About the
Flushing Remonstrance
Author: David OatsReprinted
here from the Queens Courier
Published November 18-26 1999
Religion is
both an intensely private part of our lives and a
very public one at the same time. There is the
inner spirit that drives us to believe or not to
believe. Then there is the believers own
conscience and faith and tradition that moves us
to what we believe.
Then there
is the public manifestation that allows us to
express these beliefs or unbeliefs
in the manner or custom called for. For
centuries, governments and rulers have attempted
to control what people are allowed to believe and
how to manifest it. In many societies, even today
on the brink of a new millennium, religious
persecution is prevalent.
That is why
what occurred in Flushing 342 years ago this
December was such a momentous event in the
history of religions. The town was part of Dutch
controlled New Amsterdam and ruled under the iron
hand of its Governor, Peter Stuyvesant. He
dictated that only the Dutch Reformed religion
could be publicly practiced.
When a
group called the Society of Friends (better known
as the Quakers) came to the village to practice
their faith, they were banned. An Englishman John
Bowne, had a home in the town and he was moved by
the groups plight. He opened his home to
the Quakers to hold their services in his
kitchen.
Meanwhile
the leading citizens of the town who were angered
by Stuyvesants edict, bravely gathered to
draw up a document the Remonstrance they
called it to declare that Flushing would
not tolerate religious persecution and declared
that the town was open to all faiths to fully
worship.
The
Remonstrance said "Ye have been pleased to
send up unto us a certain prohibition, or
command, that we should not retaine or entertaine
any of those people called Quakers . . . We
cannot condemn them . . . neither stretch out our
hands against them, to punish, banish or
persecute them . . . We are commanded by the Law
to do good to all men . . . That which is of God
will stand, and that which is of man will come to
nothing . . . Our only desire is not to offend
one of these little ones, in whatsoever form,
name or title he appears . . . There if any of
these said persons come in love unto us, we
cannot in conscience lay violent hands upon them,
but give them free egresse or regresse into our
town and houses . . . This is according to the
Patent and Charter of our town . . . which we are
not willing to infringe or violate.
"The
document was drawn up by the town clerk Edward
Hart and on Dec. 27, 1657 (on which the festival
of Chanukah fell that year) 28 freeholders of
Flushing and two from Jamaica signed the
Remonstrance on the site of what is today the
Flushing Armory on Northern Blvd. Meanwhile Bowne
remained firm.
Bowne was
fined and arrested and put on a ship to sail
"wherever it may land." That turned out
to be Ireland and Bowne would work his way all
the way to Holland where he made his case to the
directors of the Dutch West India Company. To his
amazement, they agreed with him, released him and
they rebuked Stuyvesant.
The
directors wrote "we doubt very much whether
vigorous proceedings against them ought not to be
discontinued, unless, indeed, you intend to check
and destroy your population, which, in the youth
of your existence, ought rather to be encouraged
by all possible means . . . The conscience of men
ought to remain free and unshackled. Let every
one remain free."
After a two
year exile, Bowne returned to Flushing and freely
practiced his religious beliefs, as did the rest
of the town of Flushing and the cities of New
Amsterdam. Bowne is buried behind the 17th
century wooden Friends Meeting House on Northern
Blvd.
The
principle bravely established in Queens became
enshrined over a century later in the Bill of
Rights of the U.S. Constitution. In 1957, on the
300th anniversary of the signing of the
Remonstrance, the U.S. government issued a
commemorative postal stamp honoring the occasion.
Today the
Bowne House, built in 1661, still stands on the
street that bears his name. It is a national
historic site and open to the public as a museum,
presenting a quaint and beautiful picture of
early Flushing.
Across the
borough, the people from around the world have
established a house of worship for every faith on
earth with Baptist and 551 other Protestant
churches, 120 synagogues, 101 Roman Catholic
churches, 26 Orthodox churches, at least 12 Hindu
temples, five mosques, four Buddhist temples, and
ever-growing new congregations making Queens a
center of international religious worship.
That is
fitting for a place where over three centuries
ago the spirit moved the citizens of Flushing to
take an important stand. In doing so a little
house on Bowne Street became a clapboard
cathedral of the soul.
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