eference to South Carolina and
Georgia, of a clause reflecting on slavery.

Copies of the immortal paper were carried post-haste up and down the
land, and Congress's bold deed was everywhere hailed with enthusiastic
demonstrations of joy. The stand for independence wrought powerfully for
good, both at home and abroad. At home it assisted vacillating minds to
a decision, as well as bound all the colonies more firmly together by
committing them irreconcilably to an aggressive policy. Abroad it tended
to lift the colonies out of the position of rebels and to gain them
recognition among the nations of the earth.

Let us now inquire into the political character of these bodies of
people which this Declaration by their delegates had erected into "free
and independent States."

Five colonies had adopted constitutions, revolutionary of course, before
the decisive manifesto. There was urgent need for such action. The few
remaining fragments of royal governments were powerless and decadent.
Anarchy was threatening everywhere. Some of the royal governors had
fled. In South Carolina the judges refused to act. In other places, as
western Massachusetts, they had been forcibly prevented from acting. In
most of the colonies only small parts of the old assemblies could be
gotten together.

New Hampshire led off with a new constitution in January, 1776. South
Carolina followed in March. By the close of the year nearly all the
colonies had established governments of their own. New York and Georgia
did not formally adopt new constitutions until the next year. In
Massachusetts a popular assembly assumed legislative and executive
powers from July, 1775, till 1780, when a new constitution went into
force. Connecticut and Rhode Island, as we have seen already, continued
to use their royal charters--the former till 1818, the latter till 1842.

Nowhere was the general framework of government greatly changed by
independence. The governors were of course now elected by the people,
and they suffered some diminution of power. Legislatures were composed
of two houses, both elective, no hereditary legislators being
recognized. All the States still had Sunday laws; most of them had
religious tests. In South Carolina only members of a church could vote.
In New Jersey an office-holder must profess belief in the faith of some
Protestant sect. Pennsylvania required members of the legislature to
avow faith in God, a future state, and the inspiration of