THE proposition to rear a monument in honor of Lord Baltimore as founder of the colony of Maryland would seem to be eminently proper; for whether we consider the personal character of the man, his zeal and enterprise as the projector of a colony in the New World, or the magnificent results that have attended his settlements on the shores of the Chesapeake, his fame is as truly meritorious as that of the founder of any other commercial enterprise in America. In this day of multiform centennial glorification let not the name of Cecilius Calvert be overlooked.
But it is to be hoped that his co-religionists—the Romanists—of the present day will not compromise themselves, nor mar the fair fame of an honorable man of affairs by persisting in claiming for him, an honor to which he did not aspire, and an administration of the colony which he had no authority to grant—that of being the pioneer, founder, and patron of religious liberty in the American colonies. If the leaders of Romanist thought in the United States, and especially in Maryland, really desire to conciliate their Protestant fellow-citizens, and to verify the truth of history, they have on this occasion a fine opportunity to retire from an offensive and untenable position—to recede from their wonted claim for Lord Baltimore—a claim inconsistent with an essential, abiding principle of their own church; false, in fact, and impossible according to the terms of the charter of Maryland.
The writer has in his possession an old folio volume containing a copy of the original charter of Maryland in Latin and English, and colonial records and acts of the assembly from 1637 to 1765. These furnish incontestible evidence that religious liberty in the colony of Maryland was not contemplated by Charles I., who granted the charter; that such liberty was never accorded to the colonists by the proprietor or his lieutenants, and never secured to the freemen by acts of the assembly. On the contrary, acts were at times passed on the subject of religion as intolerant, fierce, and bloody as any to be found in force elsewhere in the Old World or in the New. Compared with some of Maryland’s “religious liberty” enactments, under the Calverts, the “Blue Laws” of Connecticut were “gentle doves,” and the laws which hung Quakers in Boston, and witches in Salem, were righteous regulations.
The charter patent granted by Charles I. to Lord Baltimore incorporating the Province of Maryland opens with the usual preamble and the terms of the general purpose of the grant. Then follows a particular designation of the geographical metes and bounds of the region to be occupied. That is followed by an extended enumeration of the rights, franchises, and authority confirmed unto the proprietor, his heirs and assignees, “in and to the region designated, its soils, woods, marshes, lakes, rivers, bays, islands, etc., with fishings of every kind of fish, as well of whales and sturgeon and other royal fish as of other fish; and, moreover, the opening and working of veins, mines, and quarries.” And then occurs the following: “And furthermore, the patronage and advowsons of all churches which—with the increasing worship and religion of Christ—within the said region, islands, islets, and limits aforesaid, hereafter shall happen to be built, together with license and faculty of erecting and founding churches, chapels, and places of worship in convenient and suitable places within the premises, and of causing the same to be dedicated and consecrated according to the ecclesiastical laws of our kingdom of England; with all and singular such, and as ample rights, jurisdictions, privileges, prerogatives, royalties, liberties, immunities, and royal rights, and temporal franchises whatsoever, as well by sea as by land, within the region, islands, islets, and limits aforesaid, to be had, exercised, used, and enjoyed as any Bishop of Durham within the bishopric or country—Palatine of Durham, in our kingdom of England, ever heretofore hath had, held, used, or enjoyed, or of right could, or ought to have, hold, use, or enjoy.”
The above is all that Lord Baltimore’s charter contains on the special subject of religion or ecclesiastical affairs. It is proper to explain the reference to “the Palatine county of Durham.” At that period there were in England three Palatine counties—those of Chester, Lancaster, and Durham. They were called Palatine because the proprietors exercised, each in his county, royal prerogatives as a king in his palace. In the case of Durham the bishop was the proprietor, and hence he exercised the chief authority in the county, both civil and ecclesiastical; he was, in fact, a royal bishop of the county, which was, at the same time, his diocese. Taking, therefore, the Palatine county of Durham and the jurisdiction of its bishop proprietor as the model and measure of corresponding authority in Maryland, that colony was thus constituted a Palatine province, and its proprietor invested with an episcopal oversight of its churches.
But while the proprietor of Maryland was thus invested with Palatine, episcopal authority, the terms of the charter were not mandatory. He might found churches and chapels, but he was not required to found them; and then all such places of worship that might happen to be established must be “dedicated, consecrated,” and ordered after the model and according to the ritual of the established Church of England, observed in the Palatine county of Durham.
Manifestly, then, according to the terms of his charter, the proprietor of Maryland could not officially tolerate any form of dissent from the established Church of England, nor could he lawfully found or dedicate in the province a dissenting meeting-house, church, or chapel; neither was it in his power, as Lord Palatine of the province, to authorize or permit other persons to establish within his jurisdiction such places of worship for the use of dissenters from the form and faith of the Church of England.
Much less could Cecilius Calvert, or any of his successors, holding under his original charter, lawfully establish and proclaim the general principle of personal religious liberty. The very idea of such liberty was alien to all existing ecclesiastical institutions, and as an actuality, then, nowhere to be found.349It appears, however, that the Romanist Lords of Baltimore, or their representatives in the province, did not molest dissenters from the English established church, for the reason that, being themselves dissenters, they could not consistently or prudently enforce upon others those charter principles which they themselves were openly violating. And thus the ideal church of the province of Maryland, designed after the model of the Palatine Church of Durham, became from the first a nullity; while there prevailed for a time a degree of religious freedom in which all dissenters participated—Romanists and Protestants alike.
Now if for this happy state of the church in Maryland, Lord Baltimore was entitled to thanks, it must have been on the principle of a certain man who generously gave away his neighbor’s apples. As this man was helping himself to apples one day in his neighbor’s orchard, a stranger came along who, supposing him to be the proprietor, politely asked permission to gather a few apples. “Certainly,” said the supposed proprietor, “help yourself; take as many as you want.” When the stranger had filled his pockets with the choice fruit, he was quite profuse in his thanks for the kindness. “Oh, no,” replied the other, “don’t thank me; these apples are not mine. I am myself stealing them just as you are.”
It is evident Lord Baltimore had no authority to grant religious liberty to his colonists, and it is equally manifest he had no intention of granting such privilege to his followers. It could not have been his original purpose to found a State on the principle of general religious liberty; for then, as an honest, candid man, he would have refused a charter which forbade the granting of that liberty. Nor did his lordship or his Romanist adherents subsequently intend to establish universal religious freedom in the colony. This is evident from their public acts.
At a general assembly held at St. John’s, and terminating March 19, 1638—about four years from the founding of the colony—an act was passed on the closing day of the session ordaining certain laws for the government of the province, of which the first was, “That holy church within this province shall have all her rights and liberties.” At an assembly held at the same place two years later, 1640, “An Act for Church Liberties” was passed October 23, ordaining “that holy church within this province shall have and enjoy all her rights, liberties, and franchises, wholly and without blemish.” This was subsequently confirmed as a perpetual law.
Now, why this special legislation in behalf of “holy church”? Why were not all the churches, any and all sects, included if universal religious toleration was the design of the benevolent and enlightened proprietor and his general assembly? Why the necessity of this special legislation? If liberty of worship had been from the first legally accorded to all dissenting sects, the Romanists enjoyed it in common with all the rest; and hence they did not need this special protection; but if they, or any other dissenters, required legislative protection, all did, and to limit such legal assurance to one sect was not universal toleration. The authors of this partial and special toleration, therefore, could not have been those pioneers of universal liberty of conscience of whom we hear so much at this time.
—Paul Le Clair, in Converted Catholic.