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Government and Politics

In 1636, for the first time, the people of Plymouth were not ruled by a monarchy because the men now governed their colony. They wrote 4 sets of laws over the years, the first set was 1636 then the next three were in 1658, 1672, and 1685. Without royal character leading the government, the men created a “combination” in order to organize their government. When the “combination” was made, 41 men signed it. The men that signed it consisted it of John Carver, William Brewster, John Turner. The thing that the men signed was called the Mayflower Compact. The Mayflower Compact was signed in order to create fair and equal laws for the people of Plymouth. The Mayflower Compact __ General Court __: When they first settled in Plymouth they created the general court which acted as a legistlature and judicial court. This court made the first legal code for the puritans and they gave the people a right to a free trial and also came up with an early bill of rights. The town of plymouth though based their government off the British law which was the common law and Mosiac law. The Mosiac law was based more on religion and god, and the common law was decisions were based of the court and judges which they already established in the general court. What separated government in plymouth and the government in England was that the puritans established a judicial government which was different then a high ruler like a king.
 * Settlement in Plymouth: ** T he puritans back in England moved to North America because they didn't agree with the Catholic church and wanted to go away to somewhere else. When they separated from the church they were called separatists. When they came to New England they thought they were down south but they accidentally landed in Plymouth. Since they landed in Plymouth instead of their first destination they had to wait for England's approval to be able to settle there. Well while they were waiting they decided to just go on ahead and make their own government
 * __ Government in Plymouth __**

A meeting at the house of Burgesses
 * __ The house of Burgesses __**

In 1619 the House of Burgesses met for the first time and it was Virginia’s first ever government. The men who owned land got to pick its members. Maryland had a government like the one in Virginia. In the House of Burgesses, they started a representative government. Instead of being ruled by a king people would send representatives from each colony and they would vote for them. Some of the most famous representatives were George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and William Byrd. The first general assembly in Virginia was in 1628 and was run by Charles 1. It was to discuss Indians, defense, tobacco, religion and taxes.


 * __ Money Income __**

The difference between northern and southern colonies was then northern colonies were more for religion and the southern colonies were more for crops and plantations. Down south like in Jamestown they had great weather to grow crops, so they grew a lot of crops and one big crop was tobacco. So the southern colonies made a lot of their money off of agriculture. Up in the northern colonies like Plymouth they still grew some crops but still didn’t have that great weather like Jamestown and all the other southern colonies. Instead of growing crops for money they decided to build factories. When they first built factories their biggest income was from the text tile mills. After a while though and later on in time, their biggest money maker was building ships. They built ships for war but they built ships mostly for slave ships until the civil war started because the north colonies wanted to end slavery, and you can’t make slave ships if you want to end slavery.

Textile mills back in the colonial time period A picture of an old slave ship


 * __ Websites use __**

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[|http://www.ushistory.org/us/2f.asp\]

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