Liberal Supremes at work

Well that is certainly a unique interpretation BBB.

Foxfyre


I knew it would thrill you. :wink:

BBB

Well, "thrill" might be a bit of a stretch.

I am pretty sure Jefferson didn't mean "Mom and Dad" when he referred to the Creator, however.

President Thomas Jefferson in his Notes on the State of Virginia:

Foxfyre
[quote="Foxfyre"]Well, "thrill" might be a bit of a stretch.

I am pretty sure Jefferson didn't mean "Mom and Dad" when he referred to the Creator, however.

President Thomas Jefferson in his Notes on the State of Virginia:
[quote]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 of the 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[/quote][/quote]

Foxfyre, Jefferson was a Deist, not a theist.

America's Most Famous Deists

"The United States of America should have a foundation free from the influence of clergy."---George Washington

"The founders of our nation were nearly all Infidels."---The Rev. Bird Wilson, an Episcopal minister and historian (lamented in an 1831 sermon)

Founding Father Quotes You Won't Hear on the 700 Club

Ex-Judge Moore felt that keeping a monument of the 10 Commandments in a courthouse was appropriate because he felt it was the foundation of American law. He obviously never read the Constitution of the United States.

"...but America was founded as a Christian nation," many say. Not so. Most of the more famous Founding Fathers were, in fact, Deists. Just listen to their own words.

The Constitution of the United States

Article VI, Section 3: "...no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion..."

George Washington - George Washington to Tench Tilghman, (March 24, 1784):

"I am a good deal in want of a House Joiner and Bricklayer, (who really understand their profession) and you would do me a favor by purchasing one of each, for me. I would not confine you to Palatines. If they are good workmen, they may be of Asia, Africa, or Europe. They may be Mahometans, Jews or Christian of an Sect, or they may be Atheists."

John Adams - From a letter to Charles Cushing (October 19, 1756):
"Twenty times in the course of my late reading, have I been upon the point of breaking out, ?'this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.'"

A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America, 1787-88:

"The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture, hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their history. … It will never be pretended that any persons employed in that service [forming the U.S. government] had interviews with the gods, or were in any degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; it will forever be acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason and the senses. …Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery… are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind"

Treaty of Tripoli, Article 11: Written during the Administration of George Washington and signed into law by John Adams.

"The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion."

John Adams, letter to Thomas Jefferson, (July 16, 1814):

"Cabalistic Christianity, which is Catholic Christianity, and which has prevailed for 1,500 years, has received a mortal wound, of which the monster must finally die. Yet so strong is his constitution, that he may endure for centuries before he expires."

Thomas Jefferson - Letter to his nephew, Peter Carr, August 10, 1787

"Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under which weak minds are servilely crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear."

Thomas Jefferson to Jeremiah Moore, August 14, 1800

"The clergy, by getting themselves established by law, & ingrafted into the machine of government, have been a very formidable engine against the civil and religious rights of man. They are still so in many countries & even in some of these United States. Even in 1783, we doubted the stability of our recent measures for reducing them to the footing of other useful callings. It now appears that our means were effectual."

Letter to Dr. Benjamin Rush, September 23, 1800

"[The clergy] believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly: for I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man"

Thomas Jefferson, March 4, 1801, First Inaugural Address

"And let us reflect that, having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions."

Thomas Jefferson, letter to Edward Dowse, April 19, 1803

"I will never, by any word or act, bow to the shrine of intolerance, or admit a right of inquiry into the religious opinions of others."

Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, January 19, 1810

"But a short time elapsed after the death of the great reformer of the Jewish religion, before his principles were departed from by those who professed to be his special servants, and perverted into an engine for enslaving mankind, and aggrandizing their oppressors in Church and State."

Letter to Alexander von Humboldt, December 6, 1813

"History I believe furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance, of which their political as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purpose."

Letter to Horatio G. Spafford, March 17, 1814

"In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own"

Thomas Jefferson to Horatio G. Spafford, January 10, 1816

"You judge truly that I am not afraid of the priests. They have tried upon me all their various batteries, of pious whining, hypocritical canting, lying & slandering, without being able to give me one moment of pain. I have contemplated their order from the Magi of the East to the Saints of the West, and I have found no difference of character, but of more or less caution, in proportion to their information or ignorance of those on whom their interested duperies were to be plaid off. Their sway in New England is indeed formidable. No mind beyond mediocrity dares there to develope itself. If it does, they excite against it the public opinion which they command, & by little, but incessant and teasing persecutions, drive it from among them. Their present emigrations to the Western country are real flights from persecution, religious & political, but the abandonment of the country by those who wish to enjoy freedom of opinion leaves the despotism over the residue more intense, more oppressive. They are now looking to the flesh pots of the South and aiming at foothold there by their missionary teachers. They have lately come forward boldly with their plan to establish " a qualified religious instructor over every thousand souls in the US." And they seem to consider none as qualified but their own sect."

Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, May 5, 1817

"I had believed that [Connecticut was] the last retreat of monkish darkness, bigotry, and abhorrence of those advances of the mind which had carried the other States a century ahead of them. ... I join you, therefore, in sincere congratulations that this den of the priesthood is at length broken up, and that a Protestant Popedom is no longer to disgrace the American history and character. If by religion we are to understand sectarian dogmas, in which no two of them agree, then your exclamation on that hypothesis is just, 'that this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.'

Letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823

"One day the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in the United States will tear down the artificial scaffolding of Christianity. And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as His father, in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter."

Jefferson's Autobiography

"[A]n amendment was proposed by inserting ?'Jesus Christ,' so that [the preamble] should read ?'A departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion'; the insertion was rejected by a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination"

James Madison - Letter to William Bradford, April 1, 1774:

"Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise"

Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments, Section 7, 1785:

"During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution."

Ibid, Section 8:

"What influence in fact have ecclesiastical establishments had on Civil Society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the Civil authority; in many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny: in no instance have they been seen as the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wished to subvert the public liberty, may have found an established Clergy convenient auxiliaries"

James Madison, introducing the Bill of Rights at the First Federal Congress, Congressional Register, June 8, 1789:

"[The] civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner or on any pretext infringed."

James Madison, Detached Memoranda, believed to have been written circa 1817.

"The establishment of the chaplainship to Congress is a palpable violation of equal rights, as well as of Constitutional principles: The tenets of the chaplains elected [by the majority] shut the door of worship against the members whose creeds and consciences forbid a participation in that of the majority. To say nothing of other sects, this is the case with that of Roman Catholics and Quakers who have always had members in one or both of the Legislative branches. Could a Catholic clergyman ever hope to be appointed a Chaplain? To say that his religious principles are obnoxious or that his sect is small, is to lift the evil at once and exhibit in its naked deformity the doctrine that religious truth is to be tested by numbers. or that the major sects have a right to govern the minor."

James Madison, letter to Robert Walsh, March 2, 1819

"The Civil Government, though bereft of everything like an associated hierarchy, possesses the requisite stability and performs its functions with complete success, whilst the number, the industry, and the morality of the priesthood, and the devotion of the people have been manifestly increased by the total separation of the Church from the State."

James Madison, letter to Edward Livingston, July 10, 1822:

"I observe with particular pleasure the view you have taken of the immunity of Religion from civil jurisdiction, in every case where it does not trespass on private rights or the public peace. This has always been a favorite principle with me; and it was not with my approbation, that the deviation from it took place in Cong[ress], when they appointed Chaplains, to be paid from the Nat[ional] Treasury. It would have been a much better proof to their Constituents of their pious feeling if the members had contributed for the purpose, a pittance from their own pockets. As the precedent is not likely to be rescinded, the best that can now be done, may be to apply to the Const[itution] the maxim of the law, de minimis non curat."

Benjamin Franklin - From Franklin's autobiography:

"Scarcely was I arrived at fifteen years of age, when, after having doubted in turn of different tenets, according as I found them combated in the different books that I read, I began to doubt of Revelation itself "

"...Some books against Deism fell into my hands....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 quote to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations, in short, I soon became a thorough Deist."

Benjamin Franklin, The Writings of Benjamin Franklin: London, 1757 - 1775

"If we look back into history for the character of present sects in Christianity, we shall find few that have not in their turns been persecutors, and complainers of persecution. The primitive Christians thought persecution extremely wrong in the Pagans, but practised it on one another. The first Protestants of the Church of England, blamed persecution in the Roman church, but practised it against the Puritans: these found it wrong in the Bishops, but fell into the same practice themselves both here and in New England."

Ethan Allen - From Religion of the American Enlightenment:

"Denominated a Deist, the reality of which I have never disputed, being conscious that I am no Christian."

From "Reason: The Only Oracle of Man"

"Though 'none by searching can find out God, or the Almighty to perfection,' yet I am persuaded, that if mankind would dare to exercise their reason as freely on those divine topics as they do in the common concerns of life, they would, in a great measure, rid themselves of their blindness and superstition, gain more exalted ideas of God and their obligations to him and one another, and be proportionally delighted and blessed with the views of his moral government, make better members of society, and acquire, manly powerful incentives to the practice of morality, which is the last and greatest perfection that human nature is capable of."

Thomas Paine - Excerpts from The Age of Reason:

"My own mind is my own church. All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit."

"Whenever we read the obscene stores (of the Bible), the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we call it the word of a demon than the Word of God."

"...when I see throughout the greater part of this book (the Bible) scarcely anything but a history of the grossest vices and a collection of the most paltry and contemptible tales, I cannot dishonor my Creator by calling it by His name."

"(The Christian) despises the choicest gift of God to man, the Gift of Reason; and having endeavored to force upon himself the belief of a system against which reason revolts, he ungratefully calls if 'human reason' as if man could give reason to himself."

"Of all the systems of religion that ever were invented, there is no more derogatory to the Almighty, more unedifying to man, more repugnant to reason, and more contradictory in itself than this thing called Christianity"

Thomas Paine, Answers to Friends regarding The Age of Reason, Paris, May 12, 1797

"As I have now given you my reasons for believing that the Bible is not the Word of God, that it is a falsehood, I have a right to ask you your reasons for believing the contrary; but I know you can give me none, except that you were educated to believe the Bible; and as the Turks give the same reason for believing the Koran, it is evident that education makes all the difference, and that reason and truth have nothing to do in the case. You believe in the Bible from the accident of birth, and the Turks believe in the Koran from the same accident, and each calls the other infidel. But leaving the prejudice of education out of the case, the unprejudiced truth is, that all are infidels who believe falsely of God, whether they draw their creed from the Bible, or from the Koran, from the Old Testament, or from the New."

"It is often said in the Bible that God spake unto Moses, but how do you know that God spake unto Moses? Because, you will say, the Bible says so. The Koran says, that God spake unto Mahomet, do you believe that too? No. Why not? Because, you will say, you do not believe it; and so because you do, and because you don't is all the reason you can give for believing or disbelieving except that you will say that Mahomet was an impostor. And how do you know Moses was not an impostor?"

And BBB, not a single thing you posted even suggests that the founders did not believe that inalienable rights come from God.

(P.S. If it was germane to the debate--which it is not--I could put up as many pro-religion quotes uttered by the founders as you can put up anti-religion posts uttered by the founders. Putting them all in context, pro-religion wins out.)

Foxfyre


Focfyre, so what else is new? Even then, smart polititians knew what was not politically correct when dealing with the public. Just because it wasn't PC does not make it not true.

Alas, I fear you did not carefully read all of the quotes in your haste to defend your mantra.

BBB

And wanting it not to be so makes it no more true than wanting it to be so. A careful analysis of the whole picture still comes down on the side of the Founders having a faith in God that the anti-relgious now wish to deny. And it also supports a point of view that our current president applying the same criteria to appointment of judges as the Founders applied is not so sinister as some wish it to be.

Oh, I don't think anyone denies that the founders had faith in god. In fact, they were probably a quite religious lot given some of the writings that I have read.

But, don't you see how careful they were to keep any vestige of religion or Christianity out of the formation of our new gov't? It must have been difficult to do so, but they did! This shows you just how important they considered the seperation of Church and State to be; and today, our leaders are actively working for less seperation of church and state. This is diametrically opposed to the wishes of our founding fathers.

Cycloptichorn

I believe they were very careful to make no establishment of religion and to favor no religion over any other in the Constiution. They were not at all careful to keep their religious convictions out of their arguments in support of the Constitution, and they almost to a man believed only people of faith would be able to keep the Constitution.

Nevertheless, to believe that our inalienable rights come from God and to exoress a conviction to appoint judges who understand what those inalienable rights are is not necessarily a bad thing.

Foxfyre


Foxfyre, now where did you come up with that little gem?

Are you daring to imply that because I'm an atheist I cannot and do not keep the constitution? Really?

BBB

I agree. I am personally insulted by the assumption you have that people not of faith cannot keep the constitution.

And I have never read anything to that effect, stating that atheists and agnostics and those of non-Christian Religions (who would have been considered Pagans, remember) would be unable to properly run the country or keep the constitution. I would like to see those quotes.

Cycloptichorn

Note to BBB and Cyclop, I wasn't the one who said athiests or anti-religious cannot keep the constitution. I said most of the Founders said that. Now you can get mad at me for pointing that out, but it doesn't change the fact that they believed it.

"Morality is the necessary spring of popular government...Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without Christianity." - George Washington

""If we abide by the principles taught in the Bible, our country will go on prospering. But if we and our posterity neglect its instructions and authority, no man can tell how sudden a catastrophe may overwhelm us and bury all our glory in profound obscurity."" - Daniel Webster

"If we and our posterity reject religious instruction and authority, violate the rules of eternal justice, trifle with the injunctions of morality, and recklessly destroy the political constitution which holds us together, no man can tell how sudden a catastrophe may overwhelm us, that shall bury all our glory in profound obscurity." Daniel Webster

"We are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of Nature has placed in our power.... The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave." --Patrick Henry

William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania, warned us of the consequences should people of faith relinquish their rightful role in the political process. "If we will not be governed by God," he cautioned, "we must be governed by tyrants."

"You have rights antecedent to all earthly governments; rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; rights derived from the Great Legislator of the Universe." - John Adams

"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 was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." -John Adams - October 11, 1798


The great American lexicographer, known as the "Father of American Education," Noah Webster stated, "In my view, the Christian religion is the most important and one of the first things in which all children, under a free government, ought to be instructed. The Christian religion must be the basis of any government intended to secure the rights and privileges of a free people."

"Without religion, morality falters. When morality falters the Pandora's box of corruption, crime and decay set in to be followed by the demise of the nation." - Alexander Hamilton

"Resistance To Tyranny Is Obedience To GOD" -Thomas Jefferson

Source: Benjamin Franklin, The Writings of Benjamin Franklin, Jared Sparks, editor (Boston: Tappan, Whittemore and Mason, 1840), Vol. X, p. 297, April 17, 1787:
"I have lived, Sir, 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. And if a a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the Sacred Writings, that "except the Lord build the House, they labor in vain that build it." I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without His concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the Builders of Babel: We shall be divided by our partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and bye word down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing governments by human wisdom and leave it to chance, war and conquest.

I therefore beg leave to move that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one or more of the clergy of this city be requested to officiate in that service."


And so far as you being an athiest, BBB, I think it is obvious that I am not. Nevetheless, I do share Thomas Jefferson's opinion on that:

It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. Thomas Jefferson

Note to Mesquite: And despite all that, the Republic has endured for well over 200 years now and the Constitution remains reasonably intact.

Foxfyre
Foxfyre, your quote response demonstrates that there are many arrogant religious bigots in our history and today who would discriminate against those who don't share their religious beliefs.

Can you name an institution is this world that has fostered as much violence and hatred as organized religion throughout world history?

To bring us back to the topic of this thread, the Constitution was supposed to protect us from that history. Sadly, that protection appears to be under attack today and the Supreme Court barely straddles the line of whimpiness in defence of that protection.

BBB

where the whole thing gets dicey is the nature of god that these rights come from. it's not that they come from "god", but rather who's "god".

for instance, remember the big brouha over "one nation, under god" a couple of years ago ? i was talking to my pop and he asked why i didn't like it and don't say it.

1) - i do pledge my allegiance to my country.

2) - people say that the "god" in the pledge can be any god. however, usually i hear that from the same people that want to post the ten commandments all over the place.

judge roy moore is one of those folks. in a recent interview i saw with him, he admitted after being asked several times, that yes, the "god" referred to in the pledge was the judaeo-christian god. i've heard others make similar pronouncements.

3) - so, being neither jewish, christian or even islamic, why would i pledge my allegiance to someone else's god, i.e., yahweh/jehovah ?

for anyone to insist that i do so violates my right of religious freedom and is a defacto establishment of government sponsored religion when included in my pledge of allegiance to my country. both are a violation of the first amendment.

it would appear that the conflict was evident to the baptist minister that authored the pledge in the late 1800's. his original oath did not include any referrence to god or religion at all. this is the original text;

"I pledge allegiance to my flag and the Republic for which it stands - One nation indivisible - with liberty and justice for all."

whether or not the founding fathers were christians, jews or deists isn't really the issue. that they chose to keep their personal opinions on religion separate from the formation and continuation of american government, and the fundimental/evangelical christian agenda to undermine that intent is.

edited once for a typo

BBB writes


The athiestic precepts of totalitarian regimes (Russia, China, North Korea, North Vietnam, etc. etc. etc.) easily rival any hatred and violence perpetuated in the name of religion.

Personally, I think the Founders did a heck of a job in putting together our republic and Constitution and the endurance of both gives testimony to their diligence to detail and attention to principle. I saw nowhere in any of the quotes where advocacy of any organized religion was a necessary component. Each was speaking to his personal convictions re being a people of faith. Bigotry by any name is bigotry nevertheless including bigotry directed at people of faith.

I believe the Constitution is under assault, yes, but it is not from people who believe as the Founders believed whether in matters of their belief in a Creator or in principles of governance.

I am very angry at Chistians.

This is not not because they use "faith" to inform their politics or their morality. I have a respect for the Jesus in the Bible and brave people in history who used the Christian faith for good.

I am angry at American Christians because they hold beliefs and policies that directly contradict the teachings of Christ. They use the Bible as a smokescreen for a repressive brand of politics.

What most Americans call "Christianity" today really stem from the Confederate social religion. This is why much of it is based on judgement, nationalism and policies to keep class differences. If you don't believe this, compare your religious positions with that of the KKK.

Most American Christians, while denouncing the KKK agree with them on most all issues. For the record if you oppose the UN, think the US is a Christian nation, oppose gun control because guns are a good way to stop crime, think homosexuals shouldn't have rights even in a democratic society, support capital punishment and are against any rights for undocmented immigrants I am talking about you.

Jesus cared about the poor, blessed peacemakers, taught forgiveness and compassion, stopped capital punishment and turned the other cheek.

The people running the joke called Christianity today accuse the poor of being welfare leeches, call for harsh sentences and imprisonment, champion capital punishment.

I think you can be a true Christian in a free democracy living under and respecting the Constition.

But I will say this very plainly-- Nationalism and Christianity don't mix. Jesus was very clear about that his Kingdom was in heaven. The current ideaology that most Americans call Christianity is a nationalistic call to a return to Confederate America... nothing less.

It angers me that people use the name "Christianity" to advance this regressive political agenda.

I sympathise with your anger eBrown, but think it misguided to stereotype a very large group of the American public according to the words and actions of what is actually a very small group.

e-Brown
e-Brown, Kudos, great points well stated.

Salude, BBB

Intolerance has all kinds of faces.

Foxfyre,

I am not sure you are hearing what I am saying.

My anger (and I think the anger being expressed by others on this thread) is that American "Christianity" is having an big effect on our political climate. If this is a very small group... it is having a big effect and the remaining large group is decidedly silent.

This is a democracy and I accept the right of people I despise to exercise their voice in our society and our government. I will not complain about the political process or the right of even a president to express his religious beliefs (as misguided and wrong as their are)

However conversely I have the right to be very angry at the fact the political ideaology called "Christianity" is hurting the poor, stopping civil rights, providing cover for our misdeeds in Guantanamo and supporting and prolonging an injust war.

There is a lot of deep-seated anger against Christianity now that is fully justified. You are hearing some of it here.

I believe a backlash against evangelical Christianity (perhaps we can label it extremism or something) will continue to grow.

This anger and the resulting backlash is a valid part of the political process... and I hope it grows quickly... unless of course some part of the large group of Christians who you say don't support the politics of the far right find a voice. I am not hearing it-- and I am listening.