John Winthrop Quotes

John Winthrop was born in Edwardstone, Suffolk, England. He was an English-born American Puritan lawyer and one of the leading figures in founding the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the second major settlement in New England, following Plymouth Colony. He led the first large wave of immigrants from England in 1630 and served as governor for 12 of the colony's first 20 years. He studied at the Trinity College, Cambridge University. He trained in the law and became Lord of the Manor at Groton in Suffolk. He resisted attempts to widen voting and other civil rights beyond a narrow class of religiously approved individuals, opposed attempts to codify a body of laws that the colonial magistrates would be bound by, and also opposed unconstrained democracy, calling it "the meanest and worst of all forms of government". His major contributions to the literary world were A Modell of Christian Charity and The History of New England, which remained unpublished until the late 18th century.