Banned In (17th Century) Boston: Religious Tolerance

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http://wgbhnews.org/post/banned-17th-century-boston-religious-tolerance



"Return of Roger Williams from England with the First Charter," 1644.

Banned In (17th Century) Boston: Religious Tolerance
By Edgar B. Herwick III

Just how Puritan was early colonial New England? The first legal code, The Body of Liberties, was written by a minister.

Among the offenses that could get you put to death: worshipping another god, blaspheming, and committing adultery. Sure, the separation of church and state, and your right to religious freedom, are bedrocks of the American way of life today— but it hasn't always been like that.

"The Massachusetts government was almost a theocracy," said John Barry, author of "Roger Williams and the Birth of the America Soul." "Everybody in it believed that the goal of Massachusetts’s government was to fulfill God’s will."

It was this theocratic world that Roger Williams stepped into, when he arrived in Boston from England in the winter of 1631.