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1. Charles Finney-1792-1875
(A Christian Evangelist of the past whose preaching brought revival to our nation)
“The Church must take the right ground in regard to politics…The time has come that Christians must vote for honest men, and be consistent in politics or the Lord will curse them…God cannot sustain this free and blessed country, which we love and pray for, unless the Church will take the right ground. Politics are a part of a religion in such a country as this, and Christians must do their duty to the country as a part of their duty to God…(God) will bless or curse this nation, according to the course (Christians) take (in politics).”
2. United States Supreme Court-1885
(Murphy v. Ramsey & Others)
“Certainly no legislation can be supposed more wholesome and necessary in the founding of a free, self-governing commonwealth…than that which seeks to establish it on the basis of the idea of the family, as consisting in and springing from the union for life of one man and one woman in the holy estate of matrimony; (the family is) the sure foundation of all that is stable and noble in our civilization…”
3. President Harry Truman
“The basis of our Bill of Rights comes from the teachings we get from Exodus and St. Matthew, from Isaiah and St. Paul. I don’t think we emphasize that enough these days. If we don’t have a proper fundamental moral background, we will finally end up with a…government which does not believe in rights for anybody except the State!”
4. William Penn
“Governments, like clocks, go from the motion men give them…Wherefore governments rather depend upon men, than men upon governments. Let men be good, and the government cannot be bad…But if men be bad…the government (will) never (be) good…I know some say, Let us have good laws, and no matter for the men that execute them. But let them consider, that though good laws do well, good men do better; for good laws may (lack) good men… but good men will never (lack) good laws, nor (allow bad) ones.”
5. Noah Webster
“The religion which has introduced civil liberty, is the religion of Christ and his apostles, which enjoins humility, piety, and benevolence: which acknowledges in every person a brother, or a sister, and a citizen with equal rights. This is the genuine Christianity, and to this we owe our free constitution of government.”
6. President James Garfield
“Now more than ever before, the people are responsible for the character of their Congress. If that body be ignorant, reckless, and corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, recklessness, and corruption. If it be intelligent, brave, and pure, it is because the people demand these high qualities to represent them in the national legislature…if the next centennial does not find us a great nation…it will be because those who represent the enterprise, the culture, and the morality of the nation do not aid in controlling the political forces.”
7. Noah Webster
“When you become entitled to exercise the right of voting for public officers, let it be impressed on your mind that God commands you to chose for rulers, just men who will rule in the fear of God. The preservation of a republican government depends on the faithful discharge of this duty; if the citizens neglect their duty and place unprincipled men in office the government will soon be corrupted; laws will be made, not for the public good, so much as for selfish or local purposes: corrupt or incompetent men will be appointed to execute the laws; the public revenues will be squandered on unworthy men; and the rights of the citizens will be violated or disregarded. If a republican government fails to secure public prosperity and happiness, it must be because the citizens neglect their divine commands and elect bad men to make and administer laws.”
8. John Jay
(1st Chief Justice, U.S. Supreme Court)
“Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the duty as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers.”
9. Samuel Adams
“Impress the minds of men with the importance of educating their little boys and girls…in the study and practice of the exalted virtues of the Christian system.”
10. Daniel Webster
“Whatever makes men good Christians, makes them good citizens.”
11. Earl Warren
Governor of California who later became Chief Justice United States Supreme Court
(TIME Magazine, February 15, 1954, P. 49)
“I believe no one can read the history of our country,” he said, “without realizing that the Good Book and the spirit of the Saviour have from the beginning been our guiding geniuses…Whether we look to the first Charter of Virginia…or to the Charter of New England…or to the Charter of Massachusetts Bay…or to the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut…the same objective is present; a Christian land governed by Christian principles…I believe the entire Bill of Rights came into being because of the knowledge our forefathers had of the Bible and their belief in it; freedom of belief, of expression, of assembly, of petition, the dignity of the individual, the sanctity of the home, equal justice under law, and the reservation of powers to the people…I like to believe we are living today in the spirit of the Christian religion. I like also to believe that as long as we do so, no great harm can come to our country.”
12. United States Supreme Court - 1892
(Church of the Holy Trinity v. United Sates)
“No purpose of action against religion can be imputed to any legislation (state or national) because this is a religious people…This is a Christian nation.”
13. Supreme Court of Pennsylvania - 1815
(Commonwealth v. Sharpless & Others)
“Morality” is defined as the condition of conforming with right principles. It pits right against wrong. To “legislate” means to make a law. Law imposes rules of conduct and enforces them with authority. What law has ever been enacted by any government in the history of man that has not named something wrong and its opposite right? Every law establishes and legislates morality. What today’s critics are saying is. “We don’t want God to have anything to do with today’s morality. We want to determine what is right and wrong without God…America has become the battleground between the world’s two oldest religions. The first religion to appear in the history of mankind worships God. The second worships man. In America, the first is expressed primarily by Christianity. The second is humanism. It is not a question of whether morality can or should be legislated. It is a question of which religious guidelines will undergird the legislation; religious guidelines that deify God, or religious guidelines that deify man?”
14. President Abraham Lincoln
“But for (the Bible) we could not know right from wrong. All things most desirable for man’s welfare…are to be found portrayed in it.”
15. Supreme Court of South Carolina - 1846
(City of Charleston v. S.A. Benjamin)
“Christianity is a part of the common law of the land, with liberty of conscience to all. It has always been so recognized…If Christianity is part of the common law, its disturbance is punishable at common law…Christianity has reference to the principles of right and wrong…it is the foundation of those morals and manners upon which our society is formed; it is their basis. Remove this and they would fall.”
16. Jedediah More
(Founding Educator)
“To the kindly influence of Christianity we owe that degree of civil freedom, and political and social happiness which mankind now enjoys. In proportion as the genuine effects of Christianity are diminished in any nation…in the same proportion will the people of that nation recede from the blessings of genuine freedom…All efforts to destroy the foundations of our holy religion, ultimately tend to the subversion also of our political freedom and happiness. Whenever the pillars of Christianity shall be overthrown, our present republican forms of government, and all the blessings which flow from them, must fall with them.”
17. United States Supreme Court - 1952
(Zorach v. Clausion)
“We are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being…When the state encourages religious instruction or cooperates with religious authorities by adjusting the schedule of public events to sectarian needs, it follows the best of our traditions. For it then respects the religious nature of our people and accommodates the public service to their spiritual needs. To hold that it may not would be to find in the Constitution a requirement that the government show a callous indifference to religious groups. That would be preferring those who believe in no religion over those who do believe…We find no constitutional requirement which makes it necessary for government to be hostile to religion and to throw its weight against efforts to widen the effective scope of religious influence.”
18. President John Quincy Adams
“It is essential, my son…that you should form and adopt certain rules or principles…It is in the Bible, you must learn them, and from the Bible how to practice them.”
19. Abigail Adams
“A patriot without religion in my estimation is as great a paradox as an honest man without the fear of God…The Scriptures tell us righteousness exalteth a Nation.”
20. Noah Webster
“The moral principles and precepts contained in the scriptures ought to form the basis of all our civil constitutions and laws…All the miseries and evil which men suffer from vice, crime, ambition, injustice, oppression, slavery, and war, proceed from their despising or neglecting the precepts contained in the Bible.”
21. Benjamin Rush
(Signer of the Declaration and Founding Educator)
“Mothers and schools plant the seeds of nearly all the good and evil which exists in the world.”
22. President 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.”
Our American history is rich and blessed by the wise leadership of our forefathers. They firmly believed in the value and importance of true Christianity as the cornerstone in the very foundation of America’s past…present…and future. We do not need to re-write the Bible…but we do need to re-read it!