Replies

Jefferson I think would be amazed that we lasted this long in any form, that we had a relatively peaceful coexistence after slavery was ended, and a dearth of the periodic revolutions that Jefferson envisioned. I think he would also be proud that we have become the preeminent world power without becoming an expansionist empire, but a fairly benevolent force for good and the spread and support of democracy and opposition to totalitarianism. I think he would be more proud than prone to tears if his shade were free to contemplate such things.

Almost certainly, Franklin would be amazed. But the United States has been remarkably stable over time because of its widely-shared unifying core philosophy, which is essentially Christian to its core. We are not speaking of sectarian religion here, but the essential truths of Christianity that all Christian sects espouse. That unifying core is precisely what has been coming under attack over the past several decades, with the attempts to "kill God," remove "religion" from the public square, and characterize Christians as dim, superstitious, anti-science weirdos. [Need I add that this is mainly the work of the atheist "progressive" Left, conning the American public into selling their own heritage and birthright? Guess why they would want us to do that....]

Consider this, from Ellis Sandoz:

As Perry Miller remarked decades ago, the American Revolution was preached as a revival and had the astonishing result of succeeding. A new generation of scholars is concluding that Miller was right. At the center of attitudes lay a kind of consensual Christianity that unified all denominations. It joined with Whig political views to give a resonant core of love of liberty and courageous resistance to tyranny and corruption to a great moral and political cause as the heartbeat of the American community. Federalist No. 2 reflects this, and it is wonderfully stated by John Adams in a letter to Jefferson late in life. Adams wrote to his fellow "Argonaut" of the American founding in their declining years, and he asked--

"Who composed that Army of fine young fellows that was then before my eyes [during the American Revolution]? There were among them, Roman Catholicks, English Episcopalians, Scotch and American Presbyterians, Methodists, Moravians, Anabaptists, German Lutherans, German Calvinists, Universalists, Arians, Priestleyans, Socinians, Independents, Congregationalists, Horse Protestants, House Protestants, Deists and theists; and [Protestants who believe nothing]. Very few however of several of these Species. Never the less all educated in the general Principles of Christianity: and the general Principles of English and American Liberty.
"The general Principles, on which the Fathers atchieved Independence, were the only Principles in which that beautiful assembly of young gentlemen could unite.... And what were these general Principles? I answer [John Adams wrote]-- the general principles of Christianity, in which all those sects were united: And the general Principles of English and American Liberty, in which all those young men united, and which had united all parties in America, in majorities sufficient to assert and maintain her Independence. Now I will avow, that I then believed, and now believe, that those general Principles of Christianity, are as eternal and immutable, as the Existence and Attributes of God; and those principles of Liberty, as unalterable as human nature and the terrestrial, mundane system" (Letter of Adams to Jefferson, June 28, 1813).

Sandoz is Professor Hermann Moyse Jr. Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Louisiana State University and Director, Eric Voegelin Institute for American Renaissance Studies. The above was excerpted from his "AMERICAN RELIGION AND HIGHER LAW: HIGHER THAN WHAT?," April 26, 1997.

It has become fashionable lately to say that Franklin, Madison, and Jefferson were "privately" very anti-religion. Indeed, we have many champions of this view here at FR. But if this is so, then these people need to explain why Thomas Jefferson would have engraved on his personal seal the motto, "Resistance to Tyrants is Obedience to God."

I wouldn’t go about quoting Franklin as supporting evidence that the widely-shared unifying core philosophy of the United States was Christian to its core.

Franklin said in his autobiography that he was a thorough Deist, and although he believed in providence, and didn’t refrain from quoting or paraphrasing the Bible when it brought home his point (for his eye is on the sparrow)...

“My parents had early given me religious impressions, and brought me through my childhood piously in the Dissenting way. But I was scarce fifteen, when, after doubting by turns several points as I found them disputed in the different books I read, I began to doubt of the Revelation itself. Some books against Deism fell into my hands; they were said to be the substance of the sermons which had been preached at Boyle’s Lectures. It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them. For the arguments of the Deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to be much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a thorough Deist.”

Benjamin Franklin in his Autobiography.

Thomas Jefferson had “Resistance to Tyrants is Obedience to God” on his tombstone. Did that mean he believed that Jesus Christ was the son of God? No. It did not, and he did not. I do. But he did not. As much as I admire the man, he was not a Christian in the usual sense of the word, someone who thinks salvation comes through Christ our Lord who is God made man.

“They are the result of a life of inquiry and reflection, and very different from that 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 anyone to be: sincerely attached to his doctrines in preference to all others, ascribing to himself every human excellence, and believing he never claimed any other.” Thomas Jefferson from the introduction to the Thomas Jefferson Bible (New Testament with the miraculous bits taken out).

“The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus by the Supreme Being in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter.”
Thomas Jefferson in a letter to John Adams (4/11/1823