Twisting the Constitution to Kill God

© 2010  By Jim Fletcher

 

Anyone who names an organization “WallBuilders,” especially in this age of multicultural, lovey-dovey, “We are the World” gobbledygook … well, that fellow gets my attention and my respect.  

What historian and educator David Barton is doing is pointing out that the barbarians have been at the gates a good long while now, and we’d better protect ourselves and our families by knowing the foundations of our country.

 Happily for us, there is a David Barton, who has the skill set and energy to craft a book like “Original Intent: The Courts, the Constitution, & Religion.” This substantial book, a healthy 552 pages, also contains several helpful appendices, including a list of cases cited, and an index.

Barton’s research is fascinating, as he outlines what the Constitution is (notice the distinction: conservatives interpret the Constitution on what they know it to be; the left considers what the Constitution was, and acts accordingly to reshape it).

As Barton points out, the “judicial micromanagement” is nowhere more harmful than in the treatment of the First Amendment. There, the courts have, among other things, employed a “psychological coercion test, allowing a single dissenter to silence an entire community’s religious expression.”

This kind of madness makes no rational sense, unless one considers that many members of the courts, including the highest, are simply not Christians. They count on the silence of the majority of Americans, who work and pay taxes every day and do not have time to check these things. Fortunately, David Barton does.

The author rightly points out that the founders meant for our country to enjoy the fullest expressions of credible freedom, by limiting the power of government. As it happens today, we have a president who circumvents these original controls and operates by fiat.

Barton has sifted through thousands of primary-source documents to present a clear picture of where we’ve been and where we are now. The goal is to return a sense of sanity to the courts.

An example of how far we’ve strayed from the original intent of the founders is this fascinating paragraph from the last will and testament of John Jay, the original chief justice of the Supreme Court:

“Unto Him who is the author and giver of all goods, I render sincere and humble thanks for His manifold and unmerited blessings, and especially for our redemption and salvation by His beloved Son … Blessed be His holy name.”

Well, if that wouldn’t ruffle the feathers of at least half the current Court, I don’t know what would. Many of them have obviously left their spiritual legacy behind, and this has opened up the Constitution for constant reinterpretation.

In Chapter 16 of this phenomenal book, Barton also examines the notorious “Revisionists,” those who paint over the canvas of history, to present their own versions of it. Think Uncle Joe Stalin having (dead) political rivals airbrushed from official photos.

Barton points out a key strategy of these Revisionists: “Ignoring those aspects of American heritage which they deem to be politically incorrect and overemphasizing those portions which they find acceptable.”

Pay close attention to the last half of that sentence. That is the diabolical nature in a nutshell, is it not? This is called political spin, and it has proven to be very effective in undermining American culture.

Barton also points out that the Revisionists blatantly lie when necessary.

The author cites the case of Robert Ingersoll, a lecturer of the late 19th century, who stated: “Our forefathers retired God from politics. … The Declaration of Independence announces the sublime truth that all power comes from the people. This was a denial, and the first denial of a nation, of the infamous dogma that God confers the right upon one man to govern others. … Our fathers founded the first secular government that was ever founded in this world.”

There are so many falsehoods in that one statement, one wonders where to start. But notice that Ingersoll’s bias drove the multiple lies in his statement.

By the way, it is interesting to note that thinkers like Ingersoll were aided in the propagation of their false views by such Europeans as Herbert Spencer and Friedrich Delitzsch, who were operating at the same time and who promoted their evolutionary views on society – the reinterpretation of the Constitution is handled in the same manner.

In Chapter 14, “Identifying the Spirit of the Constitution,” Barton makes use of several fascinating charts, tracking the moral decline of the last several generations of Americans. This data even speaks to seemingly more benign subjects, such as SAT scores since 1954. Over a period of 40 years, there was a dramatic decline in scores, and Barton clearly makes the case in “Original Intent” that a multitude of factors affect the overall culture of a nation that drifts from its roots.

For those who enjoy – and understand the importance of – mining rich sources of our spiritual heritage, “Original Intent” is a book you can’t be without.

Courtesy of http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=167257

Contrary to University of Chicago Professor’s Rant: U.S. History includes our Faith

University of Chicago law professor Geoffrey Stone recently wrote an op-ed titled “The crazy imaginings of the Texas Board of Education,” which sought to warn an unsuspecting America that there is “a coterie of Christian evangelicals who are attempting to infiltrate our educational system to brainwash our youth.” His fretful missive was prompted by the Texas Board of Education’s efforts to restore balance to the teaching of American history after decades of successful “progressive” efforts to erase from history and the minds of children the place of Christianity in the founding of America.

The Chicago Tribune decided to publish this piece on Easter. I can only ask: Really — on Easter Sunday?

It has become so commonplace to read denigrating comments about Christians that the offensiveness of such comments barely registers on our tolerance meters. Imagine hearing these words come from the mouth of a professor at a leading American university on Passover: “a coterie of Reform Jews is attempting to infiltrate our educational system to brainwash our youth.” Or imagine these words appearing in the Trib on Eid al-Fitr, the Islamic celebration that concludes Ramadan: “a coterie of Muslims is attempting to infiltrate our educational system to brainwash our youth.”

Stone’s words almost sound bigoted and intolerant. When you look around at our leftist-dominated educational system, his words are laughable.

In the service of bolstering his thesis that America was not founded on Judeo-Christian principles, Stone could be accused of cherry-picking his quotes. For example, Stone recounts that Jefferson “condemned the details of Christian dogma as ‘dross,’ ‘abracadabra,’ ‘insanity,’ ‘a hocus-pocus phantasm,’ and a ‘deliria of crazy imaginations.’ “

Stone’s apparent concern for historical accuracy might be more credible had he included these quotations:

“The fundamental truths reported in the four gospels as from the lips of Jesus Christ … are settled and fixed moral precepts with me.”

— Abraham Lincoln

“Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the duty, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian Nation, to select and prefer Christians for their rulers. “

— John Jay, co-author of the Federalist Papers; first chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court

I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proof I see of this truth that God Governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the sacred writings, that ‘except the Lord build the House they labour in vain that build it.’ I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the Builders of Babel.”

— Benjamin Franklin

“Is it not that in the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior? That it forms a leading event in the progress of the gospel dispensation? Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer’s mission upon the earth? That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity?”

— John Quincy Adams

Stone in all his paranoid hand-wringing about the “infiltration” of education by a coterie — or did he mean “cabal” — of Christian evangelicals is apparently unconcerned about the use in public schools of Howard Zinn’s “The People’s History of the United States” to teach American history, a book that is roundly criticized for its bias.

Dr. Gary Scott Smith, chair of the Grove City College history department and author of “Faith and the Presidency: From George Washington to George W. Bush,” offers a different view from Stone’s:

“Two recent books, edited by Daniel Dreisbach, Jeffry Morrison and Mark David Hall … explained that many who played leading roles in the nation’s Declaration of Independence, the Continental Congress, and the devising and ratification of the Constitution were devout Christians, as evident in their church attendance, commitment to prayer and Bible reading, belief in God’s direction of earthly affairs, and conduct. … virtually all the founders maintained that morality depended on religion (which for them meant Christianity)…. While we must be careful not to overstate the role of religion in the founding of our nation and the Christian convictions of the founders in textbooks or public discourse, the tendency in many scholarly circles has been to ignore or discount these matters.”

With a coterie of “critical pedagogy” proselytes having successfully infiltrated schools of education decades ago, Stone need not fear the 15 Texas school board members.

Laurie Higgins is the Illinois Family Institute’s director of the division of school advocacy.

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Texas school board members dispute critics’ assertions

 

Thomas Jefferson No, Thomas Jefferson is not being removed from social studies curriculum standards in Texas, two prominent members of the Texas State Board of Education say in correcting critics’ erroneous claims.  GRAPEVINE, Texas (BP)–Despite news reports to the contrary, Texas students will be required to learn about Thomas Jefferson and constitutional religious freedom guarantees, say two prominent members of the Texas State Board of Education. Additionally, “Nowhere in our social studies curriculum standards is America referred to as a Christian nation,” said board chairman Gail Lowe, a Republican from Lampasas, Texas, contrary to claims in a March 22 letter to textbook publishers by the liberal Interfaith Alliance. In interviews with the Southern Baptist TEXAN about new social studies standards for Texas public schools, Lowe and Don McLeroy, the immediate past board chairman, said widely circulated news reports contained numerous inaccuracies, including claims that Thomas Jefferson was left out of the standards, that First Amendment religious freedom guarantees were omitted because conservative board members reject the concept of church-state separation, and that religious dogma had crept into the standards. The board meeting, held March 10-12 in Austin, made national and international news, chiefly because Texas buys or distributes about 48 million textbooks annually, influencing textbook content for most other states. The Guardian newspaper of London claimed on its blog that the board was “rewriting history,” an assertion of the Texas Freedom Network, which bills itself a “mainstream voice to counter the religious right.” In the Interfaith Alliance’s letter to textbook publishers, the group’s leader, C. Weldon Gaddy, wrote that the board’s “most egregious vote” was denying separation of religious and government institutions by rejecting a late amendment by Dallas Democrat Mavis Knight that students learn “the reasons the Founding Fathers protected religious freedom in America by barring government from promoting or disfavoring any particular religion over all others.” McLeroy said he believed Knight’s amendment would paint the founders as neutral toward religion generally. “They weren’t,” McLeroy said. “They simply didn’t want a state church, a state religion. That’s it. To say that we were against protecting the religious freedoms of all the people, that is all spin from the Texas Freedom Network. That’s all it is. Because it’s not right.” Lowe added: “The First Amendment very clearly prevents Congress from establishing a national church, but it also promotes the free exercise of religion. Students need to understand that this is what the founders intended. It is inaccurate to say the Founding Fathers were neutral about religion; most were strong proponents of religious faith but did not believe in a national church controlled by the federal government.” The new standards require, among other things, that students “trace the development of religious freedom in the United States” and “analyze the impact of the first amendment guarantees of religious freedom on the American way of life.” Additionally, students must “identify and define unalienable rights” and “identify the freedoms and rights guaranteed by each amendment in the Bill of Rights.” The board’s actions became fodder in the Texas gubernatorial campaign when Bill White, a leading Democratic candidate for governor, claimed on March 17: “Last week the Texas State Board of Education, led by [Gov.] Rick Perry’s appointee, voted to remove Thomas Jefferson from social studies textbook standards. That’s right. Thomas Jefferson … was deleted from a list of historical figures who inspired political change.” Jefferson was removed from a list of leading Enlightenment thinkers in world history curricula, but he is included numerous times in U.S. government and American history, according to copies of the standards obtained by the Texan. As of March 22, the Texas Education Agency had yet to post the standards online for public viewing. Lowe said, “The only historical figure mentioned more times than Thomas Jefferson in our curriculum standards is George Washington. There is no way students in Texas will avoid learning of his contributions to our country.” McLeroy, who is finishing his term this year after being defeated in the Republican primary by Thomas Ratliff, widely considered a moderate, said he voted for removing Jefferson from the world history Enlightenment period because Jefferson was merely “a son” of Enlightenment thinkers such as John Locke, Thomas Hobbes and Voltaire. Responding to critics who say the board has a religious agenda, Lowe said, “The social studies framework is not about religious dogma, church traditions or specific denominational beliefs. To the secular, radical left thinker, however, any mention of religious belief is anathema. It is those voices who are screaming most loudly because they do not want to admit the extent to which religious liberties and religious faith have influenced our country.” Lowe said religious references are plentiful in the country’s founding documents, which are heavily emphasized in the standards. McLeroy said the country was founded on “biblical” principles from Judaism and Christianity, “but you don’t see us putting it in the standards that we are a Christian nation and no one is pushing for that.” “The whole idea of the nature of man — man created in the image of God, man as fallen — those things are found throughout [the founders' writings]. Those are the core beliefs about the nature of man that make our country unique — the importance of the individual created in God’s image; you don’t have a king; and the idea of man as fallen. You cannot trust man 100 percent so you have a separation of powers. That whole form of government is founded upon a biblical view of the nature of man.” During the meeting, the board also turned back some controversial revisions offered by teams comprised of teachers and scholars. The board voted to retain requirements that students learn about historical notables such as Albert Einstein and Thomas Edison and added language about significant political ideas, including the “Laws of Nature and Nature’s God” cited in the Declaration of Independence. The new standards will face a final vote in May when the board meets. Standards for given subjects are revised every 10 years. The board has a 10-5 Republican majority and an eight-member conservative voting bloc. Courtesy of http://www.bpnews.net/bpnews.asp?id=32585&ref=BPNews-RSSFeed0329

Is President Obama Correct: Is America No Longer a Christian Nation?

By David Barton

Over the past several years, President Barack Obama has repeatedly claimed that America is not a Christian nation. He asserted that while a U. S. Senator, ¹ repeated it as a presidential candidate, ² and on a recent presidential trip to Turkey announced to the world that Americans “do not consider ourselves a Christian nation.” ³ (He made that announcement in Turkey because he said it was “a location he said he chose to send a clear message.” ⁴ ) Then preceding a subsequent trip to Egypt, he declared that America was “one of the largest Muslim countries in the world” ⁵ (even though the federal government’s own statistics show that less than one-percent of Americans are Muslims. ⁶

The President’s statements were publicized across the world but received little attention in the American media. Had they been carried here, the President might have been surprised to learn that nearly two-thirds of Americans currently consider America to be a Christian nation ⁷ and therefore certainly might have taken exception with his remarks. But regardless of what today’s Americans might think, it is unquestionable that four previous centuries of American leaders would definitely take umbrage with the President’s statements.

Modern claims that America is not a Christian nation are rarely noticed or refuted today because of the nation’s widespread lack of knowledge about America’s history and foundation. To help provide the missing historical knowledge necessary to combat today’s post-modern revisionism, presented below will be some statements by previous presidents, legislatures, and courts (as well as by current national Jewish spokesmen) about America being a Christian nation. These declarations from all three branches of government are representative of scores of others and therefore comprise only the proverbial “tip of the iceberg.”

Defining a Christian Nation

Contemporary post-modern critics (including President Obama) who assert that America is not a Christian nation always refrain from offering any definition of what the term “Christian nation” means. So what is an accurate definition of that term as demonstrated by the American experience?

Contrary to what critics imply, a Christian nation is not one in which all citizens are Christians, or the laws require everyone to adhere to Christian theology, or all leaders are Christians, or any other such superficial measurement. As Supreme Court Justice David Brewer (1837-1910) explained:

[I]n what sense can [America] be called a Christian nation? Not in the sense that Christianity is the established religion or that the people are in any manner compelled to support it. On the contrary, the Constitution specifically provides that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Neither is it Christian in the sense that all its citizens are either in fact or name Christians. On the contrary, all religions have free scope within our borders. Numbers of our people profess other religions, and many reject all. Nor is it Christian in the sense that a profession of Christianity is a condition of holding office or otherwise engaging in public service, or essential to recognition either politically or socially. In fact, the government as a legal organization is independent of all religions. Nevertheless, we constantly speak of this republic as a Christian nation – in fact, as the leading Christian nation of the world. ⁸

So, if being a Christian nation is not based on any of the above criterion, then what makes America a Christian nation? According to Justice Brewer, America was “of all the nations in the world . . . most justly called a Christian nation” because Christianity “has so largely shaped and molded it.” ⁹

Constitutional law professor Edward Mansfield (1801-1880) similarly acknowledged:

In every country, the morals of a people – whatever they may be – take their form and spirit from their religion. For example, the marriage of brothers and sisters was permitted among the Egyptians because such had been the precedent set by their gods, Isis and Osiris. So, too, the classic nations celebrated the drunken rites of Bacchus. Thus, too, the Turk has become lazy and inert because dependent upon Fate, as taught by the Koran. And when in recent times there arose a nation [i.e., France] whose philosophers [e.g. Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot, Helvetius, etc.] discovered there was no God and no religion, the nation was thrown into that dismal case in which there was no law and no morals. . . . In the United States, Christianity is the original, spontaneous, and national religion. ¹⁰

Founding Father and U. S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall agreed:

[W]ith us, Christianity and religion are identified. It would be strange, indeed, if with such a people our institutions did not presuppose Christianity and did not often refer to it and exhibit relations with it. ¹¹

Christianity is the religion that shaped America and made her what she is today. In fact, historically speaking, it can be irrefutably demonstrated that Biblical Christianity in America produced many of the cherished traditions still enjoyed today, including:

• A republican rather than a theocratic form of government;
• The institutional separation of church and state (as opposed to today’s enforced institutional secularization of church and state);
• Protection for religious toleration and the rights of conscience;
• A distinction between theology and behavior, thus allowing the incorporation into public policy of religious principles that promote good behavior but which do not enforce theological tenets (examples of this would include religious teachings such as the Good Samaritan, The Golden Rule, the Ten Commandments, the Sermon on the Mount, etc., all of which promote positive civil behavior but do not impose ecclesiastical rites); and
• A free-market approach to religion, thus ensuring religious diversity.

Consequently, a Christian nation as demonstrated by the American experience is a nation founded upon Christian and Biblical principles, whose values, society, and institutions have largely been shaped by those principles. This definition was reaffirmed by American legal scholars and historians for generations ¹² but is widely ignored by today’s revisionists.

With his recent statement, President Barack Obama is the first American president to deny that America is a Christian nation – a repudiation of what made America great and a refutation of the declarations of his presidential predecessors. Notice a few representative statements on this subject by some of the forty-three previous presidents:

The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were. . . . the general principles of Christianity. ¹³ JOHN ADAMS

[T]he teachings of the Bible are so interwoven and entwined with our whole civic and social life that it would be literally….impossible for us to figure to ourselves what that life would be if these teaching were removed. ¹⁴ TEDDY ROOSEVELT

America was born a Christian nation – America was born to exemplify that devotion to the elements of righteousness which are derived from the revelations of Holy Scripture. ¹⁵ WOODROW WILSON

American life is builded, and can alone survive, upon . . . [the] fundamental philosophy announced by the Savior nineteen centuries ago. ¹⁶ HERBERT HOOVER

This is a Christian Nation. ¹⁷ HARRY TRUMAN

Let us remember that as a Christian nation . . . we have a charge and a destiny. ¹⁸ RICHARD NIXON

There are many additional examples, including even that of Thomas Jefferson.

Significantly, Jefferson was instrumental in establishing weekly Sunday worship services at the U. S. Capitol (a practice that continued through the 19th century) and was himself a regular and faithful attendant at those church services, ¹⁹ not even allowing inclement weather to dissuade his weekly horseback travel to the Capitol church. ²⁰

(The fact that the U. S. Capitol building was available for church on Sundays was due to the Art. I, Sec. 7 constitutional requirement that forbade federal lawmaking on Sundays; and this recognition of a Christian Sabbath in the U. S. Constitution was cited by federal courts as proof of the Christian nature of America. ²¹ While not every Christian observes a Sunday Sabbath, no other religion in the world honors Sunday except Christianity. As one court noted, the various Sabbaths were “the Friday of the Mohammedan, the Saturday of the Israelite, or the Sunday of the Christian.” ²² )

Why was Jefferson a faithful attendant at the Sunday church at the Capitol? He once explained to a friend while they were walking to church together:

No nation has ever existed or been governed without religion. Nor can be. The Christian religion is the best religion that has been given to man and I, as Chief Magistrate of this nation, am bound to give it the sanction of my example. ²³

President Jefferson even closed presidential documents with “In the year of our Lord Christ” (see below).

Even President Jefferson recognized and treated America as a Christian nation. Clearly, President Obama’s declaration is refuted both by history and by his own presidential predecessors.

Declarations from the Legislative Branch affirming America as a Christian nation are abundant. For example, in 1852-1853 when some citizens sought a complete secularization of the public square and a cessation of all religious activities by the government, Congress responded with unambiguous declarations about America as a Christian nation:

HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: Had the people, during the Revolution, had a suspicion of any attempt to war against Christianity, that Revolution would have been strangled in its cradle. At the time of the adoption of the Constitution and the amendments, the universal sentiment was that Christianity should be encouraged, not any one sect [denomination]. Any attempt to level and discard all religion would have been viewed with universal indignation. . . . In this age there can be no substitute for Christianity; that, in its general principles, is the great conservative element on which we must rely for the purity and permanence of free institutions. ²⁴

SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: We are Christians, not because the law demands it, not to gain exclusive benefits or to avoid legal disabilities, but from choice and education; and in a land thus universally Christian, what is to be expected, what desired, but that we shall pay a due regard to Christianity? ²⁵

In 1856, the House of Representatives also declared:

[T]he great vital and conservative element in our system is the belief of our people in the pure doctrines and divine truths of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. ²⁶

On March 3, 1863 while in the midst of the Civil War, the U. S. Senate requested President Abraham Lincoln to “designate and set apart a day for national prayer and humiliation” ²⁷ because:

[S]incerely believing that no people, however great in numbers and resources or however strong in the justice of their cause, can prosper without His favor; and at the same time deploring the national offences which have provoked His righteous judgment, yet encouraged in this day of trouble by the assurances of His word to seek Him for succor according to His appointed way through Jesus Christ, the Senate of the United States do hereby request the President of the United States, by his proclamation, to designate and set apart a day for national prayer and humiliation. ²⁸ (emphasis added)

President Lincoln quickly complied with that request, ²⁹ and issued what today has become one of the most famous and quoted proclamations in America’s history. ³⁰

Across the generations, our national reliance on God, the Bible, and Christianity has been repeatedly reaffirmed. In fact, consider five representative images produced by the U. S. Government. The first three are from World War II: one shows the Nazis as the enemy because they want to attack the Bible, and the other two encourage Americans to buy War Bonds by pointing to Christian images. The fourth and fifth images are from the Department of Agriculture in the 1960s, using the Bible and even Smokey Bear in prayer as symbols to encourage Americans to be conscious of fire safety and to help preserve and conserve nature.

There are scores of other official actions by the U. S. Congress over the past two centuries affirming that America is a Christian nation.

From the Judicial Branch, consider first some declarations of prominent U. S. Supreme Court Justices regarding America as a Christian nation.

Justice Joseph Story (1779-1845) was appointed to the Court by President James Madison. Story is considered the founder of Harvard Law School and authored the three-volume classic Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1833). In his 34 years on the Court, Story authored opinions in 286 cases, of which 269 were reported as the majority opinion or the opinion of the Court ³¹ and his many contributions to American law have caused him to be called a “Father of American Jurisprudence.” Justice Story openly declared:

One of the beautiful boasts of our municipal jurisprudence is that Christianity is a part of the Common Law. . . . There never has been a period in which the Common Law did not recognize Christianity as lying at its foundations. . . . I verily believe Christianity necessary to the support of civil society. ³²

His conclusion about America and Christianity was straightforward:

In [our] republic, there would seem to be a peculiar propriety in viewing the Christian religion as the great basis on which it must rest for its support and permanence. ³³

Justice John McLean (1785-1861) was appointed to the Court by President Andrew Jackson. McLean served in the U. S. Congress, as a judge on the Ohio Supreme Court, and then held cabinet positions under two U. S. Presidents. His view on the importance of Christianity to American government and its institutions was unambiguous:

For many years, my hope for the perpetuity of our institutions has rested upon Bible morality and the general dissemination of Christian principles. This is an element which did not exist in the ancient republics. It is a basis on which free governments may be maintained through all time. . . . Free government is not a self-moving machine. . . . Our mission of freedom is not carried out by brute force, by canon law, or any other law except the moral law and those Christian principles which are found in the Scriptures. ³⁴

Justice David Brewer (1837-1910), appointed to the Court by President Benjamin Harrison, agreed. Brewer held several judgeships in Kansas and served on a federal circuit court before his appointment to the Supreme Court. Justice Brewer declared:

We constantly speak of this republic as a Christian nation – in fact, as the leading Christian nation of the world. ³⁵

Brewer then chronicled the types of descriptions applied to nations:

We classify nations in various ways: as, for instance, by their form of government. One is a kingdom, another an empire, and still another a republic. Also by race. Great Britain is an Anglo-Saxon nation, France a Gallio, Germany a Teutonic, Russia a Slav. And still again by religion. One is a Mohammedan nation, others are heathen, and still others are Christian nations. This republic is classified among the Christian nations of the world. It was so formally declared by the Supreme Court of the United States. In the case of Holy Trinity Church vs. United States, 143 U.S. 471, that Court, after mentioning various circumstances, added, “these and many other matters which might be noticed, add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation.” ³⁶

Brewer did not believe that calling America a Christian nation was a hollow appellation; in fact, he penned an entire book setting forth the evidence that America was a Christian nation. He concluded:

[I] have said enough to show that Christianity came to this country with the first colonists; has been powerfully identified with its rapid development, colonial and national, and today exists as a mighty factor in the life of the republic. This is a Christian nation. . . . [T]he calling of this republic a Christian nation is not a mere pretence, but a recognition of an historical, legal, and social truth. ³⁷

 

Justice Earl Warren (1891-1974) agreed with his predecessors. Before being appointed as Chief Justice of the U. S. Supreme Court by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Warren had been the Attorney General of California. Warren declared: 

I believe the entire Bill of Rights came into being because of the knowledge our forefathers had of the Bible and their belief in it: freedom of belief, of expression, of assembly, of petition, the dignity of the individual, the sanctity of the home, equal justice under law, and the reservation of powers to the people. . . . I like to believe we are living today in the spirit of the Christian religion. I like also to believe that as long as we do so, no great harm can come to our country. ³⁸

There are many similar declarations by other Supreme Court Justices, but in addition to the declarations of individual judges, the federal courts have repeatedly affirmed America to be a Christian nation – including the U. S. Supreme Court, which declared that America was “a Christian country,” ³⁹ filled with “Christian people,” ⁴⁰ and was indeed “a Christian nation.” ⁴¹ Dozens of other courts past and present have repeated these pronouncements ⁴² but so, too, have American Presidents – as in 1947 when President Harry Truman quoted the Supreme Court, declaring: 

This is a Christian Nation. More than a half century ago that declaration was written into the decrees of the highest court in this land [in an 1892 decision]. ⁴³

In addition to its “Christian nation” declarations, the Supreme Court also regularly relied on Christian principles as the basis of its rulings on issues such as marriage, citizenship, foreign affairs, and domestic treaties. 

For example, when some federal territories attempted to introduce the practice of bigamy and polygamy, the Supreme Court disallowed those practices because: 

Bigamy and polygamy are crimes by the laws of all civilized and Christian countries. ⁴⁴

In another case, the Court similarly explained: 

The organization of a community for the spread and practice of polygamy is . . . . contrary to the spirit of Christianity and of the civilization which Christianity has produced in the Western world. ⁴⁵

And when the issue arose of whether marriages made in foreign nations would be recognized in the United States, the federal court held that foreign marriages would be recognized only if they were not “contrary to the general view of Christendom.” ⁴⁶ 

The Supreme Court also decided military service issues in accord with Christian principles and standards. For example, in 1931, when a Canadian immigrant refused to take the oath of allegiance to the United States, the Supreme Court explained why he was therefore excluded from citizenship: 

We are a Christian people (Holy Trinity Church v. United States. 143 U.S. 457, 470 , 471 S., 12 S. Ct. 511), according to one another the equal right of religious freedom and acknowledging with reverence the duty of obedience to the will of God. But also we are a nation with the duty to survive; a nation whose Constitution contemplates war as well as peace; whose government must go forward upon the assumption (and safely can proceed upon no other) that unqualified allegiance to the nation and submission and obedience to the laws of the land, as well those made for war as those made for peace, are not inconsistent with the will of God. ⁴⁷

The Supreme Court also relied on Christian principles in its rulings on international policies. For example, if an American citizen living in a foreign land was accused of a crime under the laws of a fundamentally different nation (such as in Islamic nations, secular nations, and most recently in Japan following World War II), by means of international treaties, the U. S. citizen would be tried in front of the U. S. Consul in that nation (in what were called Consular Tribunals) rather than before the courts of that country. Of this practice, the Supreme Court explained: 

In other than Christian countries, they [the Consuls] were by treaty stipulations usually clothed with authority to hear complaints against their countrymen and to sit in judgment upon them when charged with public offenses. . . . The intense hostility of the people of Moslem faith to all other sects, and particularly to Christians, affected all their intercourse [transactions] and all proceedings had in their tribunals. Even the rules of evidence adopted by them [the Muslims] placed those of different faith on unequal grounds in any controversy with them. For this cause, and by reason of the barbarous and cruel punishments inflicted in those countries and the frequent use of torture to enforce confession from parties accused, it was a matter of deep interest to Christian governments to withdraw the trial of their subjects, when charged with the commission of a public offense, from the arbitrary and despotic action of the local officials. Treaties conferring such jurisdiction upon these consuls were essential to the peaceful residence of Christians within those countries. ⁴⁸

For example, an Islamic nation might charge an American with the capital-offense crime of blasphemy merely because the American attended Christian worship or used a Bible in that country; or a secular nation might accuse an American of the crime of proselytizing simply for sharing his faith with another (currently a crime in France, ⁴⁹ across India, ⁵⁰ Pakistan, ⁵¹ Saudi Arabia, ⁵² Malaysia, ⁵³ and many other nations). In such cases, the Consul tried the offense under America’s laws as a Christian nation. However, if another nation accused an American of a crime such as murder, the charge would stand since murder was also a crime in our Christian nation. ⁵⁴ 

The Supreme Court commended this position ⁵⁵ and federal courts observed the policy until deep into the twentieth century, ⁵⁶ when many foreign nations finally began to adopt what the Supreme Court had earlier called “a system of judicial procedure like that of Christian countries.” ⁵⁷ 

Federal domestic treaties were yet another area in which the federal judiciary relied on Christian principles and standards. For example, by 1877 a number of disputes had arisen in which Indian lands were wrongly being taken for timber, minerals, and other resources. When those cases reached the Supreme Court, the Court affirmed the occupancy rights of the tribes to the lands because: 

It is to be presumed that in this matter the United States would be governed by such considerations of justice as would control a Christian people . . . ⁵⁸

The Court repeated this position on numerous subsequent occasions – as in 1903 when it reiterated: 

[I]n decisions of this court, the Indian right of occupancy of tribal lands, whether declared in a treaty or otherwise created, has been stated to be sacred. . . . Thus. . . . “It is to be presumed that in this matter the United States would be governed by such considerations of justice as would control a Christian people . . . ” ⁵⁹

The Court’s position was subsequently enacted into federal statutory law in 1906, ⁶⁰ and in 1955, the Supreme Court was still praising this position ⁶¹ – a position regularly cited by other courts for decades, ⁶² including in the late 1990s. ⁶³ 

These are just a few examples of the literally hundreds of similar cases at both federal and state levels affirming that America is indeed a Christian nation. 

American Jewish Leaders Agree with History 

Jewish leaders, although firmly committed to their own faith, understand that by defending Christianity they are defending what has provided them their own religious liberty in America. For example, Jeff Jacoby, a Jewish columnist at the Boston Globe explains: 

This is a Christian country – it was founded by Christians and built on broad Christian principles. Threatening? Far from it. It is in precisely this Christian country that Jews have known the most peaceful, prosperous, and successful existence in their long history. ⁶⁴

Aaron Zelman (a Jewish author and head of a civil rights organization) similarly declares: 

[C]hristian America is the best home our people have found in 2,000 years. . . . [T]his remains the most tolerant, prosperous, and safest home we could be blessed with. ⁶⁵

Dennis Prager, a Jewish national columnist and popular talkshow host, warns: 

If America abandons its Judeo-Christian values basis and the central role of the Jewish and Christian Bibles (its Founders’ guiding text), we are all in big trouble, including, most especially, America’s non-Christians. Just ask the Jews of secular Europe. ⁶⁶

Prager further explained: 

I believe that it is good that America is a Christian nation. . . . I have had the privilege of speaking in nearly every Jewish community in America over the last 30 years, and I have frequently argued in favor of this view. Recently, I spoke to the Jewish community of a small North Carolina city. When some in the audience mentioned their fear of rising religiosity among Christians, I asked these audience-members if they loved living in their city. All of them said they did. Is it a coincidence, I then asked, that the city you so love (for its wonderful people, its safety for your children, its fine schools, and its values that enable you to raise your children with confidence) is a highly Christian city? Too many Americans do not appreciate the connection between American greatness and American Christianity. ⁶⁷

Don Feder, a Jewish columnist and long time writer for the Boston Herald, similarly acknowledges: 

Clearly this nation was established by Christians. . . . As a Jew, I’m entirely comfortable with the concept of the Christian America. ⁶⁸ The choice isn’t Christian America or nothing, but Christian America or a neo-pagan, hedonistic, rights-without-responsibilities, anti-family, culture-of-death America. As an American Jew. . . . [I] feel very much at home here. ⁶⁹

In fact, Feder calls on Jews to defend the truth that America is a Christian Nation: 

Jews – as Jews – must oppose revisionist efforts to deny our nation’s Christian heritage, must stand against the drive to decouple our laws from Judeo-Christian ethics, and must counter attacks on public expressions of the religion of most Americans – Christianity. Jews are safer in a Christian America than in a secular America. ⁷⁰

Michael Medved, a Jewish national talkshow host and columnist, agrees that America is indeed a Christian nation: 

The framers may not have mentioned Christianity in the Constitution but they clearly intended that charter of liberty to govern a society of fervent faith, freely encouraged by government for the benefit of all. Their noble and unprecedented experiment never involved a religion-free or faithless state but did indeed presuppose America’s unequivocal identity as a Christian nation. ⁷¹

Burt Prelutsky, a Jewish columnist for the Los Angeles Times (and a freelance writer for the New York Times, Washington Times, Sports Illustrated, and other national publications) and a patriotic Jewish American, gladly embraces America as a Christian nation and even resents the secularist post-modern attack on national Christian celebrations such as Christmas: 

I never thought I’d live to see the day that Christmas would become a dirty word. . . .How is it, one well might ask, that in a Christian nation this is happening? And in case you find that designation objectionable, would you deny that India is a Hindu country, that Turkey is Muslim, that Poland is Catholic? That doesn’t mean those nations are theocracies. But when the overwhelming majority of a country’s population is of one religion, and most Americans happen to be one sort of Christian or another, only a darn fool would deny the obvious. . . . This is a Christian nation, my friends. And all of us are fortunate it is one, and that so many millions of Americans have seen fit to live up to the highest precepts of their religion. It should never be forgotten that, in the main, it was Christian soldiers who fought and died to defeat Nazi Germany and who liberated the concentration camps. Speaking as a member of a minority group – and one of the smaller ones at that – I say it behooves those of us who don’t accept Jesus Christ as our savior to show some gratitude to those who do, and to start respecting the values and traditions of the overwhelming majority of our fellow citizens, just as we keep insisting that they respect ours. Merry Christmas, my friends. ⁷²

Orthodox Rabbi Daniel Lapin of the Jewish Policy Center unequivocally declares 

[I] understand that I live . . . in a Christian nation, albeit one where I can follow my faith as long as it doesn’t conflict with the nation’s principles. The same option is open to all Americans and will be available only as long as this nation’s Christian roots are acknowledged and honored. ⁷³

In fact, with foreboding he warns: 

Without a vibrant and vital Christianity, America is doomed, and without America, the west is doomed. Which is why I, an Orthodox Jewish rabbi, devoted to Jewish survival, the Torah, and Israel am so terrified of American Christianity caving in. ⁷⁴ God help Jews if America ever becomes a post-Christian society! Just think of Europe! ⁷⁵

— — — ◊ ◊ ◊ — — — 

President Obama’s declaration that Americans “do not consider ourselves a Christian nation” is a repudiation of the declarations of the national leaders before him and is an unabashed attempt at historical revisionism. Of such efforts, Chief Justice William Rehnquist wisely observed, “no amount of repetition of historical errors . . . can make the errors true.” ⁷⁶ 

Americans must now decide whether centuries of presidents, congresses, and courts are correct or whether President Obama is, but historical fact does not change merely because the President declares it. 

The best antidote to the type of revisionism embodied by President Obama’s statement is for citizens (1) to know the truth of America’s history and (2) share that truth with others. 

Picture Credits:
p. 2, “John Marshall,” Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, Theodor Horydczak Collection, LC-H814-T-C01-518-A; p. 4, “Thomas Jefferson,” Independence National Historical Park; p. 7, “Joseph Story,” The Collection of the Supreme Court of the United States (Artist: George P.A. Healy); “John McLean,” The Collection of the Supreme Court of the United States (Artist: Charles Bird King); “David Brewer,” Library of Congress.

 Courtesy of Wallbuilders at http://www.wallbuilders.com/LIBissuesArticles.asp?id=23909