No God, No Amercia

That America exists at all is a miracle.  Our founders were like other men of their time: widely read, full of staunch points of view, firm in their beliefs and certain of their own “rightness” in declaring their independence from Great Britain.  We are so far removed historically from them that we tend to have a two dimensional idea of who they were, what they were like, what they believed, and how effortlessly it seem they came to this “American” solution.

The Founders debated the form of the new government, but of one thing they were all in agreement: there could be no successful government without good character and that “…America would fulfill its destiny only if it was true to the moral imperatives set by God” .  They may have had differing concepts of how to approach God, or how God approached mankind, but of the existence and influence of God, there was no debate. 

The meaning of the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights has been up for debate in the last fifty to sixty years based upon the first sentence, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;…”  and that is where so called “church/state separation” supporters stop, leaving out the rest of the text of the Amendment, “…or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people to peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for redress of grievances.”   The First Amendment wasn’t written to exclude religion from the new government, but rather to protect religion FROM the government.

The right of the American people to enjoy protection from their government was the impetus for the Bill of Rights, and it is interesting that the first Amendment in the Bill of Rights was to allow the people to worship as they saw fit, without their government imposing a specific church.  After the formation of the Church of England under King Henry VIII, Catholicism became a banned religion. Having seen how this government imposition and interference in religion caused such upheaval in the government and grief to the people, the Founders wanted to ensure that the people would not experience a similar fate under the new government.

Each colony, as it was settled and populated, adopted a particular Christian point of view, whether it was Quaker, as in the case of Pennsylvania, or simple Christian Protestant principles, as in the case of Virginia, each colony looked to the Judeo/Christian God as the ultimate standard for civic life.  The first Amendment was meant to shield these different religious forms from government interference in the practice and exercise of Christianity.  The Founders believed that Judeo/Christian belief and morality was imperative to the success of the new country, not a specific form of Christianity.  They reasoned that the parameters of Christianity produced good, moral people, and a good, moral people would produce a good, moral government, but they also knew that imposing a specific religion was not the answer.

Thomas Jefferson of Virginia has been cited as an example of a church/state separatists and a Founder who did not believe in God.  To this accusation Jefferson would have disagreed.  It was clear that he believed in God, but Jefferson appealed to reason and logical argument as a foundation for belief, not coercion.  In his Virginia Colony, fines had been imposed, office positions had been denied and other punishments had been given for not attending a certain church or following denominational rules, to which Jefferson responded to by writing,

“Well aware that Almighty God hath created the mind free; that all attempts to influence it by temporal punishments or burdens, or by civil incapacitations, tend not only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness, and are a departure from the plan of the Author of our Religion, who, being Lord both of the body and mind, yet chose not to propagate it by coercion on either, as was his almighty power to do.”

The idea of tossing the Judeo/Christian God out on his ear is not an idea the Founders and framers of the Constitution would have conceived of, let alone endorsed.  God was the foundation and the author of government and only by the grace of God do we have this government.  And only by following the moral dictums of God, given to mankind, could this representative democracy ever hope to continue.  The ability of the people to have common ground and standards by which to measure a public official was of paramount concern.  They reasoned that if a man rejected God, who by definition was necessary, then how could this man be deemed able to govern?  How could the people choose someone to represent them in the new Congress if this man were of such a character as to reject the obvious?
 
The miracle of the United States isn’t that it still exists; but that it existed at all.  It should have failed.  It should have fallen apart when the Articles of Confederation were deemed inadequate to govern the new country.  But it didn’t.
 
The summer of 1787 in Philadelphia was hot and the Constitutional Convention was just as hot with debate.  The delegates had been meeting for five weeks with slow progress and little end in sight when Benjamin Franklin stood on 28 June and made an address to the delegates.  He understood that the Convention was on the verge of collapse because each delegate was looking for their piece of the pie instead of thinking about how to govern the new nation; what was best for the American people.  Franklin proposed that the Convention open every morning with prayer and that this tradition be carried into the new Congress saying, “I have lived a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth – that God governs in the affairs of men.”   His motion was seconded and carried and Congress still opens each session with prayer.

After the Convention ended and the new Constitution created, all delegates reacted with astonishment that they were able to come as close to perfection as they did.  George Washington, the First President of the new United States, urged the people of Philadelphia to adopt the new Federal Constitution saying, “When I contemplate the interposition of Providence, as it has been visibly manifested in guiding us through the Revolution, in preparing us for the General Government, and in conciliating the good will of the people of America towards one another in its adoption, I feel myself oppressed and overwhelmed with a sense of the Divine munificence.”  .

John Adams, second President of the United States, understood that reliance and trust in God is the anchor that keeps America grounded.  In a 1776 letter to his cousin, Zabdiel Adams, he wrote, “Statesmen, my dear Sir, may plan and speculate for Liberty, but it is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand.” .  No God, no freedom.  No freedom, no America.  There should be little doubt that the intent of the Founders was to create a government of the people, and that those people would always turn to the Creator of the Universe for guidance in the future of the nation.

Kat Meesey
Colorado Springs, Colorado

Edited by John P. Kaminski, The Founders on the Founders, page xxv, United States, University of Virginia Press, 2008
The United States Constitution, Amendment I, ratified, 15 December 1791.
  ibid
Benjamin F. Morris, The Christian Life and Character of the Civil Institutions of the United States, page 274,Powder Springs, GA, American Vision, 2007  Edited by John P. Kaminski, The Founders on the Founders, page 299, United States, University of Virginia Press, 2008
Edited by John P. Kaminski, The Founders on the Founders, page 305, United States, University of Virginia Press, 2008
John Adams Web, http://johnadamsweb.com/adamsquotes.html, accessed 1 November 2009