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Thanksgiving Heritage and the Religious Roots of American Freedom
The piece traces how religious faith shaped American democracy from the founding era through the Great Awakening and the Revolution. It cites Puritan covenantalism, Quaker inner light, and Protestant emphasis on individual conscience, work, and liberty, leading to the 1777 Thanksgiving and later religious freedom in the Bill of Rights. It mentions figures like John Winthrop, Cotton Mather, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and the Mayflower voyage, and events including the Virginia religious freedom statute.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
Don McLeod Dy
Associated Press
Cotton Mather
America
John Adams
Columbus
Europe
Virginia
Plymouth
Boston
Pennsylvania
Maryland
John Winthrop
Edmund Burke
Atlantic
Winthrop
John Cotton
Thomas Jefferson
Catton
John Wise
Canada
George Washington
Valley Forge
Congress