J - ,,-Mini-FACS
~nother Fundamental for American Christians
The so-called "Politically Correct" insist
the United £tates never was a Christian
nation. Is that historically accurate? Or,
is it plain old revisionist prop88anda? In
Part Two of this Mini-FAC£, here are
some truths from the national archives.
The record speaks for itself
1811
"The people of this State, in common with the
people of this country, profess the general
doctrine of Christianity, as the rule of their
faith and practice .... We are a Christian
people, and the morality of the country is
deeply engrafted upon Christianity, and not
upon the doctrines or worship of those im-
postors (other religions) .... Christianity in its
enlarged sense, as a religion revealed and
taught in the Bible, is part and parcel of the
law of the land ....." Chief Justice James Kent,
Supreme Court of New York, The People v.
Ruggles.
July 4,1821
John Quincy Adams, sixth president of the
United States: "The highest glory of the
American Revolution was this: it connected,
in one indissoluble bond, the principles of
civil government with the principles of Chris--
tianity."
1824
"Chrstianity, general Christianity, is and al-
ways has been a part of the common law of
Pennsylvania; ... not Christianity with an
established church and tithes and spiritual
courts; but Christianity with liberty of con-
science to all men." Updegraph v. the Common-
wealth 11s & R. 394,400
November, 1828
Noah Webster publishes the first edition of
his Ameriam Dictionary of the English Lan-
guage. It contains the greatest number of Bib-
lical definitions given in any secular volume;
thus demonstrating" the degree to which the
Bible was America's basic text book in all
fields." Webster believed" education useless
without the Bible."
1833
Noah Webster: "...the religion which has
introduced civil liberty, is the religion of
Christ and His apostles ... This is genuine
Christianity, and to this we owe our free con-
stitutions of government ... the moral prin-
ciples and precepts contained in the Scrip-
tures ought to form the basis of all of our civil
constitutions and laws."
1836
William McGuffey publishes the first edition
of his McGuffey's Reader. Between 1836 and
1920,122 million copies are sold. Millions of
American children learn to read and write
from that reader. In his foreword, McGuffey
wrote: "The Christian religion is the religion
of our country. From it are derived our preva-
lent notions of the character of God, the great
moral governor of the universe. On its doc-
trines are founded the peculiarities of our free
institutions."
"I have long been convinced that our
Enemies have made it an Object to
eradicate from the minds ofthe People
in general a Sense oftrue Religion and
Virtue." Samuel Adams
1841
Philosopher and historian Alexis de Tocquev-
ille (Democracy in America): "In the United
States of America the sovereign authority is
religious." " ... there is no country in the world
in which the Christian religion retains a great-
er influence over the souls of men than in
America."
June 8,1845
President Andrew Jackson asserted: "The
Bible is the rock on which our Republic rests."
1851
Justice Joseph Story (US Supreme Court, 1811-
1845; professor, Harvard Law School), wrote
in his Commentaries on the Constitution of the
United States: "Probably at the time of the
adoption of the Constitution, and of the first
amendment to it ... the general if not the uni-
versal sentiment in America was, that Chris--
tianity ought to receive encouragement by the
(Continued on page 2
state so far as was not incompatible with the
private rights of conscience and the free-
dom of religious worship. Any attempt to
level all every colony did sustain religion in
some form. lt was deemed peculiarly prop-
er that the religion of liberty should be up-
held by a free people. Had the people, dur-
ing 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 uni-
versal sentiment was that Christianity
should be encouraged - not anyone sect.
Any attempt to level or discard all religion
would have been viewed with ui1iversal
indignation. The object was not to substitute
Judaism or Mohammedanism, or infidelity,
but to prevent rivalry amoIlg the sects to the
exclusion of others."
February 11, 1861
Abraham Lincoln, farewell at Springfield,
IL: "In regard to this Great Book (The Bible),
I have but to say, it is the best gift God has
given to man. All the good The Saviour gave
to the world was communicated through
this book. But for it, we would not know
right from wrong. All things most desirable
for man's welfare, here and hereafter, are to
be found portrayed in it." (George L. Hunt,
Calvinism and The Political Order, Westmin-
ster Press, 1965, p. 33)
March 30, 1863
Presidential Proclamation for a day of fast-
ing, humiliation and prayer: "We have been
the recipients of the choicest bounties of
Heaven. We have been preserved, these
many years, in peace and prosperity. We
have grown in numbers, wealth and power,
as no other nation has ever grown. But we
have forgotten God. We have forgotten the
gracious hand which preserved us in peace,
and multiplied and enriched and strength-
ened us; and we have vainly imagined, in
the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these
blessings were produced by some susperior
wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated
with unbroken success, we have become too
self-sufficient to feel the necessity of re-
deeming and preserving grace, too proud to
pray to the God that made us."
1864
Maryland Constitution requires citizens de-
siring to hold public office must have de-
clared "belief in the Christian religion, of the
existence of God, and in a future state of
rewards and punishments."
March 3, 1865
Secretary of the Treasury, Samuel Chase,
instructs U.s. mint to prepare a "device" to
inscribe US coins with the motto, "In God we
trust." Congress gives its approval.
1884
U.s. Supreme Court in reference to the indi-
vidual's God-given rights: "These Inherent
rights have never been more happily ex-
pressed than in the Declaration of Inde-
pendence, 'we hold these truths to be self-
evident' - that is, so plain that their tru th is
recognized upon their mere statement -
'that all men are endowed' - not by edicts
of emperors, or decrees of parliament, or
acts of Congress, but 'by their Creator with
certain inalienable rights and that among
these are life, liberty and the pursuit of hap-
piness, and to secure these' - not grcfnt
them but secure them - 'governments are
instituted among men.' "
1892
U.S. Supreme Court, Church of the Holy Trin-
ity v. United States (143 US 457, US 457-
458,465-471,36 L ed 226, Justice Josiah
Brewer): "Our laws and ourinstitutionsmust
necessarily be based upon and embody the
teachings of the Redeemer of mankind. It is
impossible that it should be otherwise; and
in this sense and to this extent our civiliza-
tion and our institutions are emphatically
Christian." (In 1931, in United States v.
MacIntosh, Supreme Court Justice George
Sutherland reviews the 1892 decision and
reiterates that Americans are a "Christian
people.")
1896
"There is a hearty Puritanism in the view of
human nature that pervades the instrument
(U.s. Constitution) of 1787. It is the work of
men who believed in original sin and were
resolved to leave open to the transgressors
no door they could possibly shut."
1909
President Theodore Roosevelt: " After a week
on perplexing problems ... it does so rest my
 soul to come into the house of The Lord and
to sing and mean it, 'Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord
God Almighty' ... (my) great joy and glory
that, in occupying an exalted position in the
nation, I am enabled to preach the practical
moralities of The Bible to my fellow-coun-
trymen and to hold up Christ as the hope
and Savior of the world." (FerdinandC. Iglehart,
Theodore Roosevelt - The Man As I Knew Him, A. L.
Burt, 1919)
1913
President Woodrow Wilson: " America was
born to exemplify the devotion to the ele-
ments of righteousness which are derived
from the Holy Scriptures."
1930
"We are a Christian people .... The right of
religious freedom demands acknowledge-
ment, with reverence, of the duty of obedi-
ence to the will of God." U.S. v. McIntosh.
March 3,1931
U.s. Congress adopts "The Star Spangled
Banner" as our National Anthem: "(4th
stanza) Praise the Power that hath made and
preserved us as a nation. Then conquer we must,
when our cause it is just. And this be our motto
... "In God is our Trust.' "
1943
Statement issued by Herbert Hoover, Alfred
Smi th, Alfred Landon, Mrs. Calvin Coolidge,
Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt, James M. Cox,
John W. Davis, Mrs. William H. Taft, Mrs.
Benjamin Harrison, Mrs. Grover Cleveland:
"Menaced by collectivist trends, we must
seek revival of our strength in the spiritual
foundations which are the bedrock of our
republic. Democracy is the outgrowth of the
religious conviction of the sacredness of ev-
ery human life. On the religious side, its
highest embodiment is The Bible; on the
political side, the Constitution."
1947
"This is a Christian nation" President Harry
S. Truman in conversation with Pope Plus
XII. "The fundamental basis of our Bill of
Rights comes from the teachings we get
from Exodus and S10Matthew, from Isaiah
·and PauL"
1952
" ... we are a religious people and our insti-
tutions presuppose a Supreme Being." "No
constitutional requirment makes it necess-
sary for government to be hostile to religion
and to throw its weight against the efforts to
widen the scope of religious influence. The
government must remain neutral when it
comes to competition between sects ... The
First Amendment, however, does NOT say
that in every respect there shall be a separa-
tion of ChurchandState."USSupreme Court
(Zorach v. Clauson, 343 US 307 313, Justice W.
O. Douglas):
1954
President Dwight D. Eisenhower: " ... the
purpose of a devout and united people was
set forth in the pages ofThe Bible ... (1) to live
in freedom, (2) to work in a prosperous land
... and (3) to obey the commandments of
God .... This Biblical story of the Promised
land inspired the founders of America. It
continues to inspire us ...."
"... as an eyewitness of governmen-
tal and other public actions through-
out those years (1933-1967), I have
formed the opinion that the United
States merits the dubious distinction
of having discarded its past and its
meaning in one of the briefest spans
of modern history. NY Times colum-
II
nist, Arthur Krock
1958
Charles Malik, Ambassador to the United
Nations from Lebanon (President of the
General Assembly of the UN): "Whoever
tries to conceive the American word with-
out taking full account of the suffering and
love and salvation of Christ is only dream-
ing. I know how embarrassing this matter is
to politicians, bureaucrats, businessmen and
cynics; but, whatever these honored men
think, the irrefutable truth is that the soul of
America is at its best and highest, Chris-
tian."
1956
Congress adopts Joint Resolution provid-
ing that the national motto shall be "In God
we trust."
1973
. "Secularism is unconstitutional ... prefer-
ring those who do not believe over those
(Continued on page 4
Mini-FACS: Truths About America's Christian Heritage/Page 8

ruption ever since that early session of Con-

gress."

William Foxwell Albright once ob-

served that the writing of American
history in the 20th' Century was
mostly "a means of liberal propa-
ganda" (W. F. Albright, From The
Stone Age to Christianity). James
C. Malin put it in stronger terms (the
revisionists are) "debasing history
to the level of vicious propaganda in
support of a social program being
imposed upon a nation" (J.C. Malin,
On The Nature of History).

1985
Associate Justice William Rehnquist, Us.
Supreme Court, Wallace v. fafree, 472 U.s.,
38,991985: "It is impossible to build sound
constitutional doctrine upon a mistaken
understanding of Constitutional history ...
The establishment clause has been express-
ly freighted with Jefferson's misleading
metaphor for nearly forty years .... There is
simp~y no historical foundation for the pro-
pOSition that the framers intended to build a
wall of separation [betWeen church and state]
... The recent court decisions are in no way
based on either the language or intent of the
framers."
May 3, 1990
President George Bush, National Day of
Prayer: "The great faith that led our Nation's
F,ounding Fathers to pursue this bold expe-
nence in self~governmentmhas sustained
us in uncertain and perilous times; it has
given us strength and inspiration to the very
day. Like them, we do very well to recall our
'irm reliance on the protection of Divine
Providfence,' to give thanks for the freedom
and prosperity this Nation enjoys, and to
pray for continued help and guidance from
our wise and lOVing Creator."

For copies of this MiniFACS or for a list of

suggested reference texts and sources con-
cerning America's Christian Heritage, write
or call the Plymouth Rock Foundation, Fisk
Mill on Water Street, Marlborough NH 03455
1·800.21 0-1620