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Giovanni da
Verrazano, an Italian-born navigator sailing for France,
discovered New York Bay in 1524. Henry Hudson, an Englishman
employed by the Dutch, reached the bay and sailed up the
river now bearing his name in 1609, the same year that
northern New York was explored and claimed for France by
Samuel de Champlain.
In 1624 the first permanent Dutch settlement was established
at Fort Orange (now Albany); one year later Peter Minuit is
said to have purchased Manhattan Island from the Indians for
trinkets worth about $24 and founded the Dutch colony of New
Amsterdam (now New York City), which was surrendered to the
English in 1664.
For a short time, New York City was the U.S. capital and
George Washington was inaugurated there as the first
president on April 30, 1789.
New York's extremely rapid commercial growth may be partly
attributed to Governor De Witt Clinton, who pushed through
the construction of the Erie Canal (Buffalo to Albany),
which was opened in 1825.
For more than three centuries England and Holland had been
the closest of friends; but now, at the close of the long
and bloody Thirty Years' War, which ended with the Treaty of
Westphalia in 1648, the power of Spain was crushed, and the
Dutch, no longer having anything to fear from his Catholic
Majesty, rose to dispute with the English the dominion of
the seas. This brought about an unfriendly rivalry between
the two nations, and the unfriendliness was increased by the
fact that the Dutch of new Netherland traded freely with the
English colonies. They carried great quantities of Virginia
tobacco to Holland, and thus at least £10,000 a year was
lost in customs duties to the British government.
The first Navigation Law, 1651, was aimed largely at the
Dutch trader, but the wily Dutchman ignored the law and
continued as before. This was one cause that determined the
English on the conquest of New Amsterdam. Another, and
probably the chief one, was that the Dutch colony on the
Hudson separated New England from the other English colonies
and threatened British dominion in North America.
The English claimed New Netherland on the ground of the
Cabot discoveries; and Charles II now, 1664, coolly gave the
entire country, from the Connecticut to the Delaware, to his
brother James, Duke of York, ignoring the claims of the
Dutch colony, and even disregarding his own charter of two
years before the younger Winthrop. Richard Nicolls of the
royal navy set out with a small fleet and about five hundred
of the king's veterans. Reaching New England, he was joined
by several hundred of the militia of Connecticut and Long
Island, and he sailed for the mouth of the Hudson.
Stuyvesant had heard of the fleet's arrival at Boston, but
he was made to believe that its object was to enforce the
Episcopal service upon the Puritans of New England, and so
unsuspecting was he that he went far up the river, to Fort
Orange, to quell an Indian disturbance. Here he was when
informed that Nicolls was moving toward New Amsterdam.
Stuyvesant hastened down the river with all speed, arriving
at New Amsterdam but one day before the English fleet hove
into view. Nicolls demanded the surrender of the fort.
Stuyvesant refused; he fumed and fretted and swore and
stamped his wooden leg. He tore to bits a conciliatory
letter sent him by Nicolls. He mustered his forces for
defense. But the people were not with him; they were weary
of his tyrannical government in which they had no part,
weary of enriching a company at their own expense, and the
choleric old governor had to yield. The fort was surrendered
(1664) without bloodshed; New Amsterdam became New York,
after the Duke of York; the upper Hudson also yielded, and
Fort Orange became Albany, after another of the duke's
titles, and all New Netherland, including the Delaware
Valley, passed under English control.
By what right Charles II seized New Netherland is probably
known to kings and rulers, but not to the humble historian.
Queen Elizabeth had laid down the postulate that mere
discovery, without occupation, did not constitute a right to
new lands. This was a good rule when applied to Spain to
refute her claims to North America; it was another story
when applied to the English concerning the Hudson Valley.
But the English deftly evaded the difficulty, to their own
satisfaction, by claiming that the Hudson Valley was part of
Virginia as given by James I, in 1606, to two companies.
This tract had been settled at both ends, -- on the James
River and the New England coast, -- and why should a foreign
power claim the central portion because not yet occupied?
Thus argued the English, and their argument won because
sustained by force of arms. And yet, the providential hand
may easily be seen. The conquest of New Netherland was
scarcely less important than was the conquest of New France,
a century later, on the Plains of Abraham. It all belonged
to the preparation -- not for British dominion in North
America, but for the dominion of future generations that
were to occupy the land. Before their power England was yet
to go down, as New Netherland and New France first went down
before hers. Thus England, all unwittingly, became the
instrument in preparing the way and fighting the battles for
a nation that was yet to be born.
It is interesting to note the later career of Peter
Stuyvesant. After a journey to the fatherland to vindicate
his course, he returned to New York and made it the home of
his old age. Here on his farm, or "bowery," now bounded by
Fourth Avenue and the East River, by Sixth and Seventeenth
streets, New York City, amid the scenes of his former strife
and turmoil, he spent a few quiet, happy years. A venerable
figure was the aged Dutchman, and many who had hated him
before now learned to love him.
He and Governor Nicolls became warm friends, and many a time
they met and drank wine and told stories at each other's
tables. In 1672 this last of the Dutch governors died at the
ripe age of eighty years, and his body was laid to rest at
the little country church near his home -- at a spot now in
the heart of the vast metropolis, whose population is ten
times greater than that of all the North American colonies
of that day.
A short war between England and Holland followed the
conquest of Nicolls, and the Dutch sailed up the Thames
River and visited fearful punishment on the English, though
they did not win back New York. But nine years after the
Nicolls victory, we may say by anticipation, the two nations
were again at war, and a Dutch fleet reconquered New York
and took possession of the Hudson Valley; but by the treaty
of peace the next year the country was ceded back to the
English, and Dutch rule ceased forever in North America.
At the time of the Nichols conquest the little city at the
southern point of Manhattan contained some fifteen hundred
people, and the whole province about ten thousand, one third
of whom were English. The colony now became a proprietary
colony, but as the proprietor afterward became king of
England, it was transferred to the list of royal colonies.
Nicolls became the first governor. He was able and
conscientious. The rights of property, of citizenship, and
of religious liberty had been guaranteed in the terms of
capitulation. To these were added at a later date equal
taxation and trial by jury. In one year the tact and energy
of Nicolls had transformed the province practically into an
English colony. After four years of successful rule Nicolls
returned to England -- and a few years later, as he stood by
the side of his mater, the Duke of York, at the battle of
Solebay, his body was torn to pieces by a cannon ball.
The English inhabitants of New York had gladly welcomed the
change of government, and even the Dutch had made little
resistance, as they were tired of the tyrannical rule of the
company. If there was any bitterness against English rule
remaining, it was wholly removed in 1677 by an event of
great importance to both hemispheres -- the marriage of the
leading Hollander of his times, the Prince of Orange, to the
daughter of the Duke of York, the two afterward to become
joint sovereigns of England as William and Mary.
It is interesting to note here the transition in this colony
from Dutch to English rule. It has been claimed by a few
writers that our institutions are derived from Dutch more
than from English sources; but a little study into this
subject will easily prove the contrary. The people over whom
Nicolls became governor in 1664 were composed of three
separate communities, each different from the others in its
government; the Dutch settlers on the Hudson, the
settlements on the Delaware, and the English towns that had
grown up under Dutch rule on Long Island. Now these English
towns during the period of the Dutch supremacy enjoyed far
more liberal local government than did the Dutch towns on
the Hudson. And in this one respect Kieft, who encouraged
popular government among the English towns, was wiser than
Stuyvesant, who opposed it.1 These English towns held their
popular meetings, chose their officials, and transacted
other business after the manner of the New England towns;
while in the Dutch towns there were no town meetings, no
popular elections, the ruling officials forming a kind of
close corporation with power to fill all vacancies and
choose their own successors. As to which of these types came
nearer being the model for our local government of to-day,
no reader need be informed.
When Nicolls became governor he made little immediate change
in the general or local government except to adopt English
titles for the public officers. To understand this two
things must be remembered. First, the charter for New York,
true to the Stuart instinct, made the Duke of York absolute
master, and it made no provision for the people to take any
part in their own government; second, it was practically
such a government that Nicolls already found in New
Amsterdam. With a ready-made machine at hand, why should he
take the trouble to make a new one? He proceeded, however,
to frame a code of laws known as "The Duke's Laws." These
were intended at first for the English settlers only, but
where later extended to all. This code was borrowed largely
from the laws of New England, with the two important
omissions that there was no provision for the people to take
any part in the government, and that there was no religious
test for citizenship. It retained many Dutch features, and
introduced a few new features. To the Court of Assizes,
consisting of governor and council, sheriff and justice, was
assigned the legislative and judicial power; but as the
sheriff and justices were appointees of the governor, there
was no popular government in the plan.
But this plan did not prove permanent. The English portion
of the colony clamored for representative government. The
agitation continued until 1681, Edmund Andros being then
governor, when the English population was ready to break
into open rebellion, unless their demand for an assembly be
granted. Accordingly the next year the duke promised the
people an assembly, and the first one was elected in 1683,
while Thomas Dongan was governor. This assembly composed of
eighteen men elected by the people, now proceeded to adopt a
declaration of rights known as the "Charter of Liberties,"
by which it declared the representatives of the people
coordinate with the governor and council, and that no taxes
could be laid without their consent. It also provided that
all laws be subject to the duke's approval.
What might have been the fate of this charter under normal
conditions we know not, as the conditions were suddenly
changed. The duke's royal brother was suddenly carried off
by a stroke of apoplexy, and the duke became king of England
as James II. New York now became a royal colony, and the new
king, who at heart despised popular government, refused to
sign the Charter of Liberties, abolished the New York
assembly, and sent Andros to govern the colony as
consolidated with New England and New Jersey. Andros, with a
council of seven men, was to govern nine colonies as a
conquered province. We have noticed his career in Boston and
need not repeat it here. The fall of his master from the
British throne occasioned the immediate fall of Andros; but
this did not bring immediate peace to New York. The colony
was now about to pass through another exciting experience.
But first, a further word is here in place concerning the
sources of our present governmental system. Mr. Douglas
Campbell, in two large volumes entitled "The Puritan in
England, Holland, and America," has taken great pains to
show that we are indebted far more to Dutch than to English
sources for our system, and his attempt to prove too much
leads the critical reader to believe too little.
It is true that the English race is more nearly related to
the Dutch than to any other, and the English language
resembles the Dutch language more than any other. It is also
true that the Netherlands preceded England in securing
religious liberty and in establishing free public schools;
that the manufacturing of textile fabrics developed in
Flanders earlier than in the island kingdom across the
channel, where it grew up later largely through the
migration of skilled workmen from the Netherlands; that many
thousands of Dutchmen and Flemings, driven from their
country by religious wars, made their permanent home in
England. From these facts it will be seen that the influence
of Netherlands institutions on English civilization must
have been great; and it was probably still great on American
civilization, because the Dutch immigrants to England nearly
all became Puritans, and there is no doubt that Dutch blood
coursed in the veins of a large per cent of the New England
Puritans.2 No doubt also the Pilgrim Fathers absorbed
something from the Dutch during their sojourn in Leyden.
But when all is said on this side it must be added, on the
other, that in the seventeenth century English popular
self-government was ages in advance of the same in the
Netherlands. No better proof of this is needed than a glance
at the colony of New York. It was the English towns, even
under Dutch jurisdiction, that demanded and received a large
measure of self-government; it was the first English
governor that extended that great bulwark of Anglo-Saxon
liberty, the jury system, to the Dutch settlers, who at
first shunned it as a thing to be feared; it was the English
population of the colony that clamored for their birthright
-- an assembly and the power of taxation. During all this
period the Dutch settlers in the main were passive in
matters of popular government, and but for the coming of the
English and the overthrow of Stuyvesant and his nation, New
Netherland might have remained as despotic a government as
was New France. Moreover, the New England free school system
grew, not from Dutch models, but from the inherent character
of the Puritan religion. In the face of these facts, how can
Mr. Campbell or any one contend that our institutions of
to-day are derived from Dutch rather than from English
sources?
News of the accession of William and Mary and of the
imprisonment of Andros at Boston created a great excitement
in New York; and the militia, led by Jacob Leisler, a German
merchant, took possession of the government. For two years
Leisler, with the aid of his son-in-law, Milborne, governed
the colony with vigor and energy. But he offended the
aristocracy and the magistrates, who pronounced him a
usurper. Meantime he took measures to defend the colony
against the French and Indians, who had fallen on the
frontier town of Schenectady, had massacred the people, and
had burned the town.
The Leisler movement was in part the outgrowth of the
anti-Catholic wave that swept over England and her colonies
during the reign of James II, and Leisler's vivid
imagination greatly magnified the danger of a general
religious war. He called for the election of an assembly to
vote taxes for the pending war with Canada, but many of the
people denied his authority and refused to respond.
Leisler's next step was one that marked the beginning of
great things. He called for a meeting in New York of
delegates from all the colonies to make preparations for the
war, and the seven delegates that met, chiefly from New
England, constituted the first colonial congress in
America.3 They took counsel concerning the war, which will
be noticed in our chapter on Colonial Wars. The clouds were
now darkening around the head of Leisler, and his career was
almost over.
In 1691 Henry Sloughter was appointed governor, and he sent
his lieutenant before him to demand the surrender of the
fort. But the lieutenant could not prove his authority, and
Leisler refused to surrender. At length, when Sloughter
arrived, Leisler yielded to his authority and quiet was soon
restored. But Leisler's enemies were determined on his
destruction. He and his son-in-law had been cast into
prison, and Governor Sloughter, a weak and worthless man,
was induced to sign their death warrants while drunk,
tradition informs us. Before the governor had fully
recovered his senses, Leisler and Milborne were taken from
the prison and hanged. Leisler had doubtless been legally in
the wrong in seizing the government; but his intentions were
undoubtedly good, and his execution, after all danger was
past, was little else than political murder, and it created
two hostile factions in New York that continued for many
years.
With the passing of Leisler the royal government was
restored, and the people for the first time secured the
permanent right to take part in their government, as in the
other colonies, and, as in the others, the assembly steadily
gained power at the expense of the governor, The royal
governors sent to New York were, for the most part, men
without principle or interest in the welfare of the people.
A rare exception we find in the Earl of Bellamont, who brief
three years at the close of the century as governor of New
York, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire were all too brief
for the people, who had learned to love him as few royal
governors were loved. His successor, Lord Cornbury, was
probably the most dissolute rascal ever sent to govern an
American colony, not even excepting the infamous Sothel of
the Carolinas.
An event of great interest occurred in New York in 1735,
known as the Zenger case. Governor Cosby had entered suit
before the Supreme Court of New York to obtain a sum of
money and had lost. He then removed the judge and thus
offended the popular party. Peter Zenger, the publisher of a
newspaper, the New York Weekly Journal, attacked the
governor through its columns and severely criticised his
action. The governor was enraged at these attacks, and he
ordered the paper burned and the editor arrested for libel.
At the trial, Zenger was defended by Andrew Hamilton of
Philadelphia, the greatest lawyer in America. The justice of
the cause and the eloquence of Hamilton won the jury, and
resulted in a complete victory for the accused editor. This
was the first important victory for the liberty of the press
in America, and with little variation this liberty has been
held inviolate from that time to the present.
A few years after Zenger's case had been disposed of, New
York society was greatly convulsed by the so-called Negro
Plot. This was a craze similar to the witchcraft delusion
which had swept over Massachusetts half a century before. It
had it origin in a general belief that the Spanish Catholic
priests, in league with the slave population, were planning
to burn the city. The craze spread like an epidemic; the
whole community went made, and before the storm abated,
twenty-two persons, four of whom were whites, had been
hanged, thirteen negroes burnt at the stake, and a large
number transported. The craze soon passed away and the
people recovered their normal senses. The account of this
affair constitutes the most deplorable chapter in the
history of New York. It is now believed that no plot to burn
the city existed, and that every one who suffered on account
of the delusion was innocent.
The province of New York grew steadily to the time of the
Revolution. Every decade witnessed the coming of home
seekers in large numbers to the valley of the Hudson. French
Protestants, Scotch, Irish, Scotch-Irish, refugees from the
Rhenish palatinate, and others spread over the beautiful
river valleys; but the great majority of the people were
English and Dutch. By 1750 the population was probably
eighty thousand and this number was more than doubled by the
opening years of the Revolution.
New York City was a busy mart indeed, containing some twelve
thousand people in 1750, and more than five hundred vessels,
great and small, plowed the waters that half surrounded it.
The city was the political, social, and business center of
the province. Among its leading figures in winter were great
landholders of the Hudson Valley and Long Island, who spent
their summers on their estates. But the great middle class,
composed chiefly of tradesmen of every grade, made up the
majority of the population.
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