William, Prince of Orange,
placed himself at the head of the malcontents, and raised an army. At an
assembly of the States of Holland and Zealand in 1559, he was declared
Stadtholder, or Governor of Holland, Friesland, and Utrecht: Calvinism
was declared to be the religion of the States. In 1579, the three
provinces were joined by those of Gueldres, Zutphen, Overyssell, and
Groeningen. All signed, by their deputies, the TREATY OF UNION; it became
the basis of their constitution: still, however, they acknowledged
Philip for their sovereign. But in 1581, the deputies of the United
States assembled at Amsterdam, subscribed a solemn act, by which they
formally renounced allegiance to Philip and his successors, and asserted
their independence. They declared in their manifesto, that "the prince
is made for the people, not the people for the prince;" that "the
prince, who treats his subjects as slaves, is a tyrant, whom his
subjects have a right to dethrone, when they have no other means of
preserving their liberty;" that "this right particularly belongs to the
Netherlands; their sovereign, being bound by his coronation oath to
observe the laws, under pain of forfeiting his sovereignty.
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