Gov. Bernard of Massachusetts

Bernard, Sir Francis, 1^st Baronet (Gov of Mass.)

Born 12 July 1712

Description: Greedy, duplicitous

Wiki

The Infamous Governor (Hardcopy)

Royal Gov. of Massachusetts Colony from 2 Aug 1760 to 1 Aug. 1769.  He almost immediately made enemies in Boston when he passed over the father of James Otis, Jr. and instead appointed the non-lawyer, but much more pliable, Lt. Gov. Thomas Hutchinson to also sit as the Chief Justice of the colony's high court.  Otis had been promised the position when it became vacant by several previous governors.  

From Wiki:   

Bernard sought to vigorously enforce the Navigation Acts, in part because crown officials (including the governor and the customs officials) received shares of the proceeds from the seizure of ships that were caught violating the acts. The legal actions involving these seizures were heard in a jury-less admiralty court before a Crown-appointed judge, and were extremely unpopular. Bernard also made an early opponent of James Otis, Jr. by appointing Lieutenant Governor Thomas Hutchinson to be chief justice of the province's highest court, a post that had been promised by several previous governors to Otis' father.    

Upset over the snub the younger Otis resigned his post as advocate general (i.e. the Crown's representative, equivalent to a government prosecutor) before the admiralty court, and devoted himself instead to arguing (sometimes pro bono) on behalf of the merchants in defense of their ships.  These early actions during Bernard's tenure drew a clear dividing line between the "popular party" (exemplified by the Otises) opposed to British colonial policy and the "court party" (exemplified by Hutchinson) who supported it. 

Bernard's difficulties were compounded when, after the death in late 1760 of King George II, it became necessary to reissue writs of assistance to customs tax collectors. These writs, which were essentially open-ended search warrants, were judicially controversial and so unpopular that their issuance was later explicitly disallowed by the United States Constitution.  

Hutchinson, who approved the writs in one of his first acts as chief justice, saw his popularity fall, and Otis, who argued the writs violated the Rights of Englishmen, gained in popularity. He was elected to the provincial legislature in May 1761, where he was well placed to continue his attacks on Bernard's policies.^[23] In the 1761 session of the assembly Otis engineered the gift of Mount Desert Island to Bernard, a partially successful stratagem to divert Bernard's attention from ongoing customs seizures. . . .

 Bernard's unpopularity continued through other tax measures, including the Sugar Act (1763) and the Stamp Act (1765). While the passage of both acts occasioned protest, the response to the Stamp Act included rioting in the streets, and united many factions in the province against the governor.  In 1767 the passage by Parliament of the Townshend Acts again raised a storm of protest in the colonies. In Massachusetts the provincial assembly issued a circular letter, calling on the other colonies to join it in a boycott of the goods subject to the Townshend taxes. Bernard was ordered in April 1768 by Lord Hillsborough, who had recently been appointed to the newly created office of Colonial Secretary, to dissolve the assembly if it failed to retract the letter. The assembly refused, and Bernard prorogued it in July.

Maier says that his letters to London greatly influenced officials there, but they "distorted" reality. "His misguided conviction that the 'faction' had espoused violence as its primary method of opposition, for example, kept him from recognizing the radicals' peace-keeping efforts....Equally dangerous, Bernard's elaborate accounts were sometimes built on insubstantial evidence." 

Warden argues that Bernard was careful not to explicitly ask London for troops, but his exaggerated accounts strongly suggested they were needed. In the fall of 1767 he warned about a possible insurrection in Boston any day, and his exaggerated report of one disturbance in 1768, "certainly had given Lord Hillsboro the impression that troops were the only way to enforce obedience in the town." Warden notes that other key British officials in Boston wrote London with the "same strain of hysteria."  

Four thousand British Army troops arrived in Boston in October 1768, further heightening tensions. Bernard was vilified in the local press, and accused of writing letters to the ministry that mischaracterized the situation. Although he was challenged to release those letters he refused. Opposition agents in London were eventually able to acquire some of his letters, which reached members of the Sons of Liberty in April 1769. They were promptly published by the radical Boston Gazette, along with deliberations of the governor's council.  

One letter in particular, in which Bernard called for changes to the Massachusetts charter to increase the governor's power by increasing the council's dependence on him, was the subject of particularly harsh treatment, and prompted the assembly to formally request that "he might be forever removed from the Government of the Province."  

He was recalled to England, and Lieutenant Governor Hutchinson became acting governor. When Bernard left Boston on 1 August, the town held an impromptu celebration, decorated the Liberty Tree, and rang church bells. 

------

Bernard was an Anglican and seemed to favor the Anglican Church whenever possible, leading to a great deal of friction with the leading Congregationalist ministers in Boston, the most famous of whom was Rev. Jonathan Mayhew.