Before leaving ship, they entered into a solemn agreement for the formation of a government upon reaching land. This became the famous Mayflower Compact, by which “in the presence of God and one another” they agreed to “covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil Body Politick, for our better Ordering and Preservation” and to “enact, constitute, and frame such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, Acts, Constitutions, and Offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general Good of the Colony; into which we promise all due Submission and Obedience.” What the founders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony agreed to, in other words, was to form a government for self-rule based on popular consent and rule of law. The Mayflower Compact was like the church covenant by which Separatists formed congregations, except that it bound its signers to observe the ordinances of a civil rather than a religious society, and professed allegiance to the King as well as God. http://libertyonline.hypermall.com/Locke/second/second-frame.html It marks the introduction into the American colonies of a compact theory of government which would later serve as the basis for both popularly based State constitutions and the United States Constitution, the latter being viewed as a compact among the States as well as the people in the States.
http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa02.htm
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