The Flushing Remonstrance was a 1657 petition to Director-General of New Netherland Peter Stuyvesant, in which some thirty residents of the small settlement at Vlishing requested an exemption to his ban on Quaker worship. It is considered a precursor to the United States Constitution's provision on freedom of religion in the Bill of Rights. Its 350th anniversary was celebrated in 2007 in ceremonies throughout Queens, New York.

According to Kenneth T. Jackson, the Flushing Remonstrance was remarkable for four reasons:

Background

Vlissengen, or "Vlishing," now the community of Flushing in Queens, New York, had been part of the Dutch colony of New Netherland. It was originally settled by English people operating under a patent, issued by Governor Willem Kieft in 1645, granting them the same state of religious freedom existing in Holland, then the most tolerant of European countries.