became bicameral, the deputies forming the lower, and the council the upper house; the towns were allowed all powers not expressly granted to the commonwealth, the affairs of each being executed by a board of "chief inhabitants," acting as magistrates. The government of Connecticut was on the whole somewhat more liberal and democratic than that of Massachusetts, and was the model upon which many American States were afterwards built. Sidenote: Hooker's influence. More than to any other man, the credit for this epoch-making constitution belongs to the Rev. Thomas Hooker, of Hartford, the leading spirit of the colony. He argued that "the foundation of authority is laid in the free consent of the people;" that "the choice of public magistrates belongs unto the people by God's own allowance;" and that "they who have power to appoint officers and magistrates have the right also to set the bounds and limitations of the power and place unto which they call them." These are truisms to-day, but in 1638 they were the utterances of a political prophet. Sidenote: Characteristics of Connecticut. Under her liberal constitutional government, based upon the voice of the people, Connecticut was from the first a practically independent republic. The public officers were plain, honest men, who acceptably administered the affairs of the colony with small cost. The colonists were shrewd in political management, frugal in their expenditures, hard-working, and ingenious. Education flourished, a severe morality obtained, and religious persecution was unknown. Connecticut was noted among the colonies for its prosperity, independence, and enlightenment. 59. New Haven founded (1637-1644). Sidenote: Origin of the colony. Theophilus Eaton was a London merchant "of fair estate, and of great esteem for religion and wisdom in outward affairs." He was at one time an ambassador to the Danish court, and had been one of the original assistants of the Massachusetts Company, although not active in its affairs. John Davenport had been an ordained minister in London; he turned Puritan, and on his resignation in 1633 went to Holland. These two men formed a congregation, composed for the most part of middle-class Londoners, who resolved to migrate to America, there to set up a State founded on scriptural models. The Plymouth and Massachusetts men had started out with this same idea; but as the result of circumstances, had made compromises which Eaton and Davenport could not countenance. Sidenote: The plantation covenant.