The governments of the colonies, as provided for in their charters, or instructions to governors, or frames of government proceeding from a proprietor or from the royal government, combined some elements of royal authority with other elements of popular government. The governor was generally an appointive officer, selected either directly by the king, or indirectly, under his authority, by the proprietor or corporation to whom the colonial grant was made. There was usually a provision for a legislative body of two branches, the lower branch, at least, chosen by some form of suffrage. In the exercise of the powers of government, serious conflicts arose in several of the colonies between the representative of the royal power on the one hand, and the representatives of the people on the other, and it was quite as much the result of these local conflicts as it was of the agitation in the colonies for a greater measure of local self-government, which led to the widespread discussion of the proper sphere and functions of government.

The change from the charter or proprietary or royal government to a state government, which took place in each colony in some form in accordance with the action of the representatives of the colonies assembled in the general Congress at Philadelphia, in 1775, was a revolutionary change; that is, it was not in accordance with any prescribed constitutional form, as there could not be, of course, any power in the colonial governments to disavow the authority on which such governments rested. This change was effected in definite form in most of the colonies by the adoption of a constitution, and these first constitutions, in several instances, consisted of three parts: (1) a preamble, declaring the purpose for which the constitution was adopted; (2) a bill of rights, or declaration of rights, containing an exposition of the nature and powers of government and limitations on the powers of the government created under the constitution; (3) a description of the framework of the new government not very different from the former colonial organization. The preamble was omitted in later state constitutions, but the bill of rights has been preserved as an important feature in most, if not all, of the state constitutions which have been adopted down to the present time.