[Verginius Rufus]

I don't know where you got your information about Catholics not being allowed to move here until the early 1800s. Maryland was started as a refuge for Catholics by Lord Baltimore in the 1600s. William Penn allowed Catholics to settle in colonial Pennsylvania. Charles Carroll of Carrolton, one of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence, was a Catholic and one of the richest men in America--a Maryland plantation owner. His relative Daniel Carroll was a signer of the US Constitution and also a Catholic.

The Homestead Act did not get passed until the Civil War--but there were plenty of immigrants before then, and some of them bought farmland.

[muawiyah]

Believe it or not but in the various codicils surrounding the Treaty of London (1604), the treaty crammed down the throats of everybody in Europe by the guy who owned America, Filipe II/III, son of Filipe I/iI, there's a section on the rules of toleration ~ on how Catholics should behave in non catholic lands, and how non catholics should behave in Catholic lands.

Most folks skip over that part, but for the King of Spain who ruled over 15 separate kingdoms and principalities, each with its own constitution, ancient customs and religious divisions, this was very important.

That's the treaty that carved up North America among the king's Russian, Scottish, French and Spanish relatives ~ oh, and carved out the very worst part ~ a barren desert according to some, where Protestants could go. It was a space nearly as large as Western Europe.

That's where it starts ~ the fundamental law itself created a Catholic free Protestant refuge.

During the next couple of centuries things changed.

Regarding Maryland, it was carved out of Virginia, as was New York, Delaware, Pennsylvania an New Jersey. The Calverts said 'Catholics go here' and some did, but it was for English Catholics, not all Catholics! By 1685 they'd lost all civil liberties and were simply tolerated ~ the community was saved by intermarriage ~ as usual. Almost everyone with a Smallwood ancestor has a Carroll ancestor, and vice versa.

In general, the English, who ran much of North America, did not encourage Catholic immigration. Priests were less than welcome except in French and Spanish territory. There are neat maps on the net to show you who claimed what at which periods, but more importantly, look at the really large boundary lines ~ the PA/NY state line is a substantial part of one of them. It ran to Chicago all the way from the tip of Cape Cod. This was surveyed in the early 1600s by a Spanish company with Swedish and Dutch employees.

Then, look at the Virginia/North Carolina line ~ that too was done in the early 1600s by a different Spanish company, with Breton and Swedish employees. Look how far that line goes ~ to the MISSISSIPPI ~ with a couple of deviations to get around some geographic obstacles.

Those were adventures worthy of Lewis and Clark!

DesIsles show another line West of the MIssissippi from Arcola Texas to Kensington Minnesota ~ that may have been done a little later as a BASE LINE for further subdivision of Spain West of the Great River. They've even found Spanish boundary stones along all those lines ~ they have a peculiar shape.

Now, in the East, the Treaty of 1604 called for marking the Western boundary of the open (protestant) territory through the highest peaks of the Cordillera ~ that is, the Smokey Mountains, and lo and behold marker stones have been found for that irregular boundary.

So, where did you hear that the area the King of Spain himself set aside for Protestants was open to Catholics?