first utilized for provisions as to appeals. In the June, 1686, commission to Sir 
Edmund Andros as governor of the Dominion of New England, the basic 
instruction pattern of the insular colonies was followed. The commission thus 
permitted appeals in cases of error from the dominion courts to the Governor 
and Council in civil cases, with a sterling minimum and the usual security 
provisions. 42 This provision was reproduced in the 1688 commission to 
Andros as dominion governor, 48 and in the successive commissions to Dongan 
(1686), Sloughter (1689/90), and Fletcher (1691/2), as governors of the 
province of New York. 44 
The brief but clear instruction issued to Governor Culpeper of Virginia in 
1679 was followed in 1682 by a discursive provision which did not directly 
order appeals to the Governor and Council, but certainly assumed this to be 
the course in that colony. The same instruction went out to Maryland in 1691 
and New Hampshire in 1692. This instruction provided that as it might not 
be fit that appeals be brought to the Governor and Council too frequently or 
in causes of too small value, the governor, with the advice of the council, 
should propose local legislation whereby the method and limitation of such 
appeals might be settled in the manner most convenient to the inhabitants. 45 
But contemporarily the commissions to Copley and Nicholson of Maryland 
provided for appeals to the Governor and Council in civil cases of error with 
a sterling minimum. 46 These commissions were treated as legislative 
standards for the directed limiting acts. 47 
It was inherent in imperial administration of justice that lower legislative 
bodies should not exercise judicial functions. This policy received earliest 
42 1 Laws of New Hampshire, 150. The earlier 
commission (October, 1685) to Joseph Dudley 
as president of the Council for the Dominion 
of New England contained no such provision 
(ibid., 93). A Dominion act gave this provision 
statutory form; see An Act for establishing 
Courts of Judicature and Publique Justice, 
March 3, 1686/7 (3 Pub. Rec. Col. Conn., 
413)- For territorial extension of the commission 
to Rhode Island and Connecticut see 1 
Laws of New Hampshire, 168-69, r 7i- 
43 3 Doc. Rel. Col. Hist. N.Y., 539. 
44 Ibid., 379, 625, 829. The commission and 
the instructions of James, Duke of York, to 
Colonel Dongan as governor, in 1682/3, dui. 
not mention appeals (ibid., 328, 331). 
45 For Virginia see the instructions of 1682 to 
Thomas Culpeper (28 Virginia Magazine of 
History and Biography, 43); see also the minutes 
of the Lords Committee of Trade and 
Plantations in considering the draft of the instructions 
(26 ibid., 138-39; CO 391/3/328, 
340). This provision was preserved in subsequent 
Virginia instructions until 1702 (1 
Labaree, Royal Instructions, #446). For Maryland 
see the 1691 instructions to Copley (8 Md. 
Archives, 279) and the 1694 instructions to 
Nicholson (23 ibid., 548). For New Hampshire 
see the 1692 instructions to Samuel Allen (1 
Laws of New Hampshire,. 514). The attitude 
of Virginia in this matter is revealed in a 
March, 1661/2, act governing appeals (2 Hening, 
Statutes at Large Va., 65-66) wherein it 
is stated that "because there may be as greate 
error in judgment or will in matters of small 
value as in the greatest, it is further enacted 
that appeales shall lye open as aforesaid for any 
thing of what value soever." 
46 8 Md. Archives, 266 (Copley); 20 ibid., 86 
(Nicholson). Security was first to be given by 
appellant to answer charges awarded in case of 
affirmance. 
47 See infra, pp. 87, 215.