SG+Weekly+Journal+Entries

 8-29-09   The competition for power between European countries during the sixteenth century was endless. Spain and Portugal had begun to gain more power with the dicovery of gold in the new “unsettled” land to the west. England was trapped in an economical depression and was going through social changes. English explorers traveled to the New World hoping to find salvation from the social and economical problems happening in their home country  Wool had been a very important export in England, but wool farmers faced a serious depression during the 1550’s. They, like many people, had reason to go start over in the New World. All over the country people faced so many economical problems, and that was one of the main factors for people wanting to come to America. They had it better off in America. The percentage of poor and homelesss people was much less than it was in England. It was easy to get one hundred acres of land in America where as in England it was nearly impossible. America was new and, in the future colonists’ eyes, unpopulated. Rumors of other settlers prospering and finding gold lured others in. Having an opprotunity to have a finacialy better life than the one they had in England is one of the reasons people came to this New World.  It had always been said that people came to America for religious freedom, and that was deffinatly a factor in people coming to America. Around the same time that people started coming to America the Protestant Reformation was happening all over Europe. People of the Protestant religion were opposed to the Catholic Church. They did were prosecuted and sometimes inprisoned for their beliefs, so they sought freedom and refuge in the New World. Religion was incredibuly important to people during this time. They wanted to follow their beliefs and felt strongly when other disagreed with them. The New World offered the freedom of religion that so many people wanted. Many people fled to the Americas and stayed there because they would be prosecuted for their religion in England. People got to America and were so thrilled to be able to practice the religion that they believed in.  People came to America to change their lives. England was in an economical depression and people did not have any religious freedom. Getting land in America was much easier than it was in England making the possibility for agricultural development was great. A lot of farmers prospered so greatly that they had to expand their land. The New World also served as a place for religious refuges to go. Some of them would have been alieanated or even put in jail for believing in something different than the Catholic Church. People came and stayed to the New World because their lives there were much better than the potential lives they could’ve still been living in England.