John Winthrop (1587/88-1649) was an English Puritan lawyer born in Suffolk, England. He studied law at Cambridge University, where his Puritan beliefs began to take shape. Heir to an English Manor, Winthrop became a justice of the peace at age 18. This role, though reserved for the gentry class, was a political office close to the lives of common folk, as its major responsibility was to ensure peacefulness and enforce parliamentary and crown statues at the local level. Winthrop advanced through the courts over the next 20 years, and in 1626 he serves as an attorney in the Court of Wards and Liveries, which dealt mostly with cases of inheritance. This was a corrupt court, and within it Winthrop grew increasingly dissatisfied with the immoral conditions of his work and broader English politics. This corruption increased when Charles I took the throne of England (see Analysis).

As repair of English society from within became an increasingly unlikely proposition, Winthrop’s attention turned to a growing body of Puritans who sought to form a refuge for their faith in the New World. Plymouth, an English colony, was already one such establishment. In 1628, a group of settlers had received permission to found a new colony in the area surrounding present-day Boston.