From the ship’s hold, 102 passengers poured eagerly onto the deck, pale after 65 days of confinement, longing to see the sky and dry land again. Their arrival in the New World might have gone entirely unnoticed had these immigrants not marked history with a first act that would come to define modern democracy.
The Puritan odyssey
Among those gathered aboard the Mayflower was a congregation of sober English Puritans, driven out of old Europe by the fury of persecution. Toward the end of the sixteenth century, dissatisfied with the formalism of the Anglican Church, these ordinary people regrouped in underground congregations, determined to live strictly according to the principles of Scripture. Their very presence was an affront to the Crown, which had decreed a single faith—that of Anglicanism. The fact that the Puritans of Plymouth observed the Sabbath on Saturday rather than Sunday[1] made them all the more conspicuous.
As the movement grew in scale, the authorities responded with repression: believers were fined and thrown into prison, while pastors were publicly whipped, mutilated, and even branded on the forehead with hot irons. The hanging of John Greenwood and Henry Barrow in 1593 signaled the beginning of emigration to the Netherlands, a land of religious freedom. Even emigration, however, was illegal. Repeated attempts failed, and the would-be fugitives were cast into jail. In 1607, a large group finally managed to escape and settled in Leiden, where other groups soon joined them.
Year after year, the Puritans felt ever more acutely the negative influence of Dutch liberal society on their children. Then a theological conflict within the Dutch Church, which ended in bloodshed, convinced them that life in a foreign land could not offer the future they sought. Thus was born the dream of a true and free homeland.
“All aboard!”
On September 6, 1620, after several failed attempts, the Pilgrims boarded the Mayflower, a small vessel wholly unsuited for a transatlantic voyage.
In addition to its crew, the Mayflower carried 102 passengers. Of these, only 37 were Puritans. The remaining 65 were a mixed group, drawn by the lure of the New World. The Puritans referred to them as “strangers.” The conditions of the journey are hard to imagine: 102 passengers crammed among cargo, below deck, in near darkness. The only source of light was a single lantern. Storms plagued them throughout the voyage.
Many suffered from seasickness. Children cried incessantly. The heavy smells and unbearable stench further darkened spirits. The “strangers,” more vulnerable, gave free rein to anger and despair. In their corner, the Puritans sang and prayed almost constantly, adding yet another source of tension.
The voyage lasted more than nine weeks. The ship’s log records both the deaths of two passengers and the births of two Puritan boys, Oceanus and Peregrine. Then, about halfway through the journey, the beam supporting the main mast split in two. The situation was desperate. Without immediate action, the mast would have collapsed and the ship would have sunk. The sailors struggled helplessly. As they prayed, one of the Puritans remembered that he had brought a screw jack with him. But where could it be found amid the chaos of the hold? To their great relief, the jack was right beside them. They managed to raise the beam back into place, and the incident changed the “strangers’” attitude toward the Puritans, easing tempers on board.
The Mayflower Compact
On the sixty-sixth day, the Mayflower reached the American coast. A storm, however, had driven the ship some 170 kilometers north of Virginia, their intended destination. The Puritans decided to remain where Providence had led them. “Absolutely not! We’re going to Virginia!” most of the others protested, despite the onset of winter and the immense risks of sailing unknown waters. Amid the chaos, several of the “strangers” were on the verge of declaring anarchy: “No more authority! Everyone for himself!”
The small group of pilgrims stood on the brink of self-destruction. At the height of the crisis, three Puritan leaders—Pastor William Brewster, teacher William Bradford, and deacon John Carver—summoned all the respectable men to the captain’s cabin. Gathered around a table in a solemn setting, 41 men signed the Mayflower Compact:
“In the name of God, Amen. We whose names are underwritten, the loyal Subjects of our dread sovereign Lord King James, by the grace of God of Great Britain, France, and Ireland King, Defender of the Faith, &c. Having undertaken for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian Faith, and honor of our King and Country, a Voyage to plant the first Colony in the Northern parts of Virginia; do by these presents solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God and one another, covenant, and combine ourselves together into a civil body politick, for our better ordering and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof do enact, constitute, and frame such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the Colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience. In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the 11. of November, in the year of the reign of our sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, Anno Domini 1620.”
It was the first time in history that free people of differing backgrounds entered into a covenant based on the principle of equality, in order to create a system of government founded on the consent of the governed. The document is regarded as the first constitution built on democratic principles, and the elected leaders as the first government in modern history chosen by the people. What followed would become legend—a story marked by acts of providential deliverance, from which the “American miracle” would be born.[2]
