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. The mere Politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connexions with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked, Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instruments of investigation in Courts of Justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect, that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.It is substantially true, that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who, that is a sincere friend to it, can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?
Excerpt from Gen Washongton's Farewell Address 1796
The question I used as a title for this article could open the proverbial Pandora's box of conjecture. Believe me, I've seen it all. From those who've respected erudite discourse to those who mock it in an attempt to conceal their fear of it. One thing that cannot be denied is the revisionist tendency to shun the perspectives of the Founding Fathers. Their intimate convictions regarding the role of faith in American government comprise the kryptonite of their vision of a soulless secularized model governed by the "Thought Oprichniki "! While perusing my files I ran across this essay I wrote for a class some years ago and I thought I'd share it......
Almost since the very founding of our republic, the misnomer of a "separation between church and state" has definitively refined and, at times, trivialized the urgency of ethics and morality in government. In turn, revisionists will all but completely mock certain moral imperatives in government that were clearly engendered by Christianity. In point of fact, the two are actually inextricably linked. Due to the unfortunate enshrinement of this misnomer, certain plenary moral truths quite unique to the Judeo- Christian traditions are looked upon as not binding in governmental matters.
A scion of one of our republic’s most esteemed political families, whose ancestral bastion-incidentally- in Virginia was the site of the real first Thanksgiving, elucidated on the binding link between adherence to Christian truths and sound polity with these words:
“I deem the present occasion sufficiently important and solemn to justify me in expressing to my fellow-citizens a profound reverence for the Christian religion and a thorough conviction that sound morals, religious liberty, and a just sense of religious responsibility are essentially connected with all true and lasting happiness; and to that good Being who has blessed us by the gifts of civil and religious freedom, who watched over and prospered the labors of our fathers and has hitherto preserved to us institutions far exceeding in excellence those of any other people, let us unite in fervently commending every interest of our beloved country in all future time.”
These remarks were delivered with the uttermost pious erudition as a portion of the inaugural address of Gen. William Henry Harrison, at his ascent to the US Presidency, on March 4, 1841. He believed, as does the writer of this essay, that the greatness and fruition of our nation lay warranted singularly on Divine favor and guidance. Hence, political, economic and military might are mere fruits of election and we are charged to be stewards of these gifts and beacons to the world, at large. In addition, it was the belief unanimously held by virtually all the founding families that there is a causal link between abridgements of God’s Law and all manner of national calamity!
To this end, in a manner befitting the progeny of a family of such venerated station, his grandson, the then future US President Benjamin Harrison, would expound on the context. Please note that these remarks were made while vacillating between a career in ministry or law; as yet a student on the campus of Miami of Ohio.
“Strange as it may appear there are those who deem their Christian professions at variance with their civil duties, as if the church were the only institution of God’s own planting, the only sphere in which they are called to act, whose narrow minds can grasp but one class of duties and but poorly apprehend even those. Yet such is a prevailing notion among many Christians who glory in the shameful boast, “I’m no politician.” “I have nothing to do with politics.” Such should remember that civil society is no less an institution of God than the Church, that society can in no sense exist without government, and that man is the instrumentality appointed to administer this government. . . . The church, as a church, can take no part in the affairs of state but individual members of the church as embodying the only true morality and as members of civil society owe to that society of which they form an integral part certain duties for the neglect of which God will not hold them guiltless.”
Let me adjourn by saying, without equivocation, that this is the greatest, most forensically responsible elucidation of the proper context of morality and ethics- as applicable to civil government- I’ve ever heard. As an alternative to the apotheosizing of pluralism, the unanimity and clarity of purpose and vision for the nation more clearly resonated from the hallowed halls, chambers and corridors of government when the beliefs expounded on were more widely self-actualized by the bearers of civil magistracy. While not inclined to run the risk of exceeding the word limit for this assignment by speculating or measuring the degree of culpability for our nation’s domestic unrest due to its heterogeneity, it does appear that such discord corresponds with the descent of the Anglo-Saxon Protestant from his previous station of plurality. Sadly, it appears those of us of traditional thinking are left with only the memory of the bequests of spiritually hale and hearty stock such as the Harrisons, my distant kindred.
Calhoun, C. W. (2005). Benjamin Harrison. New York: Times.
New York : Holt,
Rinehart, and Winston, 1961.
The inaugural addresses of the American Presidents : from Washington to Kennedy.
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