My Demands 1 Request may bee Committed to Record 

 with your Honors Resolve thereto. '- 



Despite this entreaty, Jeffreys and the Council 

 ordered Bray suspended until his Majesty's pleasure 

 might be known.'" The Governor forwarded the 

 papers on the Bray case to Secretary of State Coventry, 

 noting Bray's "Insolent Behaviour in Coineing to 

 Claime his Seat in the Council in Open Court."** 



The restrictions placed upon representative govern- 

 ment in X'irginia through measures taken against the 

 House of Burgesses, the Council, and the courts oc- 

 curred after the rebellion, not before it, and were 

 opposed by the loyalists, not supported by them. 

 There is little evidence to show that the rebels were 

 concerned with representative institutions either dur- 

 ing the rel:)ellion or in the postrebellion period, but 

 it is abundantly clear that the loyalists were. The 

 battle for democratic rights in \'irginia was waged 



« Longleat, vol. 78, folio 89. 



" Order of a General Conrt, September 27, 1677, Longleat, 

 vol. 78, folio 85. 



*' Herbert Jeffreys to Henry Coventry, February II, 1678, 

 Longleat, vol. 78, folio 207. 



after and not during the rebellion; consequently, it is 

 to the postrebellion period that we must look for 

 knowledge of the evolution of representative govern- 

 ment in the colony of Mrginia. 



The effect of Bacon's Rei:)ellion on the development 

 of representative institutions in England is more difii- 

 cult to assess. The rebellion was immediately effective 

 in that it gave support to the King's opposition in the 

 House of Commons by cutting off a significant portion 

 of the King's income and thus forcing him to go 

 begging to Parliament to replace it. (The aid given 

 by the rebellion was accepted without comment by 

 the meitibers of the Hou.se of Commons because, as a 

 colonial matter, it required no thanks and no acknowl- 

 edgement.) A more lasting result of the rei)ellion was 

 that it drew attention to the inability of the English 

 constitution satisfactorily to comprehend within its 

 terms the growing numbers of Englishmen "without 

 the Realm.'' The problems brought on by the re- 

 bellion revealed that the political relationship of 

 colonist to King was evolving too haphazardly. What 

 could have been a warning, however, was seen merely 

 as an annoyance, and the opportunits' to re-establish 

 the loyalty of the colony by fair and intelligent treat- 

 ment was lost. 



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