemblies. Although England has never had a for-
mal written constitution, it did develop over the centuries a system of legal checks
and balances that, in theory at least, kept the monarch from becoming a tyrant. The 4.4
colonists claimed that this unwritten constitution preserved their rights and liberties.
However, the more the colonists studied British political theory and practice—in other
words, the more they attempted to become British—the more aware they became of 4.5
major differences.

Governing the colonies: the American experience
The colonists assumed—perhaps naively—that their own governments were modeled
on Britain’s balanced constitution. They argued that within their political systems, the
governor corresponded to the king and the governor’s council to the House of Lords.
They saw colonial assemblies as American reproductions of the House of Commons
and expected them to preserve the people’s interests against those of the monarch and
aristocracy. As the colonists discovered, however, general theories about a mixed con-
stitution were even less relevant in America than they were in Britain.
By midcentury, most of the mainland colonies had royal governors appointed
by the crown. Many of these governors were career army officers who through luck,
charm, or family connection had gained the ear of someone close to the king. These
patronage posts did not generate enough income to interest the most powerful or tal-
ented personalities of the period, but they did draw mid-level bureaucrats who were
ambitious, desperate, or both. It is perhaps not surprising that most governors decided
simply not to “consider any Thing further than how to sit easy.”
Whatever their demerits, royal governors possessed enormous powers. In fact,
they could do things in America that a king could not do in eighteenth-century
Britain, such as veto legislation and dismiss judges. The governors also served as
military commanders in each province.
Political practice in America differed from the British model in another crucial
respect. Royal governors were advised by a council, usually a body of about 12 wealthy
colonists selected by the Board of Trade in London on the recommendation of the
governor. During the seventeenth century, the council had played an important role
in colonial government, but its ability to exercise independent authority declined dur-
ing the eighteenth century. Its members did not represent a distinct aristocracy within
American society the way the House of Lords did in Britain.
If royal governors did not look like kings, nor American councils look like the
House of Lords, colonial assemblies bore little resemblance to the eighteenth-century
House of Commons. The major difference was the size of the American franchise. In
most colonies, adult white males who owned a little land could vote in colonywide
elections. One historian estimates that 95 percent of this group in Massachusetts were
eligible to vote. In Virginia it was about 85 percent. These figures—much higher than
those in contemporary England—have led scholars to view the colonies as “middle-
class democracies,” societies run by moderately prosperous yeomen farmers who—in
politics at least—exercised independent judgment. There were too many of them to
bribe, no “rotten” boroughs with few or no voters as there were in Britain, and when
these people moved west, colonial assemblies usually created new electoral districts to
represent them.
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