Jail time or fine for your words in New Jersey
A New Jersey Revolutionary Era Court Ruling
New Jersey became a state with the passage of a constitution on July 2, 17761. Beginning October 4, 1776, residents could be prosecuted for saying critical things about the new government, the army, the United States Congress, or any individual officials serving those bodies. The New Jersey Supreme Court calls this type of legal case “Seditious Words”.
Between 1776 and 1791, widespread freedom of speech protection did not exist within the United States.
On September 17, 1787, the United States Constitution was ratified and the First Amendment was passed in 1791.
The amendment prohibited Congress from passing laws:
“…respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.2”
What happens when seditious words are spoken in Revolutionary New Jersey? Read on to find out!
Timeline of Events
View a brief summary of the exhibit in a timeline format.
New Jersey’s Constitution is Ratified
The New Jersey Legislature can now pass laws.
First page of the New Jersey State constitution, ratified on July 2, 1776.
“An act to punish traitors and disaffected persons” passes
New Jersey citizens can be prosecuted for what they say.
Excerpt from “An Act to Punish Traitors and Disaffected Persons” describing seditious words.
Seditious Words cases begin
The first cases are heard before the Supreme Court in 1777, often for words spoken in late 1776.
Jabez Collver speaks seditious words at Newton, Sussex County
![First page of New Jersey Supreme Court Case File against Jabez Collver. Collver was accused of making two seditious words statements: “I think it is best to set up the King’s Standard and I think it would be best to let [Lt. Col. Joseph] Barton [a Sussex County resident who served in the New Jersey Volunteers, a Loyalist militia] set up the King’s Standard for if we set it up before the Regulars come we shall save our Estates. And if America overcome, the Presbyterians will pull down all other Persuasions. [The Court interprets the last sentence as meaning: “…the Presbyterians will establish their own Form of Church Government, in Exclusion of that of all other religious Professions, and will not suffer any Denomination of Christians to worship God in any other Way than they shall prescribe and allow].](https://www.njstatelib.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Jabez-Collver-SSV00001_Supreme_Court_Case_No_34547-1.jpg)
Jabez Collver is indicted
Jabez Collver pleads guilty and is fined 5 pounds.
Revolutionary War Ends
The United States is recognized as a separate nation from Great Britain.
The last New Jersey seditious words case
At Hackensack, Reverend William Graaf criticized the Bergen County Justices and Courts for not following the law of the land during a sermon.
Jabez Collver and his family leave New Jersey
He first settles in New York State.
The First Amendment of the United States Constitution is ratified
This Amendment protects Freedom of Speech.
Jabez Collver leaves the United States for Canada
He spends the rest of his life in Windham, Canada, where he dies in 1818.
“An Act to Punish Traitors and Disaffected Persons”
“…any Person who shall maliciously and advisedly revile or speake contemptuously of the Government of this State, or of the Honourable Congress of the United States of America, or of the Measures adopted by the said Congress, or by the Legislature of this State, or who shall maliciously and advisedly say or do any Thing whatever, which will encourage Disaffections or mainifestly tend to raise Tumults and Disorders in the State, or who shall maliciously and advisedly spread such false Rumours concerning the American Forces, or the Forces of the Enemy, as will tend to alienate the Affections of the People from the Government, or to terrify or discourage the good Subjects of this State, or to dispose them to favour the Pretensions of the Enemy; every Person so offending shall be punished with Fine and Imprisonment in the Manner aforesaid,”
Damn the Rebels:
Seditious Words spoken and prosecuted
Many of the defendants said words indicating their displeasure with paper currency, seizure of goods and property, or taking an Oath of Allegiance to the American Government. Others simply spoke in favor of the British government or British army.
A sampling of seditious words…
![Seditious Words said by John Pancas to Lewis Fenton at Upper Freehold on December 24, 1777: 7. “I have a good deal of Cyder and Whiskey to treat my friends with [meaning British troops and other disaffected citizens] when they shall come through and I hope that they will come through soon and, then I will get clear of the Rebels and live in Peace.”](https://www.njstatelib.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Seditious-Words-7-John-Pancas.png)
![William Cozens in front of Abigail Brookfield and others on February 1, 1777 at Elizabethtown said the following seditious words: "The Americans are Rebels. Notwithstanding I have taken the Oath of Allegiance to the State, I pay no regard to it as I did it to save my life. King George is my King. The Oath of Allegiance I have taken to the State, I think [is] of no consequence because I was obliged to take it to save my Life. I took the Oaths of Allegiance to King George the Second, and King George the Third freely and think I am bound to keep them and I esteem them valid."](https://www.njstatelib.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Seditious-Words-3-William-Cozens.png)
Cases by County,
1777-17863
- Sussex County, 22 cases
- Morris County, 17 cases
- Essex County, 15 cases
- Monmouth County, 12 cases
- Bergen County, 7 cases
- Middlesex County, 6 cases
- Hunterdon County, 5 cases
- Salem County, 2 cases
- Somerset County, 2 cases
- Gloucester County, 1 case
- Burlington County, no cases
- Cape May County, no cases
- Cumberland County, no cases
A prominent citizen is accused
Jabez Collver was a Presbyterian Minister, who preached at the Beemer Meetinghouse near Deckertown, New Jersey. He was a married father of 13 children who owned considerable property in Sussex County.
Collver’s legal troubles in Sussex County began after the ratification of the State Constitution in July 1776 and the passage of An Act to Punish Traitors and Disaffected Persons in October 1776.
The Court describes his actions as those of a “pernicious and disaffected Man, and a Person of a turbulent Mind of seditious Disposition and Conversation…falsely, maliciously, advisedly, and seditiously intending to terrify, disunite and discourage the good Subjects of this State and to dispose them to favour the Pretensions of the Enemy, and to alienate their Affections from the present Government established under the Authority of the People…”.
In Newton, Sussex County on April 5, 1777, Jabez Collver, Minister of the Gospel, was heard to say two seditious statements in front of Benjamin Hull and others.
“I think it is best to set up the King’s Standard and I think it would be best to let [Lt. Col. Joseph] Barton [a Sussex County resident who served in the New Jersey Volunteers, a Loyalist militia] set up the King’s Standard for if we set it up before the Regulars come we shall save our Estates.
And if America overcome, the Presbyterians will pull down all other Persuasions. [The Court interprets the last sentence as meaning: “…the Presbyterians will establish their own Form of Church Government, in Exclusion of that of all other religious Professions, and will not suffer any Denomination of Christians to worship God in any other Way than they shall prescribe and allow].“
On May 28, 1777, a Jury was selected to hear Collver’s case in the Sussex County Court of Oyer and Terminer. On June 12, 1777, he pleaded guilty to the charges.
Following his plea, Collver was fined five pounds “…and that he stand committed until his fines and fees are paid.”4
British Loyalty leads to a move
The Collver family remained in New Jersey for ten years after Jabez Collver’s indictment. In 1787, five years after the Revolutionary War ended, they sold their property in Sussex County. Jabez Collver appears on the 1790 Census in Chemung, NY, where he purchased land in 17885.
In 1794 he immigrated to Windham Canada, where he lived the rest of his life. In a land petition to Governor of Upper Canada Peter Russell, dated June 25, 1798, Collver states:
“…in order to favour an Idea or Intention entertained by the Loyalists of Sussex County in the Province of New Jersey, in or about the month of January 1776 to Erect the Royal Standard in the said County of Sussex, [Collver] Subscribed his name in writing to an Enrollment under John Pettit, who was Nominated as an Officer in a Battalion to be raised for that purpose…6”
Questions for Discussion:
- Does it surprise you to learn that New Jersey’s original Constitution did not provide citizens with the right of free speech?
- This page provides some examples of the seditious words attributed to New Jersey residents. Which one struck you the most?
- Would you stay in New Jersey after the Revolution if you were a Loyalist?
Share your thoughts with us on New Jersey history.
Continue your journey, below, into New Jersey state history
Footnotes
- New Jersey State Constitution, 1776. Accessed via https://www.nj.gov/state/archives/docconst76.html ↩︎
- United States Constitution, accessed via https://www.senate.gov/about/origins-foundations/senate-and-constitution/constitution.htm#amdt_1_(1791) ↩︎
- New Jersey State Archives. NJ Supreme Court Case Files Database, version 2, Court Case Type “seditious words”. Accessed from: https://wwwdnet-dos.nj.gov/DOS_ArchivesDBPortal/SupremeCourt2.aspx ↩︎
- New Jersey State Archives. Sussex County Court of Oyer and Terminer Rough Minutes, pages 16 and 18. Accessed via: https://nj.gov/state/darm/WebCatalogPDF/SOY00001_Oyer_Terminer_Minutes/SOY00001_Sussex_Oyer_Terminer_Minutes_May_28_June_14_1777.pdf#page=16 ↩︎
- Giorgi, Valerie Dyer. Colver-Culver Family Genealogy: As Descended from Edward Colver of Groton, Connecticut, to Thirteen Generations in America, Santa Maria, CA: V.D. Giorgi, 1984. Jabez Culver (74) p.97-99 ↩︎
- Library and Archives Canada. Land Petitions of Upper Canada, 1763-1865. Jabez Collver, Petition, Upper Canada Land grants, Vol 92 p.872, Bundle C4, Petition #60. Accessed from: https://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/microform-digitization/006003-119.01-e.php?q2=29&q3=2388&sqn=870&tt=972&PHPSESSID=g41gt6trm6qhu80srnqbt9jb2k8klqgut6tea5h0r981glo2sil0 ↩︎