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Large Town Officeholding in Eighteenth-Century Connecticut: The Growth of Oligarchy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 January 2009

Bruce C. Daniels
Bruce C. Daniels
Affiliation:
University of Winnipeg
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Extract

The Colonial New England town has always intrigued American historians but, paradoxically, few historians until recently have placed the colonial town under a microscope and studied it in detail. Most, instead, like George Bancroft and Herbert Baxter Adams, simply heaped accolades upon it. Even the Progressive historians, writing in an age of scientific history and seeking to debunk the myth of town meeting democracy, still did not apply a close scrutiny to the actual sources but instead also talked in generalities. The only real exceptions to this pattern and the only persons to delve deeply into local sources were Charles Andrews in his River Towns of Connecticut and G. E. Howard in his Introduction to the Local Constitutional History of the United States, both published in 1889. The next serious professional local study did not appear until 1961. In the intervening seventy-two years hundreds of local histories were written, but by antiquarians who frequently wrote with intelligence and felicity but seldom asked the significant questions that a professional historian would. Indeed, to be involved in local history implied, to people living in this time period, that a person was an antiquarian and not a true historian. However, since 1961 a number of historians have attempted to put the New England town under a microscope and ascertain some specifics to replace the generalities.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of American Studies , Volume 9 , Issue 1 , April 1975 , pp. 1 - 12
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1975

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References

1 Grant, Charles, Democracy in the Connecticut Frontier Town of Kent (New York, 1961)Google Scholar.

2 The most important books that deal with local officeholding in Massachusetts are: Zuckerman, Michael, Peaceable Kingdoms: New England Towns in the Eighteenth Century (New York, 1970)Google Scholar, Lockridge, Kenneth, A New England Town: The First Hundred Years (New York, 1970)Google Scholar, and Demos, John, A Little Commonwealth: Family Life in Plymouth Colony (New York, 1970)Google Scholar. In Connecticut, Grant, Democracy in the Frontier Town of Kent is the main published work. Doctoral dissertations are: Stark, Bruce, ‘Lebanon, Connecticut: A Study of Society and Politics in the Eighteenth Century’ (University of Connecticut, 1970)Google Scholar; Daniels, Bruce, ‘Large Town Power Structures in Eighteenth Century Connecticut’ (University of Connecticut, 1970)Google Scholar; and Willingham, William, ‘Windham, Connecticut: A Profile of a Revolutionary Community, 1755–1818’ (Northwestern University, 1972)Google Scholar. Both Daniels and Willingham have published articles on the subject: Daniels, , ‘Family Dynasties in Connecticut's Largest Towns, 1700–1760’ Canadian Journal of History (09, 1973), 99–111CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Willingham, , ‘Deference Democracy and Town Government in Windham, Connecticut, 1776–1786’, William and Mary Quarterly, 30 (07, 1973), 401–423CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3 Cook, Edward, ‘Local Leadership and a Typology of New England Towns, 1700–1785’, Political Science Quarterly, 86 (12, 1971), 586–608Google Scholar.

4 Ibid., p. 591.

5 Bridenbaugh, Carl, Cities in Revolt (Oxford University ed., 1971), p. 216Google Scholar.

6 I have discussed the selectmen's election patterns in ‘Deference and the Rotation of Selectmen's Offices in Eighteenth Century Connecticut’, Bulletin of the Connecticut Historical Society (07, 1972), 92–7Google Scholar.

7 All deputies' elections are from Trumbull, J. Hammond and Hoadley, Charles (eds.), The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut (15 vols., Hartford, 1850–1890)Google Scholar. I wish to thank Mrs Brenda Batzel of Winnipeg, Manitoba, for compiling the statistics from the Colony Records.

8 Cook, ‘Local Leadership’, p. 595.

9 Daniels, ‘Large Town Power Structures’, chs. 2, 3 and 4.

10 I have discussed the role of families in great detail in ‘Family Dynasties’.

11 This is based on several Burrs' close political relationships with Ebenezer Silliman, one of the assistants who incurred disfavour over the Stamp Act and was purged of his office in 1766. See Zeichner, Oscar, Connecticut's Years of Controversy (Williamsburg, 1949), ch. 3Google Scholar.

12 See Daniels, , ‘Long Range Trends of Wealth Distribution in Eighteenth Century New England’, Explorations in Economic History, 11 (Winter, 1973–1974), 123–36CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Jones, Alice Hanson, ‘Wealth Estimates for the New England Colonies About 1770’, Journal of Economic History, 32 (03, 1972), 98–127CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Henretta, James, ‘Economic Development and Social Structure in Colonial Boston’, William and Mary Quarterly, 22 (01, 1965) 93–105CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Main, Jackson Turner, The Social Structure of Revolutionary America (Princeton, 1965). pp. 7–43CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

13 The author wishes to thank the Canada Council for its support for this project.