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Crime and Social Control in Provincial Massachusetts*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

David H. Flaherty
David H. Flaherty
Affiliation:
University of Western Ontario
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Extract

The first object of this article is to present some findings from an analysis of criminal activity in an early modern society, as measured primarily through various records of the Massachusetts Superior Court of Judicature, Court of Assize, and General Jail Delivery (the Assizes) from its creation in 1692 to the eve of the American Revolution. Since the amount of serious criminal behaviour revealed by this evidence seems small, the article will then seek to identify the most important components of the system of social control over criminality evidently at work in provincial Massachusetts. These include a conscious effort to maintain a homogeneous population, a pattern of collective settlement in townships, an effective system of prosecuting serious breaches of the criminal law, the commitment of elite groups in town, church, county, and province to law and order, and the role of the family in teaching and assuring appropriate behaviour.

Type
Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 24 , Issue 2 , June 1981 , pp. 339 - 360
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1981

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References

1 See, generally, Emil, Oberholzer Jr, Delinquent saints. Disciplinary action in the early congregational churches of Massachusetts (New York, 1956);Google ScholarFlaherty, David H., Privacy in colonial New England (Charlottesville, Va, 1972), pp. 9–18;Google ScholarNorbert, Elias, The civilizing process. The history of manners (Oxford, 1978), esp. pp. 79, 82, 137, 186–90, 201;Google ScholarJames, Axtell, The school upon a hill. Education and society in colonial New England (New Haven, Conn., 1974).Google Scholar

2 The various records of the Superior Court of Judicature and the accompanying file papers are located in the office of the Clerk of the Supreme Judicial Court, Suffolk County Court House, Boston, and are described in Flaherty, David H., ‘A select guide to the manuscript court records of colonial New England’, American Journal of Legal History, XI (1967), 108–10.Google Scholar

3 On the basis of the enabling statute of 1699 the jurisdiction of the Superior Court of judicature included ‘all pleas of the crown and all matters relating to the conservation of the peace and punishment of offenders … and generally of all other matters, as fully and amply to all intents and purposes whatsoever as the courts of king's bench, pleas and exchequer within his majesty's kingdom of England have or ought to have’ (The acts and resolves, public and private, of the province of the Massachusetts Bay, ed. Goodell, A. C. [Boston, 1869–1922], 1, 370–2), (hereafter cited as Mass. Acts and Res.). Thus any criminal matter could and did come before the Assizes, but in practice the court primarily dealt with major offences, including all felonies and capital crimes. The Assizes enjoyed concurrent jurisdiction with General Sessions of the Peace in theft cases and such matters as assault. A modest trend to make certain crimes capital minimally expanded the jurisdiction of the Assizes during the early eighteenth century. Most petty offences on the docket of the Assizes came on appeal from General Sessions. The latter rarely tried serious crimes of any sort.Google Scholar

4 The following considerations prompted the selection of three particular decades (1700–9, 1720–9, 1740–9) for intensive study: the desire to compare complete decades required starting some time after the creation of the Superior Court of judicature in 1692; the wish to focus on the less-studied first half of the eighteenth century suggested beginning in 1700; the bulk of the existing records, as well as ease of comparison, inspired the choice of alternate decades.

5 The figures for original prosecutions during the 1720s yield the following crime rates for 1725, a year in which the total population of the province of Massachusetts Bay was approximately 100,000: 12.5 prosecutions per 100,000 in the population and 4.7 convictions. The comparable figures for 1745, when the total population was 168.829. are 9.2 prosecutions per 100,000 and 5.3 convictions. Only Suffolk county had a substantial increase in original prosecutions from the 1720s to the 1740s.

The evidence of a declining crime rate at the Assizes and General Sessions in the first half of the eighteenth century coincided with a rapid increase in the volume of civil litigation. David Grayson Allen pointed out that in the court of Common Pleas for Middlesex county ‘between the first and fifth decades of the eighteenth century, the number of cases increases tenfold, from an average of seven to seventy-five per quarter session’ (‘The Zuckerman thesis and the process of legal rationalization in provincial Massachusetts’, William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser. XXXIX [1972], 456). In this context the docket of the Superior Court of Judicature in Middlesex county for January 1742, was typical of the imbalance between civil and criminal litigation: there were eleven continued civil actions, 104 new civil cases, and three criminal prosecutions; none of the latter led to actual trials (Superior Court of Judicature, minute book 48).

6 The argument concerning the limited capacity of colonial law enforcement with respect to minor criminal matters is developed in Flaherty, Privacy in colonial New England, pp. 189–218, and in Flaherty, , ‘Law and the enforcement of morals in early America’, Perspectives in American history, ed. Donald, Fleming and Bernard, Bailyn, v (Cambridge, Mass., 1971), 201–53.Google Scholar

7 The author has examined the records of every county court of General Sessions for this period. The dreary round of minor prosecutions for Sabbath-breaking, illegal sale of liquor, fornication, theft, assault, and other miscellaneous matters discourage serious study in their entirety. The records quantified to date are those for Suffolk county from 1726 to 1731 and from 1744 to 1753 and for Middlesex from 1720 to 1724 and from 1740 to 1744. The 206 offences for 1720–4 in Middlesex broke down as follows: assault, 5.3%; theft, 5.3%; fornication, 62.6 %; public worship, 11.7%; and miscellaneous, 15.0%. For 1740–4 the comparative figures for 120 crimes were: assault, 3.3%; theft, 4.2%; fornication, 28.3%; public worship, 16.7%; miscellaneous or unknown, 21.7%; and killing wild deer, 25.8%.

8 See, in general, Bruce, Lenman and Geoffrey, Parker, ‘Crime and control in Scotland, 1500–1800’, History Today, xxx (1980), 13–17;Google Scholar Jan Sundin, ‘Education-control-composition-punishment. Function of Swedish parish administration before 1850’ (unpublished manuscript, university of Umea, Sweden, 1979); Sharpe, James A., ‘Crime in the county of Essex, 1620–1680’ (D.Phil, thesis, Oxford, 1978);Google ScholarSpierenburg, Pieter C., Judicial violence in the Dutch Republic. Corporal punishment, executions, and torture in Amsterdam, 1650–1750 (University of Amsterdam thesis, 1978).Google Scholar

9 Douglas, Greenberg, Crime and law enforcement in the colony of New York (Ithaca, N.Y., 1976), ch. 5.Google Scholar

10 See the discussion of urban versus rural crime rates in John, Beattie, ‘The pattern of crime in England, 1660–1800’, Past and Present, no. 62 (1974), pp. 59–60, 74–85. The Essex data are derived from the Calendar of Essex Assize Records, Essex Record Office, Chelmsford.Google Scholar

11 See the informative discussion of the problems associated with the ‘dark figure’ of unknown crime in Beattie, J. M., ‘Towards a study of crime in eighteenth century England: a note on indictments’, in David, Williams and Paul, Fritz, eds., The triumph of culture: eighteenth-century perspectives (Toronto, 1972), pp. 302–4.Google Scholar

12 The figures used here for crime reported in the Massachusetts newspapers exclude servants who simply ran away, and episodes of piracy and smuggling.

13 Basic population figures were derived from Bureau, U.S. of the Census, Historical statistics of the United States, colonial times to 1970 (Washington, D.C., 1975), part 2, p. Z, 1–23.Google Scholar

14 Michael, Zuckerman, ‘The social context of democracy in Massachusetts’, William and Mary Quarterly, xxv (1968), 538.Google Scholar

15 Greenberg, Crime and law enforcement in the colony of New York, pp. 40–9, 139, 215–16.

16 Smith, Daniel Scott, ‘The demographic history of colonial New England’, The Journal of Economic History, XXXII (1972), 171.Google Scholar

17 See Shipton, Clifford K., ‘Immigration to New England, 1680–1740’, Journal of Political Economy, XLIV (1936), 225–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

18 This trend is well described in Greven, Philip J. Jr, Four generations. Population, land, and family in colonial Andover, Massachusetts (Ithaca, N.Y., 1970), pp. 161, 212–14, 250–1;Google ScholarBonomi, Patricia U., A factious people. Politics and society in colonial New fork (New York, 1971), pp. 200–24;Google Scholar and Bushman, Richard L., From puritan to yankee. Character and the social order in Connecticut, 1690–1765 (Cambridge, Mass., 1967), pp. 83, 122.Google Scholar

19 This theme of the interaction between population density and economic opportunity has been very well developed for New Hampshire towns in the last third of the eighteenth century. See Rutman, Darrett B., ‘People in process. The New Hampshire town of the eighteenth century’, Journal of Urban History, 1 (1975), 268–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

20 President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice, The challenge of crime in a free society (Washington, D.C., 1967), ch. 3; Davis, Natalie Zemon, ‘The reasons of misrule: youth groups and charivaris in sixteenth-century France’, Past and Present, no. 50 (February, 1971), pp. 41–75;CrossRefGoogle ScholarHufton, Olwen H., ‘Attitudes towards authority in eighteenth-century Languedoc’, Social History, III (1978), 291–4;Google ScholarKeith, Thomas, Age and authority in early modern England (London, 1976), pp. 16—18.Google Scholar

21 These suggestions concerning seafaring and military service are based on an interpretation of the details of various criminal cases. However, the functions of these careers in colonial society deserve more direct investigation on these and many other points. For material that is at least partially supportive of my interpretation, see Jesse, Lemisch, ‘Jack Tar in the streets: merchant seamen in the politics of revolutionary America’, William and Mary Quarterly, xxv (1968), 371–80.Google Scholar

22 Flaherty, Privacy in colonial New England, p. 99.

23 Ibid. pp. 97–103.

24 The dates selected for comparison from Suffolk County General Sessions records are the only years from 1725 to 1755 for which such records exist.

25 Lockridge, Kenneth A., A New England town. The first hundred years: Dedham, Massachusetts, 1636–1736 (New York, 1970), pp. 93–4, 118, 148.Google Scholar

26 Ibid. p. 65; Cook, Edward M. Jrreaffirms the stable character of the Dedham population (‘ Social behavior and changing values in Dedham, Massachusetts, 1700–1775’, William and Mary Quarterly, XXVII [1970], 572).Google Scholar

27 Superior Court of Judicature, Records, 1692–5, pp. 149–50 [hereafter cited as SCJ, Recs.].

28 SCJ, Recs., 1725–30, pp. 87, 182.

29 For the six years 1726–31, an average of only one case a year from Dedham came before the General Sessions for Suffolk county. Two of these later appeared on appeal at the Assizes and are described briefly above. For the ten years 1744–53, Dedhamites averaged 1 3 cases per year at General Sessions. The total of 19 cases in 16 years broke down as follows: riot, 2; assault, 4; fornication (bastardy), 8; liquor offences, 3; and miscellaneous, 2. For 8 of the 16 years no case from Dedham came before the General Sessions.

30 SCJ, Recs., 1736–8, pp. 43–4; 1739–40, p. 191; 1757–9, PP- 424–5; 1763–4. P. 132.

31 Andover in Essex county, another much studied town, produced no cases at the Assizes between 1694 and 1729, two during the 1730s, one in the 1740s, one in the 1750s (for an assault committed in Billerica), and an appeal in the 1760s. There were two prosecutions for counterfeiting and one for an attempted poisoning; the appeal of a conviction for killing a wild deer was reversed. Andover was somewhat larger than Dedham; both belonged among the leading 20 per cent of towns in the province in terms of population and wealth. In 1693 thirty-seven of the prosecutions for witchcraft at the Assizes involved accused persons from Andover. The Andover prosecutions resulted in four convictions against two persons. (SCJ, Recs., 1692–5, pp. 6–29, 56, 61.)

32 Bushman has best described this commitment in From puritan to yankee, pp. 3–7, 10, 13. See also Cook, Edward M. Jr, The fathers of the towns. Leadership and community structure in eighteenth-century New England (Baltimore, 1976), ch. 2.Google Scholar

33 Snell, Ronald Kingman, ‘The county magistracy in eighteenth-century Massachusetts: 1692 1750’ (Ph.D diss., Princeton University, 1970), pp. 246–85.Google Scholar

34 See Flaherty, Privacy in colonial New England, pp. 151–62; and Oberholzer, Delinquent saints.

35 See Flaherty, Privacy in colonial New England, pp. 88–112, 170–5. For a modern illustration of the efficacy of local communities in controlling crime, see Clinard, Marshall B., Cities with little crime. The case of Switzerland (Cambridge, England, 1978), pp. 107, 113.Google Scholar

36 See Mass. Acts and Res. 11, 336–8; Flaherty, Privacy in colonial New England, pp. 170–5. Boston warned out 230 persons from 1701–15 and 330 from 1715–20, the latter increase in response to a sudden influx of Scotch-Irish (Carl, Bridenbaugh, Cities in the wilderness [New York, 1938], p. 231).Google Scholar

37 Cook, The fathers of the towns, p. 24.

38 See Flaherty, Privacy in colonial New England, pp. 97–112.

39 For an exceptional episode, see the Boston Evening Post, 20 July 1741; Boston News Letter, 16–23 July 1741; Boston Gazette, 13–20 July 1741.

40 See the discussion in Greven, Four generations, pp. 175–6, 215–21, 271–3.

41 Valuable examples of the exercise of discipline, including physical beatings, over household servants are contained in The diary of Samuel Pepys, ed. Latham, R. and Matthews, W. (London, 1970- ), 1, 233, 307; II, 54–5, 206–7; III, 66, 105, 116; IV, 7, 12–13, 109. Colonial diaries are not as fruitful on this particular point, but see Flaherty, Privacy in colonial New England, pp. 59–64, 67–8.Google Scholar

42 See the extended discussion in Henretta, James A., The evolution of American society, 1700–1815. An interdisciplinary analysis (Lexington, Mass., 1973), pp. 83, 94, 96, 100–1, 114–15, 175.Google Scholar

43 This paragraph is largely founded on the treatment of these matters in Towner, Lawrence W., ‘A good master well served: a social history of servitude in Massachusetts, 1620–1750’ (Ph.D. diss., Northwestern University, 1955), passim. See also the discussion in Flaherty, Privacy in colonial New England, pp. 59–66.Google Scholar

44 Ibid. pp. 397–409, 413–14.

45 Journals of the House of Representatives of Massachusetts (Boston, 1919- ), 1, 165 (hereafter cited as JHR).

46 See Boston News Letter, 12–19 Dec. 1720.

47 See JHR, v, 18–292 passim; ibid, VIII, 38–42.

48 See Flaherty, ‘Law and the enforcement of morals in early America’, 225–44; and Flaherty, Privacy in colonial New England, pp. 189–218.

49 See JHR, 1, 97; and Flaherty, Privacy, pp. 190–3.

50 See JHR, VI, 18–19, 176; Mass. Acts and Res. x, 436.

51 Kinvin Wroth stresses the role of the Massachusetts legal system as ‘ an independent and effective instrument of social control’ (‘Possible kingdoms: the New England town from the perspective of legal history’, American Journal of Legal History, xv [1971], 319–24, also 327).

52 Walton, Gary M. and Shepherd, James F., Economic rise of early America (Cambridge, England, 1979), PP- 142–5.Google Scholar

53 Cook, Fathers of the towns, p. 70.

54 Lockridge, A New England town, p. 151.

55 Cook, , ‘Social behaviour and changing values in Dedham’, William and Mary Quarterly, XXVII (1970), 568.Google Scholar

56 Hufton, Compare Olwen H., The poor of eighteenth-century France (Oxford, 1974).Google Scholar

57 See Hartwell, R. M., The industrial revolution and economic growth (London, 1971), p. 61;Google ScholarPeter, Clark and Paul, Slack, English towns in transition, 1500–1700 (London, 1976), pp. 112–14, 121–5,Google Scholar and Alan, Macfarlane, The origins of English individualism (Oxford, 1978), pp. 69–71, 77.Google Scholar

58 Warden, G. B., Boston, 1689–1776 (Boston, 1970), p. 81.Google Scholar

59 Records relating to the early history of Boston, ed. Whitmore, William H. et al. (Boston, 1876–1909), XII, 121–2 (1734), 207 (1738).Google Scholar

60 Allan, Kulikoff, ‘The progress of inequality in revolutionary Boston’, William and Mary Quarterly, XXVIII (1971), 383.Google Scholar

61 JHR, in, 147.

62 JHR, 1, 169, 182 (1717); ibid. II, 252 (1720).

63 ‘Letter book of Samuel Sewall’, Massachusetts Historical Society, Collections, 6th ser. I—II (Boston, 1886–8), 11, 152.

64 SCJ, Recs., 1725–9, p. 214.

65 JHR, II, 324–73 (1720), 379–84 (1721); ibid, VII, 47–53 (1726).

66 See note 24.

67 Early files in the office of the Clerk of the Supreme Judicial Court, no. 23170:2, Suffolk County Court House, Boston.

68 Nash, G. B., ‘ Urban wealth and poverty in pre-revolutionary America’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, VI (1976), 559 630.Google Scholar

69 Warden, G. B., ’Inequality and instability in eighteenth-century Boston: a reappraisal’Google Scholar, ibid, VI (1976), 613.

70 Jones, D. L., ‘The strolling poor: transiency in eighteenth-century Massachusetts’, Journal of Social History, VIII (1975), 28–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar