Elijah M:

The House of Burgesses was established in 1619, and it was the first form of representative government in the colonies. However, it wasn’t representative of majority of the population. To vote, or be on the ballot, there were very many qualifications you had to meet. You had to be white, male, own at least 100 acres of land, and be a Christian Protestant. “The enfranchisement of all land-owning white male inhabitants made the assembly a model for future representative institutions that eventually characterized governments throughout British America,” (McWilliams, James. E Government in Colonial America) . This quote shows how small a group the Burgesses were. It was by definition, a representative government, but it only represented the views of a small select group of people. The views of women, Africans, Native Americans, people in poverty, and people who didn’t practice Protestant Christianity were totally unheard. They couldn’t be in charge, they couldn’t even help decide who would be in charge. There was prejudice, and sexism. This was so unfair because they might have really good ideas about things like politics and the way the colony should be run. So not only was the system oppressive towards all groups other than white land-owning, Christian Protestant men, but they were harming themselves as well. They were depriving themselves of huge possible changes for the better. Our world might look completely different today had they let the other groups take parts in government earlier. These restrictions were similar to the restriction of the judges and juries in court.

Eli Harris:

In the year of 1619 the first Africans came across to the new world. This was an important year for the colonist because this was when slavery started. In this year many firsts occurred in the colonies. One of them was the first Africans to come over to the colonies. This was the start of slavery. Slavery was around for most of the Colonial Era. Rich landowners would buy and sell these slaves frequently. Slave life was hard, you were constantly being beaten and you were constantly working. But the Enslaved Africans had many forms of resistance from these things they had to do. Some would run away, some would sing about uprisings that could occur in the future and some would work very slowly. Slavery played a major role in the Colonial Era. Africans were brought over from their homes and forced to work for the colonist. What started this all was tobacco. Tobacco was the plant that saved the colonies. But tobacco only helped the British and it harmed the Powhatans and the Africans who came over and who were forced to help grow it. Slavery was a major part of the Colonial Era and it played a major role in it as well. Slavery was a horrible thing but there were so many instances where it could have been avoided. Some of the most famous politicians in that time had tons of slaves and never brought it up at all. Nobody ever realized the significance of how bad slavery was and instead they ignored it.  Slaves would be treated so poorly on so many different accounts. There were so many different types of punishments for them.