ady assertion of colonial rights. And
the form of government in the provinces was well suited to secure for
the colonists that independence which they claimed as a birthright, and
the practical achievement of which is the cardinal political fact of the
century. For it was no part of British policy to burden the English
exchequer with the maintenance of the colonial establishments. The
normal province was thought to be one in which legislation was entrusted
mainly to local assemblies elected by the colonists, while executive and
administrative authority rested mainly with a governor and council
responsible to the king. At the opening of the eighteenth century,
colonial governments mostly conformed to this model: in each colony the
owners of property regularly elected an assembly which levied taxes and
made laws; in each colony, except in Rhode Island and Connecticut, the
governor, and usually the council as well, were appointed by the Crown.

With authority thus divided, conflict was sure to arise. In theory, the
interests of colony and Crown may have been identical; in fact the
assemblies looked at the affairs of the colony from the point of view of
immediate local needs, while the governor was bound by his instructions
to regard his province as but one of many whose special interests must
be subordinated to the welfare of the whole empire. Of the assemblies'
many advantages in this perennial conflict, control of the purse was the
chief. "The governor," says a contemporary, "has two masters; one who
gives him his commission, and one who gives him his pay." It required no
little courage, and was likely to prove useless in the end, to ignore
the latter master in obedience to the former. Placemen were little
inclined to irritate those who paid them and were on the spot to watch
their every move; while even the ablest governors often found themselves
deserted by the Crown whose interests they attempted to defend. Before
the middle of the century ministers were generally indifferent to the
constitutional tendencies in the colonies; repeated recommendations of
the Board of Trade for an independent civil list went unheeded, and
governors, such as Spotswood, who stirred up trouble by endeavoring to
carry out their instructions, were likely to be replaced by others whose
adroit concessions to the assemblies created the illusion of a
successful administration.

The concrete disputes in which the persistent opposition of governor