European Exploration, Colonization and Conflict (1513–1765)

 European Exploration, Colonization and Conflict (1513–1765)

Christopher Columbus started exploring the Caribbean on behalf of Spain in 1492, resulting in Spanish-speaking colonies and missions from the current Puerto Rico and Florida to California and New Mexico. The earliest Spanish colony in today's continental United States was Spanish Florida, which was chartered in 1513. Following a number of failed settlements there because of starvation and disease, Spain's first permanent town, Saint Augustine, was established in 1565.

France also had its own settlements in French Florida in 1562, but they were either deserted (Charlesfort, 1578) or wrecked by Spanish attacks (Fort Caroline, 1565). Stable French settlements were established much later on the Great Lakes (Fort Detroit, 1701), the Mississippi (Saint Louis, 1764) and particularly the Gulf of Mexico (New Orleans, 1718). Early European settlements also included the successful Dutch settlement of New nederland (established 1626, current-day New York) and the tiny Swedish settlement of New Sweden (established 1638 in Delaware). British settlement of the East Coast started with the Virginia Colony (1607) and the Plymouth Colony (Massachusetts, 1620). The Mayflower Compact in Massachusetts and the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut set the precedents for local representative self-government and constitutionalism that would evolve in the American colonies.

Although European colonists in what is now the United States clashed with Native Americans, they also traded with them, exchanging European tools for pelts and food. Relations varied from close association to warfare and massacres. The colonial governments frequently had policies that compelled Native Americans to adopt European ways, including Christian conversion. On the eastern seacoast, colonists smuggled African slaves from the Atlantic slave trade. The original Thirteen Colonies that would eventually establish the United States were governed as British Empire possessions by crown-appointed governors, but local governments also held open to a majority of white male property owners elections. The colonial population expanded quickly from Maine to Georgia, outgrowing Native American populations by the 1770s, so that the natural growth of the population was such that only a small minority of Americans had been born abroad.

The distance of the colonies from Britain made it easy for self-rule to take root, and the First Great Awakening, a series of Christian revivals, spurred colonial enthusiasm for assured religious freedom.