freeborn Englishmen'; but the duties which were correlative to those immunities, and which are necessary to a true conception of allegiance, were not mentioned. This position was consistently maintained by the Puritans of Massachusetts as long as they remained in power. In their correspondence with the home government and its officials between 1664 and 1684 the right of appeal was always denied. Its exercise was never allowed. If we add to this the further statements that Massachusetts coined money; strove to enlarge the bounds of her patent, not only without consulting the king, but in defiance of his absolute prohibition; taxed English imports; and, without the consent of the home government, entered the New England confederation, some notion can be formed of the degree of independence claimed and exercised by that colony. The exercise of this independence however did not make it legal. It only illustrates the fact that the roots of the American revolution extend back into the times of which we are speaking. … It was to be expected that England would interfere to bring Massachusetts within the bounds of constitutional dependence. Complaints against the colony, on the part of Gorges and of those who had been banished by the Puritans, began very early. {3170} These led to 'quo warranto' proceedings for the recall of the charter in 1635. But civil strife at home compelled the government of Charles I to abandon the project. Then came the period of the Commonwealth, when the views of the English government were so fully in harmony with those of the New England leaders that the practical independence of the colony was ignored. … From the restoration dates the beginning of a more comprehensive colonial policy." With the fall of the Massachusetts charter, in 1684, "closes the first stage in the development of the idea of colonial independence. The struggle between the Puritans of Massachusetts and the crown is the most significant fact in American history previous to 1760. The Puritans were defeated; the authority of England was reasserted. … But for our purpose the important result is that the Puritans left behind them an armory full of precedents and arguments in favor of colonial independence. They had constructed the American theory on that subject. That was the chief permanent result of their experiment. They had from first to last adhered to the theory which expediency taught them to adopt. They taught the colonists how to resist the exercise of the ecclesiastical and judicial supremacy of the crown. If now at any time in the future the Americans should consider themselves aggrieved by the acts of the English government, the Puritan spirit and theory would be likely to appear. Such was the aspect of affairs at the close of the first period of colonial history. After the revolution of