The problem and potential of piracy: legal changes and emerging ideas of colonial autonomy in the early modern British Atlantic, 1670–1730

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article focuses on British maritime law to discuss the challenge of transferring Admiralty law to Britain's Atlantic colonies, considered through the lens pirate trials and executions. Colonial governors in North America and the West Indies tolerated piracy during the seventeenth century to obtain goods barred from the restrictions imposed by the Navigation Acts. These deals were largely ignored, but the increasing piratical insults against the Crown and pressure from foreign competitors, such as Spain, forced British officials to crack down on piracy. Unfortunately, years of tolerating pirates had allowed these criminals to become too numerous for British officials to transport captured pirates back to England for trial and executions. As a result, by 1700 they had to establish their maritime legal ruling body, the Admiralty Court, throughout the American colonies under the jurisdiction of local governors. However, complex geographical challenges in the Caribbean and religiously influenced social laws in North America forced colonial governors to alter the English system to fit their needs and create autonomous legal networks. This article argues that the establishment and maintenance of British Admiralty law in the Atlantic colonies led to the development of early American ideas of autonomy.