Letter to the Editor: U.S. was founded on religious principles
The Constitution is the “how” we operate as a people and the Declaration of Independence is the “why” we are operating our government the way we are. The two are inseparable and all my copies have these two documents together.
Thomas Jefferson was instrumental in writing the Declaration of Independence. It states: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
There were government-established religions all over the world, that is why the Pilgrims fled — for religious freedom. President John Adams said, “It is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand.” His predecessor, George Washington, said, “Of all the dispositions and habits, which lead to political prosperity, Religion and Morality are indispensable supports.”
Ben Franklin stood up at the Constitutional Convention and asked for prayer every morning because the convention was in danger of breaking up. The Founders’ concern was not that religion should be disestablished, but that the government should not favor a single denomination.
If secular government gives us our civil rights, then they can take them away. But our rights are endowed by our creator, not man. Otherwise a secular government can say that Jews can be thrown into ovens as National Socialist Germany did.
Or it could crush freedom of speech and kill millions like communist China and Russia did. It is a fearful thing to place your freedoms in the hands of imperfect men.
That is why Jefferson was against big centralized government. Jefferson said, “Let no more be heard of the confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution.”
Humanists keep trying to rewrite history. Washington was chosen to preside over the convention to create the Constitution. Washington said, “Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair; the event is in the hand of God.”