John Quincy Adams used a law book in 1825

Every four years a flurry of articles appear that cover the events surrounding the presidential inauguration. Many of these articles, like the January 20, 2021 AP news article, Biden’s Bible puts him in line with inaugural tradition, claim John Quincy Adams used a law book in 1825. One such article appeared eight years ago at the time of President Barack Obama’s second inauguration. In this particular article, Dean Obeidallah expressed the opinion that even though there’s been a long tradition of president’s using a Bible, "Presidents should not swear in on a Bible." In making the case, she mentions the swearing-in ceremonies for both John Quincy Adams, and Theodore Roosevelt (with more emphasis on the former).

The Constitution does not require that the president take the oath of office by swearing on a Bible. That would have been a very simple requirement for the constitutional drafters to include. To the contrary, the Founders wanted to ensure that Americans of any faith – or no faith – could hold federal office.

They set it forth plainly in Article VI: “… No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”

Placing a hand on a Bible while reciting the presidential oath is simply a tradition started by George Washington. Indeed, two presidents, Teddy Roosevelt and John Quincy Adams, did not use a Bible at their swearing-in ceremonies.

Although Roosevelt’s reasons are unclear, John Quincy Adams’ reasons could not be more plain.

Adams, the son of President John Adams, was a religious man. But he chose to be sworn in with his hand on a book of U.S. laws. He wanted to demonstrate that he recognized a barrier between church and state and that his loyalty was to our nation’s laws above all else.

Despite the many repeated claims that John Quincy Adams used a law book, the reasoning put forward as to why John Quincy Adams “chose to be sworn in with his hand on a book of U.S. laws” is totally incorrect. A law book did play a role at the March 4, 1825 inauguration of President JQA, but it was not for the purpose of placing his hand on the book (unless he was a palm reader). To be precise, Chief Justice John Marshall presented JQA with a law book from which he read the presidential oath.

The account written up in the July 6,1825 issue of The Independent Chronicle tells what actually took place::

A Contrast. – John Quincy Adams, President of the United States, is the son of the second President that ever ruled over America, the well known and peaceful successor of Washington – the Numa of the United States; and if we may judge from principles which he has taken the first occasion of testifying, he is well worthy of the honor which such an elevation confers. The manly plainness and simplicity of the form of his inauguration deserves notice. Think of the childish ceremonies, the idle pageantry, the ridiculous mummeries, holy oil, the feathers, furs, and flippery of a coronation in Europe, as contrasted with this dignified scene! At Washington, in the capitol, Mr. Adams, in a plain suit of black, ascends the Speaker’s chair, pronounces his address to his fellows citizens, walks to the table of the Judges, and on a volume of the laws of the United States reads his oath of office, and thus the magistrate of a mighty state installed.

What is plain to every president-elect is that even by John Quincy Adams’ own account a Bible was not used, and that a president-elect can chose to follow the same example set by our sixth president, which was a tradition already set in place by his five predecessors. According to contemporary historical records, the fact is that if we start with Washington’s second inauguration and examine the succeeding inaugural ceremonies for John Adams (once), Thomas Jefferson (twice), James Madison (twice), and James Monroe (twice), we’ll find they all fall in line, where there’s not the slightest indication of a Bible having been used.  

Virginia Constitution, "lack" of religious tests, TJ, & heresy

 I, for a long while, was under the initial impression that the 1776 Virginia Constitution can be seen as an exception when it came to the imposition of religious test oaths for public office. The following snippet had led me (and many others) in that direction:

The Virginia State Constitution: a reference guide, Part 56 by John J. Dinan

Section 7. Oath Or Affirmation

All officers elected or appointed under or pursuant to this Constitution shall, before they enter on the performance of their public duties, severally take and subscribe the following oath or affirmation:

   "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support the Constitution of the United States, and the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and I will faithfully and impartially discharge all the duties incumbent upon me as ______________ according to the best of my ability (so help me God)."

Although the current oath has been uncontroversial, previous oaths have generated significant controversy. The 1864 Constitution was the first to require officeholders to take an oath [my italics] and the purpose was to ensure that officeholders were not supporters of the Confederacy. Then, the 1867-68 Convention approved a "test-oath" that would have prevented a significant number of past supporters of the Confederacy from holding state office. Both of these oaths approved by the 1867-68 Convention provoked significant controversy, whether at the time or in coming years. [end excerpt]

A little research shows that my initial impression was wrong. As can be readily seen, the Virginia Constitution doesn't lack religious test oath legislation.  See Founders Online here, and here, and again here, which show, early on (~1779), a list of various test oaths for state office.

In Virginia, even when an oath-taker held religious scruples that person still had to “repeat the formulary, which in his opinion, is or ought to be observed on such occasions, according to the religion in which such person professeth to believe, … .” While apparently quite tolerant this particular clause put a person like Thomas Jefferson in an awkward position.

Thomas Jefferson, an unorthodox Christian, was elected Virginia Governor on June 1, 1779. According to common law & Virginia statute TJ should have served from jail. At least, that’s how Frederick Jonassen (So Help Me ?, pg. 329, footnote 148; also Bradley) put it:

Until 1786, a non-Christian in Virginia would have to keep his religious opinions to himself because of a statute that made it a criminal offence to publically utter a non-Christian view."' <148>

148 - It is not clear how these provisions were enforced, whether through religious tests or otherwise. And a “professed atheist, polytheist, or unorthodox Christian” in Virginia presumably “would have had to serve from jail, because both by common law and statute Virginia criminalized at least the public utterance of such views. Note as well that Anglicanism was "established" or preferred even to other Protestant sects in Virginia until 1786.51

Gerard V. Bradley, The No Religious Test Clause and the Constitution of Religious Liberty: A Machine That Has Gone of Itself, p. 683; 51 - Isaac, Evangelical Revolt: The Nature of the Baptists' Challenge to the Traditional Order in Virginia, 1765 to 1775, 31 WM. & MARY L. REV. 345-68 (1974); 52 - S. BOLTON, SOUTHERN ANGLICANISM 5 (1982). 

Written in 1781 and 1782, Jefferson assessed the state of religious rights in Virginia after the 1776 Constitution in his Notes on the State of Virginia Query #17 (published 1785):

QUERY XVII

Religion

The present state of our laws on the subject of religion is this. The convention of May 1776, in their declaration of rights, declared it to be a truth, and a natural right, that the exercise of religion should be free; but when they proceeded to form on that declaration the ordinance of government, instead of taking up every principle declared in the bill of rights, and guarding it by legislative sanction, they passed over that which asserted our religious rights, leaving them as they found them.

The same convention, however, when they met as a member of the general assembly in October 1776, repealed all acts of parliament which had rendered criminal the maintaining any opinions in matters of religion, the forbearing to repair to church, and the exercising any mode of worship; and suspended the laws giving salaries to the clergy, which suspension was made perpetual in October 1779. Statutory oppressions in religion being thus wiped away, we remain at present under those only imposed by the common law, or by our own acts of assembly. At the common law, heresy was a capital offence, punishable by burning. Its definition was left to the ecclesiastical judges, before whom the conviction was, till the statute of the 1 El. c. 1. circumscribed it, by declaring, that nothing should be deemed heresy, but what had been so determined by authority of the canonical scriptures, or by one of the four first general councils, or by some other council having for the grounds of their declaration the express and plain words of the scriptures. Heresy, thus circumscribed, being an offence at the common law, our act of assembly of October 1777, c. 17. gives cognizance of it to the general court, by declaring, that the jurisdiction of that court shall be general in all matters at the common law. The execution is by the writ De haeretico comburendo. By our own act of assembly of 1705, c. 30, if a person brought up in the Christian religion denies the being of a God, or the Trinity, or asserts there are more Gods than one, or denies the Christian religion to be true, or the scriptures to be of divine authority, he is punishable on the first offence by incapacity to hold any office or employment ecclesiastical, civil, or military; on the second by disability to sue, to take any gift or legacy, to be guardian, executor, or administrator, and by three years imprisonment, without bail. A father's right to the custody of his own children being founded in law on his right of guardianship, this being taken away, they may of course be severed from him, and put, by the authority of a court, into more orthodox hands [my italics].

This is a summary view of that religious slavery, under which a people have been willing to remain, who have lavished their lives and fortunes for the establishment of their civil freedom.  The error seems not sufficiently eradicated, that the operations of the mind, as well as the acts of the body, are subject to the coercion of the laws.  

A New Book-oath on ‘A People’s History’ Has Come to Town

Thanks to a January 6, 2020, The American Spectator article, The Zinn Education Project: Teaching Trump-Hate and Other Dogma - A decade after his death Howard Zinn lives on, propagandizing America’s youth, by Mary Grabar, I’ve learned that two recently elected officials at the very local level have had the audacity to replace the customary Bible with Howard Zinn’s, A People’s History of theUnited States.

Here’s the scoop:

Zinn’s book has attained the status of a holy book. In April [9, 2019] JoBeth Hamon used it in place of the customary Bible in her swearing-in to the Oklahoma City Council. 

In Fairfax County, Virginia, a wealthy D.C. suburb and one of the largest school districts in the nation, “Rachna Sizemore Heizer … swore the oath of office while holding a copy of . . . Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States,” according to a December 20 [2019 Fairfax County Times] article celebrating the new “historically diverse” school board, part of the transformation of this community and 32 others toward racial “equity” through groups funded by Soros, and others.

Not surprisingly, Fairfax County students will soon have one day off for protesting. The Zinn Education Project will provide plenty of resources, from abolishing Columbus Day to protesting climate change.

Mary Grabar made a special effort to scold JoBeth Hamon in the 9/17/20119 Epoch Times article, Bible Replaced by Marxist Book in Taking Oath of Office. Here’s a snippet from the beginning of her commentary:

When Oklahoma City Council member Jobeth Hamon was sworn in early this year [April 9,2019 to take her seat], she chose to use a copy of Howard Zinn’s “A People’ History of the United States,”

While there’s no law or  policy that requires the use of a Bible for swearing-in ceremonies, Hamon upset traditions going back to ninth-century England.

Mary Grabar is right about mandatory Bible (loyalty test) oaths having a long tradition going back to ninth-century England, but she should take into consideration what Tucker Lieberman explained in his 1/11/2017 blog post, The long and misguided history of swearing in on Bibles:

When England was a Catholic country, swearing oaths on physical copies of the Bible held a prominent place in the culture. A religious movement whose adherents were known as Lollards opposed this practice in the early 15th century, as did Quakers in the 17th century. Lollards were willing to swear verbally by God, but were burned at the stake for being unwilling to swear on the Bible. Quakers would not swear at all, which meant that they couldn't take oaths of allegiance and couldn't testify in court. [Melissa] Mohr writes, "A good technique for getting rid of a Quaker you didn't like was to accuse him of doing something illegal. Whether or not he was guilty, when he refused to take an oath his property would be confiscated and he would be thrown in jail for contempt of court."

Aware of this religious history in England, the American founding fathers aimed for a more secular start to the nation in the 18th century. The U.S. Constitution prescribes this presidential oath of office: "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States." This secular statement avoids the difficulties that presented themselves in England. Article VI of the Constitution additionally clarifies: "No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

So despite Mary Grabar's lamentations, and by virtue of the Constitution, there's apparently no guarantee that the long established tradition built on the Bible will be sufficient to discourage further encounters with a Marxist book, "A People's History of the United States."

Senator Bernie Sanders Disregards U.S. Constitution

Earlier this week, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) grilled Russell Vought, President Donald Trump's nominee for the position of Deputy Director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, during Mr. Vought's confirmation hearings. Was it over Mr. Vought's economic views? Not really. The most significant grilling was over Mr. Vought's religious views, specifically his views regarding salvation for those outside of the Christian faith.

In early 2016, Mr. Vought's alma mater, Wheaton College, was rocked by controversy when one of its professors said Christians and Muslims worship "the same God." Mr. Vought defended Wheaton's statement of faith and its handling of the situation, saying (in an article for Resurgent magazine) that Muslims have a "deficient theology" and "do not know God because they have rejected Jesus Christ his Son, and they stand condemned." Now this is certainly offensive talk in our postmodernist age of political correctness, but it's hardly surprising.

What Vought said is basic Christian doctrine. Doubt me? Read the New Testament. Let's start with John 3:18, where Jesus tells Nicodemus (and us): "He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." There's also John 3:16, John 14:6, Romans 10:9-10 and 13, and on and on and on and on. The Bible is certainly offensive to many people. That's why many people have tried to destroy it (unsuccessfully) over the years, but the Bible (and Christianity) have been around for 2000 years. Vought's beliefs are well within the mainstream of Christian thought.

What's most distressing for our purposes, however, is that this line of questioning even came up! Has Senator Sanders not read the Constitution? Who cares what Vought believes regarding heaven, hell, salvation, and the like? It doesn't matter! The only vested interest the government has in someone's religious beliefs are whether those beliefs will drive a person to commit violence (that's actual violence, not the verbal hurt-your-feelings, micro-aggression nonsense so many college campuses are worried about) against their fellow citizens or call for some kind of insurrection against the government. That's it. A person can believe (and express his belief) in God, Allah, or the atheists' favorite "Flying Spaghetti Monster," and it shouldn't be a matter of consideration for the U.S. Senate.

The U.S. Constitution clearly states that "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States." (Article VI, Section 3). That means it's unconstitutional for a sitting U.S. Senator to consider an executive branch nominee's religious beliefs when deciding whether to consent to that person's nomination. For a senator to do otherwise shows (at best) ignorance of or (at worst) defiance of the Constitution of the United States. It also smells, in this case, of anti-Christian bigotry.

Are we going to respect that part of the Constitution or not? Clearly, Senator Sanders is not. And, for that reason, this American is glad he is not our President today.

Jerry-rigging the Presidential Oath with the Wall Builders

Over at the Wall Builders blog, David Barton has recently posted an article, Did George Washington Actually Say “So Help Me God” During His Inauguration?, complete with an entourage of 56 endnotes.

David Barton starts out by saying:

In December 2008 following the election of Barack Obama as president, noted atheist Michael Newdow filed suit to prohibit religious acknowledgments or activities from being part of the inaugural ceremonies, specifically seeking to halt the inclusion of “So help me God” as part of the presidential oath as well as halt inaugural prayers by clergy.

It should be noted for the sake of clarity, this statement is only half true. The Newdow v. Roberts lawsuit did not generally seek "to halt the inclusion of 'So help me God' as part of the presidential oath." To be more specific, the lawsuit wanted Chief Justice John Roberts to administer the presidential oath without inflating the oath with four extra-constitutional words. On the other hand, if President Obama chose to add "So help me God" on his own, then there was no objection, just as there would be no objection to whether a president independently chooses to raise his right hand; swear his oath on either no, one, or two Bibles; have his spouse hold the book, or just have it nearby; or reverently kiss the Bible while the book is either in an open or closed position.

Soon after Barton's introduction, he goes into an us-against-them mindset, where the us-people support the perspective of those who "have affirmed that 'so help me God' is a traditional practice dating back to George Washington," and them-people, who, like Michael Newdow and Mathew Goldstein, claim there is “no eyewitness documentation he [Washington] ever added ‘so help me God’ [to his oath of office].”

Barton identifies Chief Historian [Donald R. Kennon - 2005] of the United States Capitol Historical Society, the Library of Congress [(Marvin Kranz-2005) under the direction of the Senate Rules Committee], the U. S. Supreme Court (and numbers of its Justices [i.e. Saclia, & Rehnquist]), the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies [(namely, Donald Ritchie, Senate Historical Office) under the thumb of the Senate Rules Committee], the Architect of the Capitol [under the direction of the Senate Rules Committee], and other notables [say, like Kenneth C. Davis, David McCullough, Newt Gingrich, Sarah Palin, and Michele Bachmann]" as being in the us-people column. In contrast, he puts Michael Newdow, Mathew Goldstein, [Cathy Lynn Grossman] USA Today, Jim Bendat, Peter R. Henriques, and Charles Haynes in the them-people column.

What Barton fails to recognize regarding his two-column mindset is that it is woefully out of date. He would have been better informed if he had kept up with my blogs, where I have notified the reader that both Donald Kennon of USCHS (see my 1/19/2009 blog) and the Library of Congress (see my 12/14/2010 blog) have moved over into the them-people column. He could also have learned from other sources that Charlene B. Bickford, Director of the First Federal Congress Project, George Washington University (see Newdow v. Roberts, Appendix G, and Edward Lengel, editor-in-chief of The Papers of George Washington, University of Virginia, (see 3/21/2011 NY Times Books of the Times) are squarely in the them-people column.

Barton continues by taking pot-shots at Newdow's lawsuit whichever way he can. He brings out a cavalcade of states whose colonial regulations, original state constitutions, and "legal requirements for [religious test] oath-taking specifically stipulated that “So help me God!” be part of the official oath of all legal process, whether the oaths were taken by elected officials, appointed judges, jurors, or witnesses in a court of law." What Barton doesn't mention is that not all of the original thirteen states took it for granted that an obligatory acknowledgement of God was a necessary religious test for public office. In deed, some states made a special allowance for religious dissenters, like the Quakers, who strongly objected to swearing an oath, and then others who, even more strenuously, objected to include the "irreverent" non-biblical phrase, "So help me God." Furthermore, what's obscured by Barton's blindspot is the fact that the 1776 Virginia Constitution was the only state constitution, which, not only, declared "all men are equally entitled the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience," but also had no religious test for public office. Consequently, it can't be too surprising that the delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention, with George Washington presiding, and with Madison promoting the Virginia Plan, produced a document that failed to mention "God" either as part of the presidential oath, or in any other instance, and specified that "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

Now, with this background in mind, let's go back to where Barton describes Washington's swearing-in ceremony:

The [inaugural] ceremony was conducted on the balcony at Federal Hall; and with a huge crowd gathered below watching the proceedings, the [London published King James Masonic] Bible was laid upon a crimson velvet cushion held by Samuel Otis, Secretary of the Senate. New York Chancellor Robert Livingston then administered the oath of office. (He was one of the five Founders who drafted the Declaration of Independence, but had been called back to New York to help guide his state through the Revolution before he could affix his signature to the document he had helped write. Because Livingston was the highest ranking judicial official in New York, he was chosen to administer the oath of office to President Washington.)

[dot - dot - dot]

Other states [besides CT, GA, NC, SC] had similar requirements, but consider those in place in NEW YORK when President Washington was sworn in by the state’s top judicial official. At that time, New York law required that “the usual mode of administering oaths” be followed (i.e., “So help me God”) and that the person taking the oath place his hand upon the Gospels and then kiss the Gospels at the conclusion of the oath. <33> (Like the other states, these provisions remained the legal standard long after the inauguration. <34>)

Barton is dead wrong to think that "So help me God" was legislated as being a part of New York's “usual mode of administering oaths.” His own endnotes, when fully examined, prove the point. Here's endnote <33>:

33. Laws of the State of New-York (New York: Thomas Greenleaf, 1798), p. 21, “Chap. XXV: An Act to dispense with the usual mode of administering oaths, in favor of persons having conscientious scruples respecting the same, Passed 1st of April, 1778”; James Parker, Conductor
Generalis: Or the Office, Duty and Authority of the Justices of the Peace (New York: John Patterson, 1788), pp. 302-304, “Of oaths in general.”

Here's the significant section from Laws of the state of New York: passed at the sessions of the Legislature (page 49):

First Session - CHAP. 25.AN ACT to dispense with the usual mode of administering oaths in favour of persons having conscientious scruples respecting the same. Passed the 1st of April, 1778. Whereas many of the inhabitants of this State having conscientious scruples about the present mode of administering oaths by laying the hand on and kissing the gospels for the relief of all such persons [like members of the Dutch Reformed Church], Be it enacted by the People of the State of New-York represented in Senate and Assembly, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same That all and every person or persons impowered to administer oaths within this State, shall be and they hereby are empowered, authorized and required to tender and administer the said oaths to all such person or persons as shall declare they have such conscientious scruples, in the form following, to wit. The said person or persons shall with his her or their hand or hands uplifted swear by the everliving God and shall not be compelled to lay his her or their hand or hands on the Gospels or kiss the same: And that all oaths to be administered agreeable to the mode prescribed by this act shall be and the' same are hereby declared to be as good valid and effectual to all intents and purposes, as if the same had been administered by laying the hand on, and kissing the Gospels. And all persons who being sworn agreeable to the said mode and shall be guilty of false swearing or wilful and corrupt perjury, and be convicted thereof shall incur and suffer the same pains penalties or punishments, as if they had been respectively sworn on the Holy Evangelists.

Here's endnote <34>:

34. George C. Edward, A Treatise on the Powers and Duties of Justices of the Peace and Town Officers, in the State of New York (Ithaca: Mack, Andrus & Woodruff, 1836), p. 91, “Of the proceedings on the trial.”

A search on "usual mode" goes to page 91. The chapter heading is Proceeedings on Trial. The chapter is talking about courtroom proceedings after 1821. It is not talking about oaths for public office. A search through the entire book for "so help me God" comes up empty. The post-1821 alternative is stated as "swear in the presence of the ever-living God," and, again, without "So help me God."

So, when Chancellor Livingston administered the presidential oath to George Washington, Livingston, as a New York State judicial officer, apparently followed "the usual mode of administering oaths," which meant that the oathtaker would place his hand on a Bible during the oath and then conclude the oath by kissing the book. This practice, more commonly known as the "book-oath," is what was reported as having occurred, and there is no contemporaneous report that says otherwise. Furthermore, four years later, when it came time for Washington's second inauguration that took place in Philadelphia, not only was there no mention of "So help me God," but, there was no mention of deity in Washington's inaugural address, no attendance at a church service, and no word of a bible as being needed or even present.

State Lawmaker Wants to Amend Iowa's Constitution

Here's a January 11, 2010 online news story from Radio Iowa, Lawmaker restates her oath after “God” flap, by O. Kay Henderson:

A Republican legislator is unhappy the words, “so help me God,” have been dropped as Iowa lawmakers recite the oath of office to begin a new term in the legislature.

Representative Dawn Pettingill of Mount Auburn raised the objection after two new lawmakers were sworn in in the Iowa House in opening ceremonies earlier today. She says there’s a long tradition of appealing to the divine when taking office in Iowa.

“It has been said in the oath of office since 1939 here in Iowa and it’s included in the oath for federal senators and congressman,” Pettingill says. “I think we should have had a discussion before it was removed.”

Pettingill didn’t notice the change last year when all 100 newly-elected members of the Iowa House were sworn in using an oath without the words: “so help me, God.” Mark Bransgaard, the chief clerk of the House, says there was no conscious decision to drop the phrase.

“I didn’t have a copy of the oath so I went to the constitution and copied it, unawares that we’ve said, ’so help me God’ in the past,” Bransgaard says. “I mean, we can go back to saying that if the members choose to do that.”

Representative Pettengill took matters into her own hands and asked for time to speak on the House floor today so she could restate her oath and add: “so help me God.” Pettingill plans to sponsor a resolution to try to put that phrase in the oath for good.

This is the section of the Iowa Constitution outlining the oath of office members of the legislature are to recite:

Oath of members. SEC. 32. Members of the general assembly shall, before they enter upon the duties of their respective offices, take and subscribe the following oath or affirmation: “I do solemnly swear, or affirm, (as the case may be,) that I will support the Constitution of the United States, and the Constitution of the State of Iowa, and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of senator, (or representative, as the case may be,) according to the best of my ability.” And members of the general assembly are hereby empowered to administer to each other the said oath or affirmation.
[end article]

Lawmaker Dawn Pettingill may want to do some additional research before sponsoring "a resolution to try to put that phrase in the oath for good," because according to the 1857 Constitution of the State of Iowa, Article I, Section 5 that type of change would require a constitutional overhaul:

SEC. 4. No religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office, or public trust, and no person shall be deprived of any of his rights, privileges, or capacities, or disqualified from the performance of any of his public or private duties, ... in consequence of his opinions on the subject of religion, ... .

In a previous blog I pointed out how authors Kramnick and Moore were right to single out Utah as having a "unique State Constitution." I guess I need to take that back. The Iowa Constitution apparently protects religious liberty, as spelled out in Article I Section 4, just as well. The big differences between the two states seems to be that Utah office holders are aware of what their constitution says regarding the addition of "so help me God" to the end of their oath.

So Help Me God, Knock on Wood, Did Forrest Church Get It Right?

A short while ago, co-blogger Mark in Spokane posted an article in which he praised Gordon S. Wood's new book, Empire of Liberty, A History of the Republic, 1789-1815, with these words, "each page is packed with detail and interpretation, and it is simply a joy to mull over Wood's insights." I've only read one page in the entire book, but that page includes a footnote that appears to fall short of possessing any noticeable insight. Here's the specific footnote from page 64 that I'm talking about:

35. There is no contemporary [or subsequent firsthand] evidence that he [George Washington] also said "so help me God" at the end of the oath; the matter is very controversial today. See Forrest Church, So help me God: The Founding Fathers and the Great Battle over Church and State, (New York, 2007), 445-49. Since the Judiciary Act of 1789 declared that the oath to be sworn by the justices of the Supreme Court and the other federal judges included the phrase "So help me God," it is likely that Washington may have also used the phrase (1 Cong. Ch. 20, 1 Stat. 73, Sec. 8). I owe this information to Steven G. Calabresi.

A single footnote can not affect the overall merit of a scholarly book filled with more than seven hundred pages, but, by itself, it shows that there is no substitute for a firsthand analysis of an important issue. Footnote 35 refers to an Appendix (pgs. 445-49), where Reverend Forrest Church defends the notion that George Washington added a sacred codicil to his presidential oath. Unfortunately, his presentation wanders off beyond the limits of reasonable credibility, and the second item, a reference to the secondary oath for federal judges contained in the Judiciary Act of September 24, 1789, completely overlooks the basic oath taken by all federal employees except for the president as specified in "An act to regulate the time and manner of administering certain oaths." This act was signed into law by George Washington nearly three months earlier on June 1, 1789, and it is this generic federal oath that is most similar to the presidential oath.

If a person takes a serious look at the Church's Appendix, then several glaring deficiencies become apparent. First off, Washington Irving was not the first person to describe George Washington as having added the "so help me God" codicil to his presidential oath. This so-called honor belongs to Rufus W. Griswold, who preceded Washington Irving's 1857 account by three years when he published his book, The Republican Court; or American Society in the Days of George Washington, pgs. 138-42. It turns out, neither author ever specified a source for their rendition of Washington's oath. Griswold may have used Washington Irving as his source, since he mentioned listening to a retelling of the inaugural ceremony by the master storyteller of his day. But, whatever Griswold learned from Irving no one can say just what that was. In contrast, it is absolutely clear that Griswold did use the widely circulated anonymous account, which originally appeared in Philadelphia's Federal Gazette of May 8th, as cited by Reverend Church.

The fundamental problem with Irving's account is that it does not come from what can be called a personal recollection. Instead, it is a fact that Washington Irving plagiarized the bulk of his inaugural narrative from the Memoir of Eliza Susan [Morton] Quincy (see footnote, bottom page 52). Another telling point is that, elsewhere in Irving's biography of George Washington (Vol 5, pg 21), Irving states that Washington's inaugural coach "was drawn by a single pair of horses" "on the panels of which were emblazoned the arms of the United States." (Forrest Church, unlike Washington Irving, chose six horses.) This assertion is contradicted by several contemporary newspaper reports (e.g. New York Packet, May 1, 1789) that describe Washington as riding alone in an elegant state coach, which was the only one pulled by four horses. The elegant coach with its gilded trim was loaned out for the inaugural parade by the wealthy Beekman family, and, in contrast to what Irving described, bore the Beekman family coat of arms. Furthermore, according to Griswold's placement of young Irving's viewing position, Irving was located at the "corner of Wall Street and New Streets," one block (about 200 feet) west of Federal Hall, where he was not even in a position to see any part of the inaugural parade. (It would also have been an absolute marvel if Washington Irving could have heard the inaugural oath, since Eliza, who was directly across the street, "so near," she "could almost hear him [George Washington] speak" when he took his oath.)

Next, Reverend Church tries to support his case by a May 9th Pennsylvania Mercury article. This turns out to be a real bummer, because David Humphreys, "Washington's principal aide," had absolutely nothing to do with the cited article. When I investigated this matter, I found out that Church's reference actually came from Philadelphia's Federal Gazette of May 9th, where the introduction to the article stated, "Extract from an essay published by Mr. Humphreys, in the Pennsylvania Mercury, this morning." Further examination conclusively shows that the "Mr. Humphreys" identified here is Daniel Humphreys, the publisher and editor of the Pennsylvania Mercury, and not "David Humphreys, Washington's principal aide." The truth of the matter is that the editor, Daniel Humphreys, had published a rambling and very long-winded month-long serialized essay that had been submitted by a pseudononymous Apocalypsophilos from which the Federal Gazette had selected a snippet.

Shortly after the "Mr. Humphreys" fiasco, Reverend Church refers to the ad hoc House oath of April 6th, but he fails to present any evidence that this oath was ever considered in any other context. It's simply wrong to say that this House initiated, God-laced oath was either a "competing" oath or was overturned "two months later" during the legislative process. The first piece of legislation that passed by Congress was named, "An act to regulate the time and manner of administering certain oaths." Washington signed this bill into law on June 1, 1789. From the time just preceding Washington's inaugural ceremony through to the time when Congress submitted the bill for the President's signature, the bill contained the exact same wording for the proposed federal oath. This oath, which was taken by all federal employees other than by the president, simply reads, “I, A. B. do solemnly swear or affirm (as the case may be) that I will support the Constitution of the United States.” (No reference to God.) One should note that this oath is the precursor of our current day federal oath, which is also the first oath taken by all federal judges.

The last item presented by Reverend Church comes from a responding letter written by Chief Justice John (not "George") Marshall and addressed to President-elect Thomas Jefferson. Here, Church claims, "I can conceive of no other reason for this exchange apart from Jefferson wishing assurance from Marshall that he would not be required to add the words 'So help me God' to the oath as spelled out in the Constitution." Now, that's a stretch. It is much more reasonable to view Jefferson's March 2, 1801 letter as asking Chief Justice Marshall whether he had not only to swear to the presidential oath, but to also first swear to the same basic oath applicable to all other federal employees. This was just another way of asking that since the Chief Justice had to swear to two different oaths, did the president need to follow a similar protocol? As indicated by Church, "Marshall replied, 'That [oath] prescribed in the Constitution seems to me to be the only one which is to be administered.'"

I can only speak for myself, but, in summary, I do not see how Reverend Forrest Church came close to making a persuasive argument to support the proposition that George Washington had likely added "so help me God" to his oath.

The second part of footnote 35 refers to the Judiciary Act of 1789. In this instance, the attempt to invoke some sense of proleptic rationale so one can be persuaded that "it is likely that [Washington] may have also used the [So help me God] phrase" just doesn't pass muster. As I have already indicated, judges appointed to the judicial branch must submit to two different oaths. The first oath, with no reference to God, was the standard oath until the Civil War for all federal employees to "support the Constitution," whereas the second oath exclusively commits the justices of the Supreme Court and the other federal judges to "administer justice" ... "agreeably to the constitution, and laws of the United States. So help me God"

The president and members of the congressional branch do not have a charter to administer justice. Washington understood the distinctly unique nature of the Judiciary Act when he stated in his farewell address, "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 desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice?"[my italics] In contrast, had Washington ever intimated that obligatory oaths for federal office specified a declaration of religious commitment, then there would be a case for considering whether Washington had added a sacred codicil to his oath of office. In reality, the opposite is most evident. When Washington signed his May 12, 1778 Continental Army oath of allegiance as legislated by the Continental Congress, he did not add the words "so help me God." (For more on this subject, see Historic Oath of Allegiance Comes Home.) Again, when on September 17, 1787, Washington's signature headed the list of delegates who endorsed the proposed godless Constitution, he was fully aware that "no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States." Finally and most notably, at the time of President Washington's second inauguration he planned that inaugural ceremony without a single indication of religious acknowledgement. (See American Creation: David Barton and His Seven Signs.)

What is most surprising about footnote 35 is that Professor Wood credits Professor Steven G. Calabresi as the source for his information about Washington's presidential oath, while completely ignoring the 1-12-09 History News Network article, “So Help Me God”: A George Washington Myth that Should Be Discarded, by Peter R. Henriques. You can find the associated endnotes to Henriques' article at my earlier American Creation blog (see http://americancreation.blogspot.com/2009/01/so-help-me-god-george-washington-myth.html).


Endnotes:

Further examination conclusively shows - I wasn't surprised, but when Reverend Church was presented with my research on the identity"Mr. Humphreys, he replied:

----- Message sent August 29, 2007 -----

Dear Ray,

Just got back from vacation to receive your research on Daniel Humphreys. I was hasty in my identification and will change the attribution in my appendix on line. [No change has ever been made.] I needn't have included that piece to begin with, and it doesn't change my sense that Washington is more likely than not to have said "So help me God" when he was inaugurated, though you will note that I nowhere claim that we can be certain about this. It is secondary to the argument of my book—that after a fierce, pitched battle between the forces of liberty and order (pluribus and unum), strict church-state separation was not firmly established until following the War of 1812 during the Monroe administration. There can be no doubt, however, that Washington's first inauguration (unlike his second) was a religious as well as a secular rite.

Best, Forrest

Professor Wood credits Professor Steven G Calabrisi - This is the same Steven G. Calabrisi who posted a January 25, 2009 Balkanization Guest Blog entitled, Steve Calabrisi on the Oath Controversy. In the concluding sentence of Calabrisi's guest blog he parades his outdated picture of the first "two centuries" of inaugural history by saying:

The addition of the words including the President’s name (in this case “Barack Hussein Obama”) and “so help me God” are permissible both because they do not take away any of the words the Constitution mandates and because two centuries of practice starting with George Washington himself have established that the addition of these words is permissible.

An American Tradition, Universally Understood?

When Pastor Peter Lillback, during the Q&A part of the National Constitution Center program, Washington: Devout or Deist, was confronted by Matthew Goldstein (see Comment from my previous blog) with the fact that there are several presidents who are known not to have added "So help me God" to their respective oaths, Lillback conceded that he was just repeating what he regarded as a "generally understood viewpoint." However, he went on to expand upon what he thought were the special circumstances surrounding Washington's inaugural ceremony in attempt to bolster his assertion that Washington had added "So help me God" to his presidential oath.

In his response, Lillback relied heavily on his observation that Washington was a Virginian, and as such he had likely repeated "ten or twelve oaths in his life," which concluded with the words, "So help me God." This is absolutely true, but only in the sense that all of these oaths took place during the colonial era when there was a congenital union between the English monarchy and the Anglican Church. What Lillback overlooks is that from the time starting with the American Revolution there does not appear to be a single documented instance where George Washington swore to an official oath in the service of our country that included a religious codicil.

We, also, need to consider that the Virginia Constitution of 1776 did not mandate a religious oath; and when it came to the to the Continental Congress, the Articles of Confederation did not even mention an oath as being necessary for its delegates. The United States Constitution does prescribe an oath for the president, but it omits any acknowledgement of a supreme being. This is also true for the legislated oath designated for all federal employees. When on June 1, 1789, President Washington signed An Act to regulate the Time and Manner of administrating certain oaths into law, it simply stated, "I, A. B. do solemnly swear or affirm (as the case may be) that I will support the Constitution of the United States." Most importantly, the Constitution also states that "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States" (Article VI. Section, III).

The first reported instance of Washington swearing to an oath in the post-colonial era occurred as a result of the Continental Congress passing a bill on 3 February 1778 that required all Continental Army officers to sign a certificate to "acknowledge the UNITED STATES of AMERICA, to be Free and Independent and Sovereign States, ... ." Washington signed this certificate without appending "so help me God," even though the legislation passed by the Continental Congress had included an optional use of the words "So help me God" by placing those words outside of the delimiting quotation marks. As can be seen, Washington did not append "So help me God" to his military oath of May 12, 1778.

George Washington signed this oath of allegiance on May 12, 1778 while at Valley Forge. The same document was executed by such others as Von Steuben and Alexander Hamilton. They are on display in the National Archives, Washington, DC. (Courtesy National Archives.)

Pastor Lillback continued with a second point by saying, "In fact, it [saying 'So Help me God' as was done in Virginia] was the American tradition, universally understood, because the word oath implied that you were saying this before God. And the words 'So help me God,' were not adding God to it. God was there when you took an oath. It was saying, I need help to keep what I just promised."

The problem here is that Lillback can only see George Washington as agreeing with his "universal understanding" as to what oaths meant during the colonial era. What this means, of course, is that Lillback has to turn a blind eye to what happened at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. In The Godless Constitution, Kramnick and Moore explain what happened this way:

While passionately debated in the new nation, the "no religious test" clause elicited surprisingly little discussion at the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention itself. It was introduced by Charles Pinckney, the governor of South Carolina, on August 20, whereupon it was immediately referred to the Committee on Detail without any debate among the delegates. The committee presented its general report on August 30 and made no reference to Pinckney's proposal. Not to be ignored, Pinckney moved it again to the floor. Roger Sherman of Connecticut, the committee chairman, held that the prohibition was unnecessary," the prevailing "liberality" being a sufficient security against such tests. Gouverneur Morris and General Charles Cotesworth Pinckney seconded Governor Pinckney's motion, however. It was then voted on and, according to the Maryland delegate Luther Martin, "adopted by a very great majority of the convention without much debate." No record of the exact vote, but Madison's personal notes of the convention report that North Carolina voted no and that Maryland was divided. According to Luther Martin, "there were some members so unfashionable [his italics] as to think that a belief in the existence of a Deity and of a state of future rewards and punishments would be some security for the good conduct of our rulers, and that in a Christian county it would be at least decent to hold some distinction between the professors of Christianity and downright infidelity or paganism.

Well might these 'unfashionable' members be surprised at the position taken so easily by the majority at the Constitutional Convention, for eleven of the thirteen states had religious tests for public offices in 1787. Even in Rhode Island, once the most religiously pluralistic and liberal state, where small numbers of Catholics an Jews freely worshipped, only Protestants could vote or hold office. New Hampshire, New Jersey, both Carolinas, Vermont, and Georgia also required officials to be Protestants. Massachusetts and Maryland insisted on belief in the Christian religion as a qualification for office. Pennsylvania required its officials to be Protestants who believed in God and the divine inspiration of the Old and New Testaments; in Delaware all elected and appointed public officials were required to profess 'faith in God the father, and in Jesus Christ His Holy son, and in the Holy Ghost, One God blessed forevermore.' Several state constitutions also required office holders to acknowledge that God was a 'rewarder of the good and punisher of the wicked.'"

What Lillback can't recognize, and what Professor Peter Henriques clearly
explained is this:

If you look at the evidence [as to whether Washington appended anything to his oath], and I don't want to take [more than] a short time, but the evidence for that is surprisingly weak. It's a case where people accept something, pass it on, but the actual evidence for it is not [there], and Washington is strict constructionist. He is not going to change the constitutional oath, at least, not without anyone mentioning it. Indeed the French Ambassador, who was there, and wrote down what he said, and wrote the oath, did not put it in.

The Senate, four days after Washington's Inauguration, passed an oath for Congressmen that specifically took out the words "So help me God" [from the ad hoc oath originally taken by the House members]. I can't imagine they would have taken that out of the oath if George Washington had done it, at least without any comment.