46. Political Life, and Conclusions. Sidenote: Political life. The colonists, like their brothers across sea, were eager politicians, and their political methods were much the same as in the mother-country. Attempts upon the part of England to regulate the raising and selling of tobacco, in connection with the general policy of commercial and industrial control, led to frequent quarrels with the home government, which were harassing enough to the Americans, but served their purpose as a school of legislative resistance. The gentlemen controlled colonial affairs, but found efficient support in the middle class; to these two classes suffrage was for the most part restricted. Sidenote: Administration. The political organization throughout the South was closely patterned after that of England, the governor standing for the king, the council for the House of Lords, and the assembly or house of burgesses for the Commons. There were four sources of revenue: (1) quit-rents, payable to the king or the proprietors; (2) export and port duties, for the benefit of the provincial government; (3) any duties levied by and for the assembly; (4) regular parish, county, and provincial levies. The last mentioned were payable in tobacco, and the others as might be specified. The system of taxation was simple, and was based chiefly on lands and negroes; it was moderate in extent, but not always paid cheerfully,--in North Carolina, especially, there was chronic objection to taxes in any form. Sidenote: Official rapacity. The salaries of the government officials were small; but the governor--who was the executive officer, and might lawfully have ruled his little realm in most despotic fashion, had not the assembly, as the holder of the purse-strings, continually kept him in check--considered the salary a small part of his income. By farming the quit-rents, taking fees for patenting lands, and assessing office-holders, he reaped a rich harvest. Broken-down court favorites considered an appointment to the colonies as governor a means of retrieving fallen fortunes, and made little attempt to conceal their sordid purpose. The members of the council were often admitted to a share of the spoils, and official morality was much of the time in a low condition. Sidenote: Summary.