Yet notwithstanding the existence of this aristocratic element, the real
substance of influence and power lay with the clergy. It has been taught
as an axiom of Massachusetts history, that from the outset the town was
the social and political unit; but an analysis of the evidence tends to
show that the organization of the Puritan Commonwealth was ecclesiastical,
and the congregation, not the town, the basis upon which the fabric
rested. By the constitution of the corporation the franchise went with the
freedom of the company; but in order to form a constituency which would
support a sacerdotal oligarchy, it was enacted in 1631 "that for time to
come noe man shalbe admitted to the freedome of this body polliticke, but
such as are members of some of the churches within ... the same."
[Footnote: _Mass. Records_, i. 87.] Thus though communicants were not
necessarily voters, no one could be a voter who was not a communicant;
therefore the town-meeting was in fact nothing but the church meeting,
possibly somewhat attenuated, and called by a different name. By this
insidious statute the clergy seized the temporal power, which they held
till the charter fell. The minister stood at the head of the congregation
and moulded it to suit his purposes and to do his will; for though he
could not when opposed admit an inhabitant to the sacrament, he could
peremptorily exclude therefrom all those of whom he disapproved, for "none
are propounded to the congregation, except they be first allowed by the
elders.
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