USA HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -The act was meant to ensure freedom of religion for Christian settlers of diverse persuasions in the colony.

Detailed explanation-2: -The Calvert family, who founded Maryland partly as a refuge for English Catholics, sought enactment of the law to protect Catholic settlers and those of other religions that did not conform to the dominant Anglicanism of Britain and her colonies.

Detailed explanation-3: -The Toleration Act of 1649 was passed in Maryland because the Protestants outnumbered the Catholics. New York began as a Dutch trading post. Roger Williams was banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1636 because: a seperatist who believed the government had no authority over religious matters.

Detailed explanation-4: -Religious toleration was not new to the men and women of Maryland. Planned by George Calvert, first Lord Baltimore, and actually founded by his son Cecil, the province was primarily a haven for persecuted Catholics; yet its founders had welcomed, and even sought, Protestants as settlers.