Anne Hutchinson arrived in America. So what?

source

During a time when many English emigrants were arriving in the New World, a woman named Anne Hutchinson moved to America with her husband and fourteen children. So what?

During the early seventeenth century, the Massachusetts Bay colony had become a haven for Puritans and others seeking to escape religious persecution in an England that was dominated by the Anglican church. Among those that settled in the young colony was Will Hutchinson, his wife Anne and their children. On September 18, 1634 the couple and their youngest child arrived in the Boston area. There, Anne became an active member of the religious discussion in their community. She hosted popular religious discussions in her home to follow up on the sermons of Reverend John Cotton through which she became an influential voice in the community's discussions. In time, Hutchinson began sharing ideas in her discussion group that ran contrary to the teachings of the Puritan church. This, of course, upset Reverend Cotton and other members of the religious establishment in Boston. Hutchinson was convicted of criticizing the religious leaders of the church and was banished from the Massachusetts Bay colony. She and her family relocated to Rhode Island and helped to establish it as one of the most tolerant and religiously diverse of the English colonies in the New World. In addition to her substantial contribution to American theology, Hutchinson became a strong advocate for religious tolerance.

Anne Hutchinson's determination to carry on in following her religious convictions created a safe haven for the ideas of religious tolerance that would eventually be enshrined in the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution. Because she was driven out of her home, she and her family learned to accept diversity of beliefs and worked to establish legal equality for individuals irrespective of their religion or theology.

So what? That's what.