2d Session

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

1 No. 357

THE FEDERAL AND STATE

CONSTITUTIONS

COLONIAL CHARTERS, AND OTHER
ORGANIC LAWS

OF THE

STATES, TERRITORIES, AND
COLONIES

NOW OR HERETOFORE FORMING

THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Compiled and Edited

under the Act of Congress of June 30, 1906

By

FRANCIS NEWTON THORPE, Ph. D., LL. D.

Member of the Pennsylvania Bar; Fellow and Professor of American Constitu-
tional History at the University of Pennsylvania, 1885-1898; Member of
the American Historical Association; Author of The Constitutional History
of the United States, 1765-1895; A (State) Constitutional History of
the American People, 1776-1850; A Short Constitutiona! History
of the United States; A (Social and Economic) History of the
American People; A History of the Civil War; Editor of the His-
tory of North America, Volumes IX, XV, XVI, XVIII, XIX,
XX; Author of The Government of the People of the
United States; Benjamin Franklin and the University
of Pennsylvania; The Life of William Pepper, etc.

VOL. VII

Virginia Wyoming-Index

WASHINGTON

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

1909

Republished 1977

SCHOLARLY PRESS, INC.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 9-35371

LC 70-008462

ISBN 0-403-00132-2

VIRGINIA

GRANT TO SIR WALTER RALEIGH--1584

(See page 53.)

THE FIRST CHARTER OF VIRGINIA-1606 *

JAMES, by the Grace of God, King of England, Scotland, France and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, &c. WHEREAS our loving and well-disposed Subjects, Sir Thomas Gates, and Sir George Somers, Knights, Richard Hackluit, Clerk, Prebendary of Westminster, and Edward-Maria Wingfield, Thomas Hanham, and Ralegh Gilbert, Esqrs. William Parker, and George Popham, Gentlemen, and divers others of our loving Subjects, have been humble Suitors unto us, that We would vouchsafe unto them our Licence, to make Habitation, Plantation, and to deduce a colony of sundry of our People into that part of America commonly called VIRGINIA, and other parts and Territories in America, either appertaining unto us, or which are not now actually possessed by any Christian Prince or People, situate, lying, and being all along the Sea Coasts, between four and thirty Degrees of Northerly Latitude from the Equinoctial Line, and five and forty Degrees of the same Latitude, and in the main Land between the same four and thirty and five and forty Degrees, and the Islands thereunto adjacent, or within one hundred Miles of the Coast thereof;

And to that End, and for the more speedy Accomplishment of their said intended Plantation and Habitation there, are desirous to divide themselves into two several Colonies and Companies; the one consisting of certain Knights, Gentlemen, Merchants, and other Adventurers, of our City of London and elsewhere, which are, and from time to time shall be, joined unto them, which do desire to begin their Plantation and Habitation in some fit and convenient Place, between four and thirty and one and forty Degrees of the said Latitude, alongst the Coasts of Virginia, and the Coasts of America aforesaid: And the other consisting of sundry Knights, Gentlemen, Merchants, and other Adventurers, of our Cities of Bristol and Exeter, and of our Town of Plimouth, and of other Places, which do join themselves unto that Colony, which do desire to begin their Plantation and Habitation in some fit and convenient Place, between eight and thirty Degrees and five and forty Degrees of the said

*Hening's Statutes of Virginia, I, 57-66.