Rhode Island

Native Americans were living in southern New England by about 9500 BC. The Wampanoag held the east side of Narragansett Bay, and an epidemic in 1616–1619 severely reduced their numbers; the Narragansett, nearly 5,000 strong, controlled about two-thirds of present-day Rhode Island; the Nipmuc lived in the northwest and the Niantic along the southern coast.⁠[1]

The Pequot were defeated by the Narragansett in 1632, and smallpox reduced their numbers from 16,000 to about 3,000 the following year; in 1637 Puritan colonists and their Narragansett allies nearly annihilated the Pequot.⁠[1]

Roger Williams sailed from England to the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630; banished from MassachusettsMassachusettsMassachusetts (officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts) is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States; its capital and largest city is Boston. One of the original 13 states, it ratified the U.S. Constitution on February 6, 1788, the sixth state to do so. Its population in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) was 7,029,917.Open the full entry for his religious views, he founded Providence in 1636 on land obtained from Narragansett sachems, and it became a center of religious liberty. In 1638 he founded the first Baptist church in America in Providence.⁠[2][1]

In 1638 Anne Hutchinson and her followers, also exiled from Massachusetts, founded Pocasset (Portsmouth) with Williams’s help; in 1639 William Coddington and eight other families left Portsmouth to found Newport; and in 1643 Samuel Gorton founded Shawomet (Warwick). That year Williams published A Key into the Language of America, the first dictionary of an Algonquian language and its culture.⁠[1][2]

In 1643–1644 Williams secured a parliamentary patent uniting the towns as “Providence Plantations in Narragansett Bay.” In 1644 Aquidneck Island was renamed Rhode Island. In 1647 officials of Providence, Portsmouth, Newport and Warwick created a government for Providence Plantations that established citizens’ rights, and Coddington’s resistance ended in a loose confederacy. In 1652 Rhode Island passed a law banning slavery, though it was not well enforced.⁠[2][1]

After the restoration of the monarchy, John Clarke obtained a second charter in 1663, the Royal Charter, which guaranteed Rhode Islanders freedom of religion and the right to govern themselves; it remained in force until 1842. Neighboring colonies, including Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay and ConnecticutConnecticutConnecticut is a U.S. state in the New England region. Its capital is Hartford and its largest city is Bridgeport (2010 census). It entered the Union on January 9, 1788, as the 5th state, and had a population of 3,605,944 in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020).Open the full entry, repeatedly tried to claim or absorb Rhode Island’s territory.⁠[1][2]

King Philip’s War, named for the Wampanoag sachem Metacomet, began in 1675 and lasted 14 months. Rhode Island was not an official party but suffered greatly: in December 1675 a United Colonies army attacked the Narragansett in the Great Swamp Fight, and in March 1676 the Narragansett burned Providence in retaliation. The war permanently changed Rhode Island: Native power was broken, most Indigenous people were captured, killed or left, some were sold into slavery, and most of the colony was opened to settlement.⁠[2][1]

Under King James II’s Dominion of New England (1686–1689), Rhode Island was reduced to a county; it hid its charter and reasserted its independence after James was overthrown in 1689.⁠[1]

Religious toleration drew Quakers and Jews, who built transatlantic trade networks. Newport was the colony’s leading town until the Revolution and the fifth largest in British colonial America. In 1696 the Seaflower, the first documented slave ship, arrived in Newport, and Rhode Island ships became the principal American carriers of enslaved people. In 1705 a section of Newport’s Common Burying Ground, established in 1640 for all residents regardless of religion, race or social status, was set aside for African Americans and became known as “God’s Little Acre.”⁠[1][2]

The Great Friends Meeting House was built in Newport in 1699; Newport citizens founded the Redwood Library, the oldest lending library in America, in 1747; Ann Franklin became the first female editor of an American newspaper, the Newport Mercury, in 1762; and Touro Synagogue, the oldest in America, was dedicated in Newport in 1763.⁠[2]

In 1772 the British customs vessel Gaspee ran aground while pursuing a smuggler, and citizens of Providence boarded and burned it; no one was punished, and the Department of State calls it the first armed rebellion against England. In 1774 Providence citizens were the first to propose a Continental Congress. Rhode Island sent aid to Massachusetts after the Boston Tea Party and dispatched its militia immediately after the first shots of the Revolution in April 1775.⁠[1][2][3]

On May 4, 1776, Rhode Island passed the Act of Renunciation, becoming the first colony to renounce its allegiance to King George III. The British occupied Newport for more than three years (1776–1779), bombarded Bristol and foraged extensively in the south; half of Newport’s people fled, and the British burned nearly 500 buildings for firewood.⁠[2][3]

In 1778 the General Assembly authorized the 1st Rhode Island Regiment, often called the “Black Regiment,” the first regiment of African American and Native American soldiers; that year the first combined Franco-American operation failed to dislodge the British at the Battle of Rhode Island, where the battalion distinguished itself. The British withdrew in October 1779, and in July 1780 about 6,000 French troops landed at Newport to join General George Washington. General Nathanael Greene of Rhode Island commanded the American forces that defeated British efforts in Georgia and the Carolinas (1780–1781), forcing Lord Cornwallis to retreat to Yorktown, VirginiaVirginiaVirginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state whose capital is Richmond. It entered the Union on June 25, 1788, as the 10th state, and had a population of 8,631,393 in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020).Open the full entry. In 1781 the 1st and 2nd Rhode Island Regiments combined to form the first integrated regiment in the United States.⁠[2][3]

Satisfied with the Articles of Confederation, which created a weak central government and left the state much independence, Rhode Island blocked efforts to strengthen them and refused to send delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. In 1788 it held the only popular vote on ratification and rejected the Constitution, 2,711 to 239. After repeatedly defeating ratification, it ratified more than a year after the Constitution took effect, recommending amendments including one protecting religious freedom.⁠[3][2]

Between September 1787 and January 1790 the legislature rejected 11 attempts to call a ratifying convention. On May 18, 1790, the U.S. Senate passed a bill to prohibit commercial intercourse with Rhode Island, and the state’s ratifying convention finally approved the Constitution by 34 votes to 32.⁠[4]

Rhode Island’s economy shifted from seaborne commerce to industry, and the state led the American Industrial Revolution. In 1790 Samuel Slater’s mill launched the American textile industry with the country’s first power-driven spinning machines, and in 1793 he built a water-powered textile mill in Pawtucket. In 1824 women workers in Pawtucket organized America’s first factory strike, protesting long hours and lower wages. Textiles remained the principal industry until the 1920s, and the factories drew a flood of immigrants.⁠[3][2]

By the 1890s the Providence area alone had more than 1,500 factories, and the state also developed metal trades, including machine-tool and textile-machine makers, and dozens of early automobile and truck makers. Nationally known manufacturers included Gorham (silver), BrownBrown UniversityBrown University is a private nonprofit research university in Providence, Rhode Island, and a member of the Ivy League. Chartered by Rhode Island's colonial legislature in 1764, it is known for its undergraduate Open Curriculum, which has no common required core. Christina H. Paxson, president since July 2012, announced on August 3, 2026, that the 2026–27 academic year would be her last in office. As of October 1, 2026, the search for Brown's 20th president remained underway.Open the full entry & Sharpe (precision machine tools, which standardized measuring tools in 1853), Nicholson File Co., American Screw Company, U.S. Rubber and J&P Coats.⁠[3][2]

In 1833 Providence citizens held the first public anti-slavery meeting. As the state urbanized, retention of the colonial charter gave rural interests disproportionate influence, and only property owners could vote or hold office, a requirement other states had dropped by 1840; the General Assembly refused to reapportion seats or expand suffrage.⁠[2][3]

In 1842 a convention led by Thomas Wilson Dorr drafted a new constitution, which was approved by referendum, and Dorr was elected governor; when the charter government refused to yield, Dorr’s followers attacked the Providence arsenal, the rebellion failed, and Dorr was sentenced to life imprisonment for treason in 1844, being released a year later. The rebellion forced the state to adopt its first state constitution shortly afterward, which enfranchised African Americans but discriminated against foreign-born citizens, mainly Irish Catholics, fueling ethnic and religious tensions into the 20th century.⁠[3][2]

During the Civil War industrial Rhode Island could supply nearly all of an army’s equipment, from cannons and rifles to uniforms and tents, and more than 24,000 men joined the Federal army, exceeding the state’s quota by 5,000.⁠[3]

In 1867 Elizabeth Buffum Chace submitted the first of many woman suffrage petitions to the legislature, and the next year she and Pauline Wright Davis founded the Rhode Island chapter of the Women’s Suffrage Association. In 1885 the Reverend Mahlon Van Horne became the first African American elected to the General Assembly, and he was re-elected in 1887 and 1889. In 1887 the General Assembly passed a woman suffrage amendment, the first in New England, but it failed in a statewide referendum.⁠[2]

Construction of a new State House began in 1895; it was completed nine years later and was among the first major public buildings in the United States with electricity.⁠[2]

The 1986 Constitutional Convention was the state’s third major constitutional convention. It proposed amendments to voters and prepared an updated version of the 1843 Constitution that incorporated previous amendments and removed superseded language; this 1986 version is the one posted on the General Assembly website.⁠[5]

In 2020 voters removed “Providence Plantations” from the official name of the state, and the current state seal reads “State of Rhode Island.”⁠[6]

In the apportionment following the 2020 census, Rhode Island kept its two seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, with an average of 549,082 people per seat. Rhode Island has four electoral votes in the 2024 and 2028 presidential elections.⁠[7][8]

As of November 2026 the governor is Dan McKee, who became governor in March 2021 as Rhode Island’s 76th; he was previously elected lieutenant governor in 2014 and served 12 years as mayor of Cumberland. The state legislature is the General Assembly, and the state courts form the Rhode Island Judiciary.⁠[9][10]

The General Assembly has 38 Senate districts and 75 House districts, and its members serve two-year terms without term limits. The executive branch consists of five independent General Officers, each elected statewide.⁠[11]

The Rhode Island Supreme Court is the state’s court of last resort and consists of a chief justice and four justices. The Judicial Nominating Commission submits three to five names to the governor, who appoints a justice from among them with the advice and consent of both the Senate and the House of Representatives. The court also supervises the other state courts, advises on the constitutionality of legislation, and regulates bar admission and discipline; its courtroom is on the seventh floor of the Licht Judicial Complex, 250 Benefit Street, Providence. The court’s name was shortened to “the Supreme Court” in 1843.⁠[12]

The state has 39 cities and towns.⁠[13]

The Secretary of State is Gregg M. Amore. The State Archives, part of the Department of State, holds records dating back to 1638, including Rhode Island’s copies of the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights; the Rhode Island Historical Records Advisory Board was established in 1976.⁠[14]

By U.S. Census Bureau measurements based on state boundaries as of January 1, 2010, Rhode Island has a total area of 1,545 square miles (4,001 km²), of which 1,034 square miles (2,678 km²) is land and 511 square miles (1,324 km²) is water. Its coastline is 40 miles long and its shoreline 384 miles. The highest point is Jerimoth Hill in Providence County, at 812 feet (about 247 m); the lowest point is sea level on the Atlantic Ocean.⁠[15][16][17]

U.S. Census Bureau Vintage 2025 estimates put Rhode Island’s population at 1,114,521 on July 1, 2025, up 1.6% from the April 1, 2020, estimates base of 1,097,357; population density in 2020 was 1,061.4 people per square mile. In 2020–2024, 15.3% of residents were foreign-born.⁠[18]

Bureau of Economic Analysis data put Rhode Island’s nominal GDP at $88.24 billion ($88,240.6 million) in 2025 and $83.22 billion ($83,216.5 million) in 2024. Median household income for 2020–2024 was $87,796 (in 2024 dollars), and the state had 29,510 employer establishments in 2023.⁠[19][18]

Brown University was established in Warren in 1764 as “the College,” the first college in Rhode Island; the Rhode Island State Normal School, founded in Providence in 1854, later became Rhode Island College; and the University of Rhode Island was founded in Kingston in 1892 as the Rhode Island College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts. In 2020–2024, 37.7% of residents aged 25 and over held a bachelor’s degree or higher.⁠[2][18]

Rhode Island’s nickname is the “Ocean State,” the official license-plate nickname, and its motto, “Hope,” comes from the state arms. The state seal was first adopted in 1664; the arms of the state, first adopted in 1882, show a golden anchor on a blue field with the motto “Hope”; and the state flag, first adopted in 1877, is white with a gold anchor, a blue ribbon bearing the motto “Hope” in gold, and thirteen gold stars in a circle.⁠[16][6]

The state bird is the Rhode Island Red (May 3, 1954); the state tree the red maple (March 6, 1964); the state mineral bowenite and the state rock cumberlandite were both adopted on May 26, 1966; the state flower is the violet (March 11, 1968), the state shell the quahaug (June 30, 1987), the state fruit the Greening apple (June 20, 1991), the state drink coffee milk (July 29, 1993), the state song “Rhode Island Is It for Me” (July 29, 1996), the state fish the striped bass (July 13, 2000) and the state appetizer calamari (June 27, 2014).⁠[6]

State of Rhode Island: Official website: https://www.ri.gov/ (opens in a new window).⁠[10]

Governor Dan McKee: Official website: https://governor.ri.gov/about (opens in a new window).⁠[9]