Some French Huguenots, such as came to many of the English colonies after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes of 1685, were added to the East Jersey population.A few went to Salem in West Jersey, and some of these became Quakers.In both the Jerseys, as elsewhere, they became prominent and influential in all spheres of life.There was a decided Dutch influence, it is said, in the part nearest New York, emanating from the Bergen settlement in which the Dutch had succeeded in establishing themselves in 1660 after the Indians had twice driven them from Pavonia.Many descendants of Dutch families are still found in that region.Many Dutch characteristics were to be found in that region throughout colonial times.Many of the houses had Dutch stoops or porches at the door, with seats where the family and visitors sat on summer evenings to smoke and gossip.Long Dutch spouts extended out from the eaves to discharge the rain water into the street.But the prevailing tone of East Jersey seems to have been set by the Scotch Presbyterians and the New England Congregationalists.The College of New Jersey, afterward known as Princeton, established in 1747, was the result of a movement among the Presbyterians of East Jersey and New York.
All these elements of East Jersey, Scotch Covenanters, Connecticut Puritans, Huguenots, and Dutch of the Dutch Reformed Church, were in a sense different but in reality very much in accord and congenial in their ideas of religion and politics.
They were all sturdy, freedom-loving Protestants, and they set the tone that prevails in East Jersey to this day.Their strict discipline and their uncompromising thrift may now seem narrow and harsh; but it made them what they were; and it has left a legacy of order and prosperity under which alien religions and races are eager to seek protection.In its foundation the Quakers may claim a share.
The new King, James II, was inclined to reassume jurisdiction and extend the power of the Governor of New York over East Jersey in spite of his grant to Sir George Carteret.In fact, he desired to put New England, New York, and New Jersey under one strong government centered at New York, to abolish their charters, to extinguish popular government, and to make them all mere royal dependencies in pursuance of his general policy of establishing an absolute monarchy and a papal church in England.
The curse of East Jersey's existence was to be always an appendage of New York, or to be threatened with that condition.
The inhabitants now had to enter their vessels and pay duties at New York.Writs were issued by order of the King putting both the Jerseys and all New England under the New York Governor.Step by step the plans for amalgamation and despotism moved on successfully, when suddenly the English Revolution of 1688 put an end to the whole magnificent scheme, drove the King into exile, and placed William of Orange on the throne.
The proprietaries of both Jerseys reassumed their former authority.But the New York Assembly attempted to exercise control over East Jersey and to levy duties on its exports.The two provinces were soon on the eve of a little war.For twelve or fifteen years East Jersey was in disorder, with seditious meetings, mob rule, judges and sheriffs attacked while performing their duty, the proprietors claiming quitrents from the people, the people resisting, and the British Privy Council threatening a suit to take the province from the proprietors and make a Crown colony of it.The period is known in the history of this colony as "The Revolution." Under the threat of the Privy Council to take over the province, the proprietors of both East and West Jersey surrendered their rights of political government, retaining their ownership of land and quitrents, and the two Jerseys were united under one government in 1702.Its subsequent history demands another chapter.
