20 CIVIL GOVERNMENT. 



gave to its inhabitants the blessings of peaceful liberty, social and political 

 eminence, and grandest of all, freedom of conscience in religious belief and 

 worship. 



Suti'olk County as established b}- the Act of the General Assembl}- of 

 the Province of New York, on the ist of November, 1683, differed in no 

 essential of geographical area from the East Riding of Yorkshire, as that 

 was constituted at the convention held in Hempstead, Queens county, in 

 1665, and apart from the assignment to it of a high Sheriff instead of a 

 Deputv, its municipal character would have remained unchanged by the 

 act, and the mere gift of a name exhausted all that act con erred upon it. 

 Far more serious purposes than the affixing names to portions of the Prov- 

 ince animated the Assembly of 1683, and these purposes, their origin, sup- 

 port and final triumph command our attention in this season of commem- 

 oration. A full re\-iew of the steady progress of the organic law ot' the 

 county from its settlement to the year it took position as a county, is for- 

 Ijidden by the circumstances ot the present hour, simple references to im- 

 portant events, and controlling characteristics of its people, their deter- 

 mination to frame a government upon the generous ami stable foundations 

 of personal liberty and protection of property, must suffice fur this paper. 



The settlers of Suffolk Count}- were Puritans. Few of the Church of 

 England were found here during 20 years after Farret's small colony was 

 expelled from Cow Bay by the Dutch, and found security and permanent 

 homes at Southampton; and the few so adventuring impressed upon the 

 public affairs of the communities little that is traceable through the ob- 

 scure annals of those early days. These founders of Suffolk were already 

 inured to the new life of the wilderness. At Lynn, in Massachusetts, and 

 Hartford and New Haven, in Connecticut, they had learned the hardships 

 of pioneer adventure, and were ready for the sacrifices their new settlement 

 in Long Island exacted. They were intelligent and some even learned, 

 resolute in pur})ose and fearless of difficulties. There were those among 

 them who could recall the infamous decree of James L, that every minis- 

 ter in Scotland should declare from his. pulpit ' ' that those who attend 

 church on Sunilays should not be disturbed or discouraged from dancing, 

 archery, leaping, vaulting, having Whitsun ales, Morris dances, setting up 

 May poles and other sports therewith used on Sundays after divine ser- 

 vice, ■■ a nd the punishment of those earnest ministers who refused to read 

 such declaration as an impious breach of the command to keep holy the 

 Sabbath day. 



They could testif}- to the flight of the Elect from a realm where the 

 true Word was thus perverted, and the stormy passage to Holland in 

 search of a refuge for conscience. 



Others had witnessed the accumulating j)ower of the people of En- 

 gland in its struggle with a monarch whose chief doctrine of government 

 was his faith in the divine right of kings. And others yet had participated 

 in the great uprising against this divine right, and had seen it and its vota- 

 ries swept from existence by Cromwell and his Ironsides on the plains of 

 Naseb}'. 



I'here were those, too, who had gathered from the Pilgrims the rich 

 experiences and conclusions gained during the twelve }ears residence in 

 Holland, and the study of the free, genial, and hearty systems of the 

 Dutch. These could understand the benefits of a Representative Govern- 

 ment, and the value of the principle of taxation through representation 

 only, established among the Dutch for a century and more. 



