New York Bay was discovered by Verrazano in 1524, but
though Portuguese, French and Spanish navigators, in all probability,
visited the harbor during the sixteenth century, no important
explorations were made before 1609, when almost simultaneously Samuel de
Champlain, the founder of Quebec, in August and Henry Hudson, sailing in
the half moon under the Dutch flag, in September, entered the limits of
the present State. Champlain's action in lending the Huron Indians aid
against the Iroquois imbued the Five Nations with an implacable hatred
for the French, and to a great extent determined in advance the fate of
their colonizing schemes in America. Hudson's account of New Netherland,
as he named the region, and of the great river, called at first
Mauritius and then North, and finally Hudson, which he had ascended to
the highest navigable point, led Dutch merchants, eager for furs, to
dispatch trading vessels to the new country in 1610 and subsequent
years.
Just below Albany, Captain Christiansen built Fort Nassau in 1613
(abandoned in 1617), and about the same time a number of traders built
their posts on Manhattan Island. A trading company, organized in 1615,
concluded two years later at Tawasantha, near Albany, a treaty with the
Iroquois, who remained to the last friends of the Dutch. With the
foundling of the West India Company in 1621 a fairly active immigration
began. A number of Walloons brought over by Captain May in 1623 were
settled on Manhattan Island, on Long Island, and up the Hudson at Fort
Orange (later Albany), founded in 1622.
In 1626 Peter Minuit was made director-general of the company, and
bought Manhattan Island from the Indians (See New York City, section on
History). The greater part of the population of New Netherland 200 in
number in 1625, were agents of the company, whose object in the main was
trade and not colonization: and as it guarded its monopoly jealously and
offered few inducements to permanent settlers, progress for a few years
was slow. Quickly, however, individual directors discovered the
advantageous facility with which the Indians might be brought to part
with their lands, and in 1629 the patroon system, a system of feudal
tenure on an extensive scale, was established.
Kilan Van Rensselaer purchased a large tract of land in the neighborhood
of Albany, and Michael Pauw bought Staten Island and Pavonia. Ships from
Holland stocked these great estates with colonists, tools, and animals.
The acquisition of land continued under Wouter Van Twiller (q.v.), who
came over in 1633, and under Kieft (q.v.), who succeeded Van Twiller in
1638. The abandonment of the company's trade monopoly was followed by a
large influx of colonists, among whom were many English Puritans and
French Huguenots.
The population was cosmopolitan even in 1643, when , according to Father
Jogues, 400 or 500 inhabitants spoke eighteen different languages and
were divided into Calvinists, Lutherans, Catholics, Puritans, Baptists,
and other more minute denominations. War with the Algonquins Indians,
caused by the greed of Kieft, brought the colony near to
destruction. The settlements around New Amsterdam were wiped out and the
town itself was threatened. In the moment of highest danger Kieft was
forced by popular demand to appoint a council of eight to assist him in
carrying on the war. This was the beginning of representative government
in New York.
Peter Stuyvesant (1647-64) appointed a council of nine to advise him and
acted in systematic opposition to it. Sincerely solicitous for the
welfare of the colony, he reserved it for himself to determine in what
that welfare consisted and how it was to be attained. Defying alike the
popular will and the orders of the States-General in Holland, he ruled,
arrested, confiscated, silenced public speech, and dictated the outline
for the Sunday sermon.
New Amsterdam received a burgher government in 1653, but Stuyvesant had
the appointment of the magistrates. He upheld bravely the rights of the
company against the Swedes on the Delaware, whom he dispossessed, and
the English in Connecticut and Long Island, but the citizens grew weary
of himand yielded in 1664 to an English fleet under Colonel Nicolls,
which had come to enforce the Duke of York's title to the region.
New Netherlands became New York, and was ruled by the Duke's Governors
(a legislature was refused), and the" Duke's laws." Taken by the Dutch
in 1673, it was returned to England in the following year. At the time
of the English occupation New Netherlands had a population of about
8000, comprising many nationalities, with the Dutch predominant.
Life in the colony had not that deep spiritual tinge which it bore in
New England, but it was more gracious and more free. The churches were
well supported, and the school system was excellent, but breweries and
drinking shops found their place in the order of things. In religion a
broad toleration, in social life a hearty gayety and timely hospitality
marked the cosmopolitan colony of well-fed traders and farmers.
The Dutch did not take kindly to the English rule in the beginning. The
desire of the people for some share in the government remained
unsatisfied. Complaints against the arbitrary imposition of taxes and
customs culminated in a demand, expressed in the form of petitions, for
a popular assembly, and this was finally granted in 1683, when a
provincial assembly summoned by Governor Dongan passed the Charter of
Liberties, granting freedom of religion to all Christians, and the
suffrage to all freeholders.
An important treaty with the Iroquois in 1684 confirmed the alliance
between them and the English and made them definitely the enemies of the
French, who retaliated with punitive expeditions into the country, in
1687 under Denonville, and later, repeatedly, under Frontenac. In 1686
New York and Albany obtained new charters, but in the following year the
provincial assembly was dissolved, absolute rule was restored, and New
York became a part of the Dominion of New England, under Governor Andros.
The Revolution of 1688 in England found two parties in the colony, the
richer classes who were loyal to James II., the popular majority in
favor of William of Orange. Exaggerated reports of Catholic intrigues
caused Jacob Leisler (q.v.) to seize the fort at New Amsterdam in the
name of William and Mary. A committee of safety made him
commander-in-chief, and the popular assembly in 1689 gave him autocratic
power. He held the fort against a force of troops from England, but
willingly laid down his authority when Governor Sloughter, the King's
appointee, arrived. The clergy and the wealthy merchants hated Leisler
as the champion of popular ideas, and brought about his death on a
charge of treason in 1691.
The period from 1690 to the Revolution was marked by almost continuous
disputes between the Governor and the Assembly on the questions of the
Governor's salary, the collection and the disposal of the revenue, the
control of the courts, and the establishment of an endowed church. Of
the Governors the larger number were impecunious peers sent to America
to grow fat as best they might. They bargained with the Assembly for an
increase in salary, participated in gigantic land frauds in common with
minor officials and prominent citizens, and in one instance, the notable
case of Governor Fletcher (1692-98), shared in the profits of piracy.
There were, however, Governors of a far higher character, men like
Bellomont (1698-1701), to whom the rehabilitation of Leisler's memory is
due, Robert Hunter (1710-19), or William Burnet (1720-28), who was an
ardent champion of the royal power, but nevertheless an honest man, and
zealous for the welfare of the province, but in spite of political
turmoil the growth of the colony was rapid and uninterrupted.
In 1720 the population consisted of 31,000 whites and 4000 negroes; in
1756 it comprised 83,000 whites and 13,000 negroes, and in 1771 168,000
whites and negroes. The first newspaper, the GAZETTE, a Government
organ, was published in 1725, and the second, the WEEKLY JOURNAL, an
opposition sheet, appeared in 1733. For his criticism of the Governor's
conduct the editor of the WEEKLY JOURNAL, John Peter Zenger (q.v.), was
brought to trial for libel in 1734, but, supported by the people and the
Assembly, he won his case and vindicated the freedom of the press in New
York.
In 1746 the Assembly appropriated £250 toward the foundation of King's
College. The people who fought for the freedom of the press and
established King's College were the same who in 1741, thrown into a
paroxysm of fear by the baseless rumors of a negro insurrection,
murdered 31 negroes and drove out 71 others by due process of the law.
In the early French and Indian wars New York suffered heavily, for,
owing to the factious disputes between the Governor and the Assembly,
the border was left without any troops and the frontier settlements were
swept clean by the French and their Indian allies. In 1690 Schenectady
was destroyed. Sir William Johnson kept the Iroquois friendly to the
English, and the alliance with them was strengthened at the Albany
Convention of 1754 (q.v.). By the Treaty of Fort Stanwix in 1768 a
definite line of delimitation between the English and the Indian
territory was traced.
As early as 1762 petitions and remonstrance's against the oppressive
commercial laws had been submitted to Parliament and the King. In 1764
the Assembly appointed a committee to correspond with the other
provinces concerning the common cause, and in October, 1765, a colonial
Congress assembled at New York. The imposition of the stamp duty was
followed by the outbreak of disorder, in which the Sons of Liberty
(q.v.) were prominent, and non-importation agreements were entered into
by the people. Though the commercial interests of the colony suffered
greatly, the Assembly refused to vote supplies for the troops, and on
January 18,1770, the Sons of Liberty, and the British soldiers fought
the battle of Golden Hill on John Street in the city of New York.
There was peace till 1773, when the arrival of tea ships aroused the
Sons of Liberty to renewed activity. By 1775 the Provincial Assembly had
become devotedly Tory, and unrepresentative of popular opinion. Its last
session occurred on April 3d. On April 20th a Provincial Congress,
comprising representatives of seven counties outside of New York City,
met at New York, and elected delegates to the Continental Congress. Upon
the news of the battle of Lexington a committee of 100, in which the
more conservative element among the revolutionists predominated took
possession of the Government, and issued a call for a provincial
convention, which assembled July 10, 1776, at White Plains, and
subsequently removed to Kingston, where it adjourned April 20, 1777,
after drawing up a constitution for the State of New York.
The Articles of Confederation were ratified in 1778. Two years later New
York ceded its public lands in the West to Congress, and in 1786 it
terminated its dispute with Massachusetts by granting it the right of
preemption to about 6,000,000 acres of land in the western part of the
State . Of this vast tract more than 3,500,000 acres came by purchase
into the possession of Robert Morris (q.v.), who disposed of a large
area, embracing a considerable part of that section of the State, to a
number of citizens of Amsterdam, who in 1798 were authorized by the
Legislature to hold land within the State. This tract came to be
popularly known as the Holland Purchase.
Land speculation was entered into on an extensive scale, and the region
filled up rapidly with immigrants from New England. The dispute
regarding the possession of Vermont, to which New York laid claim, was
settled by the erection of an independent State, Vermont being admitted
into the Union in 1791. The fear of too strong a central government and
the desire to retain possession of its rich custom-house made New York
ill-inclined toward the newly framed Federal Constitution. Two of its
three delegates withdrew from the Federal convention, and only after ten
States had adopted the Constitution did a State convention ratify it by
30 votes to 27 (July 26, 1788).
From the very outset party lines were sharply drawn in the State. The
Federalists were led by Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and General
Schuyler. Among the leaders of the various factions of the Republicans
were the two Clintons--George, and after him De Witt--the Livingstons,
and Aaron Burr. Federalist from 1795 to 1800, the State became
republican after that year, and passed under the domination of DeWitt
Clinton, who remained in power till 1822 except for a brief period of
eclipse between 1815 and 1817.
Politics during this period were venal, and personal ambitions
determined the attitude of factions. The followers of the ascendant
faction were rewarded with the grant of bank charters and valuable
franchises, and, favored by the provisions of the Constitution, which
gave the power of appointment to office and removal to a council of
appointment. In 1821 there were 15,000 offices, military and civil, at
its disposal), the spoils system was developed to perfection and was
introduced later by Van Buren into national politics. To De Witt Clinton
is due the rise of the canal system which brought such prosperity to the
State. The project of an Erie Canal had been discussed by Governor
Morris in 1777; it was revived by Clinton in 1810, and work on the Erie
Canal was begun in 1817 and terminated in 1825. The success of the
Undertaking brought about Clinton's election to the Governorship in 1824
and 1826, though his political following had really been shattered.
Clinton was succeeded in power by the Albany Regency (q.v.), a group of
men headed by Martin Van Buren, Silas Wright, William L. Marcy, and John
A. Dix, who made machine politics an exact science. Personal rivalries
and short-lived popular movements determined the general course of
events.
From 1836 to 1842 the anti-Masonic agitation (see Anti-Masons),
assiduously fanned into life by Thurlow Weed, was powerful enough to
decide the outcome of State elections. The anti-rent troubles
originating in the grievances of the farmers against their
landlords---the successors of the patroons and the great land
companies--lasted from 1836 to 1846, when feudal tenure was abolished by
the new Constitution.
The attitude of the Democrats toward such questions as anti-Masonry,
State and national banks, and the canal system, was not uniform.
Dissensions between the Conservatives (see Hunkers) and the Radicals (
see Barnburners) enabled the Whigs to carry the State in 1838. After
1840, when the Liberty Party arose, the anti-slavery feeling was strong
in the agricultural parts of the State, and in 1848 the Barnburner
Democrats led by Van Buren, broke away to aid in forming the free-Soil
Party. The Whigs and Know-Nothings gained and lost power in swift
succession before the Civil War broke out.
The mercantile and manufacturing classes in 1860 advocated peace at any
price, but the mass of the people were Unionist. The reaction following
upon the disasters of the first year and a half of the war put the
Democrats into power. In July 1863, occurred the draft riots in New York
City. (see Draft Riots In New York.) The war measures of President
Lincoln were denounced violently by the State authorities, and the
election of 1864 was bitterly fought, the outcome being decided in favor
of the Republicans by the votes of the men at the front.
The economic development of New York has continued uninterrupted after
the war, and has fully justified its title of Empire State." Its
history, however, has been characterized by much of that corruption
which has marked the post-bellum politics of many States. The period in
general presents a dead level of partisan rule relieved by occasional
spasmodic upheavals of civic virtue. The gubernatorial power,
nevertheless, has been repeatedly in the hands of able men, several of
whom attained national eminence.
From 1863 to 1871 New York City was ruled by the notorious William M.
Tweed (q.v.). In 1875, and again in 1899, frauds in connection with the
management of the State canals, involving high officials and others,
together known as the Canal Ring, were discovered. In the assignment of
public contracts much dishonesty was displayed. The State Capitol at
Albany and the county court house at New York are monuments of what
patient industry may accomplish in the way of nursing a modest estimate
into an enormous defalcation. Many attempts, however, were made to
remedy political evils by legislation. Laws were passed to check
lobbying, to insure honest party primaries, and to reform the civil
service.
The question of tax reform was an important subject of legislation after
1880, and brought the State into conflict with the powerful railway, gas
and insurance corporations upon the question whether their capital stock
and the value of their franchises were subject to taxation or not. The
rise of the Labor Party in 1886 was the cause of much important labor
legislation. Laws limiting the hours of daily work and protecting women
and children in factories and shops were passed in 1892 and
subsequently.
Much attention has been devoted to the preservation of the Adirondack
forests. In 1867 the public schools of the State were made entirely
free, and in 1875 primary education was made compulsory. The
Constitution of 1777 was revised in 1821; the councils of revision and
appointment were abolished, and the Governor received the veto power.
Many offices formerly filled by appointment were made elective, and, in
general, the new Constitution represented a great advance toward
democracy. This tendency was continued in the Constitution of 1846,
which put an end to feudal tenure in lands, abolished the court of
chancery, established a court of appeals, and made all the judges of the
higher courts elective.
By amendments adopted in 1869 (when a new Constitution framed in 1867
was rejected by the people), 1874, and 1882, further reforms in the
judiciary were carried out, negro voters were freed from the property
qualification hitherto imposed upon them, penalties for bribery and
corruption in office were established, and the canals were freed from
toll. Of the thirty-four amendments submitted to the people by the
Constitutional Convention of 1894, the most important among those
adopted were concerned with the reform of the judiciary, the shortening
of the Governor's term to two years, and the reapportionment of the
legislative districts of the State.
New York is an uncertain State both in national and State elections, and
the influence exerted by its large electoral vote on the outcome of
Presidential contests has given it the well-earned name of the "pivotal
State." Notable cases were the elections of 1844, 1848, and 1884. In the
Presidential election of 1844 James K. Polk, the Democratic candidate,
received 170 votes in the electoral college as against 105 votes cast
for Henry Clay, the Whig candidate. The 36 electoral votes of New York,
which Polk carried by a small plurality, were sufficient to decide the
election. In 1848 the dissensions in the Democratic Party in the State
enabled Taylor to secure the Presidency. In 1884 Cleveland , the
Democratic candidate, carried the State by a plurality of 1149 and
secured the Presidency.
New York voted for the Republican candidates from 1796 to 1808. In 1812
it cast its vote for De Witt Clinton, who had been nominated by the
section of the Republican Party opposed to the domination of the
Congressional caucus, and had been indorsed by the Federalists. It voted
for Monroe in 1816 and 1820, divided its vote among Adams, Crawford,
Clay, and Jackson in 1824 (26 out of 36 for Adams) and between Adams and
Jackson in 1828 (20 out of 36 for Adams). It was Democratic in 1832,
1836, 1844, and 1852, and Whig in 1840 and 1848. From 1856 to 1864 it
was Republican, and then entered on a course of vacillation. It voted
for Seymour (Democrat) in 1868, Grant (Republican) in 1872, Tilden
(Democrat) in 1876, Garfield (Republican) in 1880, Cleveland (Democrat)
in 1884, Harrison (Republican) in 1888, and Cleveland (Democrat) in
1892. The State went decidedly Republican on the money question in 1896
and 1900.
