You are correct that Jamestown was indeed the first permanent English settlement on the North American continent. And my posting of The Mayflower Compact in no way takes away from that fact. Jamestown had a much harder slog, and while the Pilgrims of Plymouth organized themselves into a government before they even got off the ship, it took Jamestown twelve years to set up a functioning government, based upon that of England.
But they nevertheless got it done, setting up the first legislature in the Americas, in 1619, a full year before the Pilgrims made their first landfall.
“The most convenient place we could find to sit in was the choir of the church, where Sir George Yeardley, the governor, being set down in his accustomed place, those of the Council of Estate sat next to him on both [sides], except only the secretary, then appointed speaker, who sat right before him … all the burgesses took their places in the choir, till a prayer was said … prayer being ended … all the burgesses were entreated to retire themselves into the body of the church; which being done, before they were fully admitted, they were called in order and by name, and so every man took the oath of supremacy, and then entered the Assembly.”
A government with a governor, a council of few, and an assembly of many, a structure familiar to this day!
Within a year of each other, these first two colonies would found the origins of republican government in America.
Thank you for adding another dimension to the old argument.