A History of the City of Brooklyn and Kings County, Volume I.Ostrander, Stephen M.
History
A History of the City of Brooklyn and Kings County, Volume I.
Ostrander, Stephen M.
Brooklyn (New York, N.Y.) -- History; Kings County (N.Y.) -- History
Murphy says, it has been with our own fair
city. He states that the record shows it to have been called Breucklyn,
Breuckland, Brucklyn, Broucklyn, Brookland, and Brookline. It was during
the close of the last century that its orthography became fixed as
Brooklyn.
The circumstances attending the settlement of Breuckelen as a town
were associated with a critical turn in the affairs of Kieft's
administration.
Kieft's tyrannical methods of government, a form of self-willed
procedure absolutely grotesque in many respects, had been sufficiently
recognized before the Indian war. After his infamous blunder at
Corlaer's Hook his unpopularity increased. Before the war began, Kieft
had been compelled to call a Council of Twelve[13] from the people. The
Twelve, being chosen by the people, constituted the first illustration
offered in New Netherland of representative government. This board,
soon after the war began, was abolished in a peremptory way; and not
long afterward Kieft undertook once more to call upon its advisory aid.
When the board objected to certain taxes (on wine, beer, brandy, and
beaver skins), he remarked that he still was master, and published his
proclamation levying the tax, with the statement that this was done by
advice of the council chosen by the commonalty.
To these elected representatives of the people such acts naturally were
intolerable, and it was not surprising that they should set themselves
to secure the removal of Kieft. A memorial sent to the West India
Company asked for his recall and for the introduction of the system of
government prevailing in Holland. The College of Nineteen made a report
upon the case to the States-General, mentioning incidentally that the
colony, started as a commercial enterprise, had cost the West India
Company, over all profits, more than 550,000 guilders. The resulting
reform considerably modified the theory if not the practice of
government in New Netherland. The College of Nineteen decreed a "Supreme
Council" for New Netherland. Government was placed in the hands of a
council consisting of the Director, a Vice-Director, and a Fiscal. The
people were to have a right to representation in the council, such being
desirable "for mutual good understanding, and the common advancement and
welfare of the inhabitants."
In the code of general instructions which the West India Company had
sent for the guidance of the Provincial Council, those in authority were
urged "to do all in their power to induce the colonists to establish
themselves in some of the most suitable places, with a certain number of
inhabitants, in the manner of towns, villages, and hamlets, as the
English are in the habit of doing." It was pursuant to the policy of
this code that Bout and his associates declared their intention to
"found a town at their own expense."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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