Anything but an Atheist!
Jonathan Rowe on May 15th 2007
That’s required to be a member of the 1) Boy Scouts, or 2) Freemasons. In studying the key Founders’ (Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, and Franklin) beliefs, that also aptly sums up their belief on religion’s societal necessity. These founders were not pro-atheists; on the contrary, they were pro-religion/religious citizenry. Yet, they believed all of the world religions with which they were familiar were valid ways to God and could provide the moral supports which republican governments so needed. As Ben Franklin put it in his letter to Ezra Stiles:
Here is my Creed: I believe in one God, Creator of the Universe. That He governs it by his Providence. That he ought to be worshipped. That the most acceptable Service we can render to him, is doing Good to his other Children. That the Soul of Man is immortal, and will be treated with Justice in another Life respecting its Conduct in this. These I take to be the fundamental Principles of all sound Religion, and I regard them as you do, in whatever Sect I meet with them.
And those sound religions, of which the key Founders were aware, included at least Christianity, Judaism, Deism, Unitarianism, Hinduism, Islam, Native American Spirituality, and Pagan Greco-Romanism. Some of these creeds seem downright polytheistic. True, but I can quote Adams claiming “religion and morality” is found in Hinduism and Greco-Romanism. For instance, in a publicly published book (that’s relevant because most of Adams heterodox statements come from his private letters) Adams wrote,
ZALEUCUS was of Locris in Italy, not far distant from Sybaris. He was a disciple of Pythagoras, of noble birth, and admirable morals. Having acquired the esteem and confidence of his fellow-citizens, they chose him for their legislator. Unfortunately little remains of his laws but their preamble: but this is in a style so superior to all the other legislators, as to excite regret for the loss of his code. In this preamble he declares, that all those who shall inhabit the city, ought, above all things, to be persuaded that there is a God; and if they elevate their eyes and thoughts towards the heavens, they will be convinced, that the disposition of the heavenly bodies, and the order which reigns in all nature….Having thus, in the beginning of his laws, fixed the attention of his fellow-citizens upon piety and wisdom, he ordains, above all things, that there should never be among them any irreconcilable enmity; but, on the contrary, that those animosities which might arise among them, should be only a passage to a sure and sincere reconciliation; and that he who would not submit himself to these sentiments, should be regarded as a savage in a civilized community. The chiefs of his republics ought not to govern with arrogance nor pride; nor should the magistrates be guided in their judgments by hatred nor by friendship.
This preamble, instead of addressing itself to the ignorance, prejudices, and superstitious fears of savages, for the purpose of binding them to an absurd system of hunger and glory for a family purpose, like the laws of Lycurgus, places religion, morals, and government, upon a basis of philosophy, which is rational, intelligible, and eternal, for the real happiness of man in society, and throughout his duration.
Adams, if you aren’t aware, is talking about a code of laws supposedly revealed by Athena 600BC! Such, according to Adams, falls within the rubric of “religion, morals…philosophy, which is rational, intelligible, and eternal, for the real happiness of man in society.” That’s not the only quotation. Adams — a theological unitarian who disbelieved in eternal damnation — also said similar things about Pagan Roman mythos and Hinduism. Keep that in mind the next time you read Adams’ quotation:
[W]e have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. . . . Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
Now, these Founders did, at times, praise Christianity’s superiority to the other world religions. They used language like Christianity is “better” or “best.” However, orthodox Christians don’t believe this; they believe Christianity is the only way to God. Comparative words like “better” or “best” suggest that other religions have some validity, that they have different degrees of goodness. Orthodox Christianity believes things like Deism, Unitarinaism, Hinduism, Islam, Native American Spirituality are false, thus having no goodness as they lead people down the “wrong” path.
The key Founders, on the other hand, believed the primary purpose of “religion” is virtue. And if, as Franklin once put it, the ends are achieved the means really don’t matter, we could see how they could draw some kind of equivalence between all religions, so long as they all promoted republican virtue.
So if, the key founders believed, religion’s primary purpose is virtue, and if Christianity had some kind of edge against the other “sound” world religions, Christianity’s distinctive superiority must have been its ability to promote morality better. And indeed, Jefferson, Franklin, Adams, et al. offered scads of quotations praising Jesus as a great (the best) moral teacher even as they denied the Trinity, Incarnation, and Atonement, and doctrines of orthodoxy.
Enter religious tests and the US Constitution Art. VI, cl. 3. Such says:
The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the members of the several state legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several states, shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.
How to interpret? I’m convinced by the research of Prof. Paul Horwitz that a narrow interpretation is proper. That’s the letter of the law. But the spirit of the law is broader.
No religious tests, at the federal level, simply means no formal religious test may be adopted. One cannot be forced to take an oath to any religion in particular, or “religion in general.” If the people thus want to elect an atheist, so be it. No one, not even an atheist can be forced to take any kind of religious oath. As folks who feared Art. VI’s ratification stated, if the people want to elect a “Jew, Turk, or Infidel” to public office, that’s their right. But what if “the people” don’t want to vote for an atheist or only want to vote for Christians? As John Jay said:
“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.”
That’s their right too. But what of the spirit of Jay’s assertion? After all, if “real Christians” must be orthodox Trinitarian, then Mormons aren’t Christians, and neither were the first four Presidents or key Founders! Thus, people voting for only orthodox Christians, arguably flunks the spirit of Article VI, but not the letter.
However, the letter/spirit distinction works both ways. Oaths, by their very nature, our key Founders believed, had some defacto religious element to them. As George Washington put it in his Farewell Address, “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?”
So knowing what we know about the key Founders’ views on religion, were they to construct an oath for federal office, it would have been exactly as Franklin believed:
I believe in one God, Creator of the Universe. That He governs it by his Providence. That he ought to be worshipped. That the most acceptable Service we can render to him, is doing Good to his other Children. That the Soul of Man is immortal, and will be treated with Justice in another Life respecting its Conduct in this.
And this is something that they believed, all religions including Deism, Unitarian, Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Native American Spirituality, and Pagan Greco-Romanism could pass. Avery Cardinal Dulles has called this The Deist Minimum. Yet, the Founders forbade any religious test for public office. So even this could not be imposed on an atheist. And, I believe, Torcaso properly incorporated this constitutional norm against state and local governments.
However, the Founders preferred religious folks to take office, who would read in some kind of generic religious component to the otherwise secular oaths. The spirit of the law, in this instance, is more conservative than the letter. Often when we examine the Constitution through its ideals, as opposed to its strict letter, we get more liberal results. On Romney/Mormons, if folks refused to vote for Romney solely because he is Mormon, that, a defacto religious test, violates the spirit but not the letter of Art. VI. Though, if people refused to vote for someone because he is an atheist, I don’t believe this violates the spirit or the letter because the Founders wanted people to be religious in the generic theistic sense, whether a Deist, Mormon, Muslim or Christian. Yet, if any kind of religious test were attempted to be imposed to root out atheists from public office, that would violate the letter of Article VI which dejure, forbids any religious tests.
Regarding what exact other rights atheists have under the Constitution, the letter of the Constitution protects “religion,” not Christianity, but “religion.” The relevant clauses state government “shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” and that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” Thus, whatever rights or restrictions apply to “religion” apply to all religions, not just Christianity. And if atheism qualifies, in the constitutional sense, as a religion, atheism is equally protected under all of those clauses. That is the strict letter of the law, regardless of the spirit (which preferred citizens to be religious, but didn’t care what religion, even if non-Christian). In terms of natural rights, the Founders thought atheism too was protected. As John Adams once put it:
“Government has no Right to hurt a hair of the head of an Atheist for his Opinions. Let him have a care of his Practices.”
– John Adams to John Quincy Adams, June 16, 1816. Adams Papers (microfilm), reel 432, Library of Congress; as seen in James H. Hutson, The Founders on Religion, p. 20.
Finally, where atheists/secularists can feel affinity with the spirit of the Founding is that these key Founders — the theistic rationalists — believed that man’s reason, not revelation was supreme. Thus, if one elevates science and reason, as the most important ends for man/government to pursue (and indeed these were the tools from which the Founders purportedly constructed the United States) the Founders agreed. As John Adams put it:
“The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture, hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their history. Although the detail of the formation of the American governments is at present little known or regarded either in Europe or in America, it may hereafter become an object of curiosity. It will never be pretended that any persons employed in that service had interviews with the gods, or were in any degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; it will forever be acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason and the senses.
“. . . Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind.”
Filed in The Belfry, The Bureau
Jon, since you introduced the topic of Boy Scouts into this discussion, and associated BSA’s theist only membership policy with Freemasonry’s theist only membership policy, it must be pointed out that government collectively gives BSA Councils millions of dollars each in grants, provides privileged and exclusive lease and land usage arrangements on government property, owns and operates thousand of BSA units, sponsors programs targeted specifically to assisting Boy Scouts qualify for merit badges, qualifies new recruits who are Eagle Scouts with an automatic military pay grade increase, etc. Freemasonry, like all other creed restricted participation programs, receives no such government subsidy or co-sponsorship. As a lawyer you know that this is true because of the legal prohibitions against government subsidy and co-sponsorship of creed based restricted private membership organizations and of their creed restricted programs and that the exception in this regard for Boy Scouts is a legal anamoly.
EA,
I agree. Discriminating against atheists is religious discrimination, which, unlike sexual orientation discrimination, is protected by federal statute, and is clearly protected by the original meaning of the Constitution.
However, Dale’s logic applied to atheist/religious discrimination holds the Boy Scouts are a private club and thus are allowed to discriminate.
Even if they have the constitutional right to discriminate b/n freedom of expressive association (which is a penumbra of the First Amendment) I don’t think they ought to receive public funding or support as long as they discriminate against either group.
Jon,
Let’s be clear: Atheists can be profoundly religious. More than that, they can be holy.
“We know,” writes Liebman Hersh, “that one of the greatest religions of mankind, Buddhism, is basically a religion without a god.” (Liebman Hersch, My Jewishness (1940), in Saul L. Goodman, ed., The Faith of Secular Jews, at p. 78 (KTAV, 1976)).
Accepting the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize, His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama of Tibet declared that his own “Buddhism does not accept a theory of God, or a creator.” (Tenzin Gyatso, Dalai Lama XIV, Nobel Evening Address (Oslo, Norway, December 10, 1989), in Sidney Piburn, ed., The Dalai Lama, A Policy of Kindness: An Anthology of Writings by and about the Dalai Lama, at p. 115 (Snow Lion Publ., 2d ed. 1993)).
Our nation’s founders knew little of Buddhism. But if, as Jesus tells us, a tree may be known by its fruit (Matt. 7:15-20), then it surely appears that Tibet’s spiritual leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama, though an atheist, provides a better model of Christlike sainthood than does any televangelist who presumes to preach hatred in Christ’s name.
Eric Alan Isaacson
Eric,
I agree. If only most Christians were as Christian as Ghandi or the Dalia Lama….
Though, I think Ghandi had it all wrong on on capitalism and commerce. But in terms of how to treat one another, he was more Christlike than any Christian of which I am aware.
Thus, if one elevates science and reason, as the most important ends for man/government to pursue (and indeed these were the tools from which the Founders purportedly constructed the United States) the Founders agreed. As John Adams put it:
Reason as the bases for the contruction of the United States?
“The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture, hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their history. Although the detail of the formation of the American governments is at present little known or regarded either in Europe or in America, it may hereafter become an object of curiosity. It will never be pretended that any persons employed in that service had interviews with the gods, or were in any degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; it will forever be acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason and the senses.
“. . . Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind.”>>
Not true at all! You’ve distorted the context of the quotes. Adams is criticizing roman catholicism, not Christianity, based on superstition and bondage, not a true revelation.
“As I understand the Christian religion, it was, and is, a revelation. But how has it happened that millions of fables, tales, legends, have been blended with both Jewish and Christian revelation that have made them the most bloody religion that has ever existed?”
Letter to F.A. Van der Kamp, Dec. 27, 1816
” Indeed, Mr. Jefferson, what could be invented to debase the ancient Christianism, which Greeks, Romans, Hebrews, and Christian factions, above all the Catholics, have not fraudulently imposed upon the public? Miracles after miracles have rolled down in torrents, wave succeeding wave in the Catholic church, from the Council of Nice, and long before, to this day.”
To Jefferson, Dec. 3, 1813
The United States founded on reason? That isn’t what Adams’ son says, as well as the rest of the framers.
John Quincy Adams:
• “Why is it that, next to the birthday of the Savior of the world, your most joyous and most venerated festival returns on this day [the Fourth of July]?” “Is it not that, in the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior? That it forms a leading event in the progress of the Gospel dispensation? Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer’s mission upon earth? That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity”?
–1837, at the age of 69, when he delivered a Fourth of July speech at Newburyport, Massachusetts.
Here’s a framer who isn’t one of the big eight.
cont.
Alexander Hamilton:
• Hamilton began work with the Rev. James Bayard to form the Christian Constitutional Society to help spread over the world the two things which Hamilton said made America great:
(1) Christianity
(2) a Constitution formed under Christianity.
“The Christian Constitutional Society, its object is first: The support of the Christian religion. Second: The support of the United States.”
Patrick Henry:
“It cannot be emphasized too clearly and too often that this nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religion, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason, peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here.” [May 1765 Speech to the House of Burgesses]
Here’s another quote from a useless founder:
John Jay:
“ 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.” Source: October 12, 1816. The Correspondence and Public Papers of John Jay, Henry P. Johnston, ed., (New York: Burt Franklin, 1970), Vol. IV, p. 393.
“Whether our religion permits Christians to vote for infidel rulers is a question which merits more consideration than it seems yet to have generally received either from the clergy or the laity. It appears to me that what the prophet said to Jehoshaphat about his attachment to Ahab ["Shouldest thou help the ungodly and love them that hate the Lord?" 2 Chronicles 19:2] affords a salutary lesson.” [The Correspondence and Public Papers of John Jay, 1794-1826, Henry P. Johnston, editor (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1893), Vol. IV, p.365]
James,
Save the Hamilton stuff for a later post I’ll do on why he wasn’t a Christian until the end of his life and why his CCS was not a heartful statement of orthodoxy but a Machiavellian scheme.
Patrick Henry was indeed an orthodox Christian but the quotation you offered is a fraud. Google “David Barton” and “unconfirmed quotations” and you’ll be led to a link where Barton himself admits this (though he uses the euphemism “unconfirmed”). The fact that such statement was purportedly given in 1765 should have clued you in that it is a fraud as we weren’t yet a nation! Moreover, as a militant anti-federalist the term “great nation” would have made Henry want to puke. Henry like most folks back then referred to the US in a plural sense and voted against the US Constitution in part because it referred to the US as a powerful “one” entity and not a collection of sovereign states as he thought the US should be.
John Jay too likely was an orthodox Christian. All the quotation seems to say is that, in a democracy, Christians have the right to vote for Christians, which is self-evident. Given that the first four or five Founders weren’t Christian in the orthodox Trinitarian sense, as I pointed out in the body of the post, Jay’s sentiment flunks the spirit of Article VI and toleration. Though, the letter of Art. certainly permits anyone to vote for anyone for any reason.
James,
I thought I had you convinced on Adams. You are right that he had big problems with Catholicism. But there is 1) no evidence that such passage I reproduced was directed specifically against Catholicism, and 2) as I have repeatedly shown, Adams, a theological unitarian, had problems with the entire theology of Trinitarian Christianity. Adams believed, after his spiritual mentor Joseph Priestly, that the Trinity, Incarnation, and Atonement were “corruptions” of Christianity. Moreover when he stated — “But how has it happened that millions of fables, tales, legends, have been blended with both Jewish and Christian revelation that have made them the most bloody religion that has ever existed?” — he was referring to the text of the Bible itself which he, like Jefferson, thought errant.
But in any event, Adams makes quite clear that America was founded on “reason and the senses,” and such makes sense given that in his personal writings he repeatedly elevates reason over revelation as the ultimate arbiter of truth.