Establishing Virginia Colonys First Democratic Government: The 1619 Assembly

Abstract

Instructor’s Name Date In 1619, 22 burgesses and Governor George Yeardley held the first legislative Assembly of the American colonies in a church in Jamestown. The members of the Assembly were landholders who responsibly had vast settlements in the region. The legislative Assembly was charged with making laws and regulations for the colony in agreement with Virginia Company in England. Jamestown colonists needed closure, and the first meeting was held to establish economic, social, political, and religious activities that governed them. The Virginia Company planned to control through a 13-man colony in England, and a smaller council constituted in Jamestown. In the Assembly, the land was divided, and inheritance rights were established. The establishment of laws in Virginia was very significant in making history. The meeting was the basis of a democratic government embraced in the United States. It was a pivotal year establishing the First Permanent Colony in the United States. The laws were a turning point for the government structure in Virginia. For the first time, the legislative assembly meeting entailed business on the economic arrangements and commercials of the colony. It was the first Assembly in the new world. The main agenda of the meeting was to launch an equal and unvarying régime all over the colony of Virginia. It was also a platform to develop the rules and laws of the inhabitants. The issues addressed were matters concerning religion, relation with Powhattan Indians, and regulating moral offenses. The Assembly was the basis of Great reforms for the military government and the enactment of a democratic society. The Assembly passed laws to regulate tobacco cash crops. Tobacco was to be sold for at least three shillings per pound. The Assembly also fostered securing the natural resources for building a university. The laws on social deviance and individuals participating in all kinds of criminal activities were defied in alignment with the stipulations of the colony. The rules that regulated the relationship between Native Americans and the colonists were also established during the Assembly. One of the other land laws during colonial Virginia was determent from drunkenness, gambling, dressing code, and idleness. Observance of the sabbath day was deemed mandatory for everyone. The laws were against gambling in the essence of gaming on cards and dice enforced in the present-day Assembly. "The winner or winners shall lose all their winnings, and both winners and losers shall forfeit ten shillings a man, one ten shillings whereof to go to the discoverer and the rest to charitable and pious uses in the incorporation where the faults are committed.” Any drunk person would be reproved for the first spell secretly by the priest,...