Can you provide a quote from one of them that resembles this assertion? A direct reference, at least?
How about the French Revolution, and its subsequent descent into a living hell on earth. Is that a bad enough result for you?
We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution is designed only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for any other.
John Adams
Arbitrary power is most easily established on the ruins of liberty abused to licentiousness.
George Washington
How about this one?
“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”--John Adams