Massachusetts Bay Company

American  

noun

1. a company, chartered in England in 1629 to establish a colony on Massachusetts Bay, that founded Boston in 1630.

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Example Sentences

Similarly, the Massachusetts Bay Company charter clearly expounded the rules of civil government and delineated the limits of the crown and Parliament’s authority in New England.

From Slate

Disputing the orthodox story that the Framers “discovered” written constitutionalism, Bowie argues that the American Constitution is a descendant of the 17th-century Massachusetts Bay Company charter, which functioned as a “Charter Constitution” a century and a half before the founding of the nation.

From Slate

Corporate charters, issued by the English crown, gave municipal and trading corporations like the Massachusetts Bay Company special permission to govern people and territory on the crown’s behalf.

From Slate

Bowie claims that the Massachusetts Bay Company, which governed most of New England from 1629–86, was unique in that its founders “took their charter and corporate government out of Europe and across the Atlantic Ocean so that residents of New England could govern themselves.”

From Slate

And although the Massachusetts Bay Company charter was unique in its independence from the crown, by the 1760s, almost all the colonies were governed by “charter governments.”

From Slate