We have now to note a further difference. In New England, as we have
seen, the township was the unit of representation in the colonial
legislature; but in Virginia the parish was not the unit of
representation. The county was that unit. In the colonial legislature
of Virginia the representatives sat not for parishes, but for
counties. The difference is very significant. As the political life of
New England was in a manner built up out of the political life of
the towns, so the political life of Virginia was built up out of the
political life of the counties. This was partly because the vast
plantations were not grouped about a compact village nucleus like the
small farms at the North, and partly because there was not in Virginia
that Puritan theory of the church according to which each congregation
is a self-governing democracy. The conditions which made the New
England town-meeting were absent. The only alternative was some kind
of representative government, and for this the county was a small
enough area. The county in Virginia was much smaller than in
Massachusetts or Connecticut. In a few instances the county consisted
of only a single parish; in some cases it was divided into two
parishes, but oftener into three or more.

[Sidenote: The county court was virtually a close corporation.]
In Virginia, as in England and in New England, the county was an area
for the administration of justice. There were usually in each county
eight justices of the peace, and their court was the counterpart of
the Quarter Sessions in England. They were appointed by the governor,
but it was customary for them to nominate candidates for the governor
to appoint, so that practically the court filled its own vacancies and
was a close corporation, like the parish vestry. Such an arrangement
tended to keep the general supervision and control of things in the
hands of a few families.