SETTLING NORTH AMERICA 1497 1732
MAYFLOWER COMPACT DEFINITION SUMMARY HISTORY
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Question
[CLICK ON ANY CHOICE TO KNOW THE RIGHT ANSWER]
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written before the colony formed.
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an actual primary source document.
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the ruler’s permission to colonize.
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signed by the people of the colony.
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Detailed explanation-1: -The Mayflower Compact was not a colonial charter because the central government of the colonists did not issue it. The English settlers at Plymouth drafted and enacted the compact to establish temporary rules for self-government while the British government secured the patent for the territory.
Detailed explanation-2: -In the absence of a royal charter, the Plymouth colonists initiated their organization of a government and legal structure by formulating a self-declared “combination” in which the necessity of forming a “civill body politick” was set forth.
Detailed explanation-3: -The 1620 agreement (first called the Mayflower Compact in 1793) was a legal instrument that bound the Pilgrims together when they arrived in New England.
Detailed explanation-4: -It simply bound the signers into a “Civil Body Politic” for the purpose of passing “just and equal Laws . . . for the general good of the Colony.” But those few words expressed the idea of self-government for the first time in the New World.