By Anthony J. Yanik, MA
To describe the state of Catholicism in British America during its colonial days, it is best to examine the first census made by the United States in 1790 after the Revolution. Of the four million people listed on the national roles, less than 65,000 or roughly 1.64% of the population were Roman Catholic. In the more rural areas, a normal American of that era one might never meet a Catholic during his/her life time. In his volume, CATHOLICS IN COLONIAL LAW, Francis X Curran commented,
had the American Revolution not intervened, it seems quite possible that the Catholic Church in British America, small as it was, might with time have all but disappeared.
And indeed it was miniscule, thanks in great part to the anti-Catholic legal charters the colonies received from the king when they were being founded or at later times when they were revised. Most of the charters called for a Protestant state sponsored religion primarily in New England and in the South. There were a few exceptions: Catholics were tolerated in Rhode Island, Delaware, and Pennsylvania and in Maryland, New York, and the Carolinas at various times.
Every colony needed a charter to give it legal standing. These were awarded by the king when it was being founded. There was no escaping the policies that were written into a colony’s charter. They provided the colony’s rules of conduct. There were two types: a Royal Colony charter granted to a group of men for investment purposes but owned by the king with a governor to rule in his name, or a Proprietary Colony charter also owned by a stock company for investment and with the freedom to select its own governor to administer it under English laws.
A third somewhat unofficial group was formed by the New England colonies. Being the most northern of the American British colonies we will begin our discussion of colonial anti-Catholic tendencies with the New England colonies such as Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Hampshire. Their charters were self-originated. Later they were modified to track along with a central charter for all New England drafted by a group of Puritan “gentlemen” selected by the king as proprietors of his newly created Council for New England. Its purpose was to organize the several small colonies of the region as well as help in the founding of new settlements by offering grants of land via charters to groups like the Pilgrims. The vast majority of such immigrants would come from England seeking to escape the strictures of the Church of England. Their new charters would understandably contain language to create a solid legal wall of refusing citizenship to anyone unless they were or became members of the Puritan/Congregational Church. Later Catholics were allowed to settle in these colonies, but as non- citizens had no civil rights such as voting or serving on juries.
Rhode Island was the only New England Colony to advocate freedom of religion. Its founder, Roger Williams, a Puritan minister fell out of favor with the Puritan hierarchy and was forced to leave their jurisdiction with his congregation. He purchased land from the Indians which eventually became Rhode Island, the only New England Colony not to discriminate against Catholics.
The Middle Colonies (New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Pennsylvania) tolerated freedom of religion in varying degrees and at different times during their colonial existence.
New York, for example, (originally New Netherland, a Protestant Dutch colony) fell prey to England’s Charles II when he threatened its Dutch owners into a treaty in which England took over the colony. In 1664 he transferred its title to James, his Catholic brother, as a Proprietary Owner who renamed New Netherlands the colony of New York and appointed Thomas Dongan, a Catholic its governor.
In 1685 King Charles II passed away and James became king, which have have a profound effect on New York’s religious fortunes. Because of James’ Catholicism, the Protestant English parliament forced him to flee to France whereupon Parliament invited William and Mary to take over the throne.
When news of the change reached New York, Jacob Eisler, a member of the New York militia and rabid anti-Catholic, decided it was time to get rid of its Catholic governor and appointed himself successor. He then went on a rampage of anti-Catholic programs such as refusing Catholics the right to vote or hold public office. Newcomers had to be screened to determine if they were Catholic.
When Eisler asked the king to officially appoint him governor, James instead selected William Slaughter, also a staunch anti- Catholic, who ordered that anyone who wanted to become a citizen of New York had to swear that William II was the head of the Church of England, an oath Catholics would refuse to take. Also, he ruled that if there were any priests in the colony they were subject to “perpetual imprisonment” unless they left immediately
When a series of mysterious fires broke out in New York City in March 1741, a state of panic erupted forcing the Common Council to appoint a grand jury to discover the perpetrators. Their focus fell on Mary Burton, an employee of a tavern owner named John Hughson. Burton claimed that Hughson held secret meetings with others to take over the city by setting it on fire and that the leader was a man named Ury who already had been suspected as being a priest. His guilt was easily assumed. Ury insisted that he was an Anglican vicar not a priest. His plea fell on deaf ears. Urged on by the local hysteria, a trumped up trial produced a tragic guilty verdict. Ury was hung together with 18 black slaves and 13 other innocent victims, to the shame of the colony.
Neighboring New Jersey, originally carved out of a large section of the now new colony of New York, was left largely at peace. When James received New York from the king he transferred a large portion of it into the proprietary colonies of East and West New Jersey. These he gave to his two friends: Sir George Carteret and Lord John Berkeley each as a Lord Proprietor. As such they took ownership of the land and were free to appoint its governor and Assembly. To entice settlers they drew up a statement of Concession and Agreement giving freedom of religion to all Protestants. Since New Jersey was a Proprietary Colony, everyone regardless of their faith had to swear allegiance to the king as the head of the Church of England to become a citizen. It was an oath that Catholics in good conscience would not take.
Of the Middle States, Pennsylvania was the most tolerant when it came to a colony’s religious beliefs. Chartered in 1681, this huge land mass was the result of a 16,000 pound debt owed to Sir William Penn by King Charles II. When Penn died his son, William, a Quaker convert, negotiated a trade with the king for the Pennsylvania land mass in exchange for canceling the king’s debt. His plan was to make Pennsylvania into a haven for English Quakers. He also made it open to all Protestant faiths and Catholics as well. All anyone had to do was to express a belief in Jesus Christ and pledge allegiance to the king. Unfortunately he lived mostly in England and the man he chose to manage the colony’s affairs, Philip Ford, sued Penn for non-payment of wages. Finally the Queen stepped in and paid the debt to save the Penn name.
Because of Penn’s constant absences, the colony’s management was taken over by the Pennsylvania assembly. Pressured by the English Parliament, the assembly demanded that all office seekers take the English oath. If they were Catholic they also had to add a religious test to deny Transubstantiation, that Mary was the mother of God, and the Mass, otherwise Catholics could worship freely. Fearful that Catholics might side with the French during the French and Indian War of 1774, sheriffs were given the right to search any Catholic home suspected of concealing arms and ammunition.
Over time traveling Catholic missionaries began including Philadelphia in their journeys. In 1733 when enough Catholics were living in the area to warrant the construction of a church, St. Joseph’s chapel was erected, the first urban church in the colonies
Little Delaware belongs in Pennsylvania’s history simply because when Charles II granted Penn its charter he included Delaware’s three main counties in it so that Pennsylvania would have access to the sea. There they would remain until 1776. This was fortunate for the Delaware Catholics who lived in them since Pennsylvania’s charter granted religious freedom to all except the right to vote or hold public office unless they took the heretical test oath that the king was the head of the English church. Not until 1704 did William allow Delaware to have its own assembly.
The Southern Colonies (Maryland, Virginia, Georgia, and the Carolinas’) attitude toward religion was in direct contrast to their New England cousins who came to British America to break free from the demands of the Church of England. Except for Maryland, the Southern Colonies were staunchly Anglican as specified in their charters and kept as close ties as they could with the Church of England. Because of the distance between them there was a chronic shortage of Anglican ministers to serve which left the ruling gentry with the task of providing the necessary church’s liturgical administration, a task for which they were ill prepared.
The typical Southern Colony relative to its regard toward religious toleration was Virginia, the oldest of the Royal Colonies. In 1606 King James I awarded a group of merchants who had formed the Virginia Company a Charter to found a settlement in what later would become Jamestown. The charter was relatively neutral with regard to any restrictions involving religion. However King James did specify that religious rites and services held by Virginian settlers should be in accord with those of the Church of England. The colony barely survived due to poor management, Indian attacks, and location until rescued by ships bearing supplies and its first governor. The colony grew slowly and failed to attract enough talented settlers although a number of other small settlements were formed across the land. In 1622 a surprise Indian attack led to much destruction and the death of one-third of the colony’s population. The king saved the young Virginian effort in 1624 by giving the colony a new charter declaring it to be a crown colony under his supervision. In doing so he brought the Church of England into the picture as the state sponsored religion with Anglicanism being the law of the land with minimal supervision from England. Direct administration and support of the church in Virginia was left to the gentry (Washington was one) especially since Anglican ministers rarely were anxious to come to America.
It was at the local level that a colony’s anti‑Catholic policies had the most immediate impact over and above the charter. A royal colony like Virginia was led by a governor selected by the king to be his representative in carrying out the latter’s policies. He in turn was supported by an assembly made up of citizens selected to write laws necessary for the day-to-day operation of the colony, including its religious beliefs. Any laws passed by the assembly then would be forwarded to the king for approval.
In an attempt to attract more settlers the Virginia Company created the House of Burgesses as a lower house of the assembly to allow the colonists to select their own local people to share in the governance of Virginia. It consisted of two members from each of the colony’s 11 districts and is considered the first such elected group ever to share in the making of laws passed by a colony. The move was successful and the colony grew to 1,200 members in the following year. Anti-Catholic laws now began to creep in among those passed by the assembly. In 1641 it decreed that no person could be admitted to public office without first taking the oath of allegiance and supremacy as practiced in England.
Virginia’s relations with the Church of England were in a state of flux throughout the two decades of the English Civil War with control of the country vaccilating between the crown and parliament. When Cromwell died and Charles II was restored to the throne, once again Anglicanism became the state religion of the realm. Virginia returned to its pre-civil norms which left the colony free to pass its own laws beyond its charter. In 1661 it became law that everyone regardless of their faith was bound to attend the Established (Anglican) service) or pay a fine of twenty pounds. It also ruled that all Catholic priests be brought to justice once they were discovered.
