“PROCEEDINGS OF THE SIXTH ANNUAL MEETING OF THE PACIFIC COAST BRANCH OF THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION.

By Jacob N. Bowman.

The sixth annual meeting of the Pacific coast branch of the American Historical Association was held at Stanford University on Friday and Saturday, November 19-20, 1909. The meeting was one of the most successful and most interesting that the branch has yet held, and this success is largely due to the committee on local arrangements and to Prof. E. D. Adams, head of the history department in Stanford University.

The first session was held on Friday afternoon in room 231 of the History Building. The vice president of the branch, Mr. George H. Himes, of Portland, Oreg., presided in the absence of the president, Benjamin Ide “Wheeler, in Berlin. After a few remarks Mr. Himes called to the chair Prof. Adams, of Stanford University, who presided during the remainder of the session.

The first paper was read by Prof. S. L. Ware, of Stanford University, on “The Self-government of the Elizabethan Parish.” He explained the offices of the parish, their duties and their jurisdictions. In both church and state the parish was the center of all government; its responsibility was to the Crown, as the parish government was considered the Queen’s business. The duties were burdensome and often invidious. Offices were never solicited and seldom did a person serve a second term. Freedom from service was often granted as a privilege; sometimes men paid for their release from parish offices, and cases are also noted where men have gone to court to evade office. Women could serve in some of the offices; a widow served out the unexpired term of her deceased husband. All in all, the holding of offices was felt to be a duty rather than a right. In matters of taxation the parish assessed itself; in case of the parishioners failing to do this, the constables, justices, etc., arranged it for them. Because of these conditions the select vestry, a closed body, rose in the late Elizabethan times and continued its life and work to the end of the nineteenth century. The parish was much more of a reality then than now; it was more democratic; seldom were persons asked to perform the duties of others. Justices of the peace were chosen by the parish, and the parish did its own policing in the absence of the royal police and army. The jury system imposed self-government. This system was in great contrast to the conditions on the Continent, where France, for instance, was ruled from the desks of Paris. These ideas of parish life and government were in time taken over the seas to America.”

Reference Data:

Congressional Edition, Vol. 6064, by United States Congress, 1911, page 81