In the third installment of this series we will be looking at two examples of colonists challenging established relationships of authority and the deferential society of the early colonial period through the New Jersey Land Riots and Leisler’s Rebellion. Before we talk about the specific challenges to authority it is important to understand what it was to have public power in the early colonial period. As I have come to understand it, power and authority were generally acknowledged by an unspoken social contract. Early colonial society was very deferential. Authority was given to those of a higher social standing with the accompanying wealth and connections because it was believed that those who had no material wants were more detached from their own needs and could thus concern themselves with the interests of the commonweal. If a public figure was not acting in the interests of the public good then the people had the prerogative to express their dissatisfaction and remind the offending figure of the duty their privilege conveyed.
These old ideas of social deference were challenged in early American settlements as the availability of land and opportunities for amassing wealth and material possessions proved to be a social leveler. I am not making an argument for American exceptionalism, for such struggles are by no means unique to the American experience, but the first settlers colonizing this land did find more prosperity and opportunities here than their countrymen and women had back home. When colonists discovered that they were being deprived of previously enjoyed opportunity and advantages it was within their right to demand correction. Even in the earliest periods there was contention between ruling and ruled as one tried to maintain or strengthen traditional social boundaries while the other strove to maintain a decent living standard or rise to a higher station. Now we will turn to specific examples of how these challenges played out and why the people were motivated to take such action against authority and social norms.
From the 1660’s into the early 1800’s the yeomanry and proprietary gentry of East and West New Jersey were locked in a contest of autonomy and authority over tracts of disputed territory and boundaries. These conflicts are known collectively as the New Jersey Land Riots. The proprietors of the colony, then divided into West and East Jersey, were a collection of predominantly Scottish Catholics with close ties to the English government and monarchy, who wanted to profit from their investments by transforming yeomen settlers into tenant farmers or by holding vast tracts of “vacant” and productive land for future sale. Opposing their will were the yeomanry, loosely organized collections of locally oriented communities of largely protestant immigrant farmers from the northern colonies and abroad. At stake were such matters as who had the rights to the land; the yeomanry who relied on the land for sustenance and community, or the proprietors to whom land signified status and security; how was title secured and legitimized, through deeds, use and productivity of the land, or through royal authority and connections; and who could profit from the land and in what way, through agricultural productivity, the collection of taxes, or selling of property?
Riots would break out in spurts, usually in response to violations such as cutting wood on contested territory, encroachment on local autonomy by proprietary agents, refusal to pay quit-rents, or imprisonment of a trespasser or community leader. Violence frequently took the form of mob action with the aim of asserting local control by driving trespassers from contested property or assaulting jails to free local leaders. Control of a territory was asserted, contested, and reasserted through threats, dispossession, and violence.
The rioting died down as time passed, the colony of New Jersey united and incorporated into the new United States, and proprietors died and their descendants and agents tired of trying to draw a profit from the rural population and speculation in lands inhabited by squatters. By and large the heterogeneous yeomen population defied the claims of the West and East Jersey Proprietors of authority over their settlements and lands by deferring to local community leaders and asserting their right to live for themselves from their land and labor. The yeomen disregarded or dismissed any claims that they believed illegitimate or unfounded according to their ideas of authority, deference, and proper claim to land.
Signing Leisler Declaration
Following the Glorious Revolution the North American colonies were thrown into a brief period of revolt as the Dominion of New England was dismantled and the provincial governments restored, to a degree. In 1689 New York experienced a more tumultuous transition than other colonies in large part because of its history as a conquered Dutch colony. Lieutenant Governor Nicholson surrendered the keys to the powder magazine at Fort James in order to de-escalate tensions between himself and the New York militia, who were holding the fort. This was to no avail and Nicholson left the colony. Shortly after Jacobus Leisler, a German merchant with connections from the previous colony of New Amsterdam and captain of the local militia, took control of much of southern New York and held it for thirteen months. As Gary Nash explains, Leisler had “stepped into a local power vacuum created by the Protestant revolt.” Leisler’s supporters, the Leislerians, were predominantly Dutch of the lower social strata (artisans, skilled laborers, middling merchants, and the like), former settlers of New Amsterdam who had been disadvantaged by the Anglo take over, who had lost much as established trading, economic, and cultural mores transitioned to suit the interests of the English conquerors. Leisler and his supporters were able to maintain control for the brief period they did because they could harness the unresolved ethnic hostilities between the Dutch and English populations and the resentment the older, more established group felt for the newcomers. The Dutch would rather follow one of their own.
In claiming to act in the name of the Protestant William (a dutch prince) and Mary and by appealing to this large segment of the population, one which he himself belonged to, Leisler was able to antagonize his “popish” opponents and maintain control of the English colony until the arrival of the legitimately appointed royal governor Henry Sloughter. In 1691 Leisler was arrested, tried in the city by an English court, and executed for treason alongside his chief adjutant Jacob Milbourne. The men were exhumed and reburied in the Dutch Church in 1698 as a political move by Richard Coote, earl of Bellomont to gain the support of the still very numerous and discontented Leislerians.
This series is not actually over. I am sure I will continue to come across examples of different forms and motivations of colonial protest and dissent. I will continue to add to this series as I can, and I invite others to as well. This is a conversation, and it is important that we keep it going. Crisis and Catharsis is about collecting and sharing inspirational stories from our collective past. In this period of uncertainty, turmoil, and unrest it is important to look to the past and learn from it. What have we faced before, how have we dealt with or overcome challenge and adversity? Let’s see how far this conversation can go.
Further Reading:
- The Urban Crucible: The Northern Seaports and the Origins of the American Revolution by Gary B. Nash
- These Daring Disturbers of the Public Peace: The Struggle for Property and Power in Early New Jersey by Brendan McConville
- https://www.njgsbc.org/nj-colonial-land-records/
- Colonial New York: A History by Michael Kammen
- Crossroads of Empire: The Middle Colonies in British North America by Ned C. Landsman
- Defying Empire by Thomas M. Truxes
- Merchants & Empire: Trading in Colonial New York by Cathy Matson
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