“Ancient Principles” Birthed the Greatest Nation the World Has Ever Known

(The following is taken from The Miracle and Magnificence of America.)

On the same day that the Declaration of Independence became official, an extremely telling event further reveals that our founders understood well the “ancient principles” upon which our republic must be built. On July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Congress appointed a committee—consisting of Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and John Adams—to design an official seal for the United States. Adams proposed an image of Hercules contemplating the persuasions of Virtue and Sloth.

Franklin proposed a biblical theme:

Moses standing on the Shore, and extending his Hand over the Sea, thereby causing the same to overwhelm Pharaoh who is sitting in an open Chariot, a Crown on his Head and a Sword in his hand. Rays from a Pillar of Fire in the Clouds reaching to Moses, to express that he acts by Command of the Deity. Motto: Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God.

Nineteenth Century Artistic Rendition of Franklin’s Proposed Design for the U.S. Seal

Likewise, Jefferson preferred a biblical theme. According to a letter from John Adams to his wife Abigail, Jefferson proposed:

The Children of Israel in the Wilderness, led by a Cloud by day, and a Pillar of Fire by night, and on the other Side Hengist and Horsa, the Saxon Chiefs, from whom We claim the Honour of being descended and whose Political Principles and Form of Government We have assumed.

Our founders understood well that the story of Moses embodied what they hoped would be the story of America. Bruce Feiler, author of America's Prophet: Moses and the American Story, says that, more than any other ancient figure, “Moses embodies the American story. He is the champion of oppressed people; he transforms disparate tribes in a forbidding wilderness into a nation of laws; he is the original proponent of freedom and justice for all.”

The committee agreed on an image of thirteen linked shields, each bearing the designation of a state and the motto “E Pluribus Unum,” along with the all-seeing eye of the Creator inside a triangle. On the reverse side was the biblical scene and the motto “Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God.”

However, Congress tabled the matter for several years and eventually adopted the seal and the motto as we have them today. On the reverse side of the seal is a 13-step pyramid, with the year 1776 in Roman numerals along the base. At the top of the pyramid is the Eye of Providence with the Latin motto ANNUIT COEPTIS (“[God] has favored our undertakings”) in the sky above. As the coming Revolutionary War would further prove, God had indeed “favored” the undertakings of the United States. Such favor was no doubt due to the firm faith demonstrated by those who sought to build a nation that, as Puritan leader John Winthrop would envision nearly a century-and-a-half earlier, would serve the world as a “City upon a Hill.”

After defeating the British, the trouble for the new United States of America was far from over. Winning a war was one thing; creating a functioning and thriving nation was quite another. It was becoming clear that the U.S. was not going to survive under the Articles of Confederation. After the Declaration of Independence, the United States of America would wait another 11 years (13 years before it would actually go into effect) for the strong charter of liberty called the U.S. Constitution. The Constitution would provide the enduring legal strength necessary for the U.S. to survive and thrive as a republic.

On December 6, 1787, by unanimous consent, Delaware became the first state to ratify the new Constitution. New Jersey and Georgia soon followed, also by unanimous consent. On December 12, 1787, by a vote of 46 to 23, Pennsylvania approved the Constitution. In 1788, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maryland, and South Carolina made it eight states.

New Hampshire was the last of the necessary nine states needed to ratify the Constitution. As I note in The Miracle and Magnificence of America, in order to persuade his fellow delegates to vote in favor of the U.S. Constitution, Samuel Langdon, a distinguished theologian and scholar, delivered an “election sermon” entitled, The Republic of the Israelites an Example to the American States.

After beginning by quoting Deuteronomy 4:5-8 in his sermon, Langdon noted,

[T]he Israelites may be considered as a pattern to the world in all ages; and from them we may learn what will exalt our character, and what will depress and bring us to ruin. Let us therefore look over their constitution and laws, enquire into their practice, and observe how their prosperity and fame depended on their strict observance of the divine commands both as to their government and religion.

Langdon then gave an account of how Moses, upon the wise counsel of his father-in-law Jethro, “the priest of Midian,” set up a republican form of government, with representatives (“leaders,” “rulers,” “judges,” depending on the biblical translation) from groups of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens. In addition, 70 elders, or wise-men—a type of national Senate as described by biblical and Jewish scholars—were selected by Moses and approved by the consent of the people.

Langdon added,

A government thus settled on republican principles, required laws; without which it must have degenerated immediately into aristocracy, or absolute monarchy. But God did not leave a people, wholly unskilled in legislation, to make laws for themselves: he took this important matter wholly into His own hands, and beside the moral laws of the two tables, which directed their conduct as individuals, gave them by Moses a complete code of judicial laws.

Langdon goes on to describe how this republican form of government helped the nation of Israel grow from a “mere mob” to a “well regulated nation, under a government and laws far superior to what any other nation could boast!” After detailing Israel’s later struggles—they would eventually “[neglect] their government, [corrupt] their religion, and [grow] dissolute in their morals”—Langston exhorted his fellow citizens to learn from the nation of Israel.

That as God in the course of his kind providence hath given you an excellent constitution of government, founded on the most rational, equitable, and liberal principles, by which all that liberty is secured which a people can reasonably claim, and you are empowered to make righteous laws for promoting public order and good morals; and as he has moreover given you by his son Jesus Christ, who is far superior to Moses, a complete revelation of his will, and a perfect system of true religion, plainly delivered in the sacred writings; it will be your wisdom in the eyes of the nations, and your true interest and happiness, to conform your practice in the strictest manner to the excellent principles of your government, adhere faithfully to the doctrines and commands of the gospel, and practice every public and private virtue. By this you will increase in numbers, wealth, and power, and obtain reputation and dignity among the nations: whereas, the contrary conduct will make you poor, distressed, and contemptible.

On September 21, 1788 the Constitution and the new government of the United States went into effect. Just over three years later, the Bill of Rights would be added. By 1790, when Rhode Island joined the Union, it was unanimous.

On July 4, 1837, in a speech delivered in the town of Newburyport, Massachusetts, John Quincy Adams, son of John Adams, and the sixth U.S. President, proclaimed,

Why is it that, next to the birthday of the Savior of the World, your most joyous and most venerated festival returns on this day? Is it not that, in the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior? Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer’s mission upon earth?

Witnessing the events of the Revolution as a boy, and no-doubt hearing from his father of the raucous debates that gave us the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and then going on to serve his country in many various capacities, John Quincy Adams saw that Christmas and Independence Day were fundamentally linked. He understood well that the Founders took the principles that Christ brought to the world and incorporated them into civil government. This is what makes the U.S. government so distinctive, why it has been so durable, and why, to this day, we are the greatest nation the world has ever known.

(Read this column at American Thinker.)

Copyright 2019, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor is the author of the The Miracle and Magnificence of America
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com

How the Founders Would View Same-Sex Marriage

In the ongoing debate on the definition of marriage, I have made it clear more than once that both sides are making a moral argument, and it is futile for anyone to decry the “legislating of morality.” I have also made it clear that, whether the issue is marriage or homosexuality, and whether one appeals to Scripture, Natural Law, or science, the morally superior position lies with the conservative Christian views on these matters.

When I ask a liberal upon what moral authority he relies when he reaches his pro-homosexual/same-sex marriage conclusions, inevitably the answer is the U.S. Constitution. No doubt, throughout our history, in order to further the pagan liberal agenda, liberal jurists have “interpreted” the U.S. Constitution nearly beyond recognition.

Thus, displays of the Ten Commandments on public property are ruled to violate the Constitution, while businesses peddling pornography are seen to be protected by it. When ruling on a matter pertaining to the Constitution, courts ultimately will rely on the words and deeds (though often rather selectively) of our Founders as evidence to the correct interpretation of the words of the Constitution.

One would have to have been raised by squirrels (or be a cast member of an MTV reality program) to be an adult in the U.S. and not at least have heard of the “Separation of Church and State.” In declaring government religious (mainly Christian) expression unconstitutional, the courts refer to the First Amendment, and they interpret that amendment through the words of Thomas Jefferson in a letter that he penned to the Danbury Baptists, which declared “a wall of separation between Church and State.”

For over 70 years, time and again U.S. courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, have referenced Jefferson’s “Wall” in order to restrict religious (almost exclusively Christian) expression in America. Thus, as we weigh and debate marriage in the U.S., it would be an ironic travesty not to consider the words and deeds of our Founders as we draw our legal conclusions.

I submit (with sad and stunning trepidation that such a submission is even necessary) that not one single Founder would give the notion that marriage is anything other than the union of one man and one woman more than a half-second’s thought before (rightly) concluding that such an idea is either a terrible joke or spoken by a lunatic.

First of all, forget marriage; the idea that homosexuality should be considered normal and acceptable behavior would be deemed a wicked and ridiculous conclusion by our Founders. Under British law, sodomy was a capital crime. Sir William Blackstone, as I noted recently, was a favorite English jurist of our Founders, and his Commentaries on the Laws of England served as the basis of legal jurisprudence in America.

As David Barton remarks, “In addressing sodomy (homosexuality), [Blackstone] found the subject so reprehensible that he was ashamed even to discuss it.” Nevertheless, Blackstone declared:

“What has been here observed…the infamous crime against nature committed either with man or beast. A crime which ought to be strictly and impartially proved and then as strictly and impartially punished….I will not act so disagreeable part to my readers as well as myself as to dwell any longer upon a subject the very mention of which is a disgrace to human nature [sodomy]…A taciturnity observed likewise by the edict of Constantius and Constans: …(where that crime is found, which is unfit even to know, we command the law to arise armed with an avenging sword that the infamous men who are, or shall in future be guilty of it, may undergo the most severe punishments).

“THIS the voice of nature and of reason, and the express law of God, determine to be capital. Of which we have a signal instance, long before the Jewish dispensation, by the destruction of two cities by fire from heaven: so that this is an universal, not merely a provincial, precept.”

Following the same moral precepts, each of the original 13 colonies treated homosexuality as a serious criminal offense. Jefferson himself authored such a law for the state of Virginia, prescribing that the punishment for sodomy was to be castration. (You think modern courts will look to this for guidance?)

New York’s law read, “That the detestable and abominable vice of buggery [sodomy] . . . shall be from henceforth adjudged felony . . . and that every person being thereof convicted by verdict, confession, or outlawry [unlawful flight to avoid prosecution], shall be hanged by the neck until he or she shall be dead.”

Connecticut’s law read, “That if any man shall lie with mankind as he lieth with womankind, both of them have committed abomination; they both shall be put to death.” Georgia’s law (surprisingly—at least for today’s liberals) did not call for the death penalty, but stated, “Sodomy . . . shall be punished by imprisonment at hard labour in the penitentiary during the natural life or lives of the person or persons convicted of th[is] detestable crime.”

General George Washington dealt, at least once, directly with the issue of homosexual behavior in the Continental Army. A lieutenant Enslin was tried and convicted of attempting to commit sodomy with John Monhort, a soldier. The ruling declares, “His Excellency the Commander in Chief approves the sentence and with abhorrence and detestation of such infamous crimes orders Lieutt. Enslin to be drummed out of camp tomorrow morning by all the drummers and fifers in the Army never to return.”

Liberals should not bother with the “but the Founders supported slavery” argument. First of all, many Founders did not support slavery, and it was hotly debated at our founding and beyond. (Also, it should be noted that it was Bible-believing Christians who led the abolition movement.) This is certainly not the case when it comes to homosexual behavior. Secondly, one can’t appeal to the Founders only when it is convenient.

It is also noteworthy that the due process clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments (the Fourteenth Amendment being ratified in 1868) did nothing to prevent all 50 U.S. states, including each state that entered the union after 1868, from enacting laws against homosexual behavior. As recently as 1962, sodomy was a felony in every state in the U.S.

In other words, for nearly 200 years and without any Constitutional conflictions or any serious debate, homosexual behavior in America was seen as immoral and therefore illegal. Thus, we see that the Founders do nothing but support the traditional (biblical) view of marriage.

(See this column on American Thinker.)

Copyright 2013, Trevor Grant Thomas

At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason

Trevor and his wife Michelle are the authors of: Debt Free Living in a Debt Filled World

tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com

My Opening Statement at the Gainesville College Forum on : "What Role Should Religion Play in Government?"

To deny religion, and specifically Christianity—because, let’s face it, that’s what we’re really talking about here—a role in our government today would be to ignore our Constitution, and turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the plain and simple history of this great nation.

Time and again, our Founders looked to the Word of God, and sought His Divine guidance. They understood well that their efforts without God were in vain. As John Adams noted, “It is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand.” In fact, long before the winds of revolution began to blow in America, the early settlers accepted and operated from this premise.

For example, ten years after the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, the Puritans founded the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Under the leadership of their ministers, the Puritans established a representative government with annual elections. By 1641 they had a “Body of Liberties” (essentially a Bill of Rights), which was penned by the Rev. Nathaniel Ward. This was the first legal code established by the colonists.

In 1636 the Rev. Thomas Hooker, along with other Puritan ministers, founded Connecticut. They also established an elective form of government. In 1638, after Hooker preached a sermon from the first chapter of Deuteronomy on the fair and just principles of government practiced by the nation of Israel, Roger Ludlow wrote the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut. This was the first constitution written in America. It served as a model of government for other colonies and, eventually, a union of colonies. It also served as a model for the U.S. Constitution.

After writing the Declaration of Ind. (which references God 4 times), Thomas Jefferson, along with Ben Franklin and John Adams, was appointed to a special committee to create an official seal for the United States. Jefferson and Franklin proposed that one side of the seal portray Moses leading the nation of Israel. Adams wrote, “Mr. Jefferson proposed: The children of Israel in the wilderness, led by a cloud by day, and a pillar of fire by night…”

In his inaugural address to Congress George Washington stated:

“No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand which conducts the affairs of men more than the people of the United States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency…We ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained.”

Writing to his son, the sixth President of the United States, John Quincy Adams said, “The law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code; it contained many statutes . . . of universal application-laws essential to the existence of men in society, and most of which have been enacted by every nation which ever professed any code of laws.”

John Adams noted that, “The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were…the general principles of Christianity.”

America’s “Schoolmaster” Noah Webster supports this in his 1832 History of the United States when he wrote that “our citizens should early understand that the genuine source of correct republican principles is the Bible, particularly the New Testament or the Christian religion.” Webster added, “The religion which has introduced civil liberty is the religion of Christ and His apostles…to this we owe our free Constitutions of Government.”

Noting the direct influence of religion upon politics in the young U.S., French social philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville concluded that “In the United States the sovereign authority is religious…there is no country in the whole world in which the Christian religion retains a greater influence over the souls of men than in America, and there can be no greater proof of its utility, and of its conformity to human nature, than that its influence is most powerfully felt over the most enlightened and free nation of the earth…The Americans combine the notions of Christianity and of liberty so intimately in their minds, that it is impossible to make them conceive the one without the other.”

In what sense, then, does religion play a roll in the U.S. government? To paraphrase Supreme Court Justice David Brewer: Not in the sense that the United States has an established religion, or that people of the U.S. are compelled to support any religion. Americans profess a wide variety of religions, and some reject all. Americans are free to decide such matters for themselves. The role that religion HAS played in U.S. government, and hopefully will continue to play, is that of a potter’s wheel. Religion—most specifically the Christian religion—was the foundation upon which our forefathers molded and shaped America into what she is today. Our Constitution, laws, values, and institutions reflect this, and our history bears it out.

Copyright 2012, Trevor Grant Thomas

At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
Trevor and his wife Michelle are the authors of: Debt Free Living in a Debt Filled World
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com

The Faith of the Founders

I would like to take issue with several of the things Bo Turner said in his December 23 article; however, at this time I will take issue with only one. In his article he said that most of the framers of the U.S. Constitution were “deists, agnostics, Unitarians, and free-thinkers.” First of all let’s define some of these: 1) In certain dictionaries the terms “deist,” “agnostic,” and “atheist” appear as synonyms. So a deist can range from someone who believes there is no God, to those who believe in a distant, impersonal creator, to those who believe there is no way to know if God exists. The most common definition of deism is the belief in a distant, impersonal creator. 2) Deism gave rise to Unitarianism. A Unitarian is defined as “A monotheist who rejects the doctrine of the Trinity.”

Mr. Turner said that “most” of the framers fell into one of the categories named above. While it can be argued that a few of the framers fit into his description, including Thomas Jefferson, it is very misleading to say that “most” did. In fact, hardly any of the notable Founders can be called anything but orthodox evangelical Christians. Noted historian David Barton claims that “52 of the 55 founding fathers were orthodox evangelical Christians.” Actually there were over 200 “Founders”(55 at the Constitutional Convention, to which Mr. Barton refers, 90 who framed the First Amendment and the Bill of Rights, and 56 who signed the Declaration of Independence). Let’s briefly examine some of the words of a few of the more significant, or popular, Founders.

George Washington was an open promoter of Christianity. In a speech on May 12, 1779, he stated that what children needed to learn “above all” was the “religion of Jesus Christ.” He charged his soldiers at Valley Forge that, “To the distinguished character of patriot, it should be our highest glory to add the more distinguished character of Christian.” He also said, “It is impossible to govern the world without God. He must be worse than an infidel that lacks faith, and more than wicked that has not gratitude enough to acknowledge his obligation.” In the Yale Divinity School Library there is a book by William Johnson entitled George Washington, the Christian. In it are many words from Washington which reveal that he was a devout Christian. Washington certainly doesn’t fit Mr. Turner’s description of a Founder.

Neither does Benjamin Franklin. At a very crucial point at the Constitutional Convention in May, 1787, Franklin gave a short, but resounding speech. (The debate over representation was becoming very bitter, and the Convention was on the verge of breaking up.) In it he said, “In the beginning of the contest with Britain, when we were sensible of danger, we had daily prayers in this room for Divine protection. Our prayers, Sir, were heard, and they were graciously answered…I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth: ‘that God governs in the affairs of man.’ 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 labor in vain that build it. I firmly believe this…” In a letter to the French ministry he said, “He who shall introduce into public affairs the principles of primitive Christianity will change the face of the world.” Franklin also chose a biblical inscription for the Seal of the United States and was instrumental in the establishment of a paid chaplain in Congress.

On the subject of the Bible Patrick Henry said, “There is a Book worth all other books which were ever printed.” We’ve all heard of Henry’s famous line “Give me liberty or give me death!” In that same speech he also said, “God presides over the destinies of nations and will raise up friends for us.” In his will it reads, “I have now disposed of all my property to my family; there is one more thing I wish I could give them, and that is the Christian religion. If they had this, and I had not given them one shilling, they would be rich; but if they had not that, and I had given them all the world, they would be poor.” Does Henry sound like a Unitarian?

John Adams said, “I believe in God and in His wisdom and benevolence.” Of the day that the Declaration was passed Adams wrote to his wife saying that that day “ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty.”

James Madison’s writings are full of declarations of his faith in God and Christ. In a letter to Attorney General Bradford he said that public officials should be “fervent advocates for the cause of Christ.”

John Jay, who was the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and along with Madison and Alexander Hamilton wrote the Federalist Papers, said this: “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.” Imagine that! The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court telling us that we ought to elect Christians!

Consider some of the lesser known Founders, as noted by David Barton: “Charles Pickney and John Langdon—founders of the American Bible Society; James McHenry—founder of the Baltimore Bible Society; Rufus King—helped found a Bible society for Anglicans; Abraham Baldwin—a chaplain in the Revolution and considered the youngest theologian in America; Roger Sherman, William Samuel Johnson, John Dickinson, and Jacob Broom—also theological writers; James Wilson and William Patterson—placed on the Supreme Court by President George Washington, they had prayer over juries in the U.S. Supreme Court room; and the list could go on. This does not even include the huge number of thoroughly evangelical Christians who signed the Declaration or who helped frame the Bill of Rights.” I think Mr. Turner should be more careful than to make such sweeping statements that would label men such as these to be deists, agnostics, or Unitarians.

I’ll end with a quote from Mr. Turner’s favorite Founder, Thomas Jefferson: “Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.”

Copyright 2015, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor and his wife Michelle are the authors of: Debt Free Living in a Debt Filled World
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com