[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 11]
[Senate]
[Pages 14943-14944]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      VIRGINIA HOUSE OF BURGESSES

  Mr. BYRD. Madam President, on July 30, 1619, in the church at 
Jamestown, VA, the colonial Governor of Virginia, George Yeardley, 
called into session a meeting of twenty-two citizens called burgesses, 
from each of the eleven boroughs subdivisions, of colonial Virginia.
  According to one of the participants, Mr. John Pory, ``all the 
Burgesses took their places . . . till a prayer was said by Mr. Burke, 
the minister,'' who asked God to ``guide and sanctify'' the 
``proceedings to his own glory.''
  The Speaker then addressed the members of the assembly on their 
duties as participants. ``Our intent,'' wrote Mr. Pory, was ``to 
establish one equal and uniforme kinde of government over all 
Virginia.''
  Thus began, 382 years ago this very day, the first representative, 
legislative body in American history, the Virginia House of Burgesses.
  I do find it ironic that today, when there is so much talk about 
separation of church and state, that the very first legislative 
assembly in American history took place in a church. It seems very 
fitting that the legislative foundations of the world's greatest power, 
and 

[[Page 14944]]

the world's foremost proponent of liberty and, I might add, 
religious freedom began in a church.
  What a momentous day July 30, 1619 was, not only in American history, 
but also in world history. Right there in that little church in 
Jamestown, VA, a colony still struggling to survive, a colony that had 
been decimated by plagues, disease, hunger, and war, a significant step 
was taken in the development of representative government.
  Think about it, even with all the problems of simply staying alive, 
these men, driven by that eternal desire to be free and to rule 
themselves, to be free of the control of kings, emperors, czars, and 
other autocrats, had the intellect and the foresight to meet in that 
church and begin a journey that would eventually lead to the 
establishment of our republic.
  Independence was still more than 150 years away, but the seeds of 
American democratic thought had been sown. It is probably no 
coincidence that from the House of Burgesses would come some of the 
most important champions of American liberty and greatest leaders of 
the American Revolution, including Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, 
John Marshall, and Patrick Henry.
  For this reason, I want to recognize this very important, if 
overlooked, day in our American heritage.

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