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Rhode island is the smallest state in the USA. Rhode Island was one of the original thirteen States. Its dual origin is indicated by its official title, 'The State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations', and by its two capitals, Providence and Newport. Roger Williams, the patron saint of the State, was banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony because of his attacks on the theocratic government of that colony. He advocated complete separation of church and State, and entire toleration for all creeds. He founded Providence in 1636. Two years later the Anti-nomians or followers of Anne Hutchinson founded Portsmouth, and in 1639 Newport was settled.
On March the 14th, 1644, a charter was granted by which these settlements were united in one colony with a popular government. This charter was revoked, and in 1663 a new one was granted, which continued to be the fundamental law until 1842. This gave the entire power of government to the people.
Rhode Island applied for admission to the New England Confederation, but her application was denied. In 1742, the western boundary line was finally settled with Connecticut; but not until 1862 was the eastern boundary with Massachusetts determined.
Brown University was founded in 1764. The devotion of the colony to the American cause was shown in 1772, by the affair of the Gaspe. Rhode Island was not represented in the convention of 1787, and did not ratify the American Constitution until May the 29th, 1790. This delay was due to the desire of the agricultural classes to retain the power to levy import taxes and to make paper money a legal tender.
An unjust apportionment of representatives and a property qualification for voting led to Dorr's rebellion in 1842, when a new constitution was adopted which widened the suffrage, but the property restriction was not entirely removed until the adoption of the Bourn amendment which retained the property qualification for election to city councils only.
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