2.3Thirteen different colonies

The English colonies were never a single society. New England, settled heavily by Puritans, built town-centered communities around religion, farming, and shipping. The Middle Colonies—New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey—were diverse in religion and ethnicity, with Pennsylvania's Quakers promoting relative tolerance.

The Southern colonies developed plantation economies growing tobacco, rice, and indigo for export, and became increasingly dependent on enslaved labor. These regional differences—in religion, economy, and the scale of slavery—would echo through American history for centuries, shaping conflicts that long outlasted the colonial era.