In an 1885 letter to my grandfather, a cousin, Rev. John S. Brown, wrote: "Your grandfather Abner Brown would not pay a tax for the support of the Congregational minister and was carried to jail because he refused to pay it. He paid generously for the support of his own [Baptist] minister, Elder John Parkhurst, and he thought it unjust to be compelled to pay for the support of a minister whose church he did not attend. By suffering himself to be imprisoned rather than to pay an unjust tax, he attracted the notice of fellow citizens to the great injustice of being compelled to support a denomination with which he had little sympathy. I think this determination to go to jail and to prison rather than pay an unjust tax had a large influence in getting the laws of New Hamoshire changed so that there should be no compulsion in paying a minister tax but that the support of preaching should be made a voluntary matter...." This Abner Brown (Josiah5, John4, Thomas3, Boaz2, Thomas1) was born in New Ipswich in 1776 and died there in 1824, so the event mentioned probably happened in the period 1800-1824. I'm aware that Massachusetts had this sort of "established religion" from very early on, and its diaspora carried it to other states. For general background on the ending of this practice, particularly with regard to Mas. and N.H., can any readers suggest books or other sources for me to read? Stewart Rowe