Our Founding Fathers And
Other Statesmen


Framers

FOUNDERS.....


ADAMS, JOHN:
Our Constitution was made for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for the government of any other. (1798)


BRADFORD, WILLIAM:
We whose names are underwritten, the loyal subjects of our sovereign Lord, King James, by the grace of God, of Great Britain, France, & Ireland king, defender of the faith, etc., having undertaken for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian faith, and honor of our king & country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the Northern parts of Virginia. (1620 - Mayflower Compact)

To all ye Pilgrims:
In as much as the great Father has given us this year an abundant harvest of Indian Corn, wheat, peas, beans, squashes, and garden vegetables, and has made the forests to abound with game and the sea with fish and clams, and in as much as he has protected us from the ravages of the savages, has spared us from pestilence and disease, has granted us freedom to worship God according to the dictates of our own conscience; now I, your magistrate, do proclaim that all ye Pilgrims, with your wives and ye little ones, do gather at ye meeting house, on ye hill, between the hours of 9 and 12 in the day time, on Thursday, November ye 29th, of the year of our Lord one thousand six hundred and twenty three, and the third year since ye Pilgrims landed on ye Pilgrim Rock, there to listen to ye pastor and render thanksgiving to ye Almighty God for all His blessings. (1623 - Thanksgiving)


FRANKLIN, BENJAMIN:
Whoever shall introduce into public affairs the principles of primitive Christianity will change the face of the world. (1778)

I therefore beg leave to move that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven and its blessing on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning.... (1787, Constitutional Convention)


HAMILTON, ALEXANDER:
In my opinion, the present consitution is the standard to which we are to cling. Under its banner bona fide must we combat our political foes, rejecting all changes but through the channel itself provided for amendments. By these general views of the subject have my reflections been guided. I now offer you the outline of the plan they have suggested. Let an association be formed to be denominated "The Christian Constitutional Society," its object to be first: The support of the Christian religion. second: The support of the United States. (1802 in a letter to James Bayard, explaining the bond between Christianity and Constitutional Freedom)


HENRY, PATRICK:
It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here. (1765)


JAY, JOHN (First Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court):
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. (1816)


JEFFERSON, THOMAS:
God who gave us life gave us liberty. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are a gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that His justice cannot sleep forever. (1781 - Notes on the State of Virgina)

My Views....are the result of a life of inquiry and reflection, an very different from the anti-christian system imputed to me by those who know nothing of my opinions. To the corruptions of Christianity I am, indeed, opposed; but not to the genuine precepts of Jesus Himself. I am a Christian in the only sense in which he wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines in preference to all others...(1803 letter to Benjamin Rush)


LINCOLN, ABRAHAM:
It is the duty of nations as well as of men to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon. (1863 - Proclamation Appointing a National Day of Fasting)

The philosphy of the school room in one generation will be the philosphy of government in the next.


MADISON, JAMES:
We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it. We have staked the future of all of our political institutions..... upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God. (1778)


PAINE, THOMAS:
The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind. Where, say some, is the king of America? I'll tell you friend, He reigns above. (1776)


RUSH, BENJAMIN:
In contemplating the political institutions of the U.S., if we were to remove the Bible from schools, I lament that we would be wasting so much time and money punishing crimes and would be taking so little pains to prevent them. (1791 - Educational Policy Papers)


U.S. SUPREME COURT:
Our laws and our institutions must 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 civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian. (1892)


WASHINGTON, GEORGE:
The proptious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained. (1789 - Inaugural Address)

Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and Citizens. (1796 - Farewell Speech)


WEBSTER, NOAH:
The moral principles and precepts contained in the Scriptures ought to form the basis of all of our civil constitutions and laws....All the miseries and evils which men suffer from vice, crime, ambition, injustice, oppression, slavery and war, proceed from their despising or neglecting the precepts contained in the Bible. (1832, in his "History of the United States")


AND OTHER STATESMEN.....


CARVER, GEORGE WASHINGTON:
The secret of my success? It is simple. It is found in the Bible, 'In all they ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy paths'. (1939)


HATFIELD, MARK O., U.S. Senator:
For the Christian man to reason that God does not want him involved in politics because there are too many evil men in government is as insensitive as for a Christian doctor to turn his back on an epidemic because there are too many germs there. (1988)


KING, MARTIN LUTHER, JR.:
If you will protest courageously, and yet with dignity and Christian love, when the history books are written in future generations, the historians will have to pause and say, "There lived a great people - a black people - who injected new meaning and dignity into the veins of civilization." (1955)


MARSHALL, PETER:
The choice before us is plain: Christ or chaos, conviction or compromise, discipline or disintegration. I am rather tired of hearing about our rights and privilages as American citizens. The time is come - it is now - when we ought to hear about the duties and responsibilities of our citizenship. America's future depends upon her accepting and demonstrating God's government. (1947, Chaplain of the Senate)


REAGAN, RONALD:
The family has always been the cornerstone of American society. Our families nurture, preserve, and pass on to each succeeding generation the values that are the foundation for our freedoms. In the family we learn our first lessons of God and man, love and discipline, rights and responsibilities, human dignity and human frailty.



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