June 2009 Updated Quotes

Benjamin Rush:

"I do not believe that the Constitution was the offspring of inspiration, but I am as perfectly satisfied that the Union of the United States in its form and adoption is as much the work of Divine Providence as any of the miracles recorded in the Old and New Testament." - signer of the Declaration of Independence, from "Letters of Benjamin Rush", to Elias Boudinot July 9, 1788

Charles Carroll:

"Without morals a republic cannot subsist any length of time; they therefore who are decrying the Christian religion, whose morality is so sublime and pure ... are undermining the solid foundation of morals, the best security for the duration of free governments." - Dec. of Indep. signer, from "The Life and Correspondence of James McHenry", a letter from Charles Carroll to James McHenry, Nov 4, 1880

Benjamin Franklin:

"I will make small use of an old man's priviledge, that of giving advice." - from The Pennsylvania Packet, an original letter to John Alleyne Oct. 30, 1789

Maryland Constitution:

"That no other test or qualification ought to be required, on admission to any office of trust or profit, than such oath of support and fidelity to this State, and such oath of office, as shall be directed by this Convention or the Legislature of this State, and a declaration of a belief in the Christian religion." - Article 35, Nov. 11, 1776

May 2009 Updated Quotes

Henry Lee:

"First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen." - founder from Virginia, describing a famous fellow Virginian, George Washington

Thomas Jefferson:

"God who gave us life gave us liberty.  Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God?  Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that his justice cannot sleep forever." - the third president, these words are also inscribed on the Jefferson Memorial in Washington D.C.

Gouverneur Morris:

"We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility . . ." - Pennsylvania founding father primarily responsible for the final draft of the U.S. Constitution.

April 2009 Updated Quotes

Alexander Hamilton:

"It has been observed that a pure democracy if it were practicable would be the most perfect government.  Experience has proved that no position is more false than this.  The ancient democracies in which the people themselves deliberated never possessed one good feature of government.  Their character was tyranny; their figure deformity." - from a speech June 21, 1788 urging the ratification of the Constitution in New York

 Roger Sherman:

"All civil rights and the right to hold office were to be extended to persons of any Christian denomination." - a signer of the Declaration of Independence from Connecticut 

Abigail Adams:

"We have too many high-sounding words, and too few actions that correspond with them."  - from a letter to her husband John Adams, 1774 

George Washington:

"Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the great theatre of Action; and bidding an Affectionate farewell to this August body under whose orders I have so long acted, I here offer my commission, and take my leave of all the employments of public life. "  - December 23, 1783, an address to Congress resigning his commission

March 2009 Updated Quotes

John Quincy Adams:

“Why is it that, next to the birthday of the Savior of the world, your most joyous and most venerated festival returns on this day [the Fourth of July]?" “Is it not that, in the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior? That it forms a leading event in the progress of the Gospel dispensation? Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer's mission upon earth? That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity"?  - at the age of 69, from a Fourth of July speech he delivered in 1837 at Newburyport, Mass.

James Madison:

"Religion flourishes in greater purity, without than with the aid of Government." - fourth president, 1751-1813 

Nelly Custis-Lewis:

"Is it necessary that any one should [ask], 'Did General Washington avow himself to be a believer in Christianity?'  As well may we question his patriotism, his heroic devotion to country.  His mottos were, 'Deeds, not Words'; and 'For God and my Country'."  - the adopted daughter of George Washington

Patrick Henry:

"This is all the inheritance I can give my dear family.  The religion of Christ can give them one which will make them rich indeed." - "Last Will and Testament of Patrick Henry" from David Barton's "The Practical Benefits of Christianity". 

James Wilson:

"Christianity is part of the common law." -  from James Wilson, Course of Lectures, Supreme Court justice appointed by G. Washington, signer of the Constitution & Declaration of Independence, who spoke 168 times during the Constitutional Comnvention

William Penn:

"Men must be governed by God or they will be ruled by tyrants." (1644-1718)

February 2009 Updated Quotes

Benjamin Franklin:

"...it seem'd as if all the world were growing religious, so one could not walk thro' the town in an evening without hearing psalms sung in different families of every street." - from his Autobiography, talking about the Great Awakening (1740-1760)

George Washington:

"There is a rank due to the United States among nations, which will be withheld, if not absolutely lost, by the reputation of weakness...it must be known that we are at all times ready for war." - from Our Ageless Constitution

John Adams:

"You will never be alone with a poet in your pocket." - words of advice to his son Johnny, from the biography John Adams by David McCullough, p19

January 2009 Updated Quotes

John Adams:

"Veneration for the religion of a people who profess and call themselves Christians . . . to consider a descent respect for Christianity among the best recommendations for the public service." - 1797 Inaugural Address 

John Dickinson:

"Kings or parliaments could not give the rights essential to happiness... We claim them from a higher source -- from the King of kings, and Lord of all earth.  They are not annexed to us by parchments and seals.  They are created in us by the decrees of Providence, which establish the laws of our nature.  They are born with us; exist with us; and cannot be taken from us by any human power, without taking our lives." - from "An Address to the Committee Of Correspondence" in Barabados, 1766 - signer of US Constitution from Delaware

James Madison: 

"I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." - 4th US President 

December Updated Quotes

John Quincy Adams:

"The highest glory of the American Revolution was this:  it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity." 

November Updated Quotes

Alexis de Tocqueville:

"Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word, equality.  But notice the difference:  while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude." from "Democracy in America," his study of this country during its revolutionary period 

Thomas Paine:

"These are the times that try men's souls...I have as little superstition in me as any man living, but my secret opinion has ever been, and still is, that God Almighty will not give up a people to military destruction, or leave them unsupportedly to perish, who have so earnestly and so repeatedly sought to avoid the calamities of war, by every descent method which wisdom could invent." - 1776 from "The American Crisis: #1"

Mary Washington:

"Remember that God is our only sure trust." - George Washington's mother

Patrick Henry:

"God presides over the destinies of nations." - American Revolutionist

Samuel Adams:

"I conceive we cannot better express ourselves than by humbly supplicating the Supreme Ruler of the world . . . that the confusions that are & have been among the nations may be overruled by the promoting & speedily bringing in the holy & happy period when the kingdoms of our Lord & Savior Jesus Christ may be everywhere established." - American Revolutionist and a signer of the Declaration of Independence from Massachusetts

James Madison

"All the courts are generally last in making the decision, it results to them, by refusing or not refusing, to execute a law, to stamp it with its final character.   This makes the Judiciary department paramount in fact to the Legislature, which was never intended and can never be proper."  - a warning about judicial activism, Oct. 15, 1788 

October Updated Quotes

William Penn:

"... if thou wouldst rule well, thou must rule for God, and to do that, thou must be ruled by Him." - told to the Russian Czar, Peter the Great - Thomas Jefferson called Penn "the greatest law-giver the world has produced"

Benjamin Franklin:

"I have watched that sun on the president's chair and wondered if rising or setting - now I am happy to know it is a rising sun." - referring to a picture of the sun on the back of George Washington's chair in Philadelphia, shortly after Franklin signed the Constitution with 38 other delegates, Sept. 17, 1787

James Madison:

"We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it.  We have staked the future of all of our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind of self-government; upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments." - attributed to our fourth president

Benjamin Franklin:

"Those who give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Historical Period of Pennsylvania, 1759 

September Updated Quotes

Benjamin Franklin:

"I confess that there are several parts of this constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them; for having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged by better information, or further consideration, to change opinions even on important subjects, which I once thought right, but found to be otherwise.  It is therefore that the older I grow, the more apt I am to doubt my own judgement, and to pay more respect to the judgement of others" - address to Congress, "Thoughts...On The Constitution", 1787 as he encouraged founders to swallow their pride and put their names on the constitution

Noah Webster:

"I shall know but one country.  The ends I aim at shall be my country's, my God's, my Truths.  I was born an American; I live an American; I shall die an American." - American statesman who wrote the first American Dictionary of the English Language

George Washington:

"Associate yourself with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation for 'tis better to be alone than in bad company."  - from his "Rules of Civility"

Abraham Lincoln:

"Today I leave you.  I go to assume a task more difficult than that which devolved upon George Washington.  The great God which guided him must help me.  Without that assistance I shall surely fail: with it, I cannot fail." - Feb. 11, 1861 speech as he leaves Springfield

August Updated Quotes

Thomas Paine:

"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigues of supporting it." - from "The American Crisis, #4", Sept. 11,1777

James Madison:

"We've staked our future on our ability to follow the Ten Commandmnets with all our heart." - 1778 to the General Assembly of the stae of Virginia

John Adams:

"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion.  Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net.  Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people.  It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." - October 11, 1798

Thomas Jefferson:

"God who gave us life, gave us liberty.  And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure, when we have removed their ownly firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are a gift from God?  That they are not to be violated, but with His wrath?  Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, and that His justice cannot sleep forever." - excerpts inscribed on the walls of the Jefferson Memorial, Washinton D.C.

George Washington:

"To the distinguished character of patriot, it should be our highest glory to add the more distinguished character of Christian." - May 2, 1778 at Valley Forge

John Adams:

"I have examined all religions, as well as my narrow sphere, my straigtened means, and my busy life, would allow; and the result is that the Bible is the best Book in the world.  It contains more philosophy than all the libraries I have seen." - from a letter written to Thomas Jefferson, Dec. 25,1813

Benjamin Franklin:

"I therefore beg leave to move - that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessing on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning." - spoken June 28, 1787 at the Constitutional Convention

George Washington:

"But by the all-powerful dispensations of Providence, I have been protected beyond all human probability or expectattion; for I had four bullet holes through my coat, and two horses shot under me, yet escaped unhurt, although death was leveling my companions on every side of me."  - from a letter to his brother  during the Battle of Monongahela - French and Indian War

"...the same Providence that protected us upon those occasions will, I hope, continue his Mercies, and make us happy Instruments in restoring Peace and liberty to this once favour'd, but now distressed country." - from a letter marking the anniversary of the Battle of Monongahela to Colonel Adam Stephen, who had been there with Washington

July Updated Quotes

John Adams:

"Yesterday, the greatest question was decided which ever was debated in America, and a greater perhaps never was nor will be decided among men.  A resolution was passed without one dissenting colony, 'that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states'."  - from a letter to his wife Abigail Adams, July 3,1776

Benjamin Rush:

"I have been alternately called an aristocrat and a democrat.  I am neither.  I am a Christocrat ... He alone who created and redeemed man is qualified to govern him." - signer od the Declaration of Independence

Richard Henry Lee:

"That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states, that they are absolved from all allegience to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the states of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved." - a resolution read by Lee from the Virginia assembly, June 7, 1776 asking Congress to approve

Charles Carroll:

"Without morals a Republic cannot subsist any length of time; they therefore who are decrying the Christian religion ... are undermining the solid morals, the best security for the duration of free government." - Declaration of Independence signer from Maryland

June Updated Quotes

John Quincy Adams:

"In the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior.  It forms a leading event in the progress of the Gospel dispensation.  The Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeener's mission upon earth - it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity." - 6th president, from a Fourth of July speech 1837

Benjamin Franklin:

"I therefore beg leave to move - that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessing on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning." - from a speech at the Constitutional Convention. June 28, 1787

May Updated Quotes

Francis Scott Key:

"May the heaven rescued land praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation ... And this be our motto:  In God we trust." - from his Star-Spangled Banner

John Adams:

"The general principles upon which the Fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity ... I will avow that I believed and now believe that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and the attributes of God." - from a letter to Thomas Jefferson

"We recognize no Soverign but God, and no King but Jesus." - on the eve of the Revolutionary War, April 18,1775, after a British major ordered John Adams, John Hancock and those who were with them to disperse in 'the name of George Sovereign King of England'

April Updated Quotes

Noah Webster:

"In selecting men for office let principle be your guide.  Regard not the particular sect or denomination of the candidate - look to his character ...." - from Letters to a Young Gentleman Commencing His Education 1789

Samuel Adams:

"Let each citizen remeber at the moment he is offering his vote that he is not making a present or a compliment to please an individual - or at least that he ought not to do so; but that he is executing one of the most solemn trusts in human society for which he is accountable to God and his country." - in the Boston Gazette, April 16, 1781

George Washington:

"The liberty enjoyed by the people of these states of worshipping Almighty God agreeably to their conscience, is not only among the choicest of their blessings, but also of their rights." - to the Annual Meeting of Quakers, September 1789

Virginia Bill of Rights:

"Religion, or the duty to which we owe our creator, and the matter of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and convicton, not by force or violence; and therefore all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience; and this is the mutual duty of all to practice Christian forbearance, love, and charity towards each other." - Article 16, June 12, 1776

John Quincy Adams:

"Posterity, you will know how much it cost the present generation to preserve your freedom.  I hope you will make good use of it.  If you do not, I shall repent in heaven that ever I took half the pains to preserve it." - 6th president and eldest son of John Adams, 2nd president

March Updated Quotes

Patrick Henry:

"It cannot be emphasized too clearly and too often that this nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religion, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ.  For this very reason, peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here." - May 1765, from Speech to the House of Burgesses

John Adams:

"[July 4th] ... ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty." - from a letter written to wife Abigail, July 3,1776, the day the Declaration was approved by Congress

William Bradford:

"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 colony in the northern parts of Virginia, do by these presents solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and of one another, covenant and combine ourselves together ... ." - from The Mayflower Compact, 1620

Benjamin Franklin:

"God governs in the affairs of men.  And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable an empire can rise without His aid?  We have been assured in the Sacred Writings that except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.  I firmly believe this." - June 28, 1787, from a speech at the  Constitutional Convention

Alexander Hamilton:

"For my own part, I sincerely esteem it [the Constitution] a system which without the finger of God, never could have been suggested and agreed upon by such a diversity of interests." - 1787 after the Constitutional Convention