They were offered
the alternative of voluntary annexation either to Massachusetts or to
Plymouth, or of staying out in the cold; and they chose the latter
course. Early in 1643 they had sent Roger Williams over to England to
obtain a charter for Rhode Island. In that year Parliament created a
Board of Commissioners, with the Earl of Warwick at its head, for the
superintendence of colonial affairs; and nothing could better illustrate
the loose and reckless manner in which American questions were treated
in England than the first proceedings of this board. It gave an early
instance of British carelessness in matters of American geography. In
December, 1643, it granted to Massachusetts all the territory on the
mainland of Narragansett bay; and in the following March it incorporated
the townships of Newport and Portsmouth, which stood on the island,
together with Providence, which stood on the mainland, into an
independent colony empowered to frame a government and make laws for
itself. With this second document Williams returned to Providence in the
autumn of 1644. Just how far it was intended to cancel the first one,
nobody could tell, but it plainly afforded an occasion for a conflict of
claims. [Sidenote: Turbulence of dissent in Rhode Island] [Sidenote: The
Earl of Warwick and his Board of Commissioners]
The league of the four colonies is interesting as the first American
experiment in federation.
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