Today marks the 375th anniversary of Connecticut's Fundamental Orders. They are considered by many to be America's first constitution, and probably the world's first as well.
[A] "Great Migration" of Puritans brought John Winthrop, John Cotton, Rev. Thomas Hooker and Roger Williams to these shores, each of whom held strong views about religion and government.
Uncomfortable with the orthodoxy of fellow Puritans in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, Hooker and a small group left their church in Newtowne (Cambridge) in 1636 to pursue desirable land elsewhere for their "New Israel."
They soon reached "the delightful banks of the Connecticut River," where at Hartford, Windsor and Wethersfield they set down roots, established churches and wrote a charter stating that qualified citizens delegated such powers to their representatives as are necessary to maintain a form of government for all the people.
These "Fundamental Orders of Connecticut," inspired by a Hooker sermon and likely drafted by magistrate and fellow colonist Roger Ludlow, further stated that ultimate power rests with the will of the people, and hence all powers not delegated remain in the hands of the people.
For Hooker, a graduate of Cambridge, and Ludlow, a graduate of Oxford and a lawyer, their knowledge of the history of England's "unwritten constitution" as it evolved over the centuries would now take a new form. Among the qualities they possessed as English Calvinists was a reliance on the written word. Thus 1639 marks the first appearance of a written document proclaiming self-government and committing those who choose to live by it.
There's been a dispute over which of the three towns was Connecticut's first town, Windsor, Wethersfield, or Hartford. Windsor stakes its claim based on it being the site of the first English trading post which was established in 1633. Hartford was the site of a Dutch trading post, also established in 1633, but apparently shortly after Windsor. Wethersfield, settled in 1634, claims to be Connecticut's first town, on the strenght of a distinction between an actual town and a mere trading post.
On the Connecticut Secretary of State's website, Windsor is the first. But I always knew that. I grew up there. It was sometime after 1633, though.
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