Maryland

The charter for the Province of Maryland was granted to Cæceilius Calvert, 2nd Lord of Baltimore, by Charles I in 1632. It was 1634 before Lord Baltimore sent the first settlers over. The first settlers were Protestants, although the original impetus for founding the colony was to provide a safe haven for Catholics in the American Colonies. Shortly, though, Maryland became one of the very few places in the British Empre where Catholic citizens were able to hold onto the highest political offices. In those days, Maryland was also a primary destination for the tens of thousands of British convicts the Crown was sending across the pond.

In those days, Delaware was part of Maryland. The granting of Pennsylvania to William Penn in 1680 caused a huge problem with Maryland when the Penn family took the stand that their common border was in the wrong place (too far north). Charles II tried to reach a compromise between the two groups in 1682 but then he gave Delaware to the Penn family and that caused more problems. This developed into a shooting war in the 1730's which was finally ended by George II in 1738. However, no final agreement was reached (and signed by both parties) until 1760.

Maryland was also the scene of religious upheaval for many years. In spite of earlier declarations of religious tolerance, the Anglicans, Puritans and Catholics just couldn't get along. When Virginia made Anglicanism the official religion, many Puritans moved to Maryland. In 1650, the Puritans revolted and set up a state in which both Anglicans and Catholics were outlawed. That revolt lasted until 1658 when the Calvert family finally regained control of Maryland and reinstituted the Toleration Act. But that only lasted until 1688 when William of Orange ascended to the throne and made the Protestant/Puritan faith the official faith in England. At that point, Catholicism was again outlawed in Maryland, and remained outside the law until after the American Revolution.

For more than 100 years, the majority of "colonists" arriving in Maryland were former residents in various of British debtor's prisons, and they came to the colonies as "indentured servants." As economic conditions improved in Great Britain, the flow of indentured servants decreased and the importation of slaves increased. With the American Revolution, the inflow of convicts/indentured servants from English prisons stopped (the British shifted that flow to Australia). As Maryland never seceded from the Union, slavery in the state was "legal" until a new state constitution outlawing the practice was adopted in 1864.