Remonstrance of the Grand Assembly," telling the important things they had accomplished by the protracted session, and justifying themselves.

The first charter of the Massachusetts Bay Colony was silent on the subject, and so, there being nothing to prevent, the colonists grasped the chance to keep the control in their own hands. The entry of the proceedings of the General Court, May 14, 1634, reads: "It is likewise ordered, that there shalbe foure Generall Courts held yearely, to be summoned by the Governor, for the tyme being, & not to be dissolved without the consent of the major parte of the Court." The Charter of 1691 gave the powers of adjournment, prorogation, and dissolution to the Governor, but in terms uncertain enough to permit a controversy that Hutchinson describes. In 1721, he tells us, no grants had been made, and no officers for the ensuing year had been constituted; the House, notwithstanding, sent a message to the Governor to desire the Court might rise. He refused to gratify them. "Thursday the 13th of July had been appointed for a public fast. The members desired to be at home with their families, and on Wednesday, by a vote, they adjourned themselves to Tuesday in the next week. The House of Commons adjourn for as long time, without any immediate act of royal authority, but, I presume, never contrary to a signification of the mind of the King; and the adjournments over holidays are as much established, by ancient usage, as the ordinary adjournments from day to day, and, being conformed to by both Houses of Parliament, no inconvenience can arise. But the charter was urged by the Governor to be the rule in this assembly, not the analogy between a Massachusetts House of Representatives and the Commons of Great Britain. The Governor, by the charter, has the sole power of adjourning, proroguing, and dissolving the General Court. Taken strictly, it would be extremely inconvenient; for the act of the Governor would be necessary every day. Upon a reasonable construction, therefore, the House had always adjourned from day to day, but never for so great a number of days. The Council, who were obliged to spend near a week without business, unanimously voted, upon hearing the House had adjourned, that such adjournment, without his excellency's knowledge and consent, was irregular and not agreeable to the charter. The Governor (Dudley) afterwards made

this adjournment one of the principal articles of complaint against the House," which presently acknowledged his authority in the matter and said he ought to have been informed before they adjourned, "and that it was so designed and casually omitted." But they carefully distinguished between the power of adjourning the General Court and adjourning the House of Representatives, whereupon the Governor called them before him, scolded them, and dissolved the Court.1

Partly in view of the uncertainty as to the time for which the House might adjourn, an explanatory charter was thought necessary, and such a charter accordingly passed the seals. It read: "Whereas no power is granted by the said recited letters Patents to the said House of Representatives to adjourn themselves for any time whatsoever, by means whereof divers Doubts and Controversies have arisen within our said Province to the Interruption of the Publick Business thereof and the obstruccion of Our Service," the Representatives might adjourn themselves for two days or less, but not longer without the consent of the Governor.

The Concession and Agreement of the Lords Proprietors of the Province of New Cesarea, or New Jersey, 1664, provided for a General Assembly of twelve Deputies or Representatives which was to have power to appoint its own time of meeting and "to adjourn their sessions from time to time to such times and places as they shall think convenient." In 1672 this was modified so that to the Governor and Council was given the power of summons and adjournment. The Fundamental Constitutions of East New Jersey, 1683, called for the Great Council to meet each April 20 and "sit upon their own adjournments, if they see meet," till the 20th of July, "unless the Governor and Common Council think fit to continue them longer."

By Penn's Charter of Liberties to Pennsylvania in 1682, the Provincial Council was "to continue and sit upon its own adjournments." The General Assembly was to sit until the Governor and Council informed it they had nothing further to propose. In 1696 Governor Markham's Frame of Government, giving the Assembly the right to originate measures, provided that the Assembly likewise should "sit upon their own adjournments." The same phrase, used in Penn's Charter of Privileges in 1701, brought to an issue the differences between 1 Gov. Thomas Hutchinson, History of Massachusetts, 3d ed., 11, 232-35.

the parties that had developed. The Council, representing those who stood for privilege, held that the right was limited to short periods, but the popular party, controlling the Assembly, took the opposite view and decided the matter by adjourning. Thereupon to make a show of power the Council went through the form of prorogation to the day the lawmakers had set for reassembling. However, the battle was looked upon as won by the popular body, led by David Lloyd.1 When Andrew Hamilton, Speaker of the Assembly, took leave of the House, on account of his age and infirmities, in 1729, he said: "We sit upon our own adjournments, when we please, and as long as we think necessary; and we are not to be sent a packing in the middle of a debate, and disabled from representing our just grievances to our gracious sovereign, if there should be occasion; which has often been the fate of Assemblies in other places." The privilege was always a matter of pride to Pennsylvanians.

North Carolina furnishes another illustration of colonial quarrels over this matter. Governor Everard in 1725, the first year of his administration, fearing to encounter the popular party, prorogued the Assembly before it had met. The lower House refused to recognize the validity of such a prorogation, and assembling on the day originally set, proceeded to organize. All they could do brought no recognition from the Governor, whose action they stigmatized as illegal. They declared that at their next meeting they would transact no business until their privileges had been confirmed by the Governor and Council, voted an address to the Proprietors, and then adjourned till the day for which they had already been prorogued. On reassembling, they declared that they did so according to adjournment, recognized the officers elected at the previous meeting, and in various other ways tried to establish the legality of their previous assembling.3

When in 1754 seven of the colonies sent delegates to a Congress at Albany, Benjamin Franklin drew a Plan of Union which interests us here because of its novel suggestion for a course halfway between the extreme views in this matter of adjournment. Its provision was "that the Grand Council shall neither

1 Isaac Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, 98.

Robert Proud, History of Pennsylvania, 11, 217.

J. S. Bassett, The Constitutional Beginnings of North Carolina, 62.

be dissolved, prorogued, nor continued sitting longer than six weeks at a time, without their own consent or the special command of the Crown." The fear was that the President-General might abuse power in this regard should it be entrusted to him.

The royal Governors found fresh occasion to use the power of dissolving Assemblies, in the controversies that ripened into Revolution. Two characteristic instances may be cited. One was that of the attempt by Governor Gage in Massachusetts to get rid of the bothersome General Court sitting in Salem in June of 1774. On the 17th, according to the Journal, the Governor directed the Secretary to acquaint the two Houses, it was his pleasure the General Assembly should be dissolved; and to declare the same dissolved accordingly. "The Secretary went to the Court House, and finding the door of the Representative's Chamber locked, directed the Messenger to go in, and acquaint the Speaker, that the Secretary had a message from his Excellency to the honorable House, and desired he might be admitted, to deliver it. The Messenger soon returned, and said he had acquainted the Speaker, who mentioned it to the House; and their orders were, to keep the door fast. Whereupon, the following proclamation was published on the stairs leading to the Representative's Chamber, in presence of a number of Members of the House, and divers other persons; and immediately after in Council." 1

The purpose of the Massachusetts General Court in this proceeding was the same as that which produced a like episode in South Carolina, namely, the desire to appoint Deputies to the General Congress at Philadelphia and provide for their expenses. Lieutenant-Governor Bull was Acting Governor. By a secret understanding the members of the Commons' House were on hand at eight o'clock in the morning of that day instead of waiting till ten or eleven as usual. They at once organized and sent a committee to tell the Governor they had met. He was still in bed. Old custom required that he should send communications to the Commons' House by the Master in Chancery. Before the Governor could put on his clothes, have the attendance of the Master to carry his message, and secure the presence of two of his Council to represent the upper House, the Commons' House had confirmed the appointment

1 Mass. State Papers, 416.

of the Deputies and had provided for a sum not to exceed £1500 sterling, to defray their expenses. Too late the Governor prorogued the Assembly.1

Friction of this sort over questions of adjournment gave Thomas Jefferson warrant for putting among the injuries and usurpations of the King that were set forth in the Declaration of Independence when submitting facts to a candid world: "He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people." In view of such belief, it is not strange that as each colony came to draw up a Constitution, it took particular care to anticipate trouble on this score. New Hampshire led (January 5, 1776) with a Constitution not providing for a chief executive, and so its precaution in this regard was to keep either House from coercing the other. To this end it provided that neither branch without the consent of the other should adjourn for a longer time than from Saturday to Monday. South Carolina, coming next, in March, created a President, and specifically denied him the power to adjourn, prorogue, or dissolve the legislative body, and gave either branch the power to adjourn itself independently. Virginia made like provision in June. New Jersey, in July, put the control in the hands of the lower branch, with the familiar phrase "sit upon their own adjournments"; the upper branch was to be convened at all times when the Assembly was sitting. Pennsylvania, with its single House, used the New Jersey phrase, Vermont as usual copying Pennsylvania. Delaware allowed its two branches to adjourn independently, but stipulated that the two should always sit at the same time and place.

Maryland was the first to anticipate possible differences between the branches; it provided that if they adjourned to different times, the Governor should select one of the dates, or a day between. North Carolina let each branch "sit upon their own adjournments," but added, "from day to day"; for longer adjournments they were to proceed "jointly, by ballot." In Georgia the House of Assembly was to have "power of adjournment to any time or times within the year.

In New York neither branch could adjourn itself for more than two days without the consent of the other. There a new idea appeared, or rather an old idea, for it was the provincial

1 Edward McCrady, Hist. of So. Carolina, 11, 745–47.