A Reforming People
Puritanism and the Transformation of Public Life in New England
David D. Hall
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Imprint: The University of North Carolina Press
Published: 08/2012
Pages: 288
Subject: History, Religion
| University of North Carolina
Print ISBN: 9.78E+12
eBook ISBN: 9780807837115
DESCRIPTION
In this revelatory account of the people who founded the New
England colonies, historian David D. Hall compares the reforms they
enacted with those attempted in England during the period of the
English Revolution. Bringing with them a deep fear of arbitrary,
unlimited authority, these settlers based their churches on the
participation of laypeople and insisted on "consent" as a premise
of all civil governance. Puritans also transformed civil and
criminal law and the workings of courts with the intention of
establishing equity. In this political and social history of the
five New England colonies, Hall provides a masterful re-evaluation
of the earliest moments of New England's history, revealing the
colonists to be the most effective and daring reformers of their
day.