New england colony that became the first to champion and guarantee religious freedom:

Rhode Island. The colony of Rhode Island was founded by a puritan minister named Roger Williams, who was a strong advocate of a separation between church and state, as well as religious freedoms and tolerances among peoples. Originally, Roger Williams was a minister in Massachusetts but expelled in 1636 for having too radical ideas about religious freedom and separating government authority from religious practice. He then relocated to Rhode Island and set up a colony that guaranteed religious toleration and early advocacy for abolition of slavery.