Although countless fled from Europe to America in order to avoid religious persecution, it still occurred to innumerable people. The main clash of religions that occurred in America was between Irish-Catholics and Protestants. The native-born Americans that were Catholic did not like the Irish-Catholics either, because they felt their church was being overrun by barbarians. An issue that resulted in countless riots throughout the East Coast was the issue of separation of church and state. Those of Protestant faith believed that they should be separated, and Irish-Catholics were trying to combine them into one body. As a result of Irish political power growing, they were able to accomplish some degree of fusing the two. This was done through schooling. An abundant number of Irish felt that public school created an unsafe environment that targeted their youth based on their background. They also thought that public schools were covers for Protestant proselytism. Consequently, they were able to elicit money from the government to build private, parochial
