Is it time to remove “and Providence Plantations” from the state’s official name?

TIME TO LET GO: Visitors to the Statehouse can see the seal of the State of Rhode Island and Providence ­Plantations. / PBN FILE PHOTO/FRANK MULLIN
VISITORS to the Statehouse can see the seal of the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. Statehouse leaders have said voters will again get the chance in November to decide whether "Providence Plantations" should be deleted from the state's official name. / PBN FILE PHOTO/FRANK MULLIN

Ten years ago, Rhode Island voters overwhelmingly rejected eliminating “Providence Plantations” from the state’s official name.

Statehouse leaders have said they’ll pass legislation giving voters another chance to eliminate the phrase in November. It’s already been struck from official state, General Assembly and Providence city documents in recent weeks in reaction to local and national protests against systemic racism.

Some see the phrase, which is part of the official state seal on display at the Statehouse, as a symbol of the type of systemic racism that has led to protests across the country. Others, however, see it as a link to the state’s founding that’s worth preserving and feel it has been unfairly dragged into the debate over racial inequities that has roiled much of the nation.

Is it time to remove “and Providence Plantations” from the state’s official name?

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  1. It is not time to remove “ and Providence Plantations” from the state name. The colony so named in the royal charter granted to Roger Williams. At that time in the 17th century, the word “plantation” was a term coined in Elizabethan England and simply meant “farm” and/or the “planting” of colonists from England to the New World.

    More importantly, the name was the result of uniting two factions in the area – the Aquideck island region (Newport and environs, originally thought by early explorer Giovanni da Verrazano to resemble the island of Rhodes – hence the name Rhode Island) and Providence, which was largely a farming community in the 17th century. These two areas were both competing for Royal charters (as was the Warwick area lead by Samuel Gorton)

    The Royal charter hard fought for and eventually secured by Roger Williams united these factions into the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.

    The word “plantation” had nothing to do with slavery. In fact, in the original colonial constitution framed by Roger Williams, slavery was forbidden in the colony.

    Our state name is not and should not be equated with the confederate flag or other icons of slavery and white supremacy.

    I am not a fan of removing words from the English language to suit the whims and/or sensitvities of people who are ignorant of history and the real meaning of words. Eliminating “and Providence Plantations” from the state name would not only damage the great history of our state but more importantly would also do a grave injustice to Roger Williams who founded the colony on the noblest of principles – principles that became the foundation of our beloved democracy.

    But the hollow gesture of changing the state name is nothing more than meaningless window dressing that covers up the root of the problem. We need radical change to eliminate blatant and systemic racism – plain and simple.

    Let’s start with reimagining our democracy by making such radical changes. Once that goal is achieved, then we can deal with matters like needlessly changing the good name of our state, keeping in mind that “foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.”