• The Bible is the Word of God
• The Bible is the Core Textbook on Every Academic Subject

• Past: The Bible was the source of public schools in America.
  • Bible-Based Public Schools made America the most prosperous and the most admired nation in history
• Present: The Bible has been removed from public schools in America
  • Prosperity has been replaced with bankruptcy. America is now despised, not admired.
• Future: The Bible must be the core of every child's education. All other academic subjects should flow out of the Bible.
  • Click here for a critique of the Ron Paul Curriculum.
  • Click here for a Biblical vision of a humane society.

The Past

Public Schools Taught the Bible
All Other Subjects Orbited Around the Bible

The phrase "The Laws of Nature and of Nature's God" is not a vague deistic phrase. It refers to the Bible.

William Blackstone (1723-1780) described the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God in a chapter in his Commentaries entitled, "Of the Nature of Laws in General." An excerpt is found here. Among the highlights:

Man, considered as a creature, must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator, for he is entirely a dependent being. And consequently, as man depends absolutely upon his Maker for everything, it is necessary that he should, in all points, conform to his Maker's will.
This will of his Maker is called the law of nature.
This law of nature, being coeval [existing at the same time - ed.] with mankind, and dictated by God himself, is of course superior in obligation to any other. It is binding over all the globe in all countries, and at all times: no human laws are of any validity, if contrary to this; and such of them as are valid derive all their force and all their authority, mediately or immediately, from this original. The doctrines thus delivered we call the revealed or divine law, and they are to be found only in the holy scriptures. These precepts, when revealed, are found upon comparison to be really a part of the original law of nature, as they tend in all their consequences to man's felicity [happiness].
Upon these two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation, depend all human laws; that is to say, no human laws should be suffered to contradict these. [more]

"They are to be found only in the holy scriptures." Without the Bible, "the Laws of Nature" become whatever anybody wants them to be. Civilization crumbles in pure subjectivity.

John Locke (1632-1704) was a Christian philosopher who had a great influence in America. He said:

[T]he Law of Nature stands as an eternal rule to all men, legislators as well as others. The rules that they make for other men's actions must . . . be conformable to the Law of Nature, i.e., to the will of God.
[L]aws human must be made according to the general laws of Nature, and without contradiction to any positive law of Scripture, otherwise they are ill made.
Locke, Two Treatises on Government, Bk II sec 135. (quoting Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity, 1.iii, § 9 )

Blackstone was cited more frequently than Locke by America's Founding Fathers. In 1810 Thomas Jefferson wryly commented that American lawyers used Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England with the same dedication and reverence that Muslims used the Koran.

One of the first laws concerning public schools in America (1647) is known as "the Old Deluder Satan Act."

It being one chief project of that old deluder, Satan, to keep men from the knowledge of the Scriptures, as in former times by keeping them in an unknown tongue, so in these latter times by persuading from the use of tongues, that so that at least the true sense and meaning of the original might be clouded and corrupted with love and false glosses of saint-seeming deceivers; and to the end that learning may not be buried in the grave of our forefathers, in church and commonwealth, the Lord assisting our endeavors. It is therefore ordered that every township in this jurisdiction, after the Lord hath increased them to fifty households shall forthwith appoint one within their town to teach all such children as shall resort to him to write and read, whose wages shall be paid either by the parents or masters of such children, or by the inhabitants in general, by way of supply, as the major part of those that order the prudentials of the town shall appoint; provided those that send their children be not oppressed by paying much more than they can have them taught for in other towns. And it is further ordered, that when any town shall increase to the number of one hundred families or householders, they shall set up a grammar school, the master thereof being able to instruct youth so far as they may be fitted for the university, provided that if any town neglect the performance hereof above one year that every such town shall pay 5 pounds to the next school till they shall perform this order.

"Knowledge of the Scriptures" was the reason for public schools. The Bible was not just for church, but also for civil matters ("commonwealth").

That same year in England, the Westminster Assembly was hammering out a Catechism for children, which would soon be found in every schoolroom in America.

Second only to the Bible, the "Shorter Catechism" of the Westminster Confession was the most widely published piece of literature in the pre-revolutionary era in America. It is estimated that some five million copies were available in the colonies. With a total population of only four million people in America at the time of the Revolution, the number is staggering. The Westminster Catechism was not only a central part of the colonial educational curriculum, learning it was required by law. Each town employed an officer whose duty was to visit homes to hear the children recite the Catechism. The primary schoolbook for children, the New England Primer, included the Catechism.  Daily recitations of it were required at these schools. Their curriculum included memorization of the Westminster Confession and the Westminster Larger Catechism. There was not a person at Independence Hall in 1776 who had not been exposed to it, and most of them had it spoon fed to them before they could walk.

Colonial American Children who were spoon-fed the Shorter Catechism graduated to the The Westminster Confession of Faith (1646), about which Gardiner says:

In addition to being the decree of Parliament as the standard for Christian doctrine in the British Kingdom, it was adopted as the official statement of belief for the colonies of Massachusetts and Connecticut. Although slightly altered and called by different names, it was the creed of Congregationalist, Baptist, and Presbyterian churches throughout the English speaking world. Assent to the Westminster Confession was officially required at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. Princeton scholar Benjamin Warfield wrote: “It was impossible for any body of Christians in the [English] Kingdoms to avoid attending to it.”

America was a Protestant nation. It was therefore a Bible-based nation.

Sam Adams wrote to his cousin John:

Many settlers to America had suffered persecution for their Christian beliefs at the hands of other “Christians” (many of the civil abuses of Europe inexcusably occurred under the banner of Christianity — the Inquisition, the Crusades, etc.). When Europe finally began to move away from such abuses, it did so because of the efforts of leaders like Martin Luther, John Wycliffe, John Huss, William Tyndale, and others. These individuals believed that it was the Biblical illiteracy of the people which had permitted so many civil abuses to occur; that is, since the common man was not permitted to read the Scriptures for himself, his knowledge of rights and wrongs was limited to what his civil leaders told him.

The American settlers, having been exposed to the Reformation teachings, believed that the proper protection from civil abuses in America could be achieved by eliminating Biblical illiteracy. In this way, the citizens themselves (rather than just their leaders) could measure the acts of their civil government compared to the teachings of the Bible. Consequently, one of the first laws providing public education for all children (the “Old Deluder Satan Law,” passed in Massachusetts in 1642 and in Connecticut in 1647) was a calculated attempt to prevent the abuse of power which can be imposed on a Biblically-illiterate people. That public school law explained not only why students needed an education but also how it was to be accomplished:

It being one chief project of that old deluder, Satan, to keep men from the knowledge of the Scriptures, as in former time.... It is therefore ordered . . . [that] after the Lord hath increased [the settlement] to the number of fifty householders, [they] shall then forthwith appoint one within their town, to teach all such children as shall resort to him, to write and read.... And it is further ordered, that where any town shall increase to the number of one hundred families or householders, they shall set up a grammar school... to instruct youths, so far as they may be fitted for the university.[24]

It was not uncommon for subsequent American literacy laws to stress the need to know the Scriptures. For example, the 1690 Connecticut law declared:

This [legislature] observing that... there are many persons unable to read the English tongue and thereby incapable to read the holy Word of God or the good laws of this colony... it is ordered that all parents and masters shall cause their respective children and servants, as they are capable, to be taught to read distinctly the English tongue.[25]

The concern that caused this educational law to be passed was that many were illiterate and thereby “incapable to read the holy Word of God ...”

The inseparability of Christianity from education, whether public or private, was evident at every level of American education. For example, the 1636 rules of Harvard declared:

Let every student be plainly instructed and earnestly pressed to consider well the main end of his life and studies is to know God and Jesus Christ which is eternal life (John 17.3) and therefore to lay Christ in the bottom as the only foundation of all sound knowledge and learning. And seeing the Lord only giveth wisdom, let every one seriously set himself by prayer in secret to seek it of Him (Prov. 2, 3). Every one shall so exercise himself in reading the Scriptures twice a day that he shall be ready to give such an account of his proficiency therein.[26]

Those Harvard requirements changed little over subsequent years. For example, the 1790 rules required:

All persons of what degree soever residing at the College, and all undergraduates … shall constantly and seasonably attend the worship of God in the chapel, morning and evening. . . . All the scholars shall, at sunset in the evening preceding the Lord’s Day, lay aside all their diversions and. ...it is enjoined upon every scholar carefully to apply himself to the duties of religion on said day.[27]

So firmly was Harvard dedicated to this goal that its two mottos were “For the Glory of Christ” and “For Christ and the Church.”[28] This school and its philosophy produced signers John Adams, John Hancock, Elbridge Gerry, John Pickering, William Williams, Rufus King, William Hooper, William Ellery, Samuel Adams, Robert Treat Paine, and numerous other illustrious Founders.

In 1692, through the efforts of the Rev. James Blair, the College of William & Mary was founded in Williamsburg, Virginia, so that:

[T]he youth may be piously enacted in good letters and manners and that the Christian faith may be propagated ... to the glory of Almighty God.[29]

A century later, William &. Mary was still pursuing this goal—as indicated by its 1792 requirements:

The students shall attend prayers in chapel at the time appointed and there demean themselves with that decorum which the sacred duty of public worship requires.[30]

In 1699, Yale was founded by ten ministers[31] in order:

[T]o plant, and under the Divine blessing, to propagate in this wilderness the blessed reformed Protestant religion.[32]

When classes began in 1701, Yale required:

[T]he Scriptures . . . morning and evening [are] to be read by the students at the times of prayer in the school . . . studiously endeavor[ing] in the education of said students to promote the power and purity of religion.[33]

In 1720 Yale charged its students:

Seeing God is the giver of all wisdom, every scholar, besides private or secret prayer, wherein all we are bound to ask wisdom, shall be present morning and evening at public prayer in the hall at the accustomed hour.[34]

Then in 1743, and again in 1755, Yale instructed its students:

Above all have an eye to the great end of all your studies, which is to obtain the clearest conceptions of Divine things and to lead you to a saving knowledge of God in his Son Jesus Christ.[35]

Its 1787 rules declared:

All the scholars are required to live a religious and blameless life according to the rules of God’s Word, diligently reading the holy Scriptures, that fountain of Divine light and truth, and constantly attending all the duties of religion.... All the scholars are obliged to attend Divine worship in the College Chapel on the Lord’s Day and on Days of Fasting and Thanksgiving appointed by public Authority.[36]

It was this school and its philosophy which produced signers Oliver Wolcott, William Livingston, Lyman Hall, Lewis Morris, Jared Ingersoll, Philip Livingston, William Samuel Johnson, and numerous other distin­guished Founders.

In 1746, Princeton was founded by the Presbyterians with the Rev. Jonathan Dickinson as its first president. He was followed by a long line of illustrious ministers who served as presidents, including Aaron Burr Sr., Jonathan Edwards, Samuel Davies, and Samuel Finley (all of whom were involved in America’s greatest revival—the Great Awakening).[37] Its presi­dent immediately preceding the Revolution was the Rev. Dr. John Witherspoon, later a signer of the Declaration of Independence and a venerated leader among the patriots. Notice some of Princeton’s requirements while John Witherspoon was president:

Every student shall attend worship in the college hall morning and evening at the hours appointed and shall behave with gravity and reverence during the whole service. Every student shall attend public worship on the Sabbath.... Besides the public exercises of religious worship on the Sabbath, there shall be assigned to each class certain exercises for their religious instruction suited to the age and standing of the pupils. . . . and no student belonging to any class shall neglect them.[38]

Signers James Madison, Richard Stockton, Benjamin Rush, Gunning Bedford, Jonathan Dayton, and numerous other prominent Founders, graduated from Princeton (a seminary for the training of ministers).

In 1754, Dartmouth College of New Hampshire (made especially famous by alumnus Daniel Webster’s defense of its charter before the U. S. Supreme Court in 1819[39])was founded by the Rev. Eleazar Wheelock. Its charter was very succinct as to its purpose:

Whereas... the Reverend Eleazar Wheelock.... educated a number of the children of the Indian natives with a view to their carrying the Gospel in their own language and spreading the knowledge of the great Redeemer among their savage tribes. And ... the design became reputable among the Indians insomuch that a larger number desired the education of their children in said school.... [Therefore] Dartmouth-College [is established] for the education and instruction of youths ... in reading, writing and all parts of learning which shall appear necessary and expedient for civilizing and Christianizing the children.[40]

That same year (1754), King’s College was founded in New York. Following the American Revolution, its name was changed to Columbia College; and in 1787, Constitution signer William Samuel Johnson was appointed its first president. Columbia’s admission requirements were straightforward:

No candidate shall be admitted into the College... unless he shall be able to render into English ... the Gospels from the Greek.... It is also expected that all students attend public worship on Sundays.[41]

Johnson’s commencement speech to the Columbia graduates further affirms the religious emphasis of American public education:

You this day, gentlemen, … have ... received a public education, the purpose whereof hath been to qualify you the better to serve your Creator and your country. . . .Your first great duties, you are sensible, are those you owe to Heaven, to your Creator and Redeemer. Let these be ever present to your minds and exemplified in your lives and conduct. Imprint deep upon your minds the principles of piety towards God and a reverence and fear of His holy name. The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. . . . Remember, too, that you are the redeemed of the Lord, that you are bought with a price, even the inestimable price of the precious blood of the Son of God. . . . Love, fear, and serve Him as your Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier. Acquaint yourselves with Him in His Word and holy ordinances. Make Him your friend and protector and your felicity is secured both here and hereafter.[42]

In 1766, Rutgers University was founded through the efforts of the Rev. Theodore Frelinghuysen. Its official motto, “Sun of Righteousness, Shine upon the West Also,” was an extension of the Netherlands’ University of Utrecht motto: “Sun of Righteousness, Shine upon Us.”[43]

Examination of other colleges and universities of the day reveals that the examples mentioned above were neither aberrations nor isolated selections— they represented the norm:

[H]igher education in the United States before 1870 was provided very largely in the tuitional colleges of the different religious denominations, rather than by the State. Of the two hundred and forty-six colleges founded by the close of the year 1860 . . . seventeen were State institutions and but two or three others had any State connections.[44]

Perhaps George Washington, “The Father of the Country,” provided the most succinct description of America’s educational philosophy when Chiefs from the Delaware Indian tribe brought him three Indian youths to be trained in American schools. Washington first assured the chiefs that “Congress . . . will look upon them as their own children,”[45] and then commended the Chiefs for their decision, telling them that:

You do well to wish to learn our arts and ways of life, and above all, the religion of Jesus Christ. These will make you a greater and happier people than you are. Congress will do every thing they can to assist you in this wise intention.[46]

By George Washington’s own words, what youths learned in America’s schools “above all” was “the religion of Jesus Christ.”

Today

Public Schools vs. The Bible
School District of Abington Township v. Schempp
Supreme Court of the United States, 1963

This case involved yet another voluntary activity by students: the use of the Scriptures. At issue was a Pennsylvania policy which stated:

Each school... shall be opened by the reading, without comment, of a chapter in the Holy Bible. . .. Participation in the opening exercises . . is voluntary. The student reading the verses from the Bible may select the passages and read from any version he chooses.[49]

The Court further explained:

There are no prefatory statements, no questions asked or solicited, no comments or explanations made and no interpretations given at or during the exercises. The students and parents are advised that the student may absent himself from the classroom or, should he elect to remain, not participate in the exercises.[50]

Like the New York prayer, this seemed to be a relatively innocuous activity. It was voluntary; it was student-led; no sectarian instruction or comments were permitted. Yet today's civil libertarians portray this as a coercion case -- so much so, they claim, that Edward Schempp thought himself forced to file suit to relieve his children from the coercion. However, the facts of the case disprove this assertion:

Roger and Donna [two of the Schempp children] testified that they had never protested to their teachers or other persons of authority in the school system concerning the practices of which they now complain [in this lawsuit]. In fact, on occasion, Donna herself had volunteered to read the Bible.[51] (emphasis added)

Furthermore, so non-coercive was the policy that while other children were reading the Bible, one of the Schempp children had been permitted to read the Koran.[52] The facts in the case clearly establish that there was no coercion. (However, when this case finally reached the Supreme Court, these facts, presented in the District Court, were ignored.)

Another argument raised then (and still raised today) is that the school setting is no place for religious activities; if such activities are to occur it should be at home-or in a private school. Justice Stewart, in his dissent, pointed out the constitutional fallacy of such arguments;

Freedom only for the rich?

It might be argued here that parents who wanted their children to be exposed to religious influences in school could... send their children to private or parochial schools. But the consideration which renders this contention too facile [simplistic] to be determinative [a factor] has already been recognized by the Court: "Freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion are available to all, not merely to those who can pay their own way." Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U.S. 105, 111.

Religion only for the home?

It might also be argued that parents who want their children exposed to religious influences can adequately fulfill that wish off school property and outside school time. With all its surface persuasiveness, however, this argument seriously misconceives the basic constitutional justification for permitting the exercises at issue in these cases. For a compulsory state educational system so structures a child's life that if religious exercises are held to be an impermissible activity in schools, religion is placed at an artificial and state-created disadvantage. Viewed in this light, permission of such exercises for those who want them is necessary if the schools are truly to be neutral in the matter of religion. And a refusal to permit religious exercises thus is seen, not as the realization of state neutrality, but rather as the establishment of a religion of secularism.[53]

Religion is never a purely private affair. Those who tell you your religion should be "private" are attempting to make their religion the basis for public and political power over you.

The State's compulsory schooling laws send a clear message to kids:

Your leaders want you in school because we want to teach you the things that are most important for you to know in order to become a fully human productive citizen of this great nation.

What is the first lesson students learn in secular schools? God, religion, and morality are not very important. "If they were, surely our educational experts would see to it that we learned what we need to know." Kids aren't stupid. They realize the implications of not making the Bible our foundational school textbook.

We can begin to see that it is not just that arguments against Christianity in public schools are fallacious. There are compelling social reasons for making Christianity the foundation of everything that is taught in school, and the Framers of the Constitution understood these reasons.

• The Founding Fathers correctly believed that "religion, morality and knowledge" should be taught in public schools.
• They believed that morality could not be taught without religion, and that without morality, our nation would crumble.
• The U.S. Supreme Court (1844) declared that morality could not be taught in government-operated schools without the New Testament.
• Our entire system of government was based on religion and morality
• Or as the Founders often spoke of them, "piety and virtue."

There is not a single Signer of the Constitution who would have agreed that the Constitution he was signing was intended to give the federal government the power to order municipal schools to remove The Ten Commandments and the Bible. The Founders' opinion of the Bible, and of its use in schools, was clear:

The great enemy of the salvation of man, in my opinion, never invented a more effectual means of extirpating [extinguishing] Christianity from the world than by persuading mankind that it was improper to read the Bible at schools.[54] [T]he Bible, when not read in schools, is seldom read in any subsequent period of life. . . . [It] should be read in our schools in preference to all other books from its containing the greatest portion of that kind of knowledge which is calculated to produce private and public temporal happiness.[55]
BENJAMIN RUSH, SIGNER OF THE DECLARATION

[Why] should not the Bible regain the place it once held as a school book? Its morals are pure, its examples captivating and noble. The reverence for the Sacred Book that is thus early impressed lasts long; and probably if not impressed in infancy, never takes firm hold of the mind.[56]
FISHER AMES, AUTHOR OF THE HOUSE LANGUAGE FOR THE FIRST AMENDMENT

Suppose a nation in some distant region should take the Bible for their only law book and every member should regulate his conduct by the precepts there exhibited.... What a Eutopia, what a Paradise would this region be.[57] I have examined all [religions]... and the result is that the Bible is the best Book in the world. It contains more of my little philosophy than all the libraries I have seen.[58]
JOHN ADAMS

[T]he Bible.... [is] a book containing the history of all men and of all nations and... [is] a necessary part of a polite education.[59]
HENRY LAURENS, PRESIDENT OF CONTINENTAL CONGRESS; U.S. DIPLOMAT; SELECTED AS DELEGATE TO THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION

The Bible itself [is] the common inheritance, not merely of Christendom, but of the world. [60]
JOSEPH STORY, U.S. SUPREME COURT JUSTICE; FATHER OF AMERICAN JURISPRUDENCE

To a man of liberal education, the study of history is not only useful, and important, but altogether indispensable, and with regard to the history contained in the Bible . . . "it is not so much praiseworthy to be acquainted with as it is shameful to be ignorant of it."[61]
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS

The reflection and experience of many years have led me to consider the holy writings not only as the most authentic and instructive in themselves, but as the clue to all other history. They tell us what man is, and they alone tell us why he is what he is: a contradictory creature that seeing and approving of what is good, pursues and performs what is evil. All of private and of public life is there displayed.... From the same pure fountain of wisdom we learn that vice destroys freedom; that arbitrary power is founded on public immorality.[62]
GOUVERNEUR MORRIS, PENMAN AND SIGNER OF THE CONSTITUTION

[The Bible] is a book worth more than all the other books that were ever printed.[63]
PATRICK HENRY

[T]o the free and universal reading of the Bible in that age, men were much indebted for right views of civil liberty. The Bible is . . . a book which teaches man his own individual responsibility, his own dignity, and his equality with his fellow man.[64]
DANIEL WEBSTER

The Bible is the best of all books, for it is the word of God and teaches us the way to be happy in this world and in the next Continue therefore to read it and to regulate your life by its precepts.[65]
JOHN JAY, ORIGINAL CHIEF-JUSTICE OF THE U S. SUPREME COURT

The Bible is the chief moral cause of all that is good and the best corrector of all that is evil in human society; the best book for regulating the temporal [secular] concerns of men.[66]
NOAH WEBSTER

Bibles are strong entrenchments. Where they abound, men cannot pursue wicked courses.[67]
JAMES MCHENRY, SIGNER OF THE CONSTITUTION

Not only did the Abington Court disregard these stated beliefs of the Founders, it falsely asserted:

The [First] Amendment's purpose was not to strike merely at the official establishment of a single sect . . . . It was to create a complete and permanent separation of the spheres of religious activity and civil authority.[68] (emphasis added)

This absurd claim completely reverses the Founders' intent; their purpose for the First Amendment was to "strike at the official establishment of a single sect" and definitely was not to completely and permanently separate the religious and civil spheres. Such a separation would mean that our nation was not a nation "under God." The purpose of the First Amendment was to separate the ecclesiastical and civil spheres, not the religious and civil spheres. Most Americans have not given due consideration to this distinction. The Supreme Court is either just as ignorant as these Americans, or else the Court self-consciously opposes the true intentions of the Founding Fathers. In either case, the Justices have not kept their oath of office. America's Founding Fathers lived in a religious nation, and their Constitution did not change this. The United States is a Christian nation, not a secular (atheistic) nation, because it is a nation "under God," it acknowledges its duty to God as a nation, and it endorses and promotes the true religion.

The "separation of church and state" did not mean the "separation of religion and state," much less the "separation of Christianity and the State" until 1947 and more clearly in the early 1960's. In the case of Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421 (1962), the New York case which removed voluntary prayer from public schools, Justice Douglass, who concurred in the decision of the majority, reminded the Court,

At the same time I cannot say that to authorize this prayer is to establish a religion in the strictly historic meaning of those words. The Court analogizes the present case to those involving the traditional Established Church. We once had an Established Church, the Anglican. All baptisms and marriages had to take place there. That church was supported by taxation. In these and other ways the Anglican Church was favored over the others. The First Amendment put an end to placing any one church in a preferred position. It ended support of any church or all churches by taxation. It went further and prevented secular sanction to any religious ceremony, dogma, or rite. Thus, it prevents civil penalties from being applied against recalcitrants or nonconformists. A religion is not established in the usual sense merely by letting those who choose to do so say the prayer that the public school teacher leads.
Engel at 442 and note 7

The Majority in Abington were wrong: The First Amendment's purpose was "to strike merely at the official establishment of a single sect," not to remove all traces of Christianity from the schools. Again, Justice Douglas:

Religion was once deemed to be a function of the public school system. The Northwest Ordinance, which antedated the First Amendment, provided in Article III that "Religion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged."

It is possible that by mentioning that the Northwest Ordinance was first passed before the First Amendment, Justice Douglas is trying to lead the reader to think the First Amendment changed the function of the public school, and declared that religion and morality were no longer indispensable supports for the new system of government under the Constitution. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Northwest Ordinance was re-passed by the same Congress that approved the First Amendment. It accurately reflects the views of those who signed the Constitution. Notice (emphasis added in each quote):

Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.[69]
GEORGE WASHINGTON, Farewell Address, 17 Sept. 1796.

The great pillars of all government and of social life . . . [are] virtue, morality, and religion. This is the armor, my friend, and this alone, that renders us invincible.[70]
PATRICK HENRY

One of the beautiful boasts of our municipal jurisprudence is that Christianity is a part of the Common Law. . . . There never has been a period in which the Common Law did not recognize Christianity as lying at its foundations. . . . I verily believe Christianity necessary to the support of civil society.[71]
JOSEPH STORY, U S. SUPREME COURT JUSTICE; FATHER OF AMERICAN JURISPRUDENCE

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.[72]
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

[T]he Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer's mission upon earth. [and] laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity.[73]
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS

[T]he Christian religion -- its general principles -- must ever be regarded among us as the foundation of civil society.[74]
DANIEL WEBSTER

True religion always enlarges the heart and strengthens the social tie.[75]
JOHN WITHERSPOON

Before any man can be considered as a member of civil society, he must be considered as a subject of the Governor of the Universe.[76]
JAMES MADISON

I have always considered Christianity as the strong ground of republicanism. . . . It is only necessary for republicanism to ally itself to the Christian religion to overturn all the corrupted political and religious institutions in the world.[77]
BENJAMIN RUSH, SIGNER OF THE DECLARATION

[T]he religion which has introduced civil liberty is the religion of Christ and his apostles.... and to this we owe our free constitutions of government.[78]
NOAH WEBSTER

[N]ational prosperity can neither be attained nor preserved without the favor of Providence.[79]
JOHN JAY, ORIGINAL CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE U.S. SUPREME COURT

As guardians of the prosperity, liberty; and morals of the State, we are therefore bound by every injunction of patriotism and wisdom . . . to patronize public improvements and to cherish all institutions for the diffusion of religious knowledge and for the promotion of virtue and piety.[80]
DANIEL TOMPKINS, GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK; VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES

Nowhere can it be demonstrated that the Founders desired to secularize official society and "create a complete separation of the spheres of religious duty and civil authority." The Abington decision represented a further step in the devolution of the First Amendment by rewriting the intent of those who created the Constitution and Bill of Rights.

[Adapted from David Barton, Original Intent, 160-65.]

49. Abington at 211, n. 4, 207.

50. Abington at 207.

51. Schempp v. School District of Abington; 177 Fed. Supp. 398, 400.

52. Schempp at 401.

53. Abington at 312-313, Stewart, J. (dissenting).

54. Rush, Letters, Vol. I, p.521, to Jeremy Belknap on July 13, 1789.

55. Benjamin Rush, Essays, pp. 94, 100, "A Defence of the Use of the Bible as a School Book."

56. Fisher Ames, Works of Fisher Ames (Boston: T. B. Wait & Co, 1809), pp. 134-135.

57. John Adams, Works, Vol. II, pp. 6-7, diary entry for February 22, 1756.

58. John Adams, Works, Vol. X, p. 85, to Thomas Jefferson on December 25, 1813.

59. Henry Laurens, The Papers of Henry Laurens, George C. Rogers, Jr., and David R. Chesnutt, editors (Columbia, S. C.: University of South Carolina Press, 1980), Vol. VIII, pp. 426-427, to James Lawrenson on August 19, 1772.

60. Joseph Story, A Familiar Exposition of the Constitution of the United States (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1854), p. 259, §446.

61. John Quincy Adams, Letters of John Quincy Adams to His Son on the Bible and Its Teachings (Auburn: James M. Alden, 1850), p. 34.

62. Collections of the New York Historical Society for the Year 1821 (New York: E. Bliss and E. White, 1821), p. 30, from "An Inaugural Discourse Delivered Before the New York Historical Society by the Honorable Gouverneur Morris on September 4, 1816."

63. William Wirt, Sketches of the Life and Character of Patrick Henry (Philadelphia: James Webster, 1818), p. 402. See also George Morgan, Patrick Henry (Philadelphia & London: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1929), p. 403.

64. Daniel Webster, Address Delivered at Bunker Hill, June 17, 1843, on the Completion of the Monument (Boston: T. R. Marvin, 1843), p. 31. See also W. P. Strickland, History of the American Bible Society from its Organization to the Present Time (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1849), p. 18.

65. John Jay, John Jay: The Winning of the Peace. Unpublished Papers 1780-1784, Richard B. Morris, editor (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1980), Vol. II, p. 709, to Peter Augustus Jay on April 8, 1784.

66. Noah Webster, The Holy Bible . . . With Amendments of the Language (New Haven: Durrie & Peck, 1833), p. v.

67. Bernard C. Steiner, One Hundred and Ten Years of Bible Society Work in Maryland (Baltimore: Maryland Bible Society, 1921), p. 14.

68. Abington at 217, quoting Everson v. Board of Education; 330 U.S. 1, 31-32. t

69. Washington, Address . . . Preparatory to His Declination, pp. 22-23.

70. Moses Coit Tyler, Patrick Henry (New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1897), p. 409, to Archibald Blair on January 8, 1799.

71. Joseph Story, Life and Letters of Joseph Story, William W. Story, editor (Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1851), Vol. II, pp. 8, 92.

72. James Madison, The Papers of James Madison, Henry D. Gilpin, editor (Washington: Langtree & O'Sullivan, 1840), Vol. II, p. 985, June 28, 1787.

73. John Quincy Adams, An Oration Delivered Before the Inhabitants of the Town of Newburyport at Their Request on the Sixty-First Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1837 (Newburyport: Charles Whipple, 1837), pp. 5-6.

74. Daniel Webster, Mr. Webster's Speech in Defence of the Christian Ministry and in Favor of the Religious Instruction of the Young. Delivered in the Supreme Court of the United States, February 10, 1844, in the Case of Stephen Girard's Will (Washington: Printed by Gales and Seaton, 1844), p. 41.

75. John Witherspoon, The Works of John Witherspoon (Edinburgh: J. Ogle, 1815), Vol. V, p. 272, "The Absolute Necessity of Salvation Through Christ," January 2, 1758.

76. James Madison, A Memorial and Remonstrance Presented to the General Assembly of the State of Virginia at their Session in 1785 in Consequence of a Bill Brought into that Assembly for the Establishment of Religion (Massachusetts: Isaiah Thomas, 1786), p. 4.

77. Rush, Letters, Vol. II, pp. 820-821, to Thomas Jefferson on August 22, 1800.

78. Noah Webster, History, p. 300, ¶578.

79. Speeches of the . . . Governors . . . of New York, p. 47, Governor John Jay on January 6, 1796.

80. Speeches of the . . . Governors . . . of New York, p. 136, Governor Daniel Tompkins on November 5, 1816.