No, Mr. Beck, That Wasn't 'Some Professor' - That Was Me

More from Chris Rodda, here.

The Protestant Case Against the Natural Law

Another repost at The One Best Way here.

An Interesting Book Review

I found this interesting Washington Post book review today on  The Long Road to Annapolis: The Founding of the Naval Academy and the Emerging American Republic By William P. Leeman.  Here are the portions that I think is germane to this blog:

"After American independence, patriots believed that standing armies and professional navies were instruments of royal tyranny and had no place in the new republic. George Washington, "Cincinnatus of the West," set the model, taking up arms to defend his country and then returning to the plow when the threat was past. Militias were to suffice for the new republic's defense.

Barbary pirates, conflict with France and the War of 1812 brought the realization that, indeed, an army and navy were needed, but Thomas Jefferson did not trust their officer corps because they were largely in sympathy with his political enemy Alexander Hamilton. This fear helped motivate Jefferson to establish the military academy at West Point in 1802 to inculcate republican values. Naval officers, while equally pro-federalist, did not present as great a threat as their Army counterparts for they were usually away at sea. Thus, he saw much less need for a naval academy.

So for the first half-century of the Navy's existence, its officers studied their profession in "the school of the ship." Captains took responsibility for the professional and moral training of young midshipmen, requiring them to take classroom instruction at sea from chaplains or civilian schoolmasters, who assigned extensive reading in the classics, science, philosophy and history...

If one were starting from scratch without historical anxieties and political pressures, it is unlikely that the current Naval Academy would be the outcome. There is an inherent conflict between a liberal education based on skeptical inquiry and military indoctrination requiring unquestioning obedience. Combining the two educational cultures tends to create a pressure chamber with too much to do and no time to think and absorb."

I know this is not a typical post but the last part about the "inherent conflict between a liberal education based on skeptical inquiry and military indoctrination requiring unquestioning obedience" really peaked my interest. Does it bother anyone else that at least some people are starting to doubt the merits of a liberal education because it undermines a culture of unquestioning obedience?  This sounds like Sparta not Athens and expresses an attitude that would have been anathema at our founding.

Robert P. Hunt on Leo Strauss II

This is another excerpt from Christianity, Leo Strauss, and the Modern/Ancient Distinction by Robert P. Hunt:

Under Glenn’s favorable interpretation of Strauss’s contribution to the recovery of political philosophy, Strauss’s view that the claims of reason and revelation are “mutually exclusive” need not be accepted by Roman Catholics. Rather, the Roman Catholic political philosopher can appropriate Strauss’s teaching in support of moral realism in the battle against subjectivism and relativism. In other words, Strauss shares with Roman Catholics an aversion to liberal modernity and provides a powerful philosophical argument for rejecting it, particularly in its positivist and radical historicist dimensions. The “ancient”/ “modern” distinction is a powerful hermeneutic tool through which one can embrace the moral realism of the “ancients” and reject the increasing nihilism of the “moderns.”8

And yet a closer reading of even the exoteric Strauss should give Roman Catholics pause before they embrace Strauss’s distinction. First, Strauss’s brand of “moral realism” is one which seems to be, at best, ambivalent to Christianity’s contribution to the history of political philosophy, particularly in its political ramifications. Second, Strauss’s distinction between ancients and moderns seems to be based primarily on the relationship between the philosopher and the city, not on whether the human mind has the capacity to grasp truths grounded in the nature of things. The first point is addressed obliquely in Natural Right and History, the second more directly What is Political Philosophy?

In his introduction to Natural Right and History, Strauss seems to indicate that “Roman Catholic social science” is preferable to most of “present-day American social science” in that it is not necessarily committed to “the proposition that all men are endowed by the evolutionary process or by a mysterious fate with many kinds of urges and aspirations, but certainly with no natural right.”9 In short, Straussimplies that Roman Catholic social science is at least open to the possibility of some view of natural right, implying for political philosophy the argument for a hierarchy of natural ends. The problem, however, is that “the modern followers of Thomas Aquinas” (i.e. neo-Thomists) have been forced to accept “a fundamental, typically modern, dualism of a nonteleological natural science and a teleological science of man” that seems to break with the views of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas himself, thus pushing, one infers, much of contemporary Catholic social thought in a non-teleological, imperativist direction.10 A possible implication: for Roman Catholics to salvage their own tradition from the shoals of the liberal politics of modernity, they must embrace a more fully (as envisaged by Strauss) Aristotelian Christianity and its hierarchical, prudentialist view of politics rather than a form of Kantian Christianity with its egalitarian and imperativist implications.11

And yet, at the very end of Strauss’s chapter on “Classical Right”—at the virtual center of the work itself—Strauss indicates that the problem with even St. Thomas Aquinas himself, a Thomas not read through the prism of neo-Thomists such as Jacques Maritain and Heinrich Rommen, is that “the Thomistic doctrine of natural right, or more generally expressed, of natural law, is free from the hesitations and ambiguities of the teachings, not only of Plato and Cicero, but of Aristotle as well.” Thus, for St. Thomas, there are certain immutable first principles of natural law that “suffer no exception, unless possibly by divine intervention.” Under a Thomistic dispensation, reason and revelation are reconciled in such a manner as to imply (1) that all men are conscience-bound to obey the natural law, even in its immutable first principles, and (2) that this places an undue burden on the latitude exercised by statesmen in their pursuit of the common weal. Thus, Montesquieu (a “modern” under any reasonable interpretation of Strauss’s “ancients”/”moderns” distinction) “tried to recover for statesmanship a latitude which had been considerably restricted by the Thomistic teaching.” The seeming gap between the “ancient” teleological view of political life and at least the early “modern” view (embodied in the writings of Machiavelli and Montesquieu) is bridged by a common rejection of immutable first principles that would limit the statesman’s capacity to do what might be necessary to serve the regime.12 It would seem, therefore, that the only way for political philosophers to salvage political wheat from the chaff of St. Thomas’s effort to reconcile reason and revelation is to return to a more overtly “classical” view of politics, or perhaps to argue for a Christian view which more greatly minimizes the difficulties caused by the ‘Christianizing” of “classical” political philosophy by portraying the Christian view of politics as an interesting footnote to Greek classicism.13"

I think Hunt's main point is that one does not have to throw in completely with all the implications of ancient philosophy to avoid the pitfalls of modern relativism.  The "immutable first principles" discussed here would seem to be rooted in imago dei and the inherent worth of the individual. My question is why any regime, whether ancient or modern, that would reject these principles is worth serving? 

Noll on Zuckert and “Christian America”

Another repost at The One Best Way here.

Another money quote:

Zuckert argues Locke’s influence transformed both politics and the Christian religion itself during the 18th Century. “Rational Christianity” (what Gregg Frazer terms “theistic rationalism”) is what Christianity turned into after first Locke and then Jefferson, Adams et al. transformed it into something more politically useful for the age of republicanism or classical liberalism. Whether what the Founders understood as “rational Christianity” is properly termed “Christianity” at all is debatable. To America’s key Founders, such “Christianity” often embraced theological heresies.

Noll notes that “republicanism” often presented itself with “Christianity” as though the two went together (hence the kernel of truth to the “Christian America” claim). However, Noll notes the genesis of republican ideas were outside of traditional Christian teachings. Hence a great “importing” of a-biblical, non-traditional teachings into Christianity during the 18th Century.

Some of my co-bloggers note, perhaps correctly, that rational Christianity didn't "import" anything new. The "rational Christians" may well have rediscovered or reinvigorated old Christian "heresies" like Arianism, Socinianism, Universalism, etc.

The Answers to all our Questions

Well, we had a good run. We have debated back-and-forth the founders and religion for over two years now but I guess all good things must come to an end. Why you ask? Because now we have the answers from the horse's mouth. Here's Jefferson, Madison and Hamilton discussing, amongst other things, religion and natural law:



Yep, game over. Thanks to everyone! We had a good run! =)

Conditions of Orthodoxy at Founding Era Colleges

Another repost to my new group blog here.

I'll throw in a money quote:

These men, Harvard alum preaching “Arminianism, Arianism, Pelagianism, Socinianism, and Deism” from the pulpit, disproportionately were patriot Whig preachers arguing on behalf of Revolution — notable among them, Jonathan Mayhew, Charles Chauncy, Simeon Howard, and Samuel West. The orthodox failed to root out infidelity from Harvard. In 1747, they unsuccessfully attempted to boycott unitarian Jonathan Mayhew’s ordination. And by 1805 Unitarian Henry Ware was elected to head Harvard’s Divinity studies. Starting with John Thornton Kirkland, “[f]rom 1810 until 1933 all of the presidents of Harvard University were Unitarians.”

William Hogeland on American Creation

Author William Hogeland takes positive note of American Creation, here and here with some very nice and thoughtful observations.

Was New Zealand Founded as a "Christian Nation?"

Or as a "secular state?" Heh heh. It never ends.

By Simon Collins
New Zealand Herald


The Human Rights Commission has bowed to Catholic Church objections to a statement that New Zealand was a secular state and that religion was only for the "private sphere".

The statement, contained in a draft update of the commission's 2004 report on Human Rights in New Zealand Today, drew fire this week from the country's Catholic bishops.

"To suggest that matters of religion and belief belong only in the private sphere undermines the right of churches to seek to influence public opinion and political decision making," the bishops said. The evangelical Vision Network agreed, saying "no major religion sees itself as a privatised matter".

Race Relations Commissioner Joris de Bres said yesterday that the offending words would be rewritten.

"We'll look to rephrase that to say the right to belief is a personal matter," he said.

"There wasn't any intention to limit or to privatise religious belief. It's more about the fact that it's a matter of personal choice and not of state direction, and that there is a strong tradition of religious diversity in New Zealand going right back to the so-called fourth article of the Treaty [of Waitangi]."

Bishop [Brian] Tamaki said Christianity underpinned New Zealand institutions.

Despite this protest, the commission's new draft statement initially repeated lines from the 2004 document that "New Zealand is a secular state with no state religion", and that "matters of religion and belief are deemed to be a matter for the private, rather than public, sphere".

The Catholic bishops and Vision Network director Glyn Carpenter still object to the claim that New Zealand is a "secular state".

"This is contradicted by official statistics which show that a majority of New Zealanders described themselves as having a religion in the 2006 census," the bishops said.

Full story here.

Robert P. Hunt on Leo Strauss

The following in an excerpt from the essay Christianity, Leo Strauss, and the Ancients/Moderns Distinction by Robert P. Hunt:      

Leo Strauss’s effort to rekindle an appreciation of classical political philosophy in the face of the challenges posed to it, and to any serious effort to recover the truth about political things, is to be commended. Strauss’s seeming “moral realist” approach to the study of political life was viewed by many of his contemporaries, influenced as they were by the tenets of value non-cognitivism, positivism, and historicism, as hopelessly naïve. These proponents of a “value-free”political science believed that one could understand the workings of political institutions and the ideologies that supplied justifications for those institutions without reference to some transcendent source of meaning and purpose. As Strauss ably pointed out, however, these “value-free” efforts were doomed to trivialize the study of political things, replacing political philosophy (“a doctrine which claims to be true”) with the history of political philosophy (“a survey of more or less brilliant errors”).1 For Strauss, liberal modernity was incapable of providing sustenance for an experiment in self-government, most especially that experiment explicitly grounded in an acknowledgement of the “truthfulness’” of natural rights claims.2

For Roman Catholics in particular, Strauss’s work—and the work of the scholars who express an intellectual indebtedness to him—is of special importance. It has forced them to reconsider the relationship between the Roman Catholic intellectual tradition and classical political philosophy. It has also forced them to consider the wisdom of any full-throated embrace of liberal modernity, particularly in light of the development of Catholic social and political thought as embodied in the teachings of the Second Vatican Council. Moreover, as Father James V. Schall has noted, Strauss (along with Hannah Arendt and Eric Voegelin) has “forcefully raised the question about the relation of reason and revelation, of modern and classical political philosophy to each other,” thus challenging “the very philosophy upon which the modern state has rested.”3

Central to the Roman Catholic tradition’s quest for a fuller understanding of its own intellectual premises, however, is a need to understand the relationship of the tradition to Strauss in particular and to the reading of intellectual history upon which the Straussian distinction between “ancients” and “moderns” rests. The use of the word distinction here is important, for few Roman Catholics would argue that there is indeed a distinction between a type of philosophical and moral realism that acknowledges the existence of a hierarchy of ends within nature itself—usually associated with the tenets of “classical” or “ancient” philosophy—and a philosophical and moral voluntarism and nominalism that acknowledges no natural teleology and reifies human choice as the highest human good—usually associated with “modern” philosophy. To the extent that the Straussian distinction between “ancients” and “moderns” points Catholics back to this fundamental philosophical “turn,” thereby assisting Roman Catholics to appreciate the consequences of liberal modernity’s rejection of the aforementioned transcendent norms and standards that are not a product of human will, it is helpful. To the extent to which it is hardened into something more than a useful distinction—that is, into a principled dichotomy whereunder the person who employs it seems to be pushed into embracing either classical or modern philosophy, especially as Strauss characterizes the distinction—it might fail to do full justice to the richness and integrity of the Catholic intellectual tradition and that tradition’s reflections upon the nature, purpose, and limits of political life. I will argue that Strauss’s distinction between “ancients” and “moderns” in general and between “classical” and “modern” political philosophy in particular does tend toward a dichotomizing of intellectual history whereunder even an ostensibly Catholic view of political life is, upon even a favorable reading of Strauss’s distinction, more classical than Catholic in its philosophic orientation and political ramifications.4

Ted McAllister has pointed out that “Strauss devoted little space [in his works] to an examination of Christianity,” but that “he often employed a more expansive language” in his analysis of natural right and natural law, “designed to suggest to the uninitiated reader a broad Judeo-Christian tradition when he meant the Jewish heritage simply.”5  McAllister’s reference to “the uninitiated reader” and the inference he draws from it is based at least in part on Strauss’s famous hermeneutic distinction between exoteric and esoteric writing and the need for the philosopher, in the interest of the commonweal, to cloak or disguise his true philosophic intentions. On this reading, “the great quarrel” and tension between Jerusalem (representing revelation-based societal adherence to divine law) and Athens (representing the corrosive character of reason and of true philosophic inquiry) is “the root of Western civilization,” not the transition from Greek particularism to Roman universalism.6 The recovery of the root of western civilization, therefore, requires not merely a return to classical political philosophy as Strauss understands it, but to an awareness of the tension between the conflicting demands of reason and revelation. The effort to dissolve the tension in the interest of revelational norms or philosophic truth is one of the hallmarks of modern philosophy and its proclivity toward political utopianism."

There is a lot said here and much of it is, as TVD would say, the "tall weeds" of scholarship.  I thought it germane to this blog on many levels but particularly since it mentions modern philosophies "proclivity toward utopianism" which I stated in a recent post was the Enlightenment answer to the Christian notion of the "millennial reign of Christ".  This is the much ignored back drop in many discussions on political theory leading up to, and many years after, the founding.  It would seem me that one, the other, or both was at the root of "American Exceptionalism".  In fact, if this book is correct, this concept was in the forefront of the Puritan mind that spoke of a "City on a Hill".  

Anyway, that is what jumped out to me. But, like I said there is a lot here, and I would like to here from others that may have insights.

Aquinas, the Social Contract, and Catholic Resistance Theory

Here is a good article on Aquinas, the social contract, and Catholic resistance theory.


A taste:

"One of the myths of the English-speaking world is that there was an internal connection between Protestantism and freedom. Martin Luther supposedly instituted an age of individual freedom of expression when he challenged the monolithic authority of Pope and Church. In fact, the vast majority of Protestant Reformers were just as intolerant as their Roman Catholic counterparts. There was no more tolerance of heterodox views in Calvin's Geneva or Cotton's Massachusetts than in Spain under the Inquisition.

In Hispanic countries, in contrast, Catholicism is often seen as the seed bed of democratic ideas. Thomist notions (that is to say, notions derived from the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas, 1225-74) of natural law were inherently hostile to arbitrary or despotic government. During the Religious Wars in France, Roman Catholic Leaguers wrote tracts in support of resistance to tyrannical rulers, and developed theories of original popular sovereignty.

In much of Central and Eastern Europe, the Counter-Reformation Church allied with secular authorities to reconvert the population to Catholicism and so (particularly from the later 17th century) Catholicism and Absolutism became seen as natural allies - embodied in the person of the Catholic absolutist Louis XIV of France. But this link was far from clear in Western Europe in the age of Shakespeare."

Note to Evangelical on George Washington's Religion

I was prompted to enter this discussion forum because my work was being cited there. Here is one of the notes I left:

Matthew,

... [M]y point about Glenn Beck wasn't to poison the well but rather get folks to think what is it that Beck, insofar as he fully understands what Lillback wrote (like most folks I doubt he read all 1200 pages), probably values about the book.

That GW was more religious and religion friendly, less deistic than most scholar conclude? Sure, most Mormons would value that. But that GW believed in orthodox Trinitarian doctrine? No, because Mormons reject that.

Re labels, David Holmes in his book "The Faiths of the Founding Fathers" (published by Oxford) labels the creed of the "key Founders" (the first 4 Presidents and Franklin) "Christian-Deism" as distinguished from the "non-Christian Deism" of Paine and Allen.

That is, all of the "Christian-Deists" were affiliated with Churches that professed orthodoxy, and these "Deists" believed in an active Providence, and seemed comfortable with the "Christian" label. Paine, Allen and Palmer were the ones who probably didn't consider themselves "Christians" and wanted nothing to do with the Bible. But even with them, there are instances to doubt their pure "Deism." They were all raised in a Christian culture and to an outsider looking in, most Muslims or Buddhists for instance, would label all of them from Washington to Witherspoon to Jefferson to Paine, Allen and Palmer, "Christians." Much in the same way that we look at someone like Saddam Hussein and conclude he was a "Muslim" when best that I can tell, he was a "Muslim-Deist" and a secular tyrant. (Hussein believed in religious pluralism, sadly, precisely because he didn't take his Muslim religion as seriously as for instance, Bin Laden does.)

The reason why, I think, we go thru these distinctions is when evangelical mega-churches and orthodox theologians get in the "history," culture-war game they see these issues thru their strict theological standards. Was Washington (and Jefferson, and J. Adams, etc.) a "Christian" according to certain cultural, historical and sociological standards? Yes, of course. Did he meet the minimal standards of "Christian" according to the strict test that evangelicals require? I seriously doubt it for the reason I lay out in my original article.

Glenn Beck University

I know Chris Rodda can't wait to get her "degree."

Fukuyama, Liberal Democracy, and the Tibetan Lamb

It has been about year since I started contributing to this blog and I have learned a great deal over that year and even before that as a reader and commenter.  In fact, I came to this discussion with a desire to answer some questions I had been thinking about for quite a while and have found a lot of answers. Questions that started when I began to study the rate of Christianization among the Tibetan speaking peoples of Asia a few years ago when I was there.

What I had begun to notice, in my studies, was that of these 800 or so distinct ethnic groups that all started out on the Tibetan plateau, the ones that lived in more "liberal" nations had a far higher Christianization rate than those who did not. In other words, all of the groups that had almost no interaction with Christianity(or for that matter any foreign ideas) seemed to live under totalitarian regimes or strict theocracies. 

Ok, I am sure that many of you are asking what any of this has to do with American Creation?  Well, this realization was the spark that re-ignited my interest in political theory that brought me to this blog.  The long and short of it is that I had just witnessed first hand what I had read about in Jihad vs. McWorld years earlier about the coming clash between the modern and tribal world. More specifically, I began to focus on the role that just government could play as this script was acted out.  This is the focus I brought to AC.

As I wrote, commented, and listened to many diverse points of view here there was one statement that continued to pop up over and over again that caught my attention.  Here it is in the words of Ed Brayton from Dispatches:

"There isn't a single provision in the Bill of Rights that has any concept even remotely analogous in the Bible. The Bible does not say a word about political liberty or political rights."

I am sure many of you are wondering about how what I shared about Tibet and just government have to do with Ed's statement?  It is quite simple, in that I feel that rights are fundamental to all just government. So if Ed is right that would mean that the Bible does not promote just government.  This implication would completely contradict my view that one of the main Christian obligations to the tribal world is to aid them in establishing just governments.  In other words, for a well meaning Christian that wants to bring heaven to earth this pursuit could be a waste of time.

With that said, as I began to study this topic it became abundantly clear that major streams of Christian Thought have used the Bible to promote the merits of just government based on inalienable rights; confirming that the pursuit of these ideals was not a waste of time. In fact, these rights were said to be grounded in man being made in the image of God.  Simply put, according to the way some interpret the Bible man has an inherent dignity because, as Locke would say, he is the "workmanship of God".  If true, this directly contradicts statements like the one made by Ed Brayton and brings into question what version of Christian theology he and others that follow his line of reasoning are beholden to?   

Now some might say, "What is all this theological talk doing on a history blog?"  I would retort that it is impossible to have a reasonable historical discussion when such profound ignorance about the relevant theology exists. Nonetheless,  I think it proper to stray away from truth claims and focus on the validity of labeling various streams of political theology as legitimately Christian or not.

If this is a valid line of historical inquiry, and I think that a proper understanding of Church history says it is, then the questions about the founders and their view of the foundations of just government would seem to boil down to these essential two:

1. Is there a historically valid biblical case for rights grounded in imago dei?
2. Is this case for rights that was used at the founding?

These two questions are at the heart of our ongoing discussion about vast differences in certain aspects of Enlightenment and Christian thinking and knowing the difference.  Especially those aspects that revolve around what Francis Fukuyama would call "the end of history" which was a popular topic of discussion in both circles during the founding era and into the next century.  The former called it the millennial reign of Christ and the latter utopia but both were looking forward to the day where lion shall lie down next to lamb. Which both seem to agree is only possible in a universal state of just government. A concept that goes back to Plato and Fukuyama's thesis brings back into the forefront.

At the heart of the modern version of this discussion is if "liberal democracy" is the key to a universal state of just government?  If so it seems prudent to ask what form of "liberal democracy"? That is if there is more than one form. I would submit that there is and that one is based on Enlightenment thought and its idea of man made rights and another on Christian thought and imago dei. If America is to be the example to be followed by the rest of the world then my two questions above carry great weight. That is because I don't think Fukuyama's version of the "end of history" refers to the Christian influenced version of "liberal democracy" and if the foundation of our success the last 200 years is found in God given inalienable rights this could be bad news for the Tibetan lamb.


It is also a shame because I think there is a possibility that Islam may allow for inalienable rights based on imago dei as well. But that is a discussion for another day. 

New "Star Spangled Banner" Verses Uncovered

Quite insightful:


Restoration Of 'Star Spangled Banner' Uncovers Horrifying New Verses

Madison's Notes Discuss Christianity v. Theistic Rationalism

Another repost here.

Let me note some folks here disagree with the term "theistic rationalism" to describe the theological system Madison was talking about. So let's clarify: Madison's notes on why he wrote the Memorial and Remonstrance which led to the separation of Church & State in VA, refer to the issue of "what is Christianity?" He noted 1) Arianism and Socinianism as presenting themselves as "Christian"; 2) folks dispute what books properly belong in the biblical canon, and 3) folks practice a form of "Christianity" that doesn't hold the biblical canon as "infallible" but rather that only certain "essential" parts of the Bible are divinely inspired.

Madison didn't believe government had a right to take cognizance of which theological systems qualify as "real Christianity." Back then, as today, the "orthodox" didn't believe a system that denied the Trinity and the infallibility of the biblical canon to be actual "Christianity." Rather they argue it is some "other" religion. Dr. Gregg Frazer has termed it "theistic rationalism." Back then the orthodox theologians said it was no better than "Deism." Those who believed in it, however, termed it "rational Christianity" or "liberal unitarian Christianity."

Debunking "Beck U" -- Faith 102 with "Professor" David Barton

By Chris Rodda. Here.

Founding father quote of the day: why do we have government?

"Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of man will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint."

-- Alexander Hamilton (1755-1804), Revolutionary War veteran, co-author of The Federalist Papers, the first Secretary of the Treasury, and an early leader of the Federalist Party.

Calvin Coolidge on the Declaration of Independence, Part Deux

Part One is here. Coolidge was the American president from 1923-1928. As presidents go, people sort of liked him. He retired from office gracefully, and "Silent Cal" has his picture next to "taciturn" in the dictionary:

...an old joke, according to which U.S. President Calvin Coolidge and his wife allegedly visited a poultry farm. During the tour, Mrs. Coolidge inquired of the farmer how his farm managed to produce so many fertile eggs with such a small number of roosters. The farmer proudly explained that his roosters performed their duty dozens of times each day.

"Tell that to Mr. Coolidge," pointedly replied the First Lady.

The President, overhearing the remark, asked the farmer, "Does each rooster service the same hen each time?"

"No," replied the farmer, "there are many hens for each rooster."

"Tell that to Mrs. Coolidge," replied the President.

Cal was cool.

On July 5, 1926, on the 150th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Coolidge continued:

"Ours is a government of the people. It represents their will. Its officers may sometimes go astray, but that is not a reason for criticizing the principles of our institutions. The real heart of the American Government depends upon the heart of the people. It is from that source that we must look for all genuine reform. It is to that cause that we must ascribe all our results.

It was in the contemplation of these truths that the fathers made their declaration and adopted their Constitution.

...

About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.

...

In my opinion very little of just criticism can attach to the theories and principles of our institutions. There is far more danger of harm than there is hope of good in any radical changes. We do need a better understanding and comprehension of them and a better knowledge of the foundations of government in general. Our forefathers came to certain conclusions and decided upon certain courses of action which have been a great blessing to the world. Before we can understand their conclusions we must go back and review the course which they followed. We must think the thoughts which they thought.

...

They were a people who came under the influence of a great spiritual development and acquired a great moral power.

No other theory is adequate to explain or comprehend the Declaration of Independence. It is the product of the spiritual insight of the people. We live in an age of science and of abounding accumulation of material things. These did not create our Declaration. Our Declaration created them. The things of the spirit come first. Unless we cling to that, all our material prosperity, overwhelming though it may appear, will turn to a barren scepter in our grasp. If we are to maintain the great heritage which has been bequeathed to us, we must be like minded as the fathers who created it. We must not sink into a pagan materialism. We must cultivate the reverence which they had for the things that are holy. We must follow the spiritual and moral leadership which they showed. We must keep replenished, that they may glow with a more compelling flame, the altar fires before which they worshipped."

[Next up: Woodrow Wilson on the Declaration.]

The Founding's View of the Nature of Man

The American Founders wisely recognized that soteriology---the business of salvation---is not "political theology," which is how man should live, and his duties to his fellow man in this world. In fact, the "fellow man" part is precisely where there the Christian political theology is located. But when it comes to salvation, you're on your own, man. No government ever got anyone into heaven.

It's agreed between Aristotle and Aquinas, and even "state of nature" early modernists, that man is a social animal. That's the key to the philosophical history about the nature of man. All political philosophy must flow from there, or else it's just singing "We Are the World," which is a nice sentiment, but not reality.

We're not hermits by nature---because every hermit is "free." We're not tiger or polar bear males that eat their young, yum. And mostly, we are not mantises or Black Widows that eat their male mates for the good of the children either.

Historians like Barry Alan Shain argue that the Founding-era understanding of "rights" was not the radical individualism of modern political philosophy [John Stuart Mill, etc.], but communitarian: the smaller community has its values, and the imposition of a "larger" community---a national government, the "state"---might use its overarching power to destroy the very notion of "community." We all become drones in the Universal Homogeneous State.

On the other hand, on behalf of the individual, natural law, imago Dei, and a posteriori observations like Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations ["squashed version" here], well worth your time] all argue that man is best when he is free, and further, that society is best [healthiest; vital; dynamic] when the individual is free within the sphere of "ordered liberty."

This was the Founders' view, sometimes called "classical liberalism."

One might accuse "ordered liberty" of being oxymoronic, but it's a "golden mean."

After all, a well-functioning society is good for the individual as well, even if he's not as "free" as Caligula. Free individuals make for better societies. We are not ants, afterall.

And Caligula's unmoderated freedom was bad for even Caligula himself. Surely he was unhappy; dude had no eudaimonia. Caligula was such an unsocial animal. His "freedom"---and was any man ever more "free" than Caligula?---isn't what the Founders meant by freedom.

Now it's true that Jesus was apolitical, and soteriology was his ultimate
message, the next world, not this one. Still, the corollaries for political theology are accessible to [right] reason.

As for tyranny, John of Salisbury in Policraticus [1150 CE, a pre-Gutenberg bestseller] is already on the path toward "resistance theory"; the Calvinists [more precisely, his Reformed Theology successors Theodore Beza, Peter Martyr Vermigli, Mornay[?], John Ponet, Lex Rex Rutherford, and the Phillies extended their winning streak to eight games and just traded for Roy Oswalt, who starts against the Diamondbacks tomorrow] provide the theological argument, and not a small amount of military heft, in the English civil wars of the 1600s that were a dry run for the American Revolution.

Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God. Why? Because tyrants are all about their own good, not "the common good." Now, the odd thing about the "Calvinists" is despite their rigid theological doctrines of predestination and "the elect," their political theology still arrived at no distinction on this earth between how one should treat "elect" from "non-elect." Soteriology is not political theology! You treat the "unelect" the same as the elect.

This is the Christian political theology. One cannot do justice to Christianity merely with sola scriptura or the neo-Lutheranism of Karl Barth, nor as a mere Hobbesian political arrangement, where man's religious impulse must be subordinated to and controlled by the "state."

The Founders rejected both poles.


We must do justice to Christian political theology in our discussions of the Founding, or speak of Christianity not at all, which, admittedly, many folks these days prefer not to.

But we can't trot out a one-size-fits-all caricature of "religion," as if Christianity is no more than the Flying Spaghetti Monster or some Kiwanis Club. That's not "Christianity" as the Founding era understood it.