Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol I).djvu/107

 CH. IVV [sic].] be known, whether the same laws and ordinances should receive any change or confirmation, or be totally disallowed and discharged. And the president and council were required to transmit and send over thesameby the first ship, that should depart thence for England after their making. Liberty of conscience was allowed to all protestants, those of the Church of England to be particularly encouraged. And a pledge was given in the commission to continue the privilege of an assembly in the same manner and form; unless by inconvenience arising therefrom the crown should see cause to alter the same. A body of laws was enacted in the first year of their legislation, which, upon being sent to England, was disallowed by the crown. New-Hampshire continued down to the period of the Revolution to be governed by commission as a royal province; and enjoyed the privilege of enacting her own laws through the instrumentality of a general assembly, in the manner provided by the first commission. Some alterations were made in the successive commissions; but none of them made any substantive change in the organization of the Province. The judicial power of the governor and council was subsequently, by law, confined to the exercise of appellate jurisdiction from the inferior courts; and in the later commissions a clause was inserted, that the colonial statutes should "not be repugnant to, but as near as may be agreeable, to the laws and statutes of the realm of England."

§ 81. The laws of New-Hampshire, during its