embled in the church at Jamestown and inaugurated
representative government in Virginia by passing a body of laws in which
the customs of England were adapted to the conditions of a frontier
community. After the dissolution of the company in 1624 the appointment
of the governor and council vested in the Crown, but the House of
Burgesses, elected at first by the freemen, but after the Restoration on
the basis of a freehold test, was continued. From the first the
assembly, filled by planters, exercised a beneficial influence in giving
a practical character to the laws of the province; while on certain
occasions, and notably during the period of the Commonwealth, it was the
dominant influence in the government of the colony.

But for the most part the assembly was the instrument rather than the
source of power. The directing influence was usually in the hands of the
great planter who combined the functions of merchant and country
gentleman, lawyer and politician and social leader. His knowledge of law
and his familiarity with affairs, his social connection and influence,
his greater leisure, the traditional authority which hung about his
position, all disposed the small planters to accept his initiative and
abide by his decisions. It was difficult to defeat his candidate for the
burgesses; difficult for the elected burgess not to defer to his
opinion. And if the great planters were influential among the burgesses,
they were predominant in the council. The home Government expected the
governor to manage the affairs of the colony by gathering to his support
the most wealthy and influential men in it. Accordingly, the great
planters were customarily appointed to the local offices and to the
council. Generally speaking, the governor and the great planters
established a community of interest on an exchange of favors. The small
group of men in the council, related by marriage, ambitious, shrewd, and
pushing, already wealthy or bound to become so, supported with
reasonable loyalty the royal interests, and found their reward in
exploiting, through the political machinery which they controlled, the
resources of the colony for their own profit. This compact was the basis
of the long regime of Berkeley. But the governor was made aware of the
source of his strength when he trespassed upon the preserves of the
oligarchy which supported him. His attempt to control the Indian trade
drove men like Colonel Byrd over to the side of Bacon, an