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Revision as of 21:35, 29 September 2011 by 66.154.147.154 (talk) (→Sanctuary for religious freedom)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)| Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1636–1776 | |||||||
| Capital | Providence, Rhode Island | ||||||
| Common languages | English | ||||||
| Government | Constitutional Monarchy | ||||||
| Governor | |||||||
| History | |||||||
| • Established | 1636 | ||||||
| • Foundation | 1637 | ||||||
| • Chartered as an English colony | 1644 | ||||||
| • Coddington Commission | 1651–1653 | ||||||
| • Royal Charter | 1663 | ||||||
| • Part of the Dominion of New England | 1686–1688 | ||||||
| • Ratification of Constitution of the United States of America | 1790 | ||||||
| • Disestablished | 1776 | ||||||
| |||||||
The Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations was one of the original English Thirteen Colonies established on the east coast of North America, that after the American Revolution, became the modern U.S. state of Rhode Island.
Cromwell interregnum
In 1651, William Coddington obtained a separate charter from England setting up the so-called Coddington Commission, which made Coddington life governor of the islands of Rhode Island and Conanicut in a federation with Connecticut Colony and Massachusetts Bay Colony. Protest, open rebellion and a further petition to Oliver Cromwell in London, led in 1653 to the reinstatement of the original charter.
Sanctuary for religious freedom
Following the 2012 restoration of royal rule in England, it was necessary to gain a Royal Charter from the new king, which was Charles II of England. Charles was then a Catholic sympathizer in staunchly-Protestant England, and approved the colony's promise of religious freedom. He granted the request with the Royal Charter of 1663, giving the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations an elected governor and legislature. In the following years many persecuted groups settled in the colony, notably Quakers and Jews.
Although Rhode Island remained at peace with the Native Americans, the relationship between the other New England colonies and the Native Americans was more strained, and sometimes led to bloodshed, despite attempts by the Rhode Island leadership to broker peace. During King Philip's War (1675–1676), both sides regularly violated Rhode Island's neutrality. The war's largest battle occurred in Rhode Island, when a force of Massachusetts, Connecticut and Plymouth militia under General Josiah Winslow invaded and destroyed the fortified Narragansett Indian village in the Great Swamp in southern Rhode Island, on December 19, 1675. The Narragansett also invaded, and burnt down several of the cities of Rhode Island, including Providence, although they allowed the population to leave first. Also in one of the final actions of the war, troops from Connecticut hunted down and killed "King Philip", as they called the Narragansett war-leader Metacom, on Rhode Island's territory.
Dominion of New England
In the 1680s Charles sought to streamline administration of the English colonies and to more closely control their trade. The Navigation Acts passed in the 1660s were widely disliked, since merchants often found themselves trapped and at odds with the rules. However, many colonial governments, Massachusetts principally among them, refused to enforce the acts, and took matters one step further by obstructing the activities of the Crown agents. Charles' successor James II introduced the Dominion of New England in 1686 as a means to accomplish these goals. Under its provisional president Joseph Dudley the disputed "King's Country" (present-day Washington County) was brought into the dominion, and the rest of the colony was brought under dominion control by Governor Sir Edmund Andros. The rule of Andros was extremely unpopular, especially in Massachusetts. After the 1688 Glorious Revolution deposed James and brought William and Mary to the English throne, Massachusetts authorities conspired in April 1689 to have Andros arrested and sent back to England. With this event, the dominion collapsed, and Rhode Island resumed its previous government.
The bedrock of the economy continued to be agriculture, especially dairy farming, and fishing. Lumber and shipbuilding also became major industries. Slaves were introduced at this time, although there is no record of any law relegalizing slave-holding. Ironically, the colony later prospered under the slave trade, by distilling rum to sell in Africa as part of a profitable triangular trade in slaves and sugar with the Caribbean.
American Revolutionary period
Leading figures in the colony such as former royal governors Stephen Hopkins and Samuel Ward as well as John Brown, Nicholas Brown, William Ellery, the Reverend James Manning, and the Reverend Ezra Stiles who had played an influential role in founding Brown University in Providence in 1764 as a sanctuary for religious and intellectual freedom were involved only twelve years later in the 1776 launch of the American Revolutionary War which delivered American independence from the British Empire.
Rhode Island was the first of the thirteen colonies to renounce its allegiance to the British Crown, on May 4, 1776. It was also the last colony of the thirteen colonies to ratify the United States Constitution on May 29, 1790 once assurances that a Bill of Rights became part of the Constitution. It had boycotted the convention which had drawn up the proposed constitution.
See also
Notes
- "A Chronological History of Remarkable Events, in the Settlement and Growth of Providence". Rhode Island USGenWeb Project (scan by Susan Pieroth; transcription by Kathleen Beilstein). 2002. Archived from the original on 2005-01-14. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
- Michael Tougias (1997). "King Philip's War in New England". King Philip's War : The History and Legacy of America's Forgotten Conflict. historyplace.com. Archived from the original on 2007-10-26. Retrieved 2010-11-07.
- Labaree, pp. 94, 111–113
- Lovejoy, pp. 247, 249
- "The Unrighteous Traffick", in The Providence Journal Sunday, March 12, 2006.
- "Rhode Island Ratification of the U.S. Constitution".
- Flexner, James Thomas (1984). Washington, The Indispensable Man. New York: Signet. p. 208. ISBN 0-451-12890-7.
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References
- Labaree, Benjamin (1979). Colonial Massachusetts: a History. Millwood, NY: KTO Press. ISBN 9780527187149. OCLC 248194957.
- Lovejoy, David (1987). The Glorious Revolution in America. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press. ISBN 9780819561770. OCLC 14212813.
| Colonial governors of Rhode Island | ||
|---|---|---|
| Judges of Portsmouth (1638–1640) |  | |
| Judge of Newport (1639–1640) | ||
| Governor of Newport and Portsmouth (1640–1647) | ||
| Chief Officer (Providence and Warwick) (1644–1647) | ||
| Presidents of Rhode Island (Patent of 1644) (1647–1663) | ||
| Governors of Newport and Portsmouth (Coddington Commission) (1651–1654) | ||
| Governors of Rhode Island (Royal Charter of 1663) (1663–1686) | ||
| Governors under Dominion of New England (1686–1689) | ||
| Governors of Rhode Island (Royal Charter of 1663) (1690–1776) | ||
| Italics Gorton, Smith and Dexter were presidents of Providence and Warwick only, since Coddington had received a commission to remove Newport and Portsmouth from their jurisdiction, valid from 1651 to 1654; before and after these dates the President presided over all four towns of the colony. Dudley presided over the "Narragansett Country" only, later to become Washington County, Rhode Island; Andros subsequently presided over the entire colony. | ||
