[IX. No one of the confederates to engage in any (offensive) war, without the vote of the commissioners, "as in the sixth Article is provided."]
XI. It is further agreed, That if any of the Confederates shall hereafter break any of these presents Articles, or be any other way injurious to any one of the other Jurisdictions, such breach of Agreement, or injury, shalbe duly considered and ordered by the Commissioners for the other Jurisdictions, that both peace, and this present Confederation, may be intirely preserved without violation.
Lastly, this perpetuall Confederation, and the severall Articles and Agreements thereof, being read and seriously considered, [statement of subscription by authority of the respective confederate governments.]
_Plymouth Colony Records_, I, 16-17, 118-120, 126-128.
(1) _At a meetinge of the Commissioners for the united Colonies in New England at Hartford the fift of September 1644_
... The Commissioners for the Massachusetts mooved that a due order might be attended in the subscriptions of the Acts and determinacions of this and any future meetings of the Commissioners for the united Colonies, and expressed not onely their owne apprehensions but the judgment of their generall Court, That by the Articles of Confederacion the first place did of Right belong to the Massachusetts, as being first named and so the other Colonies in like order. Which being taken into consideracion, and the Articles of Confederacion read, It appeared evidently to the Comissioners that no such priviledge had beene ever ... graunted ... by the Comissioners for the Jurisdicions in either of their former meetings, and yet the first subscription was made in the presence of the generall Court of the Massachusetts. And to prevent future inconvenience upon this occation, they thought fitt to declare that this Commission is free and may not receive any thing (not expresly agreed in the Articles) as imposed by any generall Court; yet out of their respects to the Government of the Massachusetts they did _willingly_ graunt that their Comissioners [those of Massachusetts] should first subscribe after the President in this and all future meetings, and the Comissioners for the other Colonies in such order as they are named in the Articles; viz., Plymouth, Conectacutt, and New Haven.