Editing Thirteen Colonies (section)

==Religion==
{{Main|History of religion in the United States#Before the American Revolution}}
According to Patricia Bonomi, "early Americans in all sections lived not in a spiritual desert but in a world where religion formed a key component of their mental landscape."<ref>Patricia U. Bonomi, ''Under the cope of heaven: Religion, society, and politics in colonial America'' (Oxford UP, 2003) p. xx.</ref> Protestantism was the predominant religious affiliation in the Thirteen Colonies. There were also a few Catholics in Maryland as well as [[Jews]] and [[deists]]; many colonists had no religious connection. The [[Church of England]] was officially established in most of the South. The [[Puritan movement]] divided into the [[Congregational church|Congregational]] and the [[Unitarian Universalist Association|Unitarian denominations]], and was the established religious affiliation in Massachusetts and Connecticut into the 19th century.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Foster |first=Stephen |title=The Long Argument: English Puritanism and the Shaping of New England Culture, 1570–1700 |date=1991 |publisher=UNC Press Books |isbn=9780807845837}}</ref> In practice, this meant that tax revenues were allocated to church expenses. The [[Anglican]] parishes in the South were under the control of local vestries and had public functions such as repair of the roads and relief of the poor. After 1700 the vestry no longer dominated the minister.<ref>Joan Rezner, Gundersen, "The Myth of the Independent Virginia Vestry." ''Anglican and Episcopal History'' 44.2 (1975): 133+.</ref><ref>James Bell, ''The Imperial Origins of the King's Church in Early America 1607–1783'' (Springer, 2004).</ref>

The colonies were religiously diverse, with different Protestant denominations brought by British, German, Dutch, and other immigrants. The [[Reformed tradition]] was the foundation for [[Presbyterian]], [[Congregationalist]], and [[Continental Reformed]] denominations. French [[Huguenots]] set up their own Reformed congregations. The [[Dutch Reformed Church]] was strong among [[Dutch Americans]] in New York and New Jersey, while [[Lutheranism]] was prevalent among [[German American|German immigrants]]. Germans also brought diverse forms of [[Anabaptism]], especially the [[Mennonite]] variety. [[Reformed Baptist]] preacher [[Roger Williams]] founded [[Providence Plantations]] which became the [[Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations]]. Jews were clustered in a few port cities. The Baltimore family founded [[Maryland]] and brought in fellow Catholics from England.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Rita |first=M. |date=March 1940 |title=Catholicism in Colonial Maryland |journal=Records of the American Catholic Historical Society of Philadelphia |volume=51 |issue=1 |pages=65–83 |jstor=44209361}}</ref> Catholics were about 1.6% of the population or 40,000 in 1775. Of the 200–250,000 Irish who came to the Colonies between 1701 and 1775 less than 20,000 were Catholic, many of whom hid their faith or lapsed because of prejudice and discrimination. Between 1770 and 1775 3,900 Irish Catholics arrived out of almost 45,000 white immigrants (7,000 English, 15,000 Scots, 13,200 Scots-Irish, 5,200 Germans).<ref>{{Cite book |last=Butler |first=Jon |title=Becoming America, The Revolution before 1776 |date=2000 |isbn=0-674-00091-9 |page=35|publisher=Harvard University Press }}</ref> Most Catholics were English Recusants, Germans, Irish, or blacks; half lived in Maryland, with large populations also in New York and Pennsylvania. Presbyterians were chiefly immigrants from Scotland and Ulster who favored the back-country and frontier districts.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Le Beau |first=Bryan F. |title=Jonathan Dickinson and the Formative Years of American Presbyterianism |date=1997 |publisher=University Press of Kentucky |isbn=9780813120263}}</ref>

[[Quakers]] were well established in Pennsylvania, where they controlled the governorship and the legislature for many years.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Nash |first=Gary B. |title=Quakers and Politics: Pennsylvania, 1681–1726 |date=1968 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=9780691045887}}</ref> Quakers were also numerous in Rhode Island. [[Baptists]] and [[Methodists]] were growing rapidly during the [[First Great Awakening]] of the 1740s.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Kidd |first1=Thomas S. |title=Baptists in America: A History |last2=Hankins |first2=Barry |date=2015 |isbn=9780199977536 |chapter=Chapter 1|publisher=Oxford University Press }}</ref> Many denominations sponsored missions to the local Indians.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Stevens |first=Laura M. |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/759158222 |title=The Poor Indians: British Missionaries, Native Americans, and Colonial Sensibility |date=2004 |publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press |isbn=978-0-8122-0308-0 |location=Philadelphia |oclc=759158222}}</ref>