53. Turmoil in East New Jersey, 1678-1686

0:00Volume 1, Chapter 53, Turmoil in East New Jersey, 1678-1686 When Governor Edmund Andros returned in 1678 from his trip to England, he had decided that he had a mandate for sovereignty under the Duke of York over East New Jersey and West of New Jersey. The latent explosiveness of two contradictory charters for New Jersey had now erupted. In March 1680, Andros seized ships going to Elizabeth that had not paid customs fees in New York. He ordered Governor Philip Cotteret of East New Jersey to cease exercising jurisdiction and all the inhabitants to bow to his own authority as governor. Andros's This action was clearly stimulated by Cotterett's permitting all ships to trade freely in East New Jersey without paying customs duties in New York.

1:05In short, Andrus's aggressive actions were partly motivated by an attempt to secure a monopoly of trade for the New York port. Cotterett replied forthrightly that East New Jersey was subject to the proprietorship of of Sir George Cotterett and that East New Jersey would defend itself as best it could against any force by Andros. When the New York Council ordered the New Jersey towns to send representatives to a meeting at Woodbridge on April 7, the alarmed Cotterett countermanded the order and warned that he would arrest any emissaries of Andros as subversive spies In May, Andros issued a warrant for the arrest of Philip Carteret and a few of his leading By His Majesty's command that this government was established, and without the same command, we shall never be resigned, but with our lives and fortunes, the people resolving to live and die with the name of true subjects and not traitors.

2:09In May, Andros issued a warrant for the arrest of Philip Carteret and a few of his leading councillors for having presumed to assume and exercise authority and jurisdiction over with the King's Subjects Cotterett was seized, beaten, and tried before the New York Court of Assises. He defended himself vigorously and protested a court where the accuser, jailer, and judge were one. The jury, however, upset Andros's imperialist plans by acquitting Cotterett, a verdict they thrice persisted in, even under severe pressure from Andros. The court, however, ordered Cotterett to cease jurisdiction, and Andros and his council went to Elizabethtown to meet the deputies from Jersey. Edmund Andros had now assumed the governorship of East New Jersey. Addressing the meeting of the deputies in June 1680, he told them he forgave their trespasses against authority and suggested that they put the The assembly demanded that it be called annually, but Andros and his council retorted that an assembly could be called whenever Andros deemed it necessary. The assembly also asked Andros

3:34to confirm the privileges granted in the concessions and agreements, but the governor dismissed When the assembly kept pressing its request for confirmation of New Jersey liberties and provisions for regular meetings, Andros and his council preemptorily dissolved the New Jersey representative body. Philip Cotterett, not able to muster force against his powerful neighbor, was now in a doubly weak position. Sir George Cotterett had died, and his grandson One in heir, Sir George, did not have the old proprietor's influence at court. But resistance appeared among the people of New Jersey.

4:20In the July meeting at Woodbridge, the freeholders refused to obey Andros' order to nominate local magistrates for his approval. They insisted instead that their charter gave them the right to choose their own magistrates. A month later, Samuel Moore signed a further refusal by Woodbridge to obey the order, and Samuel Dennis refused Andros's appointment as court clerk. Moore was arrested and tried before Andros in the New York court. Upon recanting this error and promising good behavior, Moore was released. Two Jerseyites were also arrested for speaking words tending to disturb the peace. A transient surveyor, William Taylor, denounced Andros in the council as rogues and traitors and said that he would not be governed by such men. Taylor was arrested and, after recanting, dismissed on good behavior by Andros in his council. A laborer, John Curtis, arrested for similar seditious remarks, broke bail and disappeared.

5:29By late 1680, however, the Duke of York's political position in England had deteriorated, and he was anxious to avoid making further enemies at home. In November, the Duke informed Andros that the Jerseys were to be governed by their proprietors. Andros was shortly recalled as governor and returned to England. The Andros menace removed, Philip Cotterett, in early 1681, jubilantly countermanded Andros's usurpations and ordered the citizens of New Jersey to ignore the courts that New York had intended to operate there. But in his joy, Cotterett grew cocky and began to assert his authority aggressively, internally and externally.

6:18Externally, Carteret suddenly laid claim to Staten Island and ordered its citizens to obey him rather than New York. This question remained in the hands of the Duke of York. Meanwhile, Carteret faced far greater troubles at home. The Assembly, with the former anti-Andros seditionist John Curtis, a member, met in in October and took the opportunity to have a new regime to urge reaffirmation of the original concessions of 1665 without the oppressive amendments of the declarations of 1672 and 1674. These amendments had shifted many powers from the assembly to the appointed executive and had deprived the people of many of their liberties.

7:10Cotterette's old troubles with the people now resumed. Cotterette and his council bitterly attacked the assembly for its presumption. Once again, the lower house threw down the gauntlet, declaring that the inhabitants of New Jersey were not obliged to conform to these later declarations and instructions. The New Jersey rebellion was now in full bloom against Cotterette. The council now insisted that the deputies pay the governor's salary and also the past incurred quitterance to the proprietor, a request met with only scorn by the assembly. After several furious interchanges, the governor and council dissolved the assembly at the suggestion of Councilor Robert Vickers. To protest this disillusion, Edward Slater, deputy from the Piscataway, called a protest meeting that was invaded by two council members, Henry Greenland and Robert Vickers. The counselors accused Slater of sedition and of rendering Carteret and his government odious in the eyes and hearts of the people. They also accused Slater of trying to stir up mutiny, insurrection and open rebellion. Greenland and Vickers promptly had Slater arrested. They then tried Slater in their capacities as justices of

8:32of the Peace, and convicted him on their own testimony. This court was conducted on no legal grounds, yet the two judges sentenced Slater to a six-month term in prison. Vickers now urged Carteret to take full control of the colony by ignoring the requirement that the assembly establish the courts and by creating his own prerogative of Courts instead. New Jersey was now back to the appointed courts and the despotism of the 1666 through 73 era. Meanwhile, however, a great change in the government of East New Jersey was underway. The estate of Sir George Carteret sold the proprietorship of East New Jersey at auction in February 1682 to a group of twelve men, eleven of them quaint.

9:28Quakers, headed by the eminent William Penn, for 3,400 pounds. In August, the Twelve expanded the partnership to 24, including 10 more Quakers, and this patent was reconfirmed by the Duke of York the following March. Thus, by the end of 1682, Quakers, though still periodically in England, owned the colonies of East New Jersey, West New Jersey, and the extensive new territory on the west bank of the upper Delaware known as Pennsylvania, granted by King Charles II to William Penn in March 1681. However, with Quakers already settled In West New Jersey and prepared to pour into Pennsylvania, East New Jersey was not a likely field for Quaker settlement. There were Quaker groups at Shrewsbury and Middletown, but most other Jersey towns were ardently Puritan. With the English Quakers immigrating to Pennsylvania and West New Jersey, the leading role in East New Jersey was taken by the Scots among the Proprietors, particularly by young Robert Barclay and his prominent non-Quaker relatives, the Arch-Royalist James Drummond, Earl of Percy, and his brother, John Drummond, the

10:59Viscount Melfort. An eminent Quaker, Barclay was a close friend of the Duke of York and was appointed Governor of East New Jersey in the fall of 1682. Barclay immediately began and to organize Scottish settlements in East New Jersey and to remodel the government of the colony. Many leading Scots were induced to buy fractional proprietorships in the colony. Eventually, Scots formed a majority of the proprietary ownership. The proprietors appointed the prominent English Quaker lawyer, Thomas Rudyard, one of the proprietors and a close Rudyard arrived in Jersey to take office in November of 1682. The proprietors instructed Rudyard to convey to the Jersey citizens the welcome news of the confirming of their rights granted to them by the concessions of 1665.

11:58The proprietors adopted the fundamental constitutions, a highly complex and overblown constitution for the colony, which would have granted great powers to themselves, voting by proxy in the East New Jersey Council. But the fundamental constitutions was never put into effect, not only because it was rejected by the Assembly, but also because it was even turned down by the Deputy Governor and his Council. The assembly called into being again met frequently during Governor Rudyard's rule in 1683. All sides were determined to be conciliatory and to undo the influence of the despotic Carteret clique. As a result, the court proceedings since late 1681 were voided and the leaders of the Carteret clique, Robert Vickers, who had been Secretary of the Colony, Henry Greenland, Samuel Edsel and Robert Vauquelin, former Surveyor General, were debarred from all public office.

13:03Edward Slater now took the opportunity to sue Vickers for trespass, false arrest, and imprisonment. He collected 45 pounds in damages. Vickers was also convicted of keeping fraudulent records and was fined and imprisoned until payment of the fine. But despite the harmony In the colony of Council and Assembly, in ridding the colony of the influence of the Cotterett clique, divisions between deputies and ruling council again emerged and deepened during 1683. The deputies urged the right of each town to adopt local ordinances without being subject to veto by the governor and council, and the similar right to impose local Taxes. Furthermore, Middletown and Shrewsbury again raised the question of the old nickels patents and claimed that by these they were exempt from paying quit rents to the new proprietors.

14:05Roger and the Council rejected these claims and considerable friction developed over them. The towns and the deputies also vainly objected to the continuation of the compulsory militia, A provision of the Declaration of 1672. In each case, as before, the deputies assumed the role of libertarian opposition to the existing regime. However, the assembly did create a regular judicial system. The law code continued the Puritan outlawing of such deviations as stage plays, games, dances, drunkenness, and profaning the Sabbath. Here the Anglican Council played a more liberal role than did the Puritan deputies. The Council reduced the penalty for not attending church services. The Council also declared itself for liberty of conscience and against compulsory worship.

15:03By the end of 1683, Governor Rudyard had incurred the displeasure of the proprietors, largely because Rudyard and the Council, eager to attract settlers to East New Jersey, failed to adhere to the clause in the concessions reserving one-seventh of the lands to the proprietors. Samuel Groom, one of the Quaker proprietors, had been sent out with Rudyard to serve under him as Surveyor General of the colony. Groom now insisted on the land Reservation, and was quickly dismissed by Rudyard. Rudyard's firing of groom led to his own dismissal and replacement toward the end of 1683 by the Quaker, Gawin, Larry, lately become one of the proprietors. By the end of 1684, enough of the proprietors, particularly the Scots, had immigrated to East New Jersey that the governing proprietor's interest in in the colony, especially in land matters, was transferred to the fourteen resident proprietors, forming the Board of Proprietors of East New Jersey.

16:15The Board was empowered to deal with all matters concerning proprietary land, land claims, collecting quit rents, boundaries and so forth. The resident proprietors ratified the laws of the Rudyard Assembly, but added what the assembly had refused to pass, exemption of the pacifist Quakers from military service. The biggest problem of the Larry administration was an attempt to collect feudal quit rents from the settlers in behalf of the proprietors. Larry was originally instructed by the impatient proprietors to collect the quit rents. In late 1684, the proprietors instructed Larry and the resident proprietors to make an end of all controversies over land titles and quit rents. Specifically, they arrogantly declared their absolute refusal to recognize any of the old nickels patents or to commute any of their quit rents, even including the arrears.

17:18Wrangling between the Larry administration and the various towns lasted a year and a In 1684, all East New Jersey towns except Bergen were still claiming exemption from all quit rents on the ground that their old nickels land patents or Indian purchases were superior to the proprietary claim. Moreover, many settlers avoided payment of quitterance by not officially patenting their lands. The old Navsink towns of Middletown and Shrewsbury also claimed the full right to make their own laws and elect their officers under the Nichols patents and the Nichols promulgated Dukes laws, but now forgotten by the East New Jersey Governors.

18:13Over against this permanent state of quasi-rebellion, Larry was supposed to persuade the six towns of the colony that the nickels patents, or Indian lands or governmental patents, were invalid, and that all landowners must pay the quit rents due since their inception in 1670. The new proprietary program of strict enforcement of quit rents was bound to create Fierced Opposition in the Colony. The first crackdown was imposed in late 1684 on John Barry of Bergen, who was a revered old settler, an agent of William Penn in East Jersey, a counselor, and a former deputy governor. Barry was opposed to enforcing quit rents and had never paid any due on his own extensive lands. He countered by dramatically challenging the The validity of the Court of Common Right, the new Supreme Court of the colony, founded during the Rudyard regime. The court fined Barry for contempt, and Barry's refusal to pay finally caused his imprisonment in early 1685. By now, Barry had become the leader of the colony's resistance to quit rents, and the outcome of the Barry case would greatly

19:34influenced the path of opposition. The Board of Proprietors in one of its first acts backed up Larry, determined on no abatement of quit rents and took up the prosecution of Barry. Barry finally yielded. However, when the Board commuted his back quit rents of over 116 pounds for £116 to £70. During this time, negotiations began with the Napsink towns of Middletown and Shrewsbury. The men of these towns, headed by the Quaker Richard Hartshorn, steadfastly refused to pay quit rents, and Laurie and the board of proprietors began to seize the This forced the Napsink towns to yield by mid 1685. No agreement, however, was concluded with Piscataway, Newark or Elizabethtown, although some individual owners in the last town took out their patents to land titles, thus following the lead of Napsink.

20:44On the other hand, Woodbridge surrendered to the proprietary in the spring, following the lead of former Provincial Treasurer Samuel Moore, who capitulated after having vowed to pay no quid rents whatever. Larry and the Council finally, in April 1686, called the Assembly in decession to demand an increase in taxes, largely for the expenses of the Secretary and the Council. The deputies incisively replied that they saw no reason why the people should be forced to pay for the expenses of officers whom they had no power to select. In the fall of 1686, Governor Larry was removed, the proprietors being disgruntled with what they believed to be Larry's, as well as Rudger's, before him, lack of zeal in reserving land to the proprietors. Larry had also shown a lack of interest in obtaining a high price in the sale of land to the settlers. The proprietors censured Larry's granting himself a large and the large tract of unused land at a cheap price, and his failure to push for approval of the fundamental constitutions.

22:06Larry was succeeded as governor by the Scot, Neil Campbell. In the fall meeting of the Assembly, Lord Campbell tried once again to insist that it increase taxes. Speaker Richard Hartshorn defiantly spoke for the deputies when he bluntly declared The failure of New York's attempt to assume power over East Jersey created a gaping hole in New York's attempted port monopoly.

22:56Monopoly. Smuggling was also rampant in East Jersey and New Yorkers kept agitating for forcible annexation of that colony. The merchants desired to secure their monopoly and the New York farmers and rural elements were envious of Jersey's freedom of trade. These grievances culminated in 1678 when a royal order made Perth Amboy, the newly built capital of East New Jersey, an approved port of entry, an act which accelerated the migration of merchants and other citizens from New York to New Jersey.