x PRINCE GEORGES COUNTY

tapany. In short order the remainder of the province was brought under submission
and government by a Protestant Association was established. 4 The causes of the
Maryland revolution of 1689 have been the subject of much scholarly debate but
it would appear that foremost among the causes for discontent were the unreason-
able exercise of the proprietor's veto power; the uncertain status of many of the
provincial laws; the illegal raising of taxes and imposition of fines by the proprie-
tor; the exaction of excessive fees by proprietary officers; the corruption, or at least
maladministration, of the judicial system; the favoritism towards Catholics as evi-
denced through land grants, office holding and special legal protection; the sei-
zure of goods under false pretenses; and the exaction of sterling instead of tobacco
for the payment of rents. 5

With control of the colony secured, representatives of the Protestant Association
petitioned that their religion, rights and liberties be safeguarded under a Protes-
tant government—in effect that the crown accept Maryland as a royal province.
The Committee for Trade and Plantations in London, consistent with its general
attitude toward the chartered colonies, welcomed the opportunity to bring Mary-
land into closer dependence on the crown and sought to maintain the status quo
in the province while obtaining legal advice in the matter. 6 In June 1690, Chief
Justice Holt of King's Bench, in what has been termed a "shuffling and ignoble"
opinion, advised that "it being a case of necessity", the King, by his commission,
might constitute a governor for the province whose authority would be legal,
although he would be responsible to Lord Baltimore for the profits.7 Although
hearings were held before the Lords of Trade on charges against Lord Baltimore
and the Attorney General was directed to proceed by scire facias against the Mary-
land charter in August 1690, such proceeding was never carried forward and after
an opinion had been received from the Attorney General of the same tenor as that
rendered by Holt, C. J., the Privy Council in January 1690/91 directed that a royal
commission for Lionel Copley as governor be drawn up. However, this commission
did not pass the Great Seal until June 27, 1691 and for various reasons Copley's
departure from England was delayed; he did not meet with his Council in Mary-
land until April 1692. 8 Lord Baltimore still retained proprietary rights to the soil
and certain fiscal rights; this led Copley to remark, after a few months in the
province, that there never would be peace and quiet until the proprietary interest
was redeemed by the crown. 9 Whether Lord Baltimore would have retained his
charter rights if royal hostility to the chartered colonies had not been aided by

4. Steiner, op. cit. 'supra,; 298-99, 304-09; 3 Osgood, op. cit. supra, 495-500; 8 MA 115-18, 225-28;
20 id. 142-145. For some discussion of the leaders of the revolt see Kammen, OF cit. supra, 319-30.

5. The first extended discussion of the causes of the revolution of 1689 appeared in Sparks,
Causes of the Maryland Revolution of 1689, JHUS, 14th Ser., XI-XII (1896); it was critical of the
earlier views of McMahon and hostile to the proprietary. Steiner in his monograph (supra note
2) takes a more favorable view of Charles Calyert and a hard look at some of the leaders of the
revolt. The most recent extended discussion of the causes is by Kammen (supra note 1). Some
contemporary justifications for the revolt appear in The Declaration of the Reasons and Motives
for the Present Appearing in Arms of their Majesties Protestant Subjects in the Province of Mary-
land (1689), in Narratives of the Insurrections, 1675-1690 (Original Narratives of Early Amer.
Hist., ed. C. M. Andrews, 1915) 305-14; 8 MA 101-07, 215-20. For a narrative stressing the
maladministration of justice and the corruption of the legal system see "Mariland's Grevances
Wiy The Have Taken OF Arms" (ed. McAnear), 8 J. So. Hist. 392 (1942). See also Wroth, The
First Sixty Years of the Church of England in Maryland, 1632-1692, 11 MHM 1, 29-34 (1916).

6. Steiner, op. cit. supra, 309-10; CSP, Col, 1689-92, Nos. 315, 405-06.

7. Steiner, op. cit. supra, 336-37; CSP, Col, 1689-92, No. 923; 8 MA 185-86.

8. Steiner, op. cit. supra, 312, 322, 337-45; CSP, Col., 1689-92, Nos. 693, 1026, 1098; 8 MA
200-04, 207, 211-12, 214-15, 229-31, 232-33, 240-41, 263-70.

9. CSP, Col, 1689-92, No. 2472; 8 MA 234-36.