“ In a sermon before the Connecticut General Court of 1638, he declared that “the choice of public magistrates belongs unto the people by God’s own allowance” and that “they who have the power to appoint officers and magistrates, it is in their power, also, to set the bounds and limitations of the power and place unto which they call them.” ”

“ Though this theory was in advance of the age, Hooker had no idea of the separation of church and state—“the privilege of election, which belongs to the people,” he said, must be exercised “according to the blessed will and law of God.” He also defended the right of magistrates to convene synods, and in the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut (1639) , which he probably framed, the union of church and state is presupposed. Hooker was pastor of the Hartford church until his death on the 7th of July 1647. ”