If you are going to name a group of Christians to feel for, it is best to list another one, besides the Puritans.
The Puritans were the religious fanatics of their day. They believed they had the right to tell everyone else what to do. They were control freaks, one and all.
Modern yankee arrogance can be traced directly back to the Puritans, they just basically replaced God with Government.
In other words, they were just like everyone else. But they went a lot easier on heretics compared to the Catholics or the English church.
The advantage of Protestants is that there are so many different, independent sects. That means that 1) No single group can gain too much power. And 2) compartmentalization limits the spread of corruption. The competition with other churches causes the bad ones to eventually fail.