Way-laid in Rhode Island with a quick jaunt across the pond. In an effort to belabor the points involved in a thesis of individual freedom NOT being license to do whatever the heck a person wants, but a privilege bestowed upon one as a member of a community in which a person has responsibilities as well as rights!
Absolutely pivotal stuff. I know that at Goddard College in addition to forming a charter for governance we were tasked to come up with a "community agreement." And if it was not a consensual contract between the individuals and the community, a charter could be...if not pointless, at least an up for grabs tool that might have been co-opted and turned against the very institution it was in part forming.
And the flexibility of "work groups" kept things active/dynamic...more so than "committees." A combination of tradition and innovation brought Goddard College into the 21st Century. And the elements of the 21st Century Plan as opposed to putting all our eggs into a particular program opened up the platform for participation rather than lending a hand to typical exclusionary politics or stagnant doctrine.
This aspect of college as a community of active participants distinguished Goddard from many of the other low-residency models available in that first decade of the 21st Century.
In England Roger Williams' THE BLOUDY TENENT, OF PERSECUTION, FOR THE CAUSE OF CONSCIENCE DISCUSSED (London, 1644) concentrated on the problems of government and religion clashing. While it was published in July and burned in August, the work of the work spawned plenty of discussion proving that the stuff of such important ponderings is not dependent on law or manifesto, really. Liberty of conscience and the separation of church and state were such important ponderings in the mid-1600's and piqued the interest of not only people congregating in sub-groups but people who were strong-minded separatists. For a world that had, in the century previous, seemed infinite and boundless, it was all hands on deck wherever people were to put some energies into co-habitating the same planet.
As with all the colonies there is much to be gleaned from a visit back in time.
In Rhode Island especially we have this landscape in which there is a struggle between globular activity amongst people (including what gets called factions) and singular moves (which sometimes get ignored and sometimes get followed). Part of why strong-minded looks so stark is because the backdrop in the 1600's was more group-oriented than individualist even though we had people literally running through the wilderness trying to find some place to just be themselves.
Another interesting aspect of studying Rhode Island in the early days is relative to what many historians talk about as the normal cycles of war, the ones which embroil all local places into some transcendent cause and demonstration, or don't when places create ways in which they have the choice to be un-involved.
And in Rhode Island (like New Haven colony) we have underfunded and a confusion of funding for efforts seeking permission to stand alone. This meant, of course, that the founders had to both get creative AND be traditional in their alliances and arguments and in the building of their "cases." In Dr. Clarke we have a non-aristocratic, hardworking, very professional, self-educated colonist who put a lot of energy into navigating the diversity of motherlode politics in the Mothercountry of England. We see him, rather late in life, taking on the role of student and diplomat in his ambassadorship. And this tenacity (sometimes called honor, tact and shrewdness) helped him get through some awfully long days in which his primary jobs came first and being politically strategic meant not giving up when it seemed like lowpoint and/or not missing a chance to further his political mission whenever the pinhole of light indicated a possible breakthrough. As a preacher he stayed focused on administering his particular brand (Baptism) of religious ritual to his flock and Pomfret notes that he did not engage in the big controversies of the day in terms of philosophical banter (Antimonianism was the buzz talk, for example), still he was arrested and humiliated at one point--pinched in the gears of cultural history. Like most of America's early men, he applied his particular talents (specialty: physician in Clarke's case) to the duties of the day (i.e., general treasurer) that kept coming up with all the chartering and evolutionary process from colony-status to statehood.
It's not "far out" to see where preacher-ing and physician-ing helped Dr. Clarke in effecting union in early Rhode Island. He was getting out there amongst the people and had the opportunity to both listen to isolated concerns and to picture the whole as a very human fabric which needed sound tools and practice in order to be fully healthy. That he understood the whole to contain faction, friction, and sometimes fanciful and flaring dramatics didn't dissuade the healer in him who had insight into the care it takes to mend. And he was a good choice of the people to be sent to England with Roger Williams in 1651.
According to Pomfret Dr. Clarke stayed in England for 13 years and while he was there he served loyally as agent and attorney for Rhode Island while eking out a living as preacher and physician. He worked with Cromwell in the new space of English politics being a mix of aristocracy and parliamentary procedure. He performed perfunctory legal tasks and procured provisions. He learned about petition, patent and procedure. And he kept matching up promise to his people back home with contemporary reality although the English political realm kept morphing and diffusing from central-seat based on Old World emperor-ing (throne) into the modern day roots of people politics.
In Dr. John Clarke's work in England we find exemplary dedication, ambition, and a calm steadiness that rivaled the tumult. And we can see how him working alone wouldn't have proved as successful...he needed to be in two places at once as a statesman! But he had no internet or phones or telegrams so he had to work with others. This was performed through socializing, writing, resource, and travel. From memos to Roger Williams to the actual charter being sent across the Atlantic in the care of Sea Captain George Baxter, Dr. Clarke's work relied on a soundness of professionalism and not just charisma and hearsay. Clarke (RI) and Winthrop (CT), for instance, didn't just drink beer when they socialized, but had a much more profound relationship from which poured political progress for all.
What?
Nutshell? Yes, those are some hefty points of importance about colonial Rhode Island in a nutshell...now we can continue on to the best part of visiting Rhode Island 2012!
Aunt Carrie, Uncle Peter, and cousin Elizabeth
[insert Elizabeth's B-day photos, RI]
Plus, from Uncle Peter we get to look at an old-time sword belonging to the Benson family! We'll be getting to the Way Back Bensons in this blog too...no worries.
