On 24 May 1689, the Toleration Act received royal assent.

The Act gave many Protestant dissenters in England a legal right to worship outside the Church of England. It was a real change. People who had faced penalties for nonconformist worship could now meet more openly, provided they accepted the conditions set by law.

Those conditions matter. This was tolerance with boundaries.

The Act followed the Glorious Revolution, when James II was deposed, and William III and Mary II took the throne. The new settlement was Protestant, but it had to deal with more than one kind of Protestantism. England still had an established church. It also had Presbyterians, Congregationalists, Baptists, Quakers and other dissenters who would not disappear because the state preferred religious uniformity.

The Act made room for many of them. It allowed registered meeting places and protected certain forms of Protestant worship from older penalties, for dissenters who had lived under pressure, which mattered. Public worship no longer had to depend so heavily on secrecy, local tolerance or the risk of prosecution.

But the Act did not create religious equality. The Church of England kept its privileged place. Dissenters were allowed to worship, but they were still outside the full religious and political settlement. Civil restrictions remained. Public office, universities and parts of national life were still guarded by laws that favoured conformity to the established church.

The exclusions were just as revealing. Catholics were not covered. Nor were non-Trinitarians. The state was not opening the door to all consciences. It was about deciding which forms of disagreement could be tolerated within a Protestant kingdom.

That is what makes the date more useful than a simple freedom story. The Act eased persecution for many Protestant dissenters, but it also showed how narrow official toleration still was. It marked a shift from enforced uniformity towards limited permission, with the law still drawing hard lines around belief, loyalty and belonging.

The Toleration Act is remembered for widening religious life in England. It should also be remembered for the limits it imposed. In 1689, toleration meant relief for some, exclusion for others, and a state still determined to decide how far religious difference could go.