ABSTRACT
William Penn (1644-1718), the proprietor of Pennsylvania chartered in 1681, soon presided over an ethnically and religiously heterogeneous population. He was a man of worldly influence and experience in the law, landowning and politics. But, equally, at an early date his spiritual idealism was evident in sympathy for religious nonconformity and his attachment to the Society of Friends. Politically, his 1701 Charter of Privileges to the Province and Counties of Pennsylvania, by comparison with the 1682 Frame of Government was marked by concessions to popular rights. Constant between the two documents, however was Penn's compact with the colony's religiously plural population to permit freedom of worship and equal right of appointment to or candidacy for public office to all Christians. The compact sought a common enterprise comprehending religious variety.
