Ok, then why does the statute in 1629-39 refer to the "names of the
Burgesses"? I am not trying to create an argument here. As we say out
here in Oklahoma, "I have no dogs in this fight" -- I just want to
figure it out, so I get it right. If I am understanding you correctly,
the members of the legislature called themselves "Burgesses" in the 1629
statute and inthe 1642 statute I quoted below, but they were not yet
part of something that was officially called "The House of Burgesses."
Is that right?
Paul
[log in to unmask] wrote:
> Paul-
> In a nutshell, from 1619-1642 Virginia's unicameral entity was called
> either the General or Grand Assembly - from 1643 to 1776 the General
> Assembly (now bicameral) comprised the Council and the House of Burgesses.
>
> Jon Kukla
>
> One will not find the name "House of Burgesses" in any primary source
> prior to the 1640s - just as one will not find "The United States of
> America" prior to the revolution. Back in 1873 I read VCRP microfilm etc 8
> hours a day for a month . . .
> The salient thing about your first quote, Paul, is that it is from W.
> W. Hening's HEADNOTE - written earily in the 19th century - not from
> the contemporary 17th-century sources he was publishing. Hening and
> McIlwaine and lots of others were reading back into the 17th-c a
> structure that only began in 1643. In the Jefferson MSS at Library of
> Congress, one can see portions of the original manuscript text that
> Hening circled with a note to the typesetter that said "Omit" - in at
> least one case the omitted material supported my interpretation of the
> structure of the assembly . . . but I digress.
>
> Warren Billings's new book (as well as my dissertation and my _Speakers
> and Clerks of the Virginia House of Burgesses, 1643-1776)) document all
> this in detail, but in a nutshell:
>
> 1619-1642 Unicameral General or Grand Assembly (literally meeting in one
> room)
> First General Assembly of 1619 was an expanded meeting of governor and
> Council with the addition of elected "burgesses" from various of the
> settlements :
> the self-styled "Speaker" John Pory was in fact secretary of the colony
> and a member of the Council, not an elected burgess.
> the word "burgess" was English parliamentary term for representative
> from a borough (as opposed to a shire or county) hence it goes along
> with the early Virginia entities of James City, Charles City, Elizabeth
> City .... (I dealt with the myth of the county formation in 1634 in an
> article in Virginia Genealogist back in the 1980s ... formal counties
> date to the early 1640s, too.)
> During these decades, the unicameral body was sometimes called the Grand
> Assembly, burgesses sat together with governor and council, having been
> elected by various geographical settlements and sometimes by parishes.
> When using Hening and especially McIlwaine one must be careful not to
> let _their_ misunderstandings obstruct one's perception of the primary
> sources . . . . (I addressed this in my introductions to the 2d
> editions of the (as McIlwaine called them) the Legislative Journals of
> the Council and the Minutes of the Council and General Court (both
> reprint editions published about 1979 I think).
> One also needs to escape the misunderstanding in Robert Beverly's
> History where he claimed that a House of Burgesses started meeting
> separately in 1680 - I dealt with that in VMHB back in 70s. Beverley
> lifted and misunderstood passages from an earlier report by Hartwell,
> Chilton and Blair.
>
> 1643-1776 Bicameral General Assembly comprised of Council and House of
> Burgesses properly so called.
> 1643 is first meeting of a bicameral General Assembly with the elected
> members organized separately as a "lower" house properly called the
> House of Burgesses - and first real "Speaker" a burgess (unlike Pory)
>
> ============
>
>
>>Warren: I am confused. What was the body called from 1619 to 1643?
>>After 1643 is the colonial legislature a unicameral and then called the
>>House of Burgesses? Hening, vol. 1, p. 230 mentions in a headnote an
>>act "signed by the Governor, memebrs of hte Council and House of
>>Burgesses, and dates at James City, the first day of April 1642." That
>>would be a year before 1643." That act (also on page 230) says it was
>>passed by the "We the Governor, Council and Burgesses of the Grand
>>Assembly in Virginia...." But, 1 Hening 147 (March 24 1629-30) lists
>>"the names of the Burgesses..."
>>
>>So, there were Burgesses in in 1629-30, but were they not yet "the House
>>of Burgesses"?
>>
>>Paul Finkelman
>>
>>--
>>Paul Finkelman
>>Chapman Distinguished Professor
>>University of Tulsa College of Law
>>3120 East 4th Place
>>Tulsa, Oklahoma 74104-2499
>>
>>918-631-3706 (office)
>>918-631-2194 (fax)
>>
>>[log in to unmask]
>>
>>Brent Tarter wrote:
>>
>>>Va-Hist subscriber Warren Billings asked me to post this to the list, as
>>>he has had some computer difficulty.
>>>
>>>Subject: Another bit of pedantry
>>>Date: Fri, 01 Apr 2005 09:32:47 -0600
>>>From: "Dr. Warren M. Billings" <[log in to unmask]>
>>>To: [log in to unmask]
>>>
>>>
>>>Permit me to add another bit of pedantry to the recent postings about
>>>ecclesiastical law and practices in colonial Virginia
>>>
>>>In those discussions, several commentators equate "House of Burgesses"
>>>with "General Assembly." Those were not synonymous terms. The General
>>>Assembly, after 1643, consisted of the governor-general, the Council of
>>>State, and the House of Burgesses, all of whom had to concur before any
>>>bill passed into law. Constitutionally, therefore, the house could not
>>>enact laws ex mero motu. Also, the burgesses could not "enforce" the law
>>>of religion or any other for that matter. The power and obligation for
>>>execution of the statutes in force lay with the colony's magistracy. To
>>>be sure, many of those magistrates sat on the Council or in the House,
>>>but when they enforced the law, they did so in their capacity as General
>>>Court judge or justice of the peace, not as councillor of state or
>>>burgess.
>>>
>>>The General Assembly, as Jon Kukla and others have clearly demonstrated,
>>>began as a unicameral body. Thus, there was no House of Burgesses
>>>between 1619 and 1643, the year Sir William Berkeley encouraged the
>>>assembly to become bicameral.
>>>
>>>Warren M. Billings
>>>
>>>Warren M. Billings
>>>Distinguished Professor
>>>Department of History
>>>University of New Orleans
>>>New Orleans, Louisiana 70148
>>>
>>>To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the
>>>instructions
>>>at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
>>
>>To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions
>>at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
>>
>>
>
>
>
> Dr. Jon Kukla, Executive Vice-President
> Red Hill - The Patrick Henry National Memorial
> 1250 Red Hill Road
> Brookneal, Virginia 24528
> www.redhill.org
> Phone 434-376-2044 or 800-514-7463
>
> Fax 434-376-2647
>
> - M. Lynn Davis, Office Manager
> - Karen Gorham-Smith, Associate Curator
> - Edith Poindexter, Curator
>
> To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions
> at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html
--
Paul Finkelman
Chapman Distinguished Professor
University of Tulsa College of Law
3120 East 4th Place
Tulsa, Oklahoma 74104-2499
918-631-3706 (office)
918-631-2194 (fax)
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