I found the following on the internet this morning. It whets my appetite for wanting to read the book this excerpt is from! My education in public school, Sunday School – and even college at a Christian University – never informed me of the extent of the Christian foundation of America! My first insights came through viewing THE TRUTH PROJECT, by Del Tackett, which provides a Christian Worldview as opposed to the altered version we received in our textbooks. This article continues that insight. It is a wonderful link to our history this Thanksgiving season!
God in Washington D.C.
by Gary DeMar
The official minutes of the first session of the continental congress in 1774 show that Sam Adams made a proposal that the sessions be opened with prayer. Not everyone agreed. John Jay and John Rutledge opposed the recommendation claiming that the diversity of religious opinion precluded such an action. Their minority opinion did not carry the day. At the end of the debate over the proposal, Adams said that it did not become “Christian men, who had come together for solemn deliberation in the hour of their extremity, to say there was so wide a difference in their religious belief that they could not, as one man, bow the knee in prayer to the Almighty, whose advice and assistance they hoped to obtain.”
After the appeal by Sam Adams, the disputation ceased and Reverend Jacob Duché led in prayer. John Adams wrote home to his wife that the prayer by Duché “had an excellent effect upon everybody here…. Those men who were about to resort to force to obtain their rights were moved by tears” upon hearing it. The Continental Congress also issued four fast-day proclamations. The July 12, 1775, fast-day is especially significant. All the colonies were to participate. John Adams, writing to his wife from Philadelphia, said, “We have appointed a Continental fast. Millions will be upon their knees at once before the great Creator, imploring His forgiveness and blessing; His smiles on American Councils and arms.”
Declaration of Independence
With the drafting of the Declaration of Independence in July of 1776, the colonies moved into a new era of political independence with ties to its Christian past. The Declaration is a religious document, basing its argument for rights on theological grounds. Rights, the Declaration maintains, are a gift from the Creator: “We are endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights.” The logic is simple. No Creator, no rights.
The moral state of our nation is directly tied to this single phrase in the Declaration. Today, while our nation clamors for rights, it rejects the standard by which those rights secure their moral anchor. “Nature’s God,” who is the “Supreme Judge of the world,” makes rights a reality. While the Declaration is a theistic document, referring to “Divine Providence,” it is not specifically a Christian document. Even so, the religious phrases found in the body of the Declaration were easily understood in terms of the prevailing Christian worldview of the time. One Roman Catholic signer of the Declaration wrote: “When I signed the Declaration of Independence I had in view, not only our independence from England, but the toleration of all sects professing the Christian religion, and communicating to them all equal rights.”
The Congressional Bible
In 1777 Congress issued a proclamation for a day of thanksgiving for November of that year. December 18 was also to be set aside for “solemn thanksgiving and praise.” The proclamation called upon all citizens to “join the penitent confession of their manifold sins,” and to offer “their humble and earnest supplication that it may please God through the merits of Jesus Christ, mercifully to forgive and blot them out of remembrance.”
The same year Congress issued an official resolution instructing the Committee on Commerce to import 20,000 copies of the Bible. With the outbreak of war with England, the sea lanes had been cut off to the colonies. This meant that goods that were once common in the colonies were no longer being imported—including Bibles printed in England. Congress decided to act. Historian B. F. Morris states the following:
The legislation of Congress on the Bible is a suggestive Christian fact, and one which evinces the faith of the statesmen of that period in its divinity, as well as their purpose to place it as the corner-stone in our republican institutions. The breaking out of the Revolution cut off the supply of “books printed in London.” The scarcity of Bibles also came soon to be felt. Dr. Patrick Allison, one of the chaplains to Congress, and other gentlemen, brought the subject before that body in a memorial, in which they urged the printing of an edition of the Scriptures.
The committee approved the importing of 20,000 copies of the Bible from Scotland, Holland, and elsewhere. Congressmen resolved to pass this proposal because they believed that “the use of the Bible is so universal, and its importance so great.” Even though the resolution passed, action was never taken to import the Bibles. Instead, Congress began to put emphasis on the printing of Bibles within the United States. In 1777 Robert Aitken of Philadelphia published a New Testament. Three additional editions were published in 1789, 1779, and 1781. The edition of 1779 was used in schools. Aitken’s efforts proved so popular that he announced his desire to publish the whole Bible; he then petitioned Congress for support. Congress adopted the following resolution in 1782:
Resolved, That the United States in Congress assembled, highly approve the pious and laudable undertaking of Mr. Aitken, subservient to the interest of religion as well as the progress of the arts in this country, and being satisfied from the above report, of his care and accuracy in the execution of the work, they commend this edition of the Bible to the inhabitants of the United States, and hereby authorize him to publish this recommendation in the manner he shall think proper.
The Continental Congress’s records show that it was not neutral to religion. “Its records are full of references to ‘God,’ under many titles, to ‘Jesus Christ,’ the ‘Christian Religion,’ ‘God and the Constitution,’ and the ‘Free Protestant Colonies.’”
The First United States Congress
The first order of business of the first United States Congress in 1789 was to appoint chaplains. The Right Reverend Bishop Samuel Provost and the Reverend William Linn became publicly paid chaplains of the Senate and House respectively. Since then, both the Senate and the House have continued regularly to open their sessions with prayer. Nearly all of the fifty states make some provision in their meetings for opening prayers or devotions from guest chaplains. Few if any saw this as a violation of the First Amendment.
On April 30, 1789, George Washington took the oath of office with his hand on a Bible. After taking the oath in Federal Hall, New York, he added, “I swear, so help me God”—words that were not part of the oath. Every president since Washington has invoked God’s name in this way. The inauguration was followed by “divine services” that were held in St. Paul’s Chapel, “performed by the Chaplain of Congress.” The first Congress that convened after the adoption of the Constitution requested of the President that the people of the United States observe a day of thanksgiving and prayer:
That a joint committee of both Houses be directed to wait upon the President of the United States to request that he would recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging, with grateful hearts, the many signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a Constitution of government for their safety and happiness.
This resolution was opposed by some as an infringement on the authority of the states: “It is a business with which Congress has nothing to do; it is a religious matter, and as such is proscribed to us.” Nevertheless, the resolution was adopted. Washington then issued a proclamation setting aside November 26, 1789, as a national day of thanksgiving, calling everyone to “unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations, and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions.” Washington called for days of prayer and thanksgiving on January 1 and February 19, 1795.
Good Government and Religion
Prayers in Congress, the appointment of chaplains, and the call for days of prayers and thanksgiving do not stand alone in the historical record. The evidence is overwhelming that America has in the past always linked good government to religion—and, in particular, to Christianity. Historians and constitutional scholars Anson Stokes and Leo Pfeffer summarize the role that the Christian religion played in the founding of this nation and the lofty position it has retained:
Throughout its history our governments, national and state, have co-operated with religion and shown friendliness to it. God is invoked in the Declaration of Independence and in practically every state constitution. Sunday, the Christian Sabbath, is universally observed as a day of rest. The sessions of Congress and of the state legislatures are invariably opened with prayer, in Congress by chaplains who are employed by the Federal government. We have chaplains in our armed forces and in our penal institutions. Oaths in courts of law are administered through use of the Bible. Public officials take an oath of office ending with “so help me God.” Religious institutions are tax exempt throughout the nation. Our pledge of allegiance declares that we are a nation “under God.” Our national motto is “In God We Trust” and is inscribed on our currency and on some of our postage stamps.
After only a cursory study of the years leading up to and including the drafting of the Constitution and the inauguration of the first president, it becomes obvious that Christianity played a foundational role in shaping our nation. It is not surprising that when courts had to define religion, they linked it to the Christian religion. In 1930 the Supreme Court declared, “We are a Christian people, according to one another the equal right of religious freedom, and acknowledging with reverence the duty of obedience to the will of God.” Further evidence of the role that the Christian religion played in the maintenance of our nation can be found in national pronouncements and inscriptions in our nation’s capital.
[Excerpt from America's Christian History: The Untold Story (Powder Springs, GA: American Vision, 1993, 2008), 113-118. Used by permission.]
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