Whether this transfer of the charter was legally justifiable or not
is a question which has been much debated, but with which we need not
here vex ourselves. The lawyers of the Company were shrewd enough to
know that a loosely-drawn instrument may be made to admit of great
liberty of action. Under the guise of a mere trading corporation the
Puritan leaders deliberately intended to found a civil commonwealth in
accordance with their own theories of government.
[Sidenote: Government of Massachusetts; the General Court]
After their arrival in Massachusetts, their numbers increased so
rapidly that it became impossible to have a primary assembly of all
the freemen, and so a representative assembly was devised after the
model of the Old English county court. The representatives sat for
townships, and were called deputies. At first they sat in the same
chamber with the assistants, but in 1644 the legislative body was
divided into two chambers, the deputies forming the lower house, while
the upper was composed of the assistants, who were sometimes called
magistrates. In elections the candidates for the upper house were put
in nomination by the General Court and voted on by the freemen.
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