Religious implications of a surviving Commonwealth

[zampano]

No that's penal servitude/transportation where instead of locking up someone you ship them to the colonies and make them work for the duration of the sentence (which might be life). However penal convicts had some rights and their children were born free, unlike slaves (who were exclusively African).

Slaves= No rights, inheritable, exclusively Africans.
Penal Convicts= Very few rights, not-inheritable, from the British Isles, including Scottish and English as well as Irish.

I wasn't talking much about servitude but regular slavery of Irish people by the Republican Gouvernement, as you can see there: http://www.historyjournal.ie/irish-slavery/55-irish-slavery-main-page/106-the-irish-slave-trade.html, I don't have much information about that though, maybe my sources are wrong, but there's a Flogging Molly song about that!

I'm sorry but that's just wrong. The standard of living in colonial New England was considerably higher than in Old England and people knew it. The high cost of transportation meant there were basically thee ways of getting across the Atlantic, group together via a Church or Sect and hire/buy an entire boat (Puritans/Amish), be rich enough to fund it yourself (Virginia Cavaliers), or sell yourself into into indenture where someone paid for your ticket and you worked for them for a number of years (normally 3-7). The 3rd option was by far and away the most popular method of getting to the 14 Colonies and provided 80% of the white immigrants by some estimates. Most indentured were British especially in the early years due to the preferences of the employers/sponsors. Continental Europeans only started to come over in the 18th century after rising prosperity in Britain reduced the attractiveness of selling yourself into temporary servitude. So unless either the Colonies are much poorer than OTL or Britain much richer you are going to see a similar thing happen. Either way you are not going to get a German speaking America.

You got a point, but I'm still not convinced. New England's economy, e.g., was pretty much dependent on commerce and craftsmanship, as it is unsuitable for agriculture. That kind of economic structure wouldn't (wasn't) very much attractive to indenture servants as the southern plantations, that would surely concentrate most of the people of the British North America.

 

[Arachnid]

I wasn't talking much about servitude but regular slavery of Irish people by the Republican Gouvernement, as you can see there: http://www.historyjournal.ie/irish-slavery/55-irish-slavery-main-page/106-the-irish-slave-trade.html, I don't have much information about that though, maybe my sources are wrong, but there's a Flogging Molly song about that!

Well the fact that there is a folk song about it closes the issue!

Seriously look at your source "Irish deportees and indentured servants" "were sent to slave conditions" "suffered under dreadful conditions in Barbados, Antigua, the southern states of the US". All that is true but notice the bolded part. In the Caribbean and southern Colonies indentured servants, penal labourers and slaves would on occasion work in the same field under similar dreadful conditions. However there were significant differences; white indentured servants and prisoners could become free and their children would be born free. Also there were limits on how the could be treated, e.g. no whipping to death. No such protections were offered to Africans. Working on a plantation was obviously pretty horrible, especially when you consider that Yellow Fever would probably kill you before your term of service was up. But you weren't a slave. In addition if you look at the records the vast majority sentenced to had committed "ordinary" crimes rather than "political" ones. It's just Scottish and Irish Jacobite's and other rebels have received most of the attention, it's much easier to sympathise with and mythologise a Highland rebel than a London rapist.

You got a point, but I'm still not convinced. New England's economy, e.g., was pretty much dependent on commerce and craftsmanship, as it is unsuitable for agriculture. That kind of economic structure wouldn't (wasn't) very much attractive to indenture servants as the southern plantations, that would surely concentrate most of the people of the British North America.

I'm sorry but you really need to read some history books. As in every pre-industrial society the vast majority of New England settlers were farmers (70-80%) and thanks to much lower population densities, lack of an entrenched aristocracy and the healthy climate New England yeoman farmers had a standard of living far above their English counterparts, who themselves were the richest in Europe. By every measure from life expectancy, infant mortality to average incomes New England was by far and away the best place to be a non-aristocrat in the entire world in 1700.
You are however correct that the Southern Colonies attracted more incomers. However most of them were black slaves who were rapidly worked to death. The mortality rate for their white masters was equally horrific but thanks to the enormous profitability of Plantation agricultural there was an effectively bottomless supply of younger sons of the English gentry to replace them.

 

[zampano]

Well, apparently I gave the wrong link, mea culpa. It was supposed to be that: http://www.historyjournal.ie/irish-slavery/57-irish-slavery-topics/113-irish-slaves-in-jamaica.html It's the same site so give me a break. I'll quote the good part for you:

The requirement for labour could still not be met and so Cromwell again turned to his "man-catchers" in Ireland and ordered them to round up and transport several thousand women and "as many young men as could be lifted out of Ireland" to work on the plantations as slaves as had occurred in Barbados.

I'm waiting for your source that goes agains it. (what would be actually really nice since it's a pretty unique event in human history)

As for the your rude refutations of my thoughts, just read this: http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/rosenbloom.indenture Again, I'll quote and highlight the nice part for you:

The use of slaves was concentrated in the Chesapeake and Lower South, where the presence of staple export crops (rice, indigo and tobacco) provided economic rewards for expanding the scale of cultivation beyond the size achievable with family labor. European immigrants (primarily indentured servants) tended to concentrate in the Chesapeake and Middle Colonies, where servants could expect to find the greatest opportunities to enter agriculture once they had completed their term of service. While New England was able to support self-sufficient farmers, its climate and soil were not conducive to the expansion of commercial agriculture, with the result that it attracted relatively few slaves, indentured servants, or free immigrants.

There is also an intersting table in this site (I don't think it's necessary to put it in here) pointing out that less than 2% of the immigrants to New England were indentured servants. When in the Middle Colonies the number reaches 90% and in the South, 20%.

And for the human conditions in New England, which in fact they were very favorable, there is no question about it, it's a cyclical issue: All of this climate of general welfare, combining the economical, political and economical freedom, is a result of the Puritan Settlement there, their ideology and the way they see their land. With a puritan in charge in London there would never exist a real impulse to settle people there in the first place! At least not in the OTL's conditions, which was the real reason why their society achieved this "welfare" level that you talk about. Without this uniqueness, as it wouldn't be a religious heaven but just a puritan corner of a puritan kingdom, New England would be faded to be as peripherical as OTL's New France or the Maritimes.

So, please, if you're going to offend me again, offend me with some real sources, please.

 

[Arachnid]

Well, apparently I gave the wrong link, mea culpa. It was supposed to be that: http://www.historyjournal.ie/irish-slavery/57-irish-slavery-topics/113-irish-slaves-in-jamaica.html It's the same site so give me a break. I'll quote the good part for you:

I'm waiting for your source that goes agains it. (what would be actually really nice since it's a pretty unique event in human history)

If true it would hardly be unique and I'll be honest I haven't heard of that particular journal before and a brief look around suggests its far from unbiased. All the sources I've read have suggested a clear difference between "classic" slavery which only happened to Africans and penal servitude. However you do have a secondary source and I don't have one to hand so I'll do some JSTOR research when I have time and get back to you on that particular issue.

As for the your rude refutations of my thoughts, just read this: http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/rosenbloom.indenture Again, I'll quote and highlight the nice part for you:

There is also an intersting table in this site (I don't think it's necessary to put it in here) pointing out that less than 2% of the immigrants to New England were indentured servants. When in the Middle Colonies the number reaches 90% and in the South, 20%.

And for the human conditions in New England, which in fact they were very favorable, there is no question about it, it's a cyclical issue: All of this climate of general welfare, combining the economical, political and economical freedom, is a result of the Puritan Settlement there, their ideology and the way they see their land. With a puritan in charge in London there would never exist a real impulse to settle people there in the first place! At least not in the OTL's conditions, which was the real reason why their society achieved this "welfare" level that you talk about. Without this uniqueness, as it wouldn't be a religious heaven but just a puritan corner of a puritan kingdom, New England would be faded to be as peripherical as OTL's New France or the Maritimes.

So, please, if you're going to offend me again, offend me with some real sources, please.

First of all the figures you're citing come from 1773-76, by which time New England was unattractive in that all the land appropriate for farming had already been settled. From that table it's obvious large scale settlement had essentially stopped and with it indenture migration. In addition the cost of transportation across the ocean had lowered and England was a more prosperous society further reducing the flow. Obviously this was not the case in the 1600's when New England was still being settled. Then large numbers of second wave, post Puritan settlers, did sell themselves into indenture though a lower proportion than in the Middle Colonies. Anyway a Commonwealth surviving isn't going to make all the Puritans already in New England abandon their farms and return.
Secondly as a non-American I tend to be rather vaguer in my definition of New England than I should be. In fact most of my posts would make more sense if you replaced "the North-East" with "New England". For example colonial New York which is not in most definitions of New England did see extensive indenture settlement, so mea culpa.

 

[funnyhat]

I apologise I meant to infer that the Quakers would stay in Britain, therefor they would not impact on American history (no Pilgrims - no Thanksgiving holiday!).

The Pilgrims weren't Quakers. Also, they reached American shores in 1620, and celebrated the first Thanksgiving the following year. The really big wave of Puritan colonization was from 1629-1642. All this was before Cromwell's takeover.

 

[Simreeve]

Would there really not be a state church? The Roundheads seemed pretty committed to their religious zealotry?

But as well as the Presbyterians, whom I think did favour the idea of their own sect becoming the 'established' church in England just as it was in Scotland, they also included a fairly significant group of 'Independents' (including Cromwell himself, and some of his top generals) whose ideas about church organisation would presumably have ruled out anything as organised as a 'state church'... Not to mention members of other sects, too.

There is a significant difference between slavery (which only happened to Africans) and penal servitude or indenture.

And even then, in mainland BNA rather than in the West Indies, it wasn't until 1655 that the Africans were legally regarded as outright slaves rather than just as 'indentured servants'.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Johnson_%28American_Colonial%29