John Quincy Adams, won a seat in Congress at age 64 (note the present Liberal lie that older people are useless), where he became an ardent anti-slavery opponent. He presented legal petition after petition for this cause.
In 1836, slave holding interests (Democrats) in Congress passed the Gag Rule, forbidding all such petitions.
[Note which party was pro slavery and that prohibited freedom of speech and petition?]
However the US Constition guaranteed the right to petition, so Adams, much like Wilberforce, challenged the rule at every opportunity in a long, lonely, and humiliating struggle.
Finally eight years later, in 1844, the motion to rescind the now infamous Gag Rule carried.
In his diary he wrote: “Blessed, forever blessed, be the name of God!” And to his dumbfoundment, he found he had become a national hero…..
In 1620 the Pilgrims, forced off course into uncharted land, realized they would have to form their own government, drew up the Mayflower Compact. This Compact is the first instance in modern history of creation of government by the consent and for the governed.
“In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten…having undertaken for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian faith and honor of our king and country, a voyage to plant the first colory in the northern parts of Virginia, do by these present, solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God and of one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic…”
John Jay, in 1777 as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New York, expressed that it is the duty of ALL men of faith to become active in their government:
“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.”
John McLean, Justice of United States Supreme Court, clearly stated to the American Bible Society in 1852:
“Aside from Revelation, darkness rests upon the world and upon the future … The Bible hs shed a glorious light upon the world. It shows us that in the coming days we must answer for the deeds done in the body. It has opened to us a new and living way, so plainly marked out that no one can mistake it. The price paid for our redemption show the value of our immortal souls.”
Samual Adams also taught and fully expected the Christian must take an active interest, and, when called to, an active role in the goverance of the Republic.
“He therefore is the truest friend to the liberty of his country who tries most to promote its virtue and who, so far as his power and influence extend, will not suffer a man to be chosen into any office of power and trust who is not a wise and virtuous man … The sum of all is, if we would most truly enjoy this gift of Heaven, let us become a virtuous people.”
He knew well the precepts of our Lord.
How wayward we have come, when in 2004 only 50% of Christians took an active interest in their government and voted.
For those who think the first States, of the United States of America, were not committed to teaching the Christian Faith to all children, in contrast to their preference today - athestic humanism.
Universally used in 18th Century New England schools, Thomas Dilworth’s New Guide to the English Tongue as a reader. The first lesson consists of only three letter words:
“No Man may put off the Law of God.
The Way of God is no ill Way.
My Joy is in God all the Day.
A bad Man is a Foe to God.”
In 1892 the US Supreme Court made an exhaustive study of the connection between Christianity and the government. After researching hundreds of volumes of historical documents, the USSC asserted:
“these references add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a religious people…a Christian nation.”
In 1931, USSC Justice George Sutherland reiterated that Americans are “a Christian people”.
In 1952, USSC Justice William O. Douglas affirmed “we are a religious people and our institutions presuppose a Supreme Being.”
Daniel Webster died on this day n 1852. His epitaph indicates his strong faith in Jesus Christ and that on occasion a philosophical argument, based on the vastness of the Universe - much like Darwinian Evolution today, did challenge his reason, but that his faith and the facts of Jesus birth, life, death, and resurrection reassured him and brought him comfort. Have you been challenged by the so called “facts” of Darwinian Evolution, which have been totally disproved today? If so, look to Jesus and the word of God for assurance and comfort:
“Philosophical
argument, especially
that drawn from the vastness of
the Universe, in comparision with the
apparent insignificance of this globe, has some-
times shaken my reason for the faith which is in me;
but my heart has always assured and reassured me that the
Gospel of Jesus Christ must be a Divine Reality. The
Sermon on the Mount cannot be a merely hu-
man production. This belief enters
into the very depths of my con-
science. The whole history
of man proves it.”
In October 1774, John Hancock, President of the Provincial Congress in Massachusetts, declared:
“We think it is incumbent upon this people to humble themselves before God on account of their sins, for He hath been pleased in His righteous judgment to suffer a great calamity to befall us, as the present controversy … And to implore the Divine Blessing upon us, that by the assistance of His grace, we may be enabled to reform whatever is amiss among us.”
On this day in 1864, Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation for a second annual Thanksgiving on the last Thursday in November:
“And I do further recommend to my fellow citizens aforesaid, that on that occasion they do reverently humble themselves in the dust, and from thence offer up penitent and fervent prayers and supplications to the great Disposer of events for a return of the inestimable blessings of peace, union, and harmony throughout the land which it has pleased Him to assign as a dwelling-place for ourselves and for our posterity throughout all generations.”
On this day in 1781, General George Washington called for a service to give thanks for the British surrender at Yorktown, the day before:
“The Commander in Chief earnestly recommends that the troops not on duty should universally attend with that seriousness of deportment and gratitude of heart which the recognition of such reiterated and astonishing interposition of Providence demands of us.”
Noah Webster, the pioneer lexicographer, when the first edition of the dictionary bearing his name was published, spoke of the Book he considered so much greater than the one he had just completed:
“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 evils which men suffer from vice, crime, ambition, injustice, oppression, slavery, and war, proceed from their despising or neglecting the precepts contained in the Bible.”
William Penn, imprisioned in the Tower of London, wrote:
“True Godliness doesn’t turn men out of the World, but enables them to live better in it and excites their endeavors to mend it.”
On this day in 1492, the day on which they were to give up, the lookout aboard the Santa Maria cried out, “Tierra! Tierra!”
An exhausted Columbus was barely able to make out the low silhouette in the darkness. He named the land San Salvador (Holy Savior), and would later write:
“I am a most unworthy sinner, but I have cried out to the Lord for grace and mercy and they have covered me completely. I have found the sweetest consolation since I made it my whole purpose to enjoy His marvelous presence…No one should fear to undertake any task in the name of our Savior, if it is just and if the intention is purely for His holy service.”
On this day in 1492, Christopher Columbus was at the edge of dispair. They had been sailing West for 32 days and seen nothing. With all three crews on the verge of mutiny, the other two ship captains had extracted a promise from him: that if they did not reach land in the next two days, they would turn back.
Yet Columbus was convinced that God had called them to this mission and that He was with them:
“I found our Lord well-disposed toward my heart’s desire, and He gave me the spirit of intelligence for the task…Who doubts that this illumination was from the Holy Spirit? He, with marvelous rays of light, consoled me through the holy and sacred Scriptures…encouraging me to proceed.”
In 1782. Lewis Cass was born in Exeter, New Hampshire. He was the Democratic nominee for President in 1848 and served as Secretary of State just prior to the Civil War. He wrote in 1846:
“God, in His providence, has given us a Book of His revealed will, to be with us at the commencement of our career in this life and at its termination; and to accompany us during all chances and changes of this trying and fitful progress, to control the passions, to enlighten the judgement, to guide the conscience, to teach us what we ought to do here, and what we shall be hereafter.”
The first National Day of Prayer and Fasting in Abraham Lincoln’s administration was the last Thursday in September, 1861:
“And whereas when our own beloved country once, by the blessing of God, united, prosperous and happy, is now afflicted with faction and civil war, it is peculiarly fit for us to recognize the hand of God in this terrible visitation, and in sorrowful rememberance of our own faults and crimes as a nation and as individuals, to humble ourselves before Him and to pray for His mercy…that the inestimable boon of civil and religious liberty, earned under His guidance and blessing by the labors and sufferings of our fathers, may be restored.”
In 1862, during prayer with Eliza Gueney and three other Quakers, Abraham Lincoln unburdened his heart.
“If I had my way this war would never have commended. If I had been allowed my way this war would have ended before this. But we find it still continues and we must believe that He permits it for some wise purpose of His own, mysterious and unknown to us, and though with our limited understanding we may not be able to comprehend it, yet we connot but believe that He who made the world still governs it.”
In terms of stature - of the debt we owe certain Americans for what they did for this Republic - no one stands taller than George Washington, rightly called the country’s father, and Abraham Lincoln, called its redeemer.
One of those in the next rank is John Marshall who, more than anyone else, shaped, defined the authority, and sent the tone of the US Supreme Court.
Chief Justice Marshall for more than thirty years, delighted in traveling anonymously usually in casual attire. Once, in a hotel tavern, some young men invited him to join their debate on Christianity. For over an hour he calmly deisarmed every arguement brought against the teaching of Jesus. Only after he had left, did they learn who he was.
On September 21, 1776, a young Yale graduate student, Nathan Hale, was captured in the disguise of a Dutch school master by the British. As he was about to be hung as a spy, he requested a Bible and the services of a minister, but these last requests were refused.
His last words would never be forgotton by those who heard them:
“I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country”
Unbeknown to those urging him one way or the other on the question of imancipation, Abraham Lincoln had already privately written such a proclamination. His only concern (just like Sarah Palin’s statement toher church) was it part of God’s plan?
With the Army of Northern Virginia advancing towards Pennsylvania, and the Union Army hoping to stop them at Antietam, Lincoln prayed (Charlie Gibson take note). After the Union victory, the President informed his Cabinet on this day in 1862, of his decision to issue the Imancipation Proclamination.
“I made a solemn vow before god, that if General Lee were driven back, I would crown the result by the declaration of freedom to the slaves.”