Of all Washington’s speeches on religion and morality, however, one stands out among all others: his “Farewell Address” as president. If last words are the most memorial among humans and leaders, it sure seems this passionate admonition for the future state of the republic was peculiar if Washington were merely nominally religious:
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 connections 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 deserts 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.[9]
At very least, the NPS guide could have conveyed any of the content in the video display that plays on a continuous loop at the now historic park of Mt. Vernon, George Washington’s estate. It plays the following non-stop for visitors going through the museum and educational center. As their website explains,[10] the display is titled, “George Washington and Religion,” and is “shown on the wall above the reconstructed church pew in the ‘Gentleman Planter Gallery,’ where visitors learn about the role religion played in Washington’s life and his encouragement of religious expression.” The short video production is flanked by displays of the Ten Commandments and the Lord’s Prayer on the walls right next to it.
The footage explains the following, with the voice of an actor as George Washington every time quotations appear below. It opens with the words:
“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.” [A quote from Washington’s farewell address as president]
Then there’s a slight pause with the words on the screen “George Washington and religion.” Then the narrator proceeds with the following paragraphs:
George Washington was raised in the Anglican Church, the official church of Virginia and the other southern colonies. As in other Virginian families of this period, he appears to have received his spiritual education from his mother using the family bible and other religious works at the time.
He was a member and vestryman of Pohick Church and Christ’s Church in Virginia. When he married Martha Dandridge Custis in 1759, it was in a Christian ceremony. At Mt. Vernon, their family home, the couple was known to say grace at meal times, and they provided a religious education to Martha’s children and grandchildren.
As president, Washington acknowledged the presence of a Divine hand in the fate of the nation by promoting the celebration of a Day of Thanksgiving: “I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be.”[11]
During the Revolutionary War, General Washington encouraged the religious convictions of his troops and asked the Continental Congress to support payment for clergymen of many faiths [or denominations] to tend to the spiritual needs of the men. “While we are contending for our own liberty, we should be very cautious of violating the rights of conscience in others, ever considering that God alone is the Judge of the hearts of men, and to him only in this case are they answerable.”[12]
Washington believed that political and religious freedom went hand-in-hand, and he encouraged the new republic to embrace religious tolerance: “[For you, doubtless, remember that I have often expressed my sentiment, that] every man, conducting himself as a good citizen, and being accountable to God alone for his religious opinions, ought to be protected in worshipping the Deity according to the dictates of his own conscience.”[13]
Washington tried to set an example by worshipping with different sects: Presbyterian, Quakers, Roman Catholics, Methodists, Congregationalists and Baptists. In a famous letter to Touro Synagogue, he made it clear that religious tolerance in a new nation was not for Christians alone: “May the children of the stock of Abraham, who dwell in this land, continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants; while every one shall sit [in safety] under his own vine and fig tree, and there shall be none to make him afraid.”[14]
It is clear in Washington’s writings that he was a deeply spiritual man, with a strong belief that a benevolent power was acting in his life and in the founding of the United States: “Every step, by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency.”[15]
It is no surprise that, on the wall above President Washington and his wife Martha’s tombs, are engraved the biblical words of Jesus from John 11:25: “I am the Resurrection and the Life, sayeth the Lord. He that believeth in Me, though he were dead yet shall he live. And whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die.”
How excellent is that Mt. Vernon summary of Washington’s religious passion and convictions? And how different it is from the short, skeptical and tart lie that the group of 100+ guests heard from the NPS guide at Independence Hall: “George Washington didn’t even attend church!”?
If that explanation of Washington’s Christian and religious commitment is good enough for Mt. Vernon to play non-stop throughout each day as myriads of visitors watch, is it too much for NPS guides at Independence Hall to learn and teach the same things without rabbit trailing down a negative, antagonistic and false road about Washington’s religious beliefs and practice?
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(2) While the NPS guide physically hunched over, mimicked and mocked one carrying and swinging an oversized bible in his hand, he said to the crowd: “Even if I said the founders were Christians, how could we really know?Just because people carry a big ol’ Bible in their hand, they can still be atheists!”
Why this NPS guide physically illustrated this point with such a sense of disdain and disrespect, I will never know. But it was simply unbecoming of any NPS guide to mock not just the founders but anyone who carries a bible, of all places in Independence Hall.
As you know, the fact is there wasn’t an atheist in the group of founders. Benjamin Franklin himself wrote atheism was virtually non-existent in those days. As Franklin’s explained in his 1787 pamphlet [16] for those in Europe thinking of relocating to America highlighted,
To this may be truly added, that serious religion, under its various denominations, is not only tolerated, but respected and practiced. Atheism is unknown there; Infidelity rare and secret; so that persons may live to a great age in that country without having their piety shocked by meeting with either an Atheist or an Infidel. And the Divine Being seems to have manifested his approbation of the
mutual forbearance and kindness with which the different sects treat each other; by the remarkable prosperity with which he has been pleased to favor the whole country.
Some retort in opposition that the Constitution is godless. That it makes no mention of God. They allege the Founders and Framers were trying to establish a secular state. Nothing could be further from the truth.
First, the founders’ already declared God’s central place in the Declaration of Independence, six of which signed it as well as the U.S. Constitution. Second, the Constitution describes the framework for a working government. It didn’t require the terms “God” or “Creator” as much as terms like the “executive branch” and “congress.” And the Declaration of Independence already established the new republics dependence upon a Creator. The Constitution didn’t need to restate what the Declaration of Independence already did: that our Founders believed in a Creator and were basing their republic upon his personage and works. Third, the Framers did in fact debate religious inclusion in the Constitution. That’s why the First Amendment was added to it. They established a sacred not secular state, through which its citizens were free to live out their own religious convictions.
Justice James Wilson, a signer of the Constitution, explained the relation between religion and law:
Human law must rest its authority ultimately upon the authority of that law which is divine….Far from being rivals or enemies, religion and law are twin sisters, friends, and mutual assistants. Indeed, these two sciences run into each other. The divine law as discovered by reason and moral sense forms an essential part of both. The moral precepts delivered in the sacred oracles form part of the law of nature, are of the same origin and of the same obligation, operating universally and perpetually. [17]
The Constitution assured in Article VI that a candidate didn’t have to believe one particular way to be elected.[18] Yet, it was also a right of free speech for government officials to advocate the election of Christians. As John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the United States, appointed by George Washington, wrote, "Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers. And it is the duty as well as the privilege and interest, of a Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers." [19]
For the Founders, God and government were intricately linked. Even Thomas Paine, perhaps the most religiously exempt among the founders, echoed one year earlier, “Spiritual freedom is the root of political freedom….As the union between spiritual freedom and political liberty seems nearly inseparable, it is our duty to defend both.” [20]
The Creator was the basis for our founders’ freedom and government. He gave them their appraisal for human value. He showed them how to maintain civility in society—with religion.
It is no coincidence that the Declaration of Independence begins with a spiritual emphasis: “When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature [21] and of nature's God entitle them….that they are endowed by their Creator….”
And that Creator prompted them to be moral, civil and true to their word. Religion, and the morals it produced, were so critical to the life of our country that our founders believed government would collapse without it. Charles Carroll, a signer of the Constitution, wrote, “Without morals a republic cannot subsist any length of time; they therefore who are decrying the Christian religion whose morality is so sublime and pure….are undermining the solid foundation of morals, the best security for the duration of free governments.” [22]
So what was the audience at Independence Hall supposed to think in July 2010, when the NPS guide retorted: “Even if I said the founders were Christians, how could we really know? Just because people carry a big ol’ Bible in their hand, they can still be atheists!”
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Benjamin Franklin statue in Philadelphia |
(3) “We know that Benjamin Franklin was a deist.”
Again, why would the NPS point out this one singular and particularly non-traditional religious point about Franklin’s life, what is often retorted in skeptical arenas about Franklin’s religion, when we know so much more that debates that very point? We know many, many, many other things about Benjamin Franklin too. And one of them is that, if one truly understands the religious confessions, beliefs and practices of Franklin, he or she will at least question if he was a deist at all—and if so, a very poor one, according to classic definitions.
First, Benjamin Franklin was an Episcopalian. Within roughly 50 years of his life of the revolutionary period, B. J. Lossing’s 1848 work on the Signers of the Declaration of Independence [23] (reprinted in Lives of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence, WallBuilder Press: Aledo, Texas, 1995), explained some early influences of Christianity upon Franklin’s life (page 105):
Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on the seventeenth day of January, 1706. His father was a true Puritan, and emigrated hither from England, in 1682. He soon afterward married Miss Folger, a native of Boston. Being neither a mechanic nor farmer, he turned his attention to the business of a soap-boiler, and tallow-chandler, which was his occupation for life.
The parents of Benjamin wished him to be a minster of the gospel, and they began to educate him with that end in view, but their slender means were not adequate for the object, and the intention was abandoned. He was kept at a common school for a few years, and then taken into the service of his brother. The business did not please the boy... At length the harmony between himself and brother was interrupted, and he left his service and went on board a vessel in the harbor, bound for New York. In that city he could not obtain employment, and he proceeded on foot to Philadelphia, where he arrived on a Sabbath morning. He was then but seventeen years old, friendless and alone, with but a single dollar in his pocket... It is said that his first appearance in Philadelphia attracted considerable attention in the streets. With his spare clothing in his pocket, and a loaf of bread under each arm, he wandered about until he came to a Quaker meeting, where he entered, sat down, went to sleep, and slept soundly until worship was closed. He was then awakened by one of the congregation, and he sought some other place of rest.
Of course, let’s not forget while Franklin lived in Philadelphia, he attended the historic Christ Church a few blocks away from Independence Hall. The Church’s website notes that: “During the Revolutionary Era, Christ Church welcomed the Continental Congresses. Benjamin and Deborah Franklin and Betsy Ross were parishioners. Later, George Washington and John Adams attended services while they were the nation’s Chief Executives.”[24] In fact, the steeple on Christ Church was erected because Benjamin Franklin raised the money to build it.
But the big question is: was Franklin a deist? Though I’m not debating that he might have had some deistic tendencies, as you know, the key belief of a deist is the belief that God is the divine watchmaker, who just creates and “winds up” creation but then lets it go on its own course and does not intervene in it any longer. But that is not what Ben Franklin believed. He later confessed to Congress itself that he believed the Creator was very much involved and engaged in the affairs of men, including the founding of our republic. An 81-year old Franklin echoed his belief as he appealed to the Constitutional Convention, after meeting for five weeks with no unanimity, to remember the contributing and effective nature of God and prayer:
In the beginning of the contest with Britain, when we were sensible of danger, we had daily prayers in this room for the divine protection! Our prayers, Sir, were heard; and they were graciously answered. All of us, who were engaged in the struggle, must have observed frequent instances of a superintending Providence in our favor. To that kind Providence we owe this happy opportunity of consulting in peace on the means of establishing our future national felicity. And have we now forgotten that powerful friend? Or do we imagine we no longer need its assistance? 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 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 little partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and byword 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.[25]
If those are the words and beliefs of a true-blue deist, I wish there were more deists flooding Washington D.C.! When Franklin said, “Our prayers, sir, were heard and graciously answered,” was he speaking of a bunch of Hindu, Buddhist or even a non-identifiable neutered Creator prayers? No, he was referring to the Creator to whom most of the founders prayed—the God of the Judeo-Christian scriptures.
