QUOTES
of the American Founding
Fathers
We often hear—especially in an election year—people
advocating to "take America back to the values of the founding fathers."
Often, such advocacy is based on a mythical view of the nation's founders
as Bible-thumping fundamentalist Christians, usually extracted from
partisan commentary rather than from the founders' own thoughts.
What original material does appear in the advocates' claims is usually
out-of-context cherry-pickings from works intended for public consumption. This misrepresents the
actual views and values of these men—many of whom, as the founders of
modern democracy, hailed from the free-thinking, non-traditional
humanistic philosophies of The Enlightenment—as is evident from a look at their
personal communications and private writings.
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John Adams (1735-1826) co-author of the U.S.
Constitution; 2nd U.S. President.
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"The government of
the United States is not, in any sense, founded
on the Christian religion." (Treaty
of Tripoli, 1797)
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Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) American statesman and
diplomat; co-author of the U.S. Constitution; printer;
experimenter and inventor; "rational Christian"
deist.
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"When a religion is good, I conceive it will support itself; and
when it does not support itself, and God does not take care to
support it so that its professors are oblig'd to call for help of
the Civil Power, 'tis a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one."
(letter to Richard Price, 1780)
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Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American statesman;
author of the Declaration of Independence; 3rd U.S.
President; architect, educator, philosopher, naturalist,
scientist, inventor, musician; materialist
humanist;
deist.
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"The Christian God
is a being of terrific character—cruel,
vindictive, capricious and unjust. … I
read the Apocalypse and considered it merely the
rantings and ravings of a maniac. …
What has not meaning admits no explanation."
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"Question with
boldness even the existence of God; because if
there be one, He must approve the homage of
Reason rather than that of blindfolded
Fear." (letter to Peter Carr,
Jefferson's nephew and ward)
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"Millions of
innocent men, women and children, since the
introduction of Christianity, have been burnt,
tortured, fined and imprisoned, yet we have not
advanced one inch toward uniformity. What
has been the effect of this coercion? To
make one half of the world fools and the other
half hypocrites." ("Notes on
Virginia")
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"In every country
and in every age the priest has been hostile to
liberty; he is always in alliance with the
despot, abetting his abuses in return for
protection to his own." (letter to Horatio G.
Spafford, 17 Mar. 1814)
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"They [the clergy]
believe that any portion of power confided to me,
will be exerted in opposition to their
schemes. And they believe rightly:
for I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal
hostility against every form of tyranny over the
mind of man." (letter to Benjamin Rush, 1800; excerpted in
the rotunda of the Jefferson Memorial by extracting the final clause from its context)
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Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) 16th U.S. President.
(Although Lincoln was not among the founding generation
of leaders, as preserver of the nation through the most divisive episode
in its history, he has long been considered by many the greatest of
America's presidents, and thus perhaps qualifies as an "honorary
founding father.")
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James Madison (1751-1836) primary author of the
U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights; 4th U.S.
President; co-author of the Federalist Papers;
humanist; initially Presbyterian, later
deist.
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"During almost
fifteen centuries, the legal establishment of
Christianity has been on trial. What have
been its fruits? These are the fruits more
or less, in all places: pride and indolence
in the clergy, ignorance and servility in the
laity, and in both clergy and laity,
superstition, bigotry, and persecution."
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Thomas Paine (1737-1809) British-American
revolutionary pamphleteer, author of Common Sense
and The Age of Reason;
deist.
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"Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous
debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting
vindictiveness with which more than half the Bible is filled, it
would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than
the word of God."
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George Washington (1732-1799) American military
leader; President of the Constitutional Convention; 1st
U.S. President; nominal Episcopalian.
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Washington was never open about his religious beliefs. In none of his
speeches, letters, or other writings, did
he ever allude to a personal belief in
the Christian faith. Indeed, when pressed
directly, he purposefully evaded the issue.
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