Spannish town st catherine parish consil

The House of Assembly was the

legislature A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its p ...

of the British colony of Jamaica. It held its first meeting on 20 January 1664 at

Spanish Town Spanish Town ( jam, label=Jamaican Creole, Panish Tong) is the capital and the largest town in the parish of St. Catherine in the historic county of Middlesex, Jamaica. It was the Spanish and British capital of Jamaica from 1534 until 1872. Th ...

. Cundall, Frank. (1915
''Historic Jamaica''.
London: Institute of Jamaica. p. 15. As a result of the

Morant Bay Rebellion The Morant Bay Rebellion (11 October 1865) began with a protest march to the courthouse by hundreds of people led by preacher Paul Bogle in Morant Bay, Jamaica. Some were armed with sticks and stones. After seven men were shot and killed by th ...

, the Assembly voted to abolish self-governance in 1865. Jamaica then became a direct-ruled

crown colony A Crown colony or royal colony was a colony administered by The Crown within the British Empire. There was usually a Governor, appointed by the British monarch on the advice of the UK Government, with or without the assistance of a local Counci ...

. Originally there were twelve districts represented. For many years, a high property qualification ensured that the House of Assembly was dominated by the

White Jamaican White Jamaicans also known as European-Jamaicans are Jamaican people whose ancestry lies within the continent of Europe, most notably Great Britain and Ireland. There are also communities of people who are descendants of people who arrived from ...

planter class The planter class, known alternatively in the United States as the Southern aristocracy, was a racial and socioeconomic caste of pan-American society that dominated 17th and 18th century agricultural markets. The Atlantic slave trade permitted p ...

. However, to elect these representatives, the bar was lower for "freeholders", who just had to be white men with a house, pen or plantation, and owned black slaves.Christer Petley, ''White Fury'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), p. 42. A law passed in 1840 allowed some blacks and mixed-race men to vote in elections to the Assembly, though they had to own property, so the white planters continued to dominate it.

References

{{Jamaican elections, state=collapsed Colony of Jamaica Historical legislatures Politics of Jamaica Political organisations based in Jamaica 1664 establishments in Jamaica 1865 disestablishments in Jamaica Members of the House of Assembly of Jamaica Speakers of the House of Assembly of Jamaica

See also

References