The transfer of the supreme authority to the Parliament, though hailed with enthusiasm in New England, increased, if anything, her confidence.  In the summer of 1644 a ship bearing a commission from the Parliament attacked and captured in the harbor of Boston another ship friendly to the king; Massachusetts showed her displeasure by addressing a strong protest to Parliament.  Not long after another vessel of Parliament attacked a ship belonging to persons from Dartmouth in sympathy with the king.  This time Winthrop turned the guns of the battery upon the parliamentary captain and made him pay a barrel of powder for his insolence.[2]

The same summary action was adopted in regard to the growing demand for a freer suffrage.  In May, 1646, an able and respectful petition was presented to the general court for the removal of the civil disabilities of all members of the churches of England and Scotland, signed by William Vassall, Samuel Maverick, Dr. Robert Child, and four other prominent Presbyterians.  The petition was pronounced seditious and scandalous, and the petitioners were roundly fined.  When Child set out for England with his grievances, he was arrested and his baggage searched.  Then, to the horror of the rulers of Massachusetts, there was discovered a petition addressed to Parliament, suggesting that Presbyterianism should be established in New England and that a general governor should be sent over.  The signers, brought before the court, were fined more heavily than before and imprisoned for six months.  At length Vassall and his friends contrived to reach England, expecting to receive the aid of the Presbyterian party in Parliament; but misfortune overtook them there as in Massachusetts, for the Independents were now in control and no help could be obtained from them.[3]

The agitation in England in favor of Presbyterianism, and the petition of Vassall and his friends in Massachusetts, induced the general court in May, 1646, to invite the clergy to meet at Cambridge, “there to discuss, dispute, and clear up, by the word of God, such questions of church government and discipline as they should think needful and meet,” until “one form of government and discipline” should be determined upon.  The “synod” met September 1, 1646, and after remaining in session fourteen days they adjourned.  In August, 1648, after the downfall of Presbyterianism in England, another meeting was held, and a plan of church government was agreed upon, by which order and unity were introduced among members theoretically independent.[4]

By a unanimous vote the synod adopted “a platform” approving the confession of faith of the Westminster divines, except as to those parts which favored the Presbyterian discipline.  The bond of union was found in the right of excluding an offending church from fellowship and of calling in the civil power for the suppression of idolatry, blasphemy, heresy, etc.  The platform recognized the prerogative of occasional synods to give advice and admonition to churches in their collective capacity, but general officers and permanent assemblies, like those of the Presbyterian and Anglican churches, armed with coercive power to act upon individuals, were disclaimed.[5]