ON THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION 153 
choose twelve of their number as electors, and that 
these twelve should choose the seven magistrates who 
were to administer the affairs of the settlement. These 
magistrates were really equivalent to selectmen; they 
were known as pillars of the church. It was further- 
more agreed that the Holy Scriptures contain perfect 
rules for the ordering of all affairs civil and domestic 
as well as ecclesiastical. So far was this principle ap- 
plied that New Haven refused to have trial by jury 
because no such thing could be found in the Mosaic 
law. The assembling of freemen for an annual elec- 
tion was simply the meeting of church members to 
choose the twelve electors, while the rest of the people 
had nothing to say. It was therefore as far as possible 
from the system adopted by the three river towns. 
The constitution of Connecticut was democratic, that 
of New Haven aristocratic. Connecticut, moreover, 
at its beginning was a federation of towns; New 
Haven at its beginning was simply a group of towns 
juxtaposed but not confederated. 
Nevertheless, circumstances soon drove the New 
Haven towns into federation, and here for a moment 
let us pause to consider how federation was inevitably 
involved in this whole process which we have been 
considering. We have seen that the principal reason 
why New England did not develop into a single solid 
state like Virginia or Pennsylvania, but into a conge- 
ries of scattered communities, was to be found in the 
slight but obstinate differences between different par- 
ties of settlers on questions mainly of church polity, 
sometimes of doctrine; and we must remember that 
the isolation of these communities was greater than we 
can easily realize, because our minds are liable to be 
