Lucius R. Paige, History of Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1630-1877, with a genealogical register

Dudley was superseded in the government by Sir Edmund Andros, who “landed at Boston Dec. 20, 1686, and his commission was published the same day.” ¹ During his administration, the people were in a condition little better than slavery. In the “Massachusetts Archives” ² is a statement by Thomas Danforth, that, “Our rulers are those that hate us and the churches of Christ and his servants in the ministry; they are their daily scorn, taunt, and reproach; and yet are we, our lives, and liberties, civil and ecclesiastical, in their hands, to do with us as they please; some of the chief of them have said,—no better than slaves, only they had not power to sell us for slaves. We are deprived of privileges of Englishmen, of the benefit of the great Charter of our nation; our lands and possessions seized and granted to strangers, contrary to the Stat. Car. I. Cap. 10, and contrary to the assurance given to his Majesty's subjects here, by the declaration of his late Majesty and of his present Majesty, copies whereof I herewith send you.”

A tract was published at London, in 1689, entitled “A Sixth Collection of Papers relating to the present juncture of affairs in England.” The tenth and last paper in the collection is “A narrative of the miseries of New England, by reason of an Arbitrary Government erected there.” It was evidently prepared by a person well acquainted with the facts, perhaps by Increase Mather, who was at that time in London. The case is so well stated that I shall quote freely:—

Before these changes happened, New England was of all the foreign plantations (their enemies themselves being judges) the most flourishing and desirable. But their Charters being all (one way or other) declared to be void and insignificant, it was an easy matter to erect a French Government in that part of the King's dominions, (no doubt intended by the evil counsellors) as a specimen of what was designed to be here in England as soon as the times would bear it. Accordingly Sir Edmond Andross (a Gernsey man) was pitched on as a fit instrument to be made use of; and a most illegal commission given him, bearing date June 3, 1686, by which he, with four of his Council (perhaps all of them his absolute devotees) are empowered to make laws, and raise moneys on the King's subjects without any Parliament, Assembly, or consent of the people. . . . . Laws are made by a few of them, and indeed what they please: nor are they printed, as was the custom in the former governments, so that the people