The old charters of Massachusetts, Virginia, and the Carolinas had given title to strips of territory extending from the Atlantic westward to the Pacific.

The colonies had little occasion to feel or to resent direct royal prerogative.

Many attempts had been made by colonial legislatures to cut off or to tax the importation of slaves.

The residence of the Plymouth settlers in the Netherlands, and the later conquest of the Dutch colonies, had brought the Americans into contact with the singularly wise and free institutions of the Dutch.

The participation of the people in their own government was the more significant, because the colonies actually had what England only seemed to have, - three departments of government.

In some of the middle colonies the towns and counties were both active and had a relation with each other which was the forerunner of the present system of local government in the Western States.