pennsylvania the holy experiment (1681)

William Penn's Holy Experiment

Server costs fundraiser 2024.

In the 17th century, many groups of British Christians rose and fought against religious intolerance and corruption. The Puritans sought a return to biblical religion and a purified form of Christianity in England . This resulted in the Puritan Revolution, as well as a migration to America to find a place to worship God in what they considered the 'correct' fashion.

Another group, called the Quakers, who approached Christianity from an extreme spiritual interpretation, also pushed against the status quo. They were often criticized and abused for their faith, both by the religious and the civic world. One of their members, William Penn (1644-1718), was influential in the establishment of that faith in America and was responsible for creating a colony in America where a government was established that earnestly and actively sought to protect religious and civil rights. Quaker specialist Bonnelyn Young Kunze writes in her article:

William Penn's chief claim to historical fame was his founding of the Quaker colony of Pennsylvania, as well as his prolific writings in defense of Quakerism and religious toleration in England. (170)

William Penn's parents were an interesting mix. According to American sociologist and historian Harry Wildes, Penn's father was an admiral in the royal navy and was "by conviction pro-Anglican and royalist" (Wildes, 10). He was a stern and serious man who lived and worked amidst the political chaos of the time. Not a great deal is known about Penn's mother except that she was "energetic, extroverted" (Wildes, 9), and was left alone for long periods of time to raise her children by herself. Her initial style of parenting was unorthodox, but later on, she attempted to improve upon her approach.

William Penn was described as quiet and introspective, although he was reported to have "exhibited a strong mystical streak. By his own account, he had mystical experiences by the time he was twelve or thirteen" (Dunn and Dunn, 4). No doubt this would be a determinant factor in his joining the Quakers.

At this same time, Penn and his father had "fairly stormy relations" (Dunn and Dunn, 4) that are documented in correspondences between the two. He often rebelled against his father's wishes and demands of him. This rebellious streak led him into trouble a great deal as a young man. He was expelled from Oxford in 1662 for objecting "to the prayer book and to ritual which seemed too popish" (Dunn and Dunn, 7) and was severely punished for his involvement with the Puritans. According to historian Hans Fantel, Penn's father, hoping to separate him from the "company of subversives" (Fantel, 45), sent him abroad to Paris, France. There, he mingled with many great men, including King Louis XIV of France (r. 1643-1715) and Moïse Amyraut (1596-1664), a famous Protestant Christian humanist.

During this time, contrary to what his father hoped to accomplish, Penn honed his challenging views even more, but he did learn some tact and diplomacy. He returned home a more mature, even-tempered man (much to his parents' delight), but he still had questions. His father, too, questioned why Penn was wasting his time on so much theology and enrolled him in law school. Fortunately for Penn, he was able to spend more time with his father and observed him in his military duties, which no doubt influenced Penn's later administration of the Pennsylvania colony.

At this time, Penn was also introduced to the English royal court, providing contacts that would serve him well later on. As a responsible adult, Penn was given more family responsibilities, and his father sent him to Ireland to take care of some family holdings and estates.

Penn Befriends The Quakers

While away from his family's influence, Penn began attending Quaker meetings. These meetings were forbidden under the Claredon Code, which "forbade all religious gatherings except those under the auspices of the official Church of England" (Fantel, 66). Again, Penn found himself pitted against authority concerning his religious rights. During one meeting, Penn had the opportunity to listen to Thomas Loe, a famous Quaker leader. There, Penn was deeply affected by what he heard.

]Penn] recognized the Quaker meeting as a community through which a free faith of separate individuals could take on socially effective forms. ... Penn had found ... a practical intersection of faith and society." (Fantel, 68)

Eventually, Penn joined the Quakers and was subsequently arrested and jailed after a meeting of theirs was discovered with him in attendance. He was given the opportunity to escape imprisonment by a politically savvy judge, but he stood fast to his ideals. At age 22, William Penn had declared himself a Quaker, much to his father's sorrow and anger.

Penn's conversion was predictable considering his mystical background. With the Quakers, "He could share ... powerful feelings of possession by the spirit and enjoy a certain freedom to interpret and act on those feelings in an individual way" (Dunn and Dunn, 5). Furthermore, this new faith of Penn's also managed to justify some of his belligerence with his parents. Being a Quaker "gave Penn good religious grounds for disobeying his parents" (Dunn and Dunn, 6) if they made religious demands that challenged his beliefs. The ultimate result of this was bad relations with his father until his father's death in 1670.

Penn not only had difficult relations with his family but also managed to get himself in much trouble with the Church of England. He was imprisoned in the Tower of London in 1667 for writing a tract entitled, The Sandy Foundation Shaken Speaking Against the Doctrine of the Trinity . While in the Tower, he wrote No Cross, No Crown and Innocency with Her Open Face, and he later went on to write several other works. Many of his tracts were written by Penn to defend his Quaker brethren or in defense of religious freedom. According to Quaker historian Melvin Endy Jr.,

Penn's originality as a tolerationist consisted largely in the ingenuity with which he drew up variations of arguments intended to convince his readers that it was to their interest as individuals, citizens, and merchants to replace coerced uniformity with the blessings of toleration. (Endy, 323)

Penn also began to preach, and in 1671, he was arrested and imprisoned for preaching at a worship service. Still, "Despite filthy and crowded conditions, Penn wrote three lengthy tracts and several epistles focusing on liberty of conscience" (Adams and Emmerich, 63). He took the matter of religious liberty very seriously and hoped to use his talents in a just and righteous cause. He found that cause in the establishment of a Quaker colony in America. There, Penn hoped to put his religious and political beliefs to the test in one grand 'Holy Experiment.'

The Pennsylvania Colony & the Holy Experiment

In 1680, an older debt of King Charles II of England (r. 1660-1685) was passed from the deceased Admiral Penn to his son, William Penn, but instead of that money owed to him, young Penn asked to receive "proprietary title to a huge territory in America" (Dunn and Dunn, 41). He asked for this because “by obtaining the proprietorship to a Quaker colony, he could vastly expand his service to his coreligionists and to the general cause of religious and political liberty – and at the same time greatly enlarge his property holdings" (Dunn and Dunn, 42). It was Penn's overwhelming desire to "create a theocentric society without resorting to compulsion in religious matters" (Adams and Emmerich, 66). In that utopian society, Penn "sought to reconcile liberty and authority in his frame of government" (Stern, 85).

Therefore, Penn established this colony with the hope that religious toleration would be maintained without abuse by the government. He "argued that intolerance was contrary to reason. To sacrifice the liberty and property of a man for religious causes would not win the loyalty of that man for the prince. Enforced conversion ... resembled forced marriage" (Beatty, 134). Of course, as the head proprietor and governor of those holdings in America, Penn had complete authority as detailed in the Pennsylvania charter of 1681. However, he used this position as much as possible to procure liberties for the colonists and not to help himself. Sadly, he did not succeed as fully as he had hoped.

Penn's earliest plan of government was called the Fundamental Constitutions of Pennsylvania. This document, probably drafted by Penn himself, was the "most liberal of the early plans of government for Pennsylvania. Its opening section declares religious liberty for all inhabitants" (Soderlund, 96). Furthermore, it was extremely democratic in spirit and law. Much of the power rested in the hands of the people, rather than with the governor and the administrative council.

Unfortunately, this plan was rejected for political reasons at the time and was neither ratified nor signed by the new colonists (not even by Penn). Instead, a new Frame of Government was enacted. It had a stronger hierarchical style of government with most of the earlier plan's extreme democratic representation being removed from its provisions. According to Historian Jean Soderlund, it still guaranteed "religious freedom to all inhabitants who believe in one God" (119) and established an electoral legislative system, prohibited taxation without representation, and guaranteed free trade .

This experiment in religion and government thrived, with new colonists coming in from all parts of Europe . Interestingly, not all immigrants to Pennsylvania were Quakers. There were many Puritans, Catholics, and people from other sects, but Penn's system of government still incorporated them. Things began to change for Penn and his colony, however, with the advent of the Glorious Revolution (1688-1689).

Penn's association and friendship with the fleeing king of England made him a hunted man, and he had to spend some time hiding to save his life. During this period, the control of the Pennsylvania colony was taken away from him because of the lack of military support for the French-Indian War by its colonists. Eventually, Penn regained control in the colony, but by that time, there was great "political disorder, religious factionalism, and a General Assembly hostile to his executive power" (Adams and Emmerich, 68).

Sign up for our free weekly email newsletter!

Ever the man of peace, Penn approved a Charter of Privileges in 1701, which gave the Pennsylvania legislature even greater powers. He also returned to England to fight against a bill in Parliament seeking to re-establish royal control over the colonies, never to return to his colony in Pennsylvania again. In 1718, he died in England from complications from several debilitating strokes he suffered earlier that year. Initially, Penn's charter was split between his sons, but eventually, the Penn family sold it back to the Crown.

Penn's Holy Experiment proved true to its name. It was a testing ground for new and innovative ways of dealing with religious tolerance alongside civic administration. It showed that, at least for a time, the two kingdoms of faith and government could co-exist in ways that were free and fruitful. This form of society could prosper and flourish despite hardships, military struggles, and religious diversity.

The colony in Pennsylvania did more than just succeed for itself; it provided the framework and example for other colonies to follow in America. Even beyond that, it greatly influenced the eventual constitution of the United States of America. Adams and Emmerich have stated, "No other colony inspired the Founders more in the area of religious liberty than Pennsylvania" (68).

This incitement did not just happen on its own; William Penn was the force responsible for the creation of this important colony. As Edward Beatty concluded, Penn's "great enterprise in the New World was an endeavor to set up a social order blessed with religious toleration and controlled by humanitarian ideals" (305). Without him, there may not have been as strong a desire to create an environment for the cultivation of religious freedoms.

Subscribe to topic Bibliography Related Content Books Cite This Work License

Bibliography

• Arlin Adams and Charles J. Emmerich. "William Penn and the American Heritage of Religious Liberty." The Journal of Law and Religion , 1/8/1990.
• Beatty, Edward Corbyn Obert. William Penn As Social Philosopher. Kessinger Publishing, 1970.
• Bonnelyn Young Kunze. "Religious Authority and Social Status in Seventeenth-Century England: the Friendship of Margaret Fell, George Fox, and William Penn." Church History , 2/57/1988.
• Dunn, Richard S. & Dunn, Mary Maples. The World of William Penn. University of Pennsylvania Press, 1986.
• Edwin Broner and David Fraser. William Penn’s Published Writings: 1660–1726. University of Pennsylvania Press, 1986
• Endy Jr., Melvin B. William Penn and Early Quakerism . Princeton University Press, 2016.
• Fantel, Hans. William Penn. Morrow, 1974.
• Soderlund, Jean R. William Penn and the Founding of Pennsylvania: A Documentary History. University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983.
• T. Noel Stern. "William Penn on the Swearing of Oaths: His Ideas in Theory and Practice." Quaker History , 2/70/1981.
• Wildes, Harry Emerson & illus. William Penn. Macmillan, 1974.

About the Author

Translations

We want people all over the world to learn about history. Help us and translate this article into another language!

Questions & Answers

Who was william penn, what was the holy experiment, related content.

Nathanael Greene

Colonel Tye

William Penn

William Penn as a Young Man

Battle of Rhode Island

William the Conqueror

Free for the world, supported by you.

World History Encyclopedia is a non-profit organization. For only $5 per month you can become a member and support our mission to engage people with cultural heritage and to improve history education worldwide.

Recommended Books

Cite This Work

Knox, J. S. (2022, June 02). William Penn's Holy Experiment . World History Encyclopedia . Retrieved from https://www.worldhistory.org/article/2001/william-penns-holy-experiment/

Chicago Style

Knox, John S.. " William Penn's Holy Experiment ." World History Encyclopedia . Last modified June 02, 2022. https://www.worldhistory.org/article/2001/william-penns-holy-experiment/.

Knox, John S.. " William Penn's Holy Experiment ." World History Encyclopedia . World History Encyclopedia, 02 Jun 2022. Web. 29 Aug 2024.

License & Copyright

Submitted by John S. Knox , published on 02 June 2022. The copyright holder has published this content under the following license: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike . This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon this content non-commercially, as long as they credit the author and license their new creations under the identical terms. When republishing on the web a hyperlink back to the original content source URL must be included. Please note that content linked from this page may have different licensing terms.

• Donate Today
• Access Lesson Plans LOG IN or SIGN UP
• Mission & Awards
• Testimonials
• American History & Western Civilization Challenge Bowl
• Miracle of America
• America’s Heritage: An Adventure in Liberty
• America’s Heritage: An Experiment in Self-Government
• American Heritage Month
• Seminars & Teacher Workshops
• The Founding Blog

William Penn: His “Holy Experiment” in Religious Tolerance in Pennsylvania

The Birth of Pennsylvania, 1680 , by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris.  King Charles II granted a title of land in America to William Penn to repay a debt to Penn’s father, Sir William, who was a friend of the Crown.

William Penn was one of America’s most notable advocates and movers for religious freedom in early America . Penn believed everyone had the God-given right to choose what to believe and how to peaceably worship.

William Penn’s Early Life and Advocacy for Liberty of Conscience

William Penn

As a Quaker in England who believed in the “Inner Light of Christ” and criticized formal external religion, Penn was expelled from the Church of England. He was sent to France by his father to shake his non-conformist views but there, studying among persecuted Huguenots (or French Protestants), became a stronger dissenter. Penn traveled Europe, visiting Quakers and met philosopher John Locke . When non-conformists were persecuted in Britain, he became an advocate for religious freedom and was imprisoned. He corresponded with Roger Williams of Rhode Island and protested to colonial authorities when Quakers in Massachusetts were mistreated.

In 1670, Penn wrote  A Great Case of Liberty of Conscience Debated and Defended by the Authority of Reason, Scripture, and Antiquity  in support of freedom of belief and against religious coercion and persecution as violating the Bible and human rights. Some of Penn’s views reflected those of Martin Luther and Roger Williams. Penn argued that coercion discredits the honor of God, the meekness of the Christian religion, the authority of Scripture, the privilege of nature, the principles of common reason, the well-being of government and society, and the teachings of wise men in historical and modern times. One early historian called Penn’s treatise “the completest exposition of the theory of toleration of the time.”

Penn’s Founding of Pennsylvania and Experiment in Religious Tolerance

In 1681, Penn was granted a charter and title of land in colonial America by King Charles II to repay a debt to Penn’s father and to remove Penn and his protests from England. King Charles named the land Pennsylvania, meaning “Penn’s woods” or “Penn’s forest,” to honor Penn’s father, Sir William, who had been a friend of the Crown. In founding a new colony, Penn hoped for revenue to pay off debts and to create a “tolerance settlement” in America for persecuted Christians. He called this colony a “Holy Experiment” in religious tolerance and hoped it would be an example for Christians everywhere.

Penn’s ideas of religious tolerance, like Williams’s, differed from those of others who sought a conformed religious society that followed a state church. Penn wanted to allow differences in Christian belief and worship. He thought believers’ doctrinal differences were less important than their shared, fundamental Christian belief.

Implementing the Holy Experiment

Penn’s colony of Pennsylvania was self-governing, had no state church, and allowed religious pluralism . It forbid irreverence against God but did not impose conformity to one sect. One had to be a Christian to be a citizen or hold public office, but no denominational restrictions existed. The government maintained peace, order, and other necessary affairs. Penn placed power in the hands of the people and in their consent of governance and laws.

Pennsylvania’s Frame of Government of 1682 declares, “Any government is free to the people under it where the laws rule, and the people are a party to those laws, and more than this is tyranny, oligarchy, or confusion.” The colony provided, says lawyer David Gibbs, Jr. in his book  One Nation Under God , “not freedom  from  religion but freedom  of  religion—not a separation of government from all religion, but a government that respected the religious consciences of all its citizens.” Penn hoped the environment would allow colonists to pursue and find true faith in God.

Penn recruited Christians of all sects from England and Europe. Refugees came from many parts of Europe that were affected by the Protestant Reformation , European religious wars, and English Civil War. Such Christian groups included:

• Presbyterians
• Roman Catholics
• Methodist Episcopalians

Colonists often described the settlers as “a great mixt multitude.” Pennsylvania became one of the most religiously tolerant places in New England and the world at that time. It became an example for the future nation of the United States of America.

Legacy of the Holy Experiment

The legacy of William Penn’s Holy Experiment in Pennsylvania had a profound impact on American religious freedom, making the colony one of the most religiously tolerant places in New England and the world at that time. Penn’s progressive ideas of religious tolerance directly influenced the framers of the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights , embedding the principles of religious freedom into the foundation of American law. This enduring legacy set a lasting example for the future nation of the United States, demonstrating the importance and viability of a society based on religious tolerance and freedom.

Support the American Heritage Education Foundation

At the American Heritage Education Foundation (AHEF), we are dedicated to preserving and promoting the foundational principles of American history, including the values of religious tolerance and freedom championed by visionaries like William Penn. Your support helps us create educational resources, conduct workshops, and provide teachers with the tools they need to inspire students about the importance of these principles in shaping our nation.

Join us in our mission to educate future generations about the rich heritage of religious freedom and tolerance that forms the cornerstone of American democracy. By donating to AHEF or participating in our programs, you can make a lasting impact on the quality of history education and ensure that the legacy of the “Holy Experiment” continues to inspire and guide us.

Contact us to learn more and get involved today!

Contributed by AHEF and Angela E. Kamrath.

—–

Source for more information:   Kamrath, Angela E.   The Miracle of America:  The Influence of the Bible on the Founding History and Principles of the United States of America for a People of Every Belief .  Second Edition.  Houston, TX:  American Heritage Education Foundation, 2014, 2015.

Related posts/videos: 1.  An Introduction t o Popular Sovereignty 2.  Challenges in the Early Puritan Colonies: The Dilemma of Religious Laws and Dissent 3.   The Two Kingdoms Doctrine : Religious Reformers Recognize the Civil and Spiritual Kingdom 4.   The First Experiments in Freedom of Belief & Religious Tolerance in America 5.  Roger Williams:  His Quest for Religious Purity and Founding of Rhode Island 6.  Roger Williams:  First Call for Separation of Church and State in America  7.   Early Americans supported Religious Tolerance based on God as Judge of Conscience 8.   Early Americans opposed Religious Persecution as contrary to the Biblical Teachings of Christ . 9.   Early Americans argued Religious Coercion opposes Order of Nature 10.   Early Americans Believed Religious Coercion Opposes Reason 11.   Early Americans Supported Religious Tolerance within Civil Peace and Order 12.   Philosopher John Locke & His Letters Concerning Toleration 13.   The Religious Landscape of the Thirteen Colonies in Early 1700s America

Additional Reading/Handout:  Why Religious Freedom Became an Unalienable Right & First Freedom in America by Angela E. Kamrath, American Heritage Education Foundation.  Paper available to download from member resources, americanheritage.org .

Activity:  Miracle of America High School Teacher Course Guide, Unit 4, Part 1 of 2, Activity 6:  Thinking About Freedom of Conscience and Religion, p. 147.  MS-HS.

Thinking About Freedom of Conscience and Religion

Purpose/Objective:   Students learn about the arguments, motives, and actions of Roger Williams and William Penn who founded or influenced the religiously tolerant colonies of Rhode Island and Pennsylvania.

Suggested Readings:  1) Chapter 4 of  Miracle of America  sourcebook/text.  Students read sections from Introduction to 4.15. 2) Paper/handout titled  Why Religious Freedom Became an Unalienable Right & First Freedom in America by Angela E. Kamrath (AHEF).  Paper available to download from member resources, americanheritage.org . 3) Related Post: The First Experiments in Freedom of Belief & Religious Tolerance in America

Activity:   A) Short-Paragraph Test.  Students think about, write on, discuss in small groups/whole class (with chairs in a circle, if possible) the questions below.  In writing on these questions, students may use more informal journaling/reflective writing.  Students may use this activity or parts of it as test preparation for a short-answer test on the same questions: 1.  How did the beliefs of Williams and Penn differ from those of the Puritans?  How were they similar? 2.  How do the experiences of Roger William and William Penn influence your own views about religious tolerance and freedom of belief? 3.  What main points from the Bible and other sources were used by Williams and Penn to argue against religious coercion and in support of religious tolerance and freedom of belief? 4.  Why do you think Williams and Penn based their arguments against religious intolerance and coercion largely on the Bible and Christian principles? 5.  Why is it important for people to have freedom of conscience and to be tolerant toward other people’s peaceful religions? (These and other questions are also found in Chapter 4 of Miracle of America sourcebook/text, p. 125.)

B) Text Analysis.  Have students discuss and rephrase in their own words two or more quotes from Williams and Penn.

To download this whole unit,  sign up as an AHEF member  (no cost) to access the “resources” page on  americanheritage.org .  To order the printed binder format of the course guide with all the units, go to the  AHEF bookstore .

Copyright © American Heritage Education Foundation.  All rights reserved.

Dr. Danilo Petranovich is an Advising Scholar for AHEF.  Dr. Petranovich is the Director of the Abigail Adams Institute at Harvard University in Cambridge, MA. Previously, he taught political science at Duke University and Yale University.  His scholarly expertise is in nineteenth-century European and American political and social thought, with a special emphasis on American culture and Abraham Lincoln.  He has authored a number of articles on Lincoln and is currently writing a book on nationalism and the North in antebellum America.  He is a member of Harvard’s Kirkland House.  He holds a B. A. from Harvard and a Ph. D. in Political Science from Yale University.

Dr. Richard J. Gonzalez (1912-1998) is Co-Founder of AHEF.  Dr. Gonzalez served as Chief Economist and a member of the Board of Directors for Humble Oil and Refining Company (later Exxon Mobil) in Houston, Texas, for 28 years.  Later, he served as an economic consultant to various federal agencies and studies including the Department of Defense and the National Energy Study. 

He consulted with the Petroleum Administration for Defense and the Office of Defense Mobilization. In 1970, he was appointed by the U. S. Secretary of the Interior to the National Energy Study.  In addition, Gonzalez chaired and directed many petroleum industry boards and committees.  He served as director of the National Industrial Conference Board, chairman of the Economics Advisory Committee-Interstate Oil Compact Commission, and chairman of the National Petroleum Council Drafting Committee on National Oil Policy.  Gonzalez also held visiting professorships at the University of Texas, University of Houston, University of New Mexico, Stanford University, and Northwestern University.  From 1983-1991, he was a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Texas IC2 Institute (Innovation, Creativity, and Capital).

Gonzalez authored many articles and papers on topics ranging from energy economics to the role of progress in America. His articles include “Economics of the Mineral Industry” (1976), “Energy and the Environment: A Risk Benefit Approach” (1976), “Exploration and Economics of the Petroleum Industry” (1976), “Exploration for U. S. Oil and Gas” (1977), “National Energy Security” (1978), and “How Can U.S. Energy Production Be Increased?” (1979).

Born in San Antonio, Texas, Gonzalez earned his B.A. in Mathematics, M.A. in Economics, and Ph.D. in Economics (Phi Beta Kappa with highest honors) from the University of Texas at Austin.  He was and still is the youngest candidate ever to earn his Ph.D. from UT-Austin at the age of 21 in 1934.

In 1993, Dr. and Mrs. Gonzalez were recognized by the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution (NSSAR) with the Bronze Good Citizenship Medals for “Notable Services on Behalf of American Principles.”

Selected Articles: 1.  “What Makes America Great? An Address before the Dallas Chapter Society for the Advancement of Management” (1951) 2.  “Power for Progress” (1952) 3.  “Increasing Importance of Economic Education” (1953) 4.  “Federal Spending and Deficits Must Be Controlled to Stop Inflation” (1978) 5.  “What Enabled Americans to Achieve Great Progress? Keys to Remarkable Economic Progress of the United States of America” (1989) 6.  “The Establishment of the United States of America” (1991)

Eugenie Gonzalez is Co-Founder of AHEF. Mrs. Gonzalez was elected to the Houston Independent School District (HISD) Board of Trustees with Dr. Herman Barnett III and David Lopez from 1972-1976 and was a key designer and advocate for HISD’s Magnet School program.  With HISD and AHEF in 1993, she designed and implemented HISD’s annual American Heritage Month held every November throughout HISD. 

Jeannie was recognized in 1993 by the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution (NSSAR) for “Notable Services on Behalf of American Principles” with the Bronze Good Citizenship Medal and in 2011 by the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution (NSDAR) for “Outstanding Achievement through Education Pursuits” with the Mary Smith Lockwood Medal.  In 2004, she was honored to receive HISD’s first American Heritage Month Exemplary Citizenship Award.

Jeannie was a volunteer, participant, and supporter of M. D. Anderson Cancer Hospital, St. Luke’s United Methodist Church, Gethsemane United Methodist Church, Houston Grand Jury Association (board member), League of Women Voters, Houston Area Forum, the Mayor’s Charter Study Committee, Vision America, Houston Parks Department, and Houston Tennis Association.  She was instrumental in the founding of the Houston Tennis Association and Houston Tennis Patrons.

In her youth, Jeannie was the leading women’s tennis player in the Midwest Section of the US Lawn Tennis Association and competed at the U. S. National Championships.  She attended by invitation and became the first women’s tennis player at the University of Texas at Austin.  In 1932, 1933, and 1934, Jeannie was women’s finalist at the Houston Invitational Tennis Tournament which became the River Oaks Invitational Tennis Tournament and is now the USTA Clay Court Championships.  She was instrumental in bringing some of the nation’s top amateur tennis players to that event.  Jeannie became the first teaching tennis professional at Houston Country Club and River Oaks Country Club, starting active junior programs at each.  Jeannie and her father, Jack Sampson, were jointly inducted into the Texas Tennis Hall of Fame in 2012.

Claudine Kamrath is Outreach Coordinator, Office Manager, and Resource Designer for AHEF. She oversees outreach efforts and office administration. She also collaborates on educational resource formatting and design.  She has served as an Elementary Art Teacher in Texas as well as a Communications and Design Manager for West University United Methodist Church in Houston. She also worked as a childrens’ Camp Counselor at St. Luke’s United Methodist Church in Houston.  She holds a B.A. in Art and a Bachelor of Fine Art from the University of Texas at Austin as well as Texas Teacher Certification from the University of Houston. She has served in various children’s and student ministries.

Dr. Brian Domitrovic is an Advising Scholar for AHEF.  Dr. Domitrovic is a Senior Associate and the Richard S. Strong Scholar at the Laffer Center for Supply-Side Economics. He is also Department Chair and Professor of History at Same Houston State University.  He teaches American and European History and Economics.  His specialties also include Economic History, Intellectual History, Monetary Policy, and Fiscal Policy.  He has written articles, papers, and books–including  Econoclasts –in these subjects.  He is a board member of the Center for Western Civilization, Thought & Policy at the University of Colorado-Boulder and a trustee of the Philadelphia Society.  He has received several awards including the Director’s Award from Intercollegiate Studies Institute and fellowship grants from Earhart Foundation, Krupp Foundation, Princeton, Texas A&M, and SHSU.  He holds a B. A. in History & Mathematics from Columbia University, an M. A. in History from Harvard University, and a Ph. D. in History, with graduate studies in Economics, from Harvard University.

Jack Kamrath is Co-Founder and Vice-President of AHEF.  A Texas state champion and nationally-ranked tennis player during his high school and college years, Kamrath is the Co-Founder and Principal of Tennis Planning Consultants (TPC) in Houston, Texas, since 1970. TPC is the first, oldest, and most prolific tennis facility design and consulting firm in the United States and world.  Mr. Kamrath is also the founder and owner of Kamrath Construction Company and has owned and managed various real estate operating companies.  He worked with Brown and Root in construction and human resources in Vietnam during the Vietnam War from 1966-1970. He holds a Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of Texas at Austin.  He is a member of St. Luke’s United Methodist Church in Houston.  In 2008, AHEF President Mr. Kamrath and AHEF received the Distinguished Patriot Award from the Society of the Sons of the American Revolution (NSSAR) for leadership in preserving America’s heritage and the teaching of good citizenship principles.

Essays: 1.   1776:  From Oppression to Freedom 2.   FUPR:  The Formula for the American Experiment 2.   In Support of Our Pledge of Allegiance 3.   A Summation of America’s Greatest Ever Threat to Its Survival and Perpetuation 4.   A Brief Overview:  The Moral Dimension of Rule of Law in the U. S. Constitution  (editor)

Dr. Michael Owens is Director of Education of AHEF. He has served as a Presenter/Trainer of AHEF teacher training workshops. Owens has taken on a number of administration leadership roles in Texas public education throughout his career–including Superintendent in Dripping Springs ISD, Assistant Superintendent in Friendswood ISD, and Associate Executive Director of Instruction Services for Region IV Education Service Center. He has also served as Director of Exemplary Programs for the Texas Education Agency, Director of Curriculum and Instruction for College Station ISD, and Director of Elementary and Secondary Education for College Station ISD. Owens has led many professional development worships for the Texas School Boards Association, Texas Assessment, Texas Education Agency, and others. He has specialization in educational technology systems and educational assessments, and has Texas teaching experience. He currently serves as Texas Technology Engineering Literacy (TEL) test administrator for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) for part of Texas. He holds a B.S. and a M.Ed. from Stephen F. Austin State University and a Ed.D. from the University of North Texas.  He retired in 2021.

Angela E. Kamrath is President and Editorial Director of AHEF.  She is the author of the critically-acclaimed  The Miracle of America: The Influence of the Bible on the Founding History and Principles of the United States of America for a People of Every Belief . She is editor and co-contributor of AHEF’s widely-distributed teacher resources,  America’s Heritage: An Adventure in Liberty ,  America’s Heritage: An Experiment in Self-Government , and  The Miracle of America High School Teacher Course Guide . In addition, she is editor and contributor for  The Founding Blog  and AHEF websites. Kamrath has taught, tutored, and consulted in writing and research at the University of Houston, Belhaven College, and Houston Christian University.  She also served as a Secondary English Teacher in Texas and as a Communications Assistant for St. Luke’s United Methodist Church in Houston.  She served as a Research Assistant intern in the Office of National Service during the George H. W. Bush administration.  She holds a B.A. in Government from the University of Texas at Austin, a M.A. in Journalism from Regent University, and a M.Ed. in Curriculum and Instruction as well as Texas Teacher Certification from the University of Houston.  She has served in various children’s and student ministries.

Dr. Steve Balch is an Advising Scholar for AHEF.  Dr. Balch is the Principal Founder and former President of the National Association of Scholars (NAS). He served as a Professor of Government at City University of New York from 1974-1987.  Dr. Balch has co-authored several NAS studies on education curriculum evolution and problems including  The Dissolution of General Education:  1914-1993 ,  The Dissolution of the Curriculum 1914-1996 , and  The Vanishing West .  He is the author of  Economic and Political Change After Crisis:  Prospects for Government, Liberty and Rule of Law  and numerous articles relating to issues in academia.  Dr. Balch has also founded and/or led many education organizations including the Institute for the Study of Western Civilization at Texas Tech University, Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization, Association for the Study of Free Institutions, American Academy for Liberal Education, Philadelphia Society, Historical Society, and Association of Literary Scholars.  He has also served on the National Advisory Board of the U. S. Department of Education’s Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education (FIPSE), Educational Excellence Network, and New Jersey State Advisory Committee to the U. S. Commission on Civil Rights.  Dr. Balch was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President George W. Bush in 2007, and the Jeanne Jordan Kirkpatrick Academic Freedom Award by the Bradley Foundation and American Conservative Union Foundation in 2009.  He holds a B. A. in Political Science from City University of New York and a M. A. and Ph. D. in Political Science from the University of California-Berkeley.

Dr. Rob Koons is an Advising Scholar for AHEF.  Dr. Koons is a Professor of Philosophy and Co-Founder of The Western Civilization and American Institutions Program at The University of Texas at Austin. He teaches ancient, medieval, contemporary Christian, and political philosophy as well as philosophy of religion.  He has authored/co-authored countless articles and several books including  Realism Regained ,  The Atlas of Reality, Fundamentals of Metaphysics,  and  Neo-Aristotelian Perspectives on Contemporary Science .  He has been awarded numerous fellowships and is a member of the American Philosophical Association, Society of Christian Philosophers, and American Catholic Philosophical Association.  He holds a B. A. in Philosophy from Michigan State University, an M. A. in Philosophy and Theology from Oxford University, and a Ph. D. in Philosophy from the University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA).

Dr. Mark David Hall is an Advising Scholar for AHEF.  Dr. Hall is a Professor of Political Science in the Robertson School of Government at Regent University and a Senior Research Fellow in the Center for Religion, Culture & Democracy at First Liberty Institute.  He is also a Distinguished Scholar of Christianity & Public Life at George Fox University, Associate Faculty in the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University, and Senior Fellow in the Institute for Studies of Religion at Baylor University. His teaching interests include American Political Theory, Religion and Politics, Constitutional Law, and Great Books.  Dr. Hall is a nationally recognized expert on religious freedom and has written or edited a dozen books on religion and politics in America including  Proclaim Liberty Throughout All the Land:  How Christianity Has Advanced Freedom and Equality for All Americans ,  Did America Have a Christian Founding? Separating Modern Myth from Historical Truth ,  Great Christian Jurists in American History ,  America’s Wars: A Just War Perspective ,  Faith and the Founders of the American Republic ,  The Sacred Rights of Conscience ,  The Founders on God and Government , and  The Political and Legal Philosophy of James Wilson .  He writes for the online publications Law & Liberty and Intercollegiate Studies Review and has appeared regularly on a number of radio shows, including Jerry Newcomb’s Truth in Action, Tim Wildman’s Today’s Issues, the Janet Mefferd Show, and the Michael Medved Show.  He has been awarded numerous fellowships and the Freedom Project Award by the John Templeton Foundation in 1999 and 2000.  He holds a B. A. in Political Science from Wheaton College and a Ph. D. in Government from the University of Virginia.

Pennsylvania (Founding)

By Stephanie Grauman Wolf

In March of 1681, King Charles II of England (1630-85) granted William Penn (1644-1718), gentleman and Quaker, the charter for a proprietary colony on the North American continent. Although both English colonial policy and the organization of the Society of Friends, known as Quakers, were works in progress between the years 1682 and 1701, in many ways the pattern of scattered farms and religious tolerance that Pennsylvania developed in those early years became a model for an American way of life.

Penn’s grant settled an old debt owed by the king to Penn’s father, Admiral William Penn (1621-70). The king’s charter to Penn set the northern border of Pennsylvania at 42 degrees north latitude (the border of New York), and the eastern limit at the Delaware River (the boundary with New Jersey), while the western limit was undefined. Named for the admiral as well as for the woodland it encompassed (Penn’s woods), the new grant differed in form and substance from those offered to proprietors of other colonies. Under the proprietary system, the grantee obtained a charter from the king and established the colony at his own risk. The Crown looked on it as a feudal estate, a grant equivalent to independent sovereignty limited only by loyalty to the king. Proprietors could grant titles, had sole authority to initiate laws, levy taxes, coin money, regulate commerce, appoint provincial officials, administer justice, grant pardons, make war, erect manors, and control the land and waterways.

By the time Penn received his “true and absolute proprietary of Pennsylvania,” the powers given to proprietors had become much more limited. He still had complete control of granting land: in the common parlance of the time period under 100 acres constituted a farm, between 100 and 1,000 acres a plantation, and over 1,000 acres a manor. Those holding larger parcels could, in turn, sell or rent them as smaller holdings. The proprietor no longer had the right to grant titles of nobility, however, and he had to submit provincial laws to the king for approval, acknowledge the right of Parliament to tax the colony, maintain a provincial agent in London, and present all Pennsylvania laws to the “freemen” or to “their delegates” for approval. Most disappointing to Penn was an added clause that gave the established Church of England’s Bishop of London the right to appoint an Anglican minister in Pennsylvania. Penn had recruited settlers, largely Quakers, but also Mennonites, and other pietists, from widely dispersed parts of Britain and Europe and saw this clause as making them “dissenters in [their] own Countrey.” However, since his first law code guaranteed religious freedom from the legal penalties and punishments that inhibited the practice of Quakerism and other dissenting Christian groups in England, it was still possible to promote Pennsylvania as a religious refuge for the persecuted.

In July 1681, Penn issued his first conditions or “ concessions ” to “adventurers and purchasers” that laid out specifications for a great city on a river , provided for road surveys, related grants of city land to country manors, and set up townships. Penn’s blueprint for Pennsylvania was unique among colonial frames of government by containing several provisions requiring that “natives” be treated equally with settlers both economically and legally and that “no man shall. . . in word, or deed, affront, or wrong any Indian.”

The First Frame of Government

Penn followed up the concessions document in May 1682 with the first Frame of Government , which laid out the form and shape of governance in the new colony. The government itself was to consist of the governor, a Provincial Council, and a General Assembly chosen by the freemen who were defined as those who were resident in the province, were free of servitude, owned and cultivated part of their land, and paid a tax to the government.

Twenty-three ships bearing settlers arrived in the new colony between December 1681 and December 1682. The Welcome , William Penn aboard, landed on October 28, 1682. Within two years, fifty ships had arrived in Pennsylvania carrying 600 investors and 4,000 settlers. Penn and his colonists entered a land that was populated by Native Americans and European settlers who provided food and shelter to the newcomers, allowing the new colony to avoid the “starving time” that had been the fate of other earlier colonies to its north and south. Including the Europeans who settled West New Jersey in the 1670s, there were about 2,500 Lenape Indians and 3,000 Europeans on both sides of the Delaware River when Penn’s colonists arrived.

The inhabitants were diverse, including the Lenapes from whom Penn purchased land on the west bank of the river. The European inhabitants included the Dutch, who had established a trading post in the area in 1624, and the Swedes and Finns who created the first permanent settlement of New Sweden in 1638. Most of these settlers lived in the area from what was later Philadelphia to New Castle, Delaware. The Dutch conquered New Sweden in 1655 and then, following England’s victory over the Dutch in 1664, King Charles’s brother, James, Duke of York (1633-1701) took ownership of the west bank of the Delaware River.

In 1682, Penn divided the land along the Delaware River into the counties of Chester, Philadelphia, and Bucks, appointing colonists to serve on each county court and administer local government. To allow Pennsylvania an outlet to the sea, in the same year Penn leased from the Duke of York the land south of Chester County on the western shore of the Delaware Bay, setting the border of the “three lower counties” (later the state of Delaware) twelve miles north of New Castle. The charter for Pennsylvania and the lease for the three lower counties remained separate entities, however, requiring agreement to laws by a single assembly that met alternately at Philadelphia and New Castle. By 1704, the inconvenience of this arrangement led to a mutual agreement to set up distinct assemblies and pass laws separately, although they continued to share a governor. The border between Pennsylvania and Delaware was not actually established until the mid-eighteenth century, with the drawing of the Mason-Dixon line , which also settled the boundary with Maryland.

“Holy Experiment” Did Not Materialize

Penn’s hope for a “ Holy Experiment ”—where Pennsylvanians did well economically while doing good morally and religiously—failed to materialize. Landed gentleman investors did not, in general, emigrate, and their investments went badly. The Society of Free Traders was bankrupt within a few years. Penn, himself, never achieved the profits he expected. Although he lived until 1718, he only passed four years in Pennsylvania (1682-84 and 1699-1701). He was bedeviled by personal and financial problems and had to remain in England to attempt to resolve them. He actually spent time in debtors prison.

Early arrivals who prospered were largely farmers from northwestern England, an area of scattered farms, along with urban artisans and workmen, many of them from Germany and Holland. Settlers also came from Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and London and its environs. By 1690, the population of the colony numbered about 11,500, that of the principal city, Philadelphia, about 2,000. Ten years later, the colony had close to 18,000 inhabitants, and Philadelphia over 3,000. The Society of Friends was never established as the official religion of the colony and Quakers were always a minority, although their influence was predominant in both the government and the early society.

While religion continued to motivate many settlers, many more were drawn by the rich farmland and its availability. The desire for wealth prompted importation of bound European servants and enslaved Africans. Penn had envisioned a colony of townships, where farms would produce the crops and livestock needed to fuel local centers of government, religion, industry, and trade. Instead, the Thomas Holme 1687 map of Pennsylvania indicates that almost from the beginning scattered farmsteads became the pattern of settlement for the three counties. Lumbering, grist mills to produce flour, and iron-mining operations as well as small manufactories for textiles, paper, and printing dotted the countryside from the 1690s. By 1701, however, Philadelphia had become the focus of trade, manufacture and civic life, exhibiting most of the attributes of an urban complex and draining the vitality out of potential township centers.

Welsh and German settlers, receiving large grants just outside Philadelphia, made the most determined efforts to maintain their identity. The Welsh Quakers in the Welsh Tract (1684) stood out for their attempts to maintain their own communities with the rights to hold contiguous property, limit the activities of anyone within their boundaries, and govern themselves in their old ways. Within the year, however, assimilation with English Quaker and Anglican settlers overwhelmed the Welsh and the tract survived mainly in Welsh names such as Bala Cynwyd and Bryn Mawr.

Germantown Was Unique

The situation of Germantown was unique in the founding years of Pennsylvania. Through some confusion, Penn granted the same territory to both a group of Dutch Quakers and the German-based Frankfort Land Company whose legal agent was Francis Daniel Pastorius (1651-1720). They arrived at the same time in 1683. As Pastorius was the only member of the company to immigrate, he became, de facto, the leader of the Dutch group, apportioning the land and heading the government. By 1684, the territory acquired its name as it was flooded with German immigrants of many religious sects. The craft occupations of the inhabitants and the distribution of Germantown’s land in small lots strung along a highway leading from Philadelphia to the hinterlands created a miniature urban center. It was chartered as a borough, but failure of the settlers to perform its governmental functions led to loss of that status in 1707. The Quaker meeting retained many of its German beliefs, leading to a protest against slavery in 1688 and a split within the meeting itself over the Keithian controversy in the 1690s.

Ever since the first “Frame of Government and Laws Agreed Upon in England” in 1682, factions of settlers were dissatisfied with its terms, and it was superseded or amended several times—in 1683,1684, and 1691. The colony was taken away from Penn in 1693 on suspicion of treasonable association with James II, but returned to him in 1695, initiating yet another charter in 1696.

The final Charter of Privileges was granted in 1701 since the older frames had all been found “not so suitable to the Present circumstances of the Inhabitants,” and remained in force until the American Revolution. Each frame had gradually increased the powers of the elected assembly and it now received more privileges than any other legislative body in the English colonies, undoubtedly more than Penn, himself, had originally intended. A unicameral legislature with its Assembly elected annually could initiate legislation and conduct its own affairs, but the proprietor or his governor retained the right to veto legislation.

Most significantly, the first clause of the Charter of Privileges reiterated Pennsylvania’s commitment to religious liberty—freedom of worship to all who “acknowledge one almighty God” without attending or belonging to a religious body, and the ability to serve in office by all who believed in Jesus Christ and were willing to affirm, if not swear, allegiance to the government. The affirmation was important to Quakers who refused to swear oaths. Along with Rhode Island and several other colonies, Pennsylvania was a pioneer of the separation of religion and government in the American colonies.

Stephanie Grauman Wolf is a senior fellow at the McNeil Center for Early American Studies at the University of Pennsylvania and author of As Various As Their Land: The Everyday Lives of Eighteenth-Century Americans.

Copyright 2016, Rutgers University

William Penn, Portrait by Francis Place

Historical Society of Pennsylvania

English Quaker William Penn founded Pennsylvania in 1681, when King Charles II granted him a charter for over 45,000 square miles of land. Penn had previously helped found Quaker settlements in West New Jersey and was eager to expand his Quaker colony. In order to generate interest in his new land holdings, Penn wrote a promotional tract, “Some Account of the Province of Pennsylvania in America,” which outlined the terms for obtaining land and promised to clear all Indian titles. In July 1681, he refined these terms in a document titled “Conditions or Concessions.” In this agreement, Penn promised to reserve ten acres of land in Philadelphia for each five hundred acres purchased, planning a “greene country towne” that would extend for miles along the Delaware River. The document also provided for road surveys, set up townships, and outlined the rules of purchase. Among these were that all tracts must be settled within three years of purchase or else they could be offered to another buyer.

Penn's Treaty with the Indians

Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts

The Treaty of Shackamaxon, otherwise known as William Penn’s Treaty with the Indians, is Pennsylvania’s most longstanding historical tradition, a counterpart to the foundation stories of Virginia (John Smith and Pocahontas) and New England (the first Thanksgiving). The traditional story of William Penn’s peaceful treaty with the Lenape is depicted in this painting, Penn’s Treaty with the Indians , by Benjamin West. Pennsylvania Academy o the Fine Arts

Thomas Holme's 1687 Map of Pennsylvania

Library Company of Philadelphia

William Penn arrived in Pennsylvania accompanied by surveyor Thomas Holme. Holme drafted this map of Pennsylvania in 1687 delineating the land bought by the First Purchasers in the region that became Philadelphia, Chester, Delaware, Montgomery, and southern Bucks Counties. Penn had envisioned a colony of townships, where farms would produce the crops and livestock needed to fuel local centers of government, religion, industry, and trade. However, as this map indicates, scattered farmsteads became the pattern of settlement.

While Penn’s fellow Englishmen made up most of the First Purchasers, his advertising efforts in continental Europe also attracted individual investors from Germany, Holland, and France. Within England, most of the First Purchasers resided in the areas around London and Bristol, where the Society of Friends had met with considerable missionary success and Penn was well known. Quakers of various economic backgrounds took advantage of the opportunity that he created to worship free of the persecution persistent in England. While those purchasing larger tracts hailed from the Quaker mercantile elite, Penn’s offerings to sell plots as small as 125 acres attracted people of more humble circumstances.

Thones Kunders House

Thones Kunders’s family was among the first of thirteen to settle in the region of northwest Philadelphia known as Germantown. The Germantown Society of Friends held their first meeting in Kunders’s home and, in 1688, Francis Daniel Pastorius, the founder of Germantown, wrote the first formal protest against slavery there as well. The 1688 Germantown Protest challenged the Society of Friends to treat African-descended people as brethren and not bondsmen.

This early twentieth-century postcard depicts the façade of a house that was built on the site of the Kunders home. At that site in 1983 a historic marker was erected, reading, “Here in 1688, at the home of Tunes Kunders, an eloquent protest was written by a group of German Quakers. Signed by Pastorius and three others, it preceded by ninety-two years Pennsylvania’s passage of the nation’s first state abolition law.”

The Slate Roof House

Built around 1687, this red brick mansion, known as the Slate Roof House, stood in the 100 block of Second Street between Chestnut and Walnut Streets. William Penn rented the home during his second stay in Pennsylvania from 1699 to 1701. It was here that he wrote the final Charter of Privileges, which reiterated Pennsylvania’s commitment to religious liberty—freedom of worship to all who “acknowledge one almighty God” without attending or belonging to a religious body, and the ability to serve in office by all who believed in Jesus Christ and were willing to affirm, if not swear, allegiance to the government. Along with Rhode Island and several other colonies, Pennsylvania was a pioneer of the separation of religion and government in the American colonies.

During the American Revolution, members of the First Continental Congress occupied the home, including John Adams and John Hancock. By the nineteenth century, the home had fallen into disrepair and in 1868 it was demolished.

Related Topics

• Holy Experiment
• Quaker City
• Greater Philadelphia
• Philadelphia and the World
• City of Firsts

Time Periods

• Colonial Era
• Northwest Philadelphia
• First Purchasers of Pennsylvania
• Free Society of Traders
• Hinterlands
• Immigration and Migration (Colonial Era)
• Lower Delaware Colonies (1609-1704)
• Native American-Pennsylvania Relations 1681-1753
• Pennsylvania Charter of Privileges
• Religious Society of Friends (Quakers)
• Surveying (Colonial)
• Treaty Negotiations with Native Americans
• Treaty of Shackamaxon
• West New Jersey

Related Reading

Dunn, Richard S., and Mary Maples Dunn, eds. The World of William Penn. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1986.

Hoffecker, Carol E., et al., eds. New Sweden in America. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1995.

Hoover Seitz, Ruth and Blair Seitz. Pennsylvania’s Historic Places. Intercourse, Pa.: Good Books in cooperation with Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, 1989.

Magda, Matthew S. The Welsh in Pennsylvania. The Peoples of Pennsylvania Pamphlet No.1. Harrisburg, Pa.: Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, 1986.

Marvil, James E., ed. A Pictorial History of Lewes, Delaware, 1609-1985. Lewes, Del.: Lewes Historical Society, 1991.

Miller, Randall M., and William Pencak, eds. Pennsylvania: A History of the Commonwealth. University Park and Harrisburg, Pa.: Pennsylvania State University Press and Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, 2002.

Weigley, Russell F., et al., eds.  Philadelphia: A 300-Year History . New York: Norton, 1982.

Wolf, Stephanie Grauman. Urban Village: Population, Community, and Family Structure in Germantown, Pennsylvania, 1683-1800. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1976.

Related Collections

Penn Family Papers, Historical Society of Pennsylvania , 1300 Locust Street, Philadelphia.

Albert Cook Myers Collection, Chester County Historical Society , 225 N. High Street, West Chester, Pa.

Germantown Historical Society , 5501 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia.

Related Places

Pennsbury Manor , 400 Pennsbury Memorial Road, Morrisville, Pa.

Merion Friends Meeting House , 615 Montgomery Avenue, Narberth, Pa.

Kelpius Community Historical Marker , Hermit Lane near Henry Avenue, Fairmount Park, Philadelphia.

First Protest Against Slavery Historical Marker (site of Thones Kunders House), 5109 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia.

Gloria Dei (Old Swedes’) Church, 19 S. Swanson Street, Philadelphia.

Penn Treaty Park , 1341 N. Delaware Avenue, Philadelphia.

Backgrounders

Connecting Headlines with History

• Rhyme, reason and much more behind names of Philly streets (WHYY, February 28, 2011)
• William Penn deed from 1701 given to Delaware (WHYY, July 13, 2011)
• Germantown Avenue then and now (WHYY, July 14, 2015)
• 17th Century Documents : 1600 - 1699 (The Avalon Project)
• The Vision of William Penn (ExplorePAHistory.com)
• Doomsday Cult on the Wissahickon (Hidden City Philadelphia)
• PhilaPlace: Gloria Dei (Old Swedes') Episcopal Church (Historical Society of Pennsylvania)
• PhilaPlace: Arch Street Friends Meeting House — Hub of Quaker Activity (Historical Society of Pennsylvania)

Connecting the Past with the Present, Building Community, Creating a Legacy

The Pennsylvania Colony: A Quaker Experiment in America

William Penn's 'Holy Experiment' on the Delaware River

Corbis / VCG via Getty Images

• Important Historical Figures
• U.S. Presidents
• Native American History
• American Revolution
• America Moves Westward
• The Gilded Age
• Crimes & Disasters
• The Most Important Inventions of the Industrial Revolution
• African American History
• African History
• Ancient History and Culture
• Asian History
• European History
• Latin American History
• Medieval & Renaissance History
• Military History
• The 20th Century
• Women's History
• M.A., History, University of Florida
• B.A., History, University of Florida

The Pennsylvania colony was one of the 13 original British colonies that became the United States of America. It was founded in 1682 by the English Quaker William Penn.

Escape From European Persecution

In 1681, William Penn, a Quaker, was given a land grant from King Charles II, who owed money to Penn's deceased father. Immediately, Penn sent his cousin William Markham to the territory to take control of it and be its governor. Penn's goal with Pennsylvania was to create a colony that allowed for freedom of religion. The Quakers were among the most radical of the English Protestant sects that had sprung up in the 17th century. Penn sought a colony in America—what he called a "holy experiment"—to protect himself and fellow Quakers from persecution.

When Markham arrived on the western shore of the Delaware River, however, he found that the region was already inhabited by Europeans. Part of present-day Pennsylvania was actually included in the territory named New Sweden that had been founded by Swedish settlers in 1638. This territory was then surrendered to the Dutch in 1655 when Peter Stuyvesant sent a large force to invade. Swedes and Finns continued to arrive and settle in what would become Pennsylvania.

Arrival of William Penn

In 1682, William Penn arrived in Pennsylvania on a ship called the "Welcome." He quickly instituted the First Frame of Government and created three counties: Philadelphia, Chester, and Bucks. When he called a General Assembly to meet in Chester, the assembled body decided that the Delaware counties should be joined with those of Pennsylvania and that the governor would preside over both areas. It would not be until 1703 that Delaware would separate itself from Pennsylvania. In addition, the General Assembly adopted the Great Law, which provided for the liberty of conscience in terms of religious affiliations.

By 1683, the Second General Assembly created the Second Frame of Government. Any Swedish settlers were to become English subjects, seeing that the English were now in a majority in the colony.

Pennsylvania During the American Revolution

Pennsylvania played an extremely important role in the American Revolution . The First and Second Continental Congresses were convened in Philadelphia. This is where the Declaration of Independence was written and signed. Numerous key battles and events of the war occurred in the colony, including the crossing of the Delaware River, the Battle of Brandywine, the Battle of Germantown, and the winter encampment at Valley Forge. The Articles of Confederation were also drafted in Pennsylvania, the document that formed the basis of the new Confederation that was created at the end of the Revolutionary War.

Significant Events

• In 1688, the first written protest against enslavement in North America was created and signed by the Quakers in Germantown. In 1712, the trade of enslaved people was outlawed in Pennsylvania. 
• The colony was well-advertised, and by 1700 it was the third-biggest and the richest colony in the New World.
• Penn allowed for a representative assembly elected by landowners.
• Freedom of worship and religion was granted to all citizens.
• In 1737, Benjamin Franklin was named the postmaster of Philadelphia. Before this, he had set up his own printing shop and started publishing "Poor Richard's Almanack." In the following years, he was named the first president of the Academy, performed his famous electricity experiments, and was an important figure in the fight for American independence.
• Frost, J.W. " William Penn's Experiment in the Wilderness: Promise and Legend ." The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, vol. 107, no. 4, October 1983, pp. 577-605.
• Schwartz, Sally. " William Penn and Toleration: Foundations of Colonial Pennsylvania ." Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies, v ol. 50, no. 4, October 1983, pp. 284-312.
• A Brief History of the Delaware Colony
• The Christiana Riot
• How Rhode Island Colony Was Founded
• The Abolitionists
• Facts About the Colony of Georgia
• Facts About the Maryland Colony
• Transcendentalism in American History
• Founding of the Connecticut Colony
• The Founding of North Carolina Colony and Its Role in the Revolution
• American Colonization Society
• The Founding of the Massachusetts Bay Colony
• Mercantilism and Its Effect on Colonial America
• A Brief History of New Amsterdam
• The Declaration of Independence
• Learn About New Hampshire Colony
• Founding and History of the New York Colony

• History & Society
• Science & Tech
• Biographies
• Animals & Nature
• Geography & Travel
• Arts & Culture
• Games & Quizzes
• On This Day
• One Good Fact
• New Articles
• Lifestyles & Social Issues
• Philosophy & Religion
• Politics, Law & Government
• World History
• Health & Medicine
• Browse Biographies
• Birds, Reptiles & Other Vertebrates
• Bugs, Mollusks & Other Invertebrates
• Environment
• Fossils & Geologic Time
• Entertainment & Pop Culture
• Sports & Recreation
• Visual Arts
• Demystified
• Image Galleries
• Infographics
• Top Questions
• Britannica Kids
• Saving Earth
• Space Next 50
• Student Center
• Introduction & Top Questions
• Early life and education
• Quaker leadership and political activism

Founding and governorship of Pennsylvania

Final years.

• What was William Penn’s education?
• What is William Penn best known for?
• What are the American colonies?
• Who established the American colonies?
• What pushed the American colonies toward independence?

Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article.

• World History Encyclopedia - William Penn's Holy Experiment
• Bill of Rights Institute - William Penn and the Founding of Pennsylvania
• New Netherland Institute - Biography of William Penn
• Quaker.org - William Penn, America's First Great Champion for Liberty and Peace
• David Nash Ford's Berkshire History - William Penn
• Pennsylvania Center for the Book - Biography of William Penn
• UShistory.org - William Penn
• William Penn - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11)
• William Penn - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up)
• Table Of Contents

Penn had meanwhile become involved in American colonization as a trustee for Edward Byllynge, one of the two Quaker proprietors of West New Jersey. In 1681 Penn and 11 other Quakers bought the proprietary rights to East New Jersey from the widow of Sir John Carteret. In that same year, discouraged by the turn of political events in England , where Charles II was ruling without Parliament and prospects for religious freedom seemed dark, Penn sought and received a vast province on the west bank of the Delaware River , which was named Pennsylvania after his father (to whom Charles II had owed a large debt canceled by this grant). A few months later the duke of York granted him the three “lower counties” (later Delaware ). In Pennsylvania Penn hoped to provide a refuge for Quakers and other persecuted people and to build an ideal Christian commonwealth. “There may be room there, though not here” he wrote to a friend in America, “for such a holy experiment.”

As proprietor, Penn seized the opportunity to create a government that would embody his Quaker-Whig ideas. In 1682 he drew up a Frame of Government for the colony that would, he said, leave himself and his successors “no power of doing mischief, that the will of one man may not hinder the good of a whole country.” Freedom of worship in the colony was to be absolute, and all the traditional rights of Englishmen were carefully safeguarded. The actual machinery of government outlined in the Frame proved in some respects to be clumsy and unworkable, but Penn wisely included in the Frame an amending clause—the first in any written constitution—so that it could be altered as necessity required.

Penn himself sailed in the Welcome for Pennsylvania late in 1682, leaving his family behind, and found his experiment already well under way. The city of Philadelphia was already laid out on a grid pattern according to his instructions, and settlers were pouring in to take up the fertile lands lying around it. Presiding over the first Assembly, Penn saw the government of the “lower counties” united with that of Pennsylvania and the Frame of Government incorporated in the Great Law of the province. In a series of treaties based on mutual trust, he established good relations with the Delaware Indians. He also held an unsuccessful conference with Lord Baltimore, the proprietor of the neighbouring province of Maryland , to negotiate a boundary between it and Pennsylvania. When this effort proved unsuccessful, Penn was obliged in 1684 to return to England to defend his interests against Baltimore.

Before his return, he published A Letter to the Free Society of Traders (1683), which contained his fullest description of Pennsylvania and included a valuable account of the Delaware based on firsthand observation. With the accession of his friend the duke of York as James II in 1685, Penn found himself in a position of great influence at court, whereby he was able to have hundreds of Quakers, as well as political prisoners such as John Locke , released from prison. Penn welcomed James’s Declaration of Indulgence (1687) but received some criticism for doing so, since the declaration provided religious toleration at the royal pleasure rather than as a matter of fundamental right. But the Act of Toleration (1689), passed after James’s abdication, finally established the principle for which Penn had laboured so long and faithfully.

Penn’s close relations with James brought him under a cloud when William and Mary came to the throne, and for a time he was forced to live virtually in hiding to avoid arrest. He used this period of forced retirement to write more books. Among them were An Essay Towards the Present and Future Peace of Europe (1693), in which he proposed an international organization to prevent wars by arbitrating disputes , and A Brief Account of the Rise and Progress of the People Called Quakers (1694), which was the earliest serious effort to set down the history of the Quaker movement. Penn also drafted (1696) the first plan for a future union of the American colonies , a document that presaged the U.S. Constitution .

In 1696, his first wife having died in 1694, Penn married Hannah Callowhill, by whom he had seven children, five of whom lived to adulthood. Meanwhile, affairs had been going badly in Pennsylvania. For about two years (1692–94), while Penn was under suspicion, the government of the colony had been taken from him and given to that of New York . Afterwards, Pennsylvania’s Assembly quarreled constantly with its Council and with Penn’s deputy governors. The “lower counties” were unhappy at being unequally yoked with the larger province of Pennsylvania. Relations with the home government were strained by the Quakers’ conscientious refusal to provide military defense. In 1699 Penn, his wife, and his secretary, James Logan , returned to the province. He settled many of the outstanding difficulties, though he was compelled to grant the Pennsylvania Assembly preeminence in 1701 in a revised constitution known as the Charter of Privileges. He also allowed the lower counties to form their own independent government. After less than two years Penn’s affairs in England demanded his presence, and he left the province in 1701, never to see it again. He confided his Pennsylvania interests to the capable hands of James Logan, who upheld them loyally for the next half century.

Penn’s final years were unhappy. His eldest son, William, Jr., turned out a scapegrace. Penn’s own poor judgment in choosing his subordinates (except for the faithful Logan) recoiled upon him: his deputy governors proved incompetent or untrustworthy, and his steward , Philip Ford, cheated him on such a staggering scale that Penn was forced to spend nine months in a debtors’ prison. In 1712, discouraged at the outcome of his “holy experiment,” Penn began negotiations to surrender Pennsylvania to the English crown. A paralytic stroke , which seriously impaired his memory and dulled his once-keen intellect, prevented the consummation of these negotiations. Penn lingered on, virtually helpless, until 1718, his wife undertaking to manage his proprietary affairs. Penn’s collected works were published in 1726.

• Search Menu

Sign in through your institution

• Author Guidelines
• Open Access Options
• Why Publish with JAH?
• About Journal of American History
• About the Organization of American Historians
• Editorial Board
• Advertising and Corporate Services
• Self-Archiving Policy
• Dispatch Dates
• Journals on Oxford Academic
• Books on Oxford Academic

• < Previous

William Penn's “Holy Experiment”: The Founding of Pennsylvania, 1681–1701 . By Edwin B. Bronner. (New York: Temple University Publications, distributed by Columbia University Press, 1962. [x] + 306 pp. Map, chronology, notes, appendix, bibliography, and index. $6.00.)

• Article contents
• Figures & tables
• Supplementary Data

David S. Lovejoy, William Penn's “Holy Experiment”: The Founding of Pennsylvania, 1681–1701 . By Edwin B. Bronner. (New York: Temple University Publications, distributed by Columbia University Press, 1962. [x] + 306 pp. Map, chronology, notes, appendix, bibliography, and index. $6.00.), Journal of American History , Volume 50, Issue 1, June 1963, Pages 108–109, https://doi.org/10.2307/1888990

• Permissions Icon Permissions

Article PDF first page preview

Organization of american historians members, personal account.

• Sign in with email/username & password
• Get email alerts
• Save searches
• Purchase content
• Activate your purchase/trial code
• Add your ORCID iD

Institutional access

Sign in with a library card.

• Sign in with username/password
• Recommend to your librarian
• Institutional account management
• Get help with access

Access to content on Oxford Academic is often provided through institutional subscriptions and purchases. If you are a member of an institution with an active account, you may be able to access content in one of the following ways:

IP based access

Typically, access is provided across an institutional network to a range of IP addresses. This authentication occurs automatically, and it is not possible to sign out of an IP authenticated account.

Choose this option to get remote access when outside your institution. Shibboleth/Open Athens technology is used to provide single sign-on between your institution’s website and Oxford Academic.

• Click Sign in through your institution.
• Select your institution from the list provided, which will take you to your institution's website to sign in.
• When on the institution site, please use the credentials provided by your institution. Do not use an Oxford Academic personal account.
• Following successful sign in, you will be returned to Oxford Academic.

If your institution is not listed or you cannot sign in to your institution’s website, please contact your librarian or administrator.

Enter your library card number to sign in. If you cannot sign in, please contact your librarian.

Society Members

Society member access to a journal is achieved in one of the following ways:

Sign in through society site

Many societies offer single sign-on between the society website and Oxford Academic. If you see ‘Sign in through society site’ in the sign in pane within a journal:

• Click Sign in through society site.
• When on the society site, please use the credentials provided by that society. Do not use an Oxford Academic personal account.

If you do not have a society account or have forgotten your username or password, please contact your society.

Sign in using a personal account

Some societies use Oxford Academic personal accounts to provide access to their members. See below.

A personal account can be used to get email alerts, save searches, purchase content, and activate subscriptions.

Some societies use Oxford Academic personal accounts to provide access to their members.

Viewing your signed in accounts

Click the account icon in the top right to:

• View your signed in personal account and access account management features.
• View the institutional accounts that are providing access.

Signed in but can't access content

Oxford Academic is home to a wide variety of products. The institutional subscription may not cover the content that you are trying to access. If you believe you should have access to that content, please contact your librarian.

For librarians and administrators, your personal account also provides access to institutional account management. Here you will find options to view and activate subscriptions, manage institutional settings and access options, access usage statistics, and more.

Short-term Access

To purchase short-term access, please sign in to your personal account above.

Don't already have a personal account? Register

Email alerts

Citing articles via.

• Process - a blog for american history
• Recommend to your Library

Affiliations

• Online ISSN 1945-2314
• Print ISSN 0021-8723
• Copyright © 2024 Organization of American Historians
• About Oxford Academic
• Publish journals with us
• University press partners
• What we publish
• New features  
• Open access
• Rights and permissions
• Accessibility
• Advertising
• Media enquiries
• Oxford University Press
• Oxford Languages
• University of Oxford

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide

• Copyright © 2024 Oxford University Press
• Cookie settings
• Cookie policy
• Privacy policy
• Legal notice

This Feature Is Available To Subscribers Only

Sign In or Create an Account

This PDF is available to Subscribers Only

For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual subscription.

This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Without cookies your experience may not be seamless.

• Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies

William Penn’s Holy Experiment: Quaker Truth in Pennsylvania by James Proud (review)

• Barbara Franco
• Penn State University Press
• Volume 88, Number 2, Spring 2021
• pp. 272-274
• View Citation

Additional Information

• Buy Article for $19.00 (USD)
• William Penn’s Holy Experiment: Quaker Truth in Pennsylvania by James Proud

The founding of Pennsylvania as William Penn’s “holy experiment” in religious toleration and peaceful coexistence is regarded as one of the events in American history that helped establish principles of self-government and democracy. The iconic mages of Benjamin West’s painting, Penn’s Treaty with the Indians (1771–72), or Edward Hicks’s many versions of a Peaceable Kingdom (1820s–1840s) have helped perpetuate a mythic version of Penn’s enterprise. The account we read in William Penn’s Holy Experiment by James Proud is far more complicated and problematic.

Penn himself used the term “holy experiment” at least once in a 1681 letter expressing hope that “an example may be set up to the nations” (97). The primary “truth” for Penn, expressed in the original 1682 Frame of Government , was freedom of religion and liberty of conscience for all people living peaceably and justly in civil society. Proud sets out to track the succeses and failures of this experiment through its major themes of peace, religious freedom, public education, friendship with Native Americans, and abolition of slavery. Using original records and source materials, Proud moves beyond Penn’s aspirations for the colony to dig deeply into the legal, religious, political, and financial challenges that remained a constant reality. The author’s legal background is apparent as he navigates through complex legal and political issues that Penn faced during his lifetime, and those that continued after his death until the end of the proprietorship. [End Page 272]

The first chapter provides a comprehensive introduction to the political and religious conflicts in England from 1350 to 1682, George Fox’s spiritual journey, Penn’s religious conversion, and his subsequent persecution for his Quaker beliefs. Penn’s early life and his relationship with his father are placed in the historical context of political upheavals in England that spanned the overthrow of Charles I, the establishment of a Commonwealth under Parliament, and the restoration of the monarchy under Charles II. Penn’s knowledge of America began with his own involvement in a dispute among Quakers concerning the proprietorship of West Jersey as well as George Fox’s visit to America in 1672. Facing growing debts and intensifying persecutions for his nonconformist religious beliefs, Penn petitioned Charles II for the grant of lands in America to repay an outstanding debt to his father’s estate.

The second chapter covers the period from Penn’s first visit to Pennsylvania in 1682 until his death in 1718. For two years, as the proprietor and governor, Penn worked with the General Assembly to put his Frame of Government into practice. He helped establish a Yearly Meeting of Friends and developed Pennsbury as his manorial seat, before returning to England in 1684 to resolve a contentious boundary dispute with Lord Baltimore. Penn remained in England for the next fifteen years, engaged in the affairs of his colony at a distance, while he struggled with continued political conflicts, arrest and imprisonment, the death of his first wife, and growing debt. Penn’s second visit to Pennsylvania in 1699–1701 was precipitated by concerns that the English Crown was threatening to remove Penn and other proprietors as “chief governor” (139). Accompanied by his new wife, Hannah, Penn established himself at Pennsbury and addressed the governance issues resulting from his long absence. A new Charter of Privileges was enacted, and the Friends Public School was chartered. In 1701 Penn’s meeting with a delegation of Native Americans resulted in Articles of Agreement pledging peace with each other. In November 1701 he returned to England where he continued to govern the colony from afar as he struggled with his personal financial problems and even considered the option of selling Pennsylvania back to the Crown.

The third chapter traces the years following Penn’s death when Hannah Penn was left to oversee the handling of Penn’s estate in England and the family’s holdings in...

• Buy Digital Article for $19.00 (USD)
• Buy Complete Digital Issue for $27.00 (USD)

Project MUSE Mission

Project MUSE promotes the creation and dissemination of essential humanities and social science resources through collaboration with libraries, publishers, and scholars worldwide. Forged from a partnership between a university press and a library, Project MUSE is a trusted part of the academic and scholarly community it serves.

2715 North Charles Street Baltimore, Maryland, USA 21218

+1 (410) 516-6989 [email protected]

©2024 Project MUSE. Produced by Johns Hopkins University Press in collaboration with The Sheridan Libraries.

Now and Always, The Trusted Content Your Research Requires

Built on the Johns Hopkins University Campus

Quakers in the World

Related articles.

• Mission work and Quaker settlement in colonial New Jersey
• The Lloyd Family
• Caspar Wistar
• William Penn
• The Holy Experiment, in Pennsylvania
• Britain, Ireland and America in C17,and early Quakerism
• Eliminating Slavery amongst Quakers
• Benjamin Lay
• John Woolman
• Thomas Story
• Mission in Colonial North America

Quakers in colonial Pennsylvania

In 1681, William Penn became ‘sole’ proprietor of Pennsylvania. He had already participated in the establishment of what became New Jersey, but now he could set up his Holy Experiment in religious and political freedom, exactly as he thought right.

He advertised for settlers, explaining that Pennsylvania would be democratic, tolerant of all religions, and a place where people from all walks of life would be welcome. Many responded, and during 1682 twenty-three ships sailed up the Delaware, carrying about 2000 settlers between them. They came from all over Britain, with particularly large numbers from Wales, Yorkshire and the Midlands. Many German Mennonites came too, thanks to Penn’s visit to the Rhineland in 1677.  In the following years, thanks to William Edmundson’s missionary work, a wave of Irish Quaker settlers arrived. Pennsylvania was open to all, but the vast majority of early settlers seem to have been Quakers, or kindred spirits like the Mennonites.

Penn arrived himself in 1682, and called a colonial assembly to discuss his draft constitution, the ‘Frame of Government’. After some amendments, it was soon agreed. It included personal rights (property, suffrage, consumer protection, education, religious freedom), a criminal code, and provision for the poor, all overseen by a Council, and a House of Representatives.

Penn had also come with plans for Philadelphia (the city of Brotherly Love), calling it a ‘green countrie towne’. It pioneered a grid pattern and included plenty of open spaces, and was intended to be a healthy environment conducive to peaceful and productive living. All the land needed for the city or surrounding farms was purchased from the Indians, and relationships with them were good.

Penn’s first period in Pennsylvania was cut short after only two years. In 1684 he had to return to Britain to defend his rights, and could not return until 1699. He appointed a succession of people to act for him, and was in regular touch,  but little happened in governance terms except for fruitless attempts to collect taxes. The settlers resisted all such efforts, enjoying their new freedom, and simply got on with their lives.

The Quakers looked after each other, built meeting houses, and educated their children, founding Penn Charter School in 1689. Leadership was in the hands of Thomas Lloyd , leader of the Welsh Quakers and a member of the Lloyds clan of iron manufacturers and future bankers.

Pennsylvania prospered. Quakers continued to arrive, alongside many others from across the Atlantic and from other colonies, and when Penn returned in 1699, for a busy and effective two years, Pennsylvania was about 50% Quaker.  Penn oversaw the revision of the constitution as the ‘Charter of Privileges’, and clarified political responsibilities in a number of ways.  He had to leave in 1701, again for political reasons, and was never able to return.

The second generation of Quakers was inevitably different from the pioneers who had fled persecution. Quakerism was the dominant religion, and they were comfortable in their peaceful lives and Quaker routines. They mixed with non-Quakers, absorbing some of their ideas, and some left, or were forced to leave when they married non-Quakers. They were challenged for their relaxed approach as early as 1690, by George Keith, headteacher of the new school, and many of the hundred or so missionaries who visited over the years commented on the relative complacency they saw, and challenged it, sometimes with success. In 1758, for example, John Woolman appealed for an end to slavery amongst Quakers, catalysing real action at last. By 1776 no Pennsylvanian Quakers were involved.

Quakers such as James Logan, Thomas Story and others, were prominent in public life. They were often faced with awkward challenges imposed by the Crown, such as oath taking requirements for public officials, and military conflicts in which they wanted no part.  Some coped by withdrawing from office. Others ceased to be Quakers.  But for half a century many found ways of accommodating their principles while remaining in office, and the legislature remained largely in Quaker hands until the 1750s. The end of their involvement finally came as the independence movement grew. Their refusal to fight was seen as supporting the status quo, and the choice was stark and unavoidable. Either way, Quaker dominance in Pennsylvania politics came to an end.

Colonial Pennsylvania was a great success story in many ways. Its openness and freedoms made it a wonderful place for new ideas to develop. Science flourished (including many Quakers such as botanist John Bartram ), and the American Philosophical Society and the University of Pennsylvania were founded. The economy prospered, with much international trade, and their currency was always sound. Pennsylvania became a major power amongst the colonies. It was in Philadelphia that the Declaration of Independence was crafted. The constitution of the new United States owed much to Penn’s vision of ‘inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness’.

Further Reading and Credits

• James Logan
• Jones, Rufus M, Sharpless, Isaac, Gunmere Amelia M, The Quakers in the American Colonies, Macmillan, London, 1911.

We’re fighting to restore access to 500,000+ books in court this week. Join us!

Internet Archive Audio

• This Just In
• Grateful Dead
• Old Time Radio
• 78 RPMs and Cylinder Recordings
• Audio Books & Poetry
• Computers, Technology and Science
• Music, Arts & Culture
• News & Public Affairs
• Spirituality & Religion
• Radio News Archive

• Flickr Commons
• Occupy Wall Street Flickr
• NASA Images
• Solar System Collection
• Ames Research Center

• All Software
• Old School Emulation
• MS-DOS Games
• Historical Software
• Classic PC Games
• Software Library
• Kodi Archive and Support File
• Vintage Software
• CD-ROM Software
• CD-ROM Software Library
• Software Sites
• Tucows Software Library
• Shareware CD-ROMs
• Software Capsules Compilation
• CD-ROM Images
• ZX Spectrum
• DOOM Level CD

• Smithsonian Libraries
• FEDLINK (US)
• Lincoln Collection
• American Libraries
• Canadian Libraries
• Universal Library
• Project Gutenberg
• Children's Library
• Biodiversity Heritage Library
• Books by Language
• Additional Collections

• Prelinger Archives
• Democracy Now!
• Occupy Wall Street
• TV NSA Clip Library
• Animation & Cartoons
• Arts & Music
• Computers & Technology
• Cultural & Academic Films
• Ephemeral Films
• Sports Videos
• Videogame Videos
• Youth Media

Search the history of over 866 billion web pages on the Internet.

Mobile Apps

• Wayback Machine (iOS)
• Wayback Machine (Android)

Browser Extensions

Archive-it subscription.

• Explore the Collections
• Build Collections

Save Page Now

Capture a web page as it appears now for use as a trusted citation in the future.

Please enter a valid web address

• Donate Donate icon An illustration of a heart shape

William Penn's holy experiment; the founding of Pennsylvania, 1681-1701

Bookreader item preview, share or embed this item, flag this item for.

• Graphic Violence
• Explicit Sexual Content
• Hate Speech
• Misinformation/Disinformation
• Marketing/Phishing/Advertising
• Misleading/Inaccurate/Missing Metadata

plus-circle Add Review comment Reviews

73 Previews

10 Favorites

DOWNLOAD OPTIONS

No suitable files to display here.

EPUB and PDF access not available for this item.

IN COLLECTIONS

Uploaded by station17.cebu on September 11, 2019

SIMILAR ITEMS (based on metadata)

Located at 859 County Line Road in Horsham, PA 19044

• Call : 215-343-0965 | Contact Us

Pennsylvania, A Holy Experiment

William Penn, a Quaker, was looking for a haven in the New World where he and other Quakers could practice their religion freely and without persecution. He asked King Charles II to grant him land in the territory between Lord Baltimore’s province of Maryland and the Duke of York’s province of New York in order to satisfy a debt owed to his father’s estate. With the Duke’s support, Penn’s petition was granted. Charles signed the Charter of Pennsylvania on March 4, 1681, and it was officially proclaimed on April 2. With this act, the King not only paid his debt to the Penn family, but rid England of troublesome Quakers who often challenged the policies of the Anglican church.

Penn was granted 45,000 acres and, at Charles’ insistence, named the new colony Pennsylvania (meaning Penn’s Woods) in honor of his father, Admiral William Penn. Penn intended to establish Pennsylvania as a Holy Experiment built on the Quaker ideals of religious tolerance, belief in the goodness of human nature, participatory government, and brotherly love. His desire was to create a society where people of different faiths could worship as they chose and actively participate in a government that guaranteed that right. However, while all groups enjoyed religious freedom, the right to participate in the government was actually only extended to Protestant Christians—Catholics and Jews were excluded from voting or holding office. This religious tolerance attracted Catholics, Jews, Anglicans, Baptists, Scots-Irish Presbyterians, and several sects of Germans, who all lived harmoniously.

Pennsylvania’s government was organized into three parts: the Proprietor, who was William Penn, acted as the governor of the colony (or in Penn’s absence a deputy (our William Keith) fulfilled the duties of executive); a seventy-two member Provincial Council, or upper house; and a unicameral Provincial Assembly, or lower house. The right to vote was extended to virtually all free Christian (non-Catholic) men, regardless of whether or not they owned land.

In the 1682 Frame of Government, the first document which formed the foundation of the new colony’s government, Penn wrote:

Governments, like clocks, go from the motion men give them, and as governments are made and moved by men, so by them they are ruined, too. Wherefore governments rather depend upon men than men upon governments. Let men be good, and the government cannot be bad; if it be ill, they will cure it. But, if men be bad, let the government be ever so good, they will endeavor to warp and spoil it to their turn.

Succeeding Frames of Government were produced in 1683, 1696 and 1701. The fourth Frame was also known as the Charter of Privileges and remained in effect until the Revolution.

(Source: Kashatus, William; “William Penn’s Legacy, Religious & Spiritual Diversity,” Pennsylvania Heritage Magazine, Volume XXXVII, No. 2 – Spring 2011)

• Carla Loughlin
• 18th Century Lifestyle

Penn's Sylvania: "A Holy Experiment"

• Suzanne Alexander Wichita State University

In 1681, King Charles II of England granted land in the New World to William Penn. The colony which Penn established, Pennsylvania, was a unique social experiment in religious liberty that lasted for seventy-five years. In order to understand Penn's experiment, and its impact, it is necessary to look at two factors. The first is Penn's convincement to Quakerism, in the face of societal and parental opposition. 1 The second is the unique friendship he enjoyed with the Stuart monarchs--his radical religious views notwithstanding. Penn's ideologies shaped the character of the colony which later became the center pf the fledgling government of the United States of America. Penn's "holy experiment", as he called it, became the proving ground for religious tolerance and individual liberty.

Developed By

Information.

• For Readers
• For Authors
• For Librarians

You are here

William penn's 'holy experiment': quaker truth in pennsylvania, 1682-1781 (hardcover).

Related Editions

• Paperback (September 15th, 2019): $35.00

Description

William Penn's life was, at its core, a search for peace. This study concentrates attention on his greatest effort to secure true peace for all--his undertaking to populate and cultivate the region of North America granted him by the English Crown in March 1681.

Penn intended that Pennsylvania should be a haven for seekers of religious freedom and liberty of conscience, especially those who, for the sake of faith and principle, had suffered property forfeiture or bodily imprisonment during the persecutions of the English Civil War, Commonwealth, Protectorate, and Restoration. In commenting on how he had acquired Pennsylvania and what ends it might serve, Penn wrote to William Harrison:

For my country, I eyed] the Lord in the obtaining of it; and more was I drawn inward to look to Him, and to o we it] to His hand and power, than to any ot her way]. I have so obtained it and desire that I may not be unworthy of His love, but do that which may answer yet His kind providence and serve His Truth and people; that an example may be set up to the nations. There may be room there, though not here, for such a holy experiment

This book traces the historical progress of the foremost themes of the holy experiment from 1681, when Penn wrote the above letter to Harrison. These themes were most fully realized by the 1750s, but the holy experiment continued until 1781, when the experiment was finally laid down. The great themes of the experiment, in addition to the founding principles of peace grounded in religious freedom and liberty of conscience, were public education, preserving friendship with the Native Americans, and abolishing the evil of slavery. By the end of the experiment in 1781, both successes and failures had been realized, successes and failures that continue to underlie the society America has become since those days of its birthing at Philadelphia when the founding fathers gave order to the United States.

James Proud is an attorney, now retired, and a priest of the Episcopal Church. Proud is the editor of John Woolman and the A airs of Truth, published by Inner Light Books in 2010.

• United States - Colonial Period (1600-1775)
• Europe - Great Britain - Stuart Era (1603-1714)
• Create new account
• Request new password

Shopping cart

There are no products in your shopping cart.

Staff Picks

Lincoln in the Bardo: A Novel (Paperback)

Forget everything you think you know about how a novel is supposed to be written and trust in George Saunders. This book is going to take you on a journey through time, life, and death while also looking at the love between a father and son. This strange, beautiful novel deserves all the accolades it's been given. -Marion