1715.] HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 223 



her reign expired. The following persons were appointed 

 Justices for the County of Chester at the commencement of 

 the reign of George the First, viz. : Caleb Pusey, Nicholas 

 Pyle, Richard Webb, Henry Pearce, Henry Neal, Nicholas 

 Fairlanib, John Blunstoii, Jr., and Richard Hayes. 



Another affirmation Act was passed this year, and received 

 the approbation of Governor Gookin. "By an act of Parlia- 

 ment of 1 Geo. I. the Stat, of 7 & 8 Wil. III. was made per- 

 petual in Great Britain, and was extended to the Colonies for 

 five years. By a provision of this latter act, no Quaker by 

 virtue thereof, could be qualified or permitted to give evidence 

 in criminal cases, or serve on juries, or hold any office of profit 

 in the Government.^ The Governor contended that this act 

 repealed the provincial law, and had the same disqualifying 

 efi'ects upon Quakers here as it had in England. Most of the 

 important offices in the Province were filled by Quakers ; and 

 the Justices of the Supreme Court hesitated to perform their 

 duties in the face of the opinion of the Governor. Under these 

 difficulties, criminal justice was not, for a time, administered 

 throughout the Province. 



One of the most important cases left untried, was that of 

 Hugh Pugh, and others, for the murder of Jonathan Hayes, in 

 Chester County. The criminals were eventually admitted to 

 bail.2 



The evidence is almost conclusive that the murdered man 

 was the same Jonathan Hayes who resided in Marple, and who 

 served for a long time as a Justice of the Court, and sometimes 

 as a member of the Legislature. The murder excited great 

 interest in the County. Three men were fined for refusing to 

 aid the constable "in apprehending Hugh Pugh," who was 

 charged as a principal in the murder; and so much interest 

 attached to the case, that three persons were appointed by the 

 Court to find a place more convenient than the Court-house for 

 the trial of the murderers. 



The subject of negro slavery had for some time engaged the 

 attention of sundry members of the Society of Friends, and as 

 early as 1688, a little community of German Quakers, at Ger- 

 mantown, arrived at the conclusion that holding slaves was 

 inconsistent with Christianity. These people presented the sub- 

 ject to the monthly meeting to which they belonged, in a letter 

 alike remarkable for the simplicity of its language and the 

 strength of the arguments adduced against holding human 

 beings in bondage. 



But even the Society of Friends was not, as a body, quite 

 prepared at that period to view the institution as sinful. The 



1 Gordon's Hist. Penna 'leO. ^ Col. Rec. ii. 660. 



