The limitation of civil rights by religious tests is
indeed one of those common inheritances from the old Aryan world that
we find again and again cropping out, even down to the exclusion of
Catholics from the House of Commons from 1562 to 1829. The obvious
purpose of this policy in England was self-protection; and in like
manner the restriction of the suffrage in Massachusetts was designed
to protect the colony against aggressive episcopacy and to maintain
unimpaired the uniformity of purpose which had brought the settlers
across the ocean. Under the circumstances there was something to be
said in behalf of such a measure of self-protection, and the principle
required but slight extension to cover such cases as the banishment of
Roger Williams and the Antinomians. There was another side to the case,
however. From the very outset this exclusive policy was in some ways
a source of weakness to Massachusetts, though we have seen that the
indirect effect was to diversify and enrich the political life of New
England as a whole. [Sidenote: Restriction of the suffrage to church
members]
At first it led to the departure of the men who founded Connecticut,
and thereafter the way was certainly open for those who preferred the
Connecticut policy to go where it prevailed. Some such segregation was
no doubt effected, but it could not be complete and thorough.
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