A LETTER FROM MICHAEL FARRIS, PRESIDENT of PATRICK HENRY COLLEGE

Concerning the Beliefs of America's founding Fathers and the Role of PHC.
APRIL 30, 2002

    You are familiar with the charges. If you engage in any conversation about the role of Christianity in the generation of the Founding Fathers, you will inevitably hear it said, "Most of the Founders were deists, not Christians."

    There is a reason that this view is so widely held. It has been the standard historical interpretation for at least two generations. For decades, school children have heard their teachers and texts recite this mantra in the same way their teachers had been instructed in college.

    Most friends of Patrick Henry College are also familiar with the pioneering work of Christian writers who have thoroughly researched America's past to paint a more accurate picture of the generation that laid the cornerstone of our nation. But if you ever try to use such sources in an open debate, the charge will be made (regardless of any sense of fairness) that our sources are the writings of activists, not historians.

    You can imagine my excitement upon finding an incredible book documenting the religious history of the early years of the American republic that cannot be criticized using the standard establishment party line that it is a biased or unprofessional source.

    James Hutson (B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. in history -- all from Yale University) is the Chief of the Manuscript Division for the Library of Congress. Dr. Hutson is the author of Religion and the Founding of the American Republic. His scholarship is thorough and unbiased. His analysis is fresh and insightful. And his commitment to truth is apparent to all who read this fine work.

    So what does an author with those credentials say about the role of deism in the generation of the Founders?

    He accurately describes Benjamin Franklin as a deist. Thomas Jefferson is portrayed in depth, and there were periods of his life when he was essentially a deist. But Hutson notes that during his presidency, Jefferson called himself a Christian (even though I've never heard anyone claim he was born again), and he faithfully attended church -- church held in government buildings, I might add. Regarding George Washington, Hutson finds little evidence of deism and says, "Judging from his public conduct, he was a loyal Episcopalian." Hutson's conclusion: "Evangelism demolished deism in eighteenth-century America."

    As I read through Dr. Hutson's book, I repeatedly felt affirmed in the mission and goals of Patrick Henry College. We have deliberately sought to adopt much of the thinking and many of the good characteristics of the Founding Fathers as we chart a course for training national and cultural leaders for the twenty-first century.

    In fact, there are remarkable parallels between the Founder's generation and the goals and practices of Patrick Henry College. To demonstrate these similarities, I want to share several excerpts from Dr. Hutson's book that inspired me, followed by comments from a number of our students to gain their perspectives.


1. THE PRESENT VALUE OF ETERNAL THINKING
Hutson writes:
    Republican virtue had, for many of the Founders, s special connotation of participation in public service. They did not, of course, expect every citizen to be ready or able to drop the plow and save the republic, but they did expect their fellow Americans, however humble their station, to be virtuous in the more modest sense of acting in socially responsible ways, and they counted on religion to create a basic level of good behavior in the body politic...The Christian doctrine of the future state of rewards and punishments. When internalized by believers, was considered by the revolutionary generation to be a far more effective source of social behavior than human laws..

    Some states went so far, Hutson notes, as to require voters and officeholders to profess a belief in heaven or hell before they could be trusted with the privileges of citizenship. While I would not embrace the details of that requirement today, it is a remarkable statement of the value that was placed on Christian conviction as a key to national success.

2. THE ROLE OF SCRIPTURAL THINKING IN MAJOR POLITICAL DECISIONS

    Another of Hutson's remarkable pieces of scholarship is his analysis of the role of Christianity in the American Revolution. Some have claimed it was irrelevant. Others have claimed religion caused the American Revolution. The author is more careful. He writes:
 

3. THE NEED FOR CHRISTIAN CHARACTER OF SECURE THE BLESSING OF GOD FOR OUR NATION
Concerning the Continental Congress, Hutson says:

It is difficult to overemphasize Congress's concern for the spiritual condition of the armed forces, for the covenant mentality convinced it that irreligion in the ranks was, of all places, the most dangerous, for God might directly punish a backsliding military with defeat, extinguishing in the process American independence.

4. A BALANCED VIEW OF THE INTERSECTION OF RELIGION AND GOVERNMENT

    As a constitutional attorney, I value Hutson's in-depth analysis of the topic of religious liberty. Often, the generation of the Founders is treated as if they were all of one mind both in doctrine and in the concept of religious freedom. Moreover, it is often portrayed as if religious freedom, which was scarce at the landing of the Puritans in Massachusetts, was somehow frozen in time in the seventeenth century until the Enlightenment gradually took over and promoted it.

    However, Hutson's rich and detailed descriptions of the various evangelists and denominations reveal that it was children of the Great Awakening, not the followers of the Enlightenment, who were most responsible for the advent of true religious freedom in America.

    Hutson notes that the majority of the backers of Jefferson's famous Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom were Baptists and other evangelicals who had suffered persecution at the hands of the Virginia Anglicans and who believed that the best way for the government to promote the Christian faith was to leave it alone. He notes the disparity between the true motives of those who won the victory for Jefferson's bill and those of Jefferson himself.
 

He says of the Supreme Court's current use of Jefferson's words and views of the 1780's:
 

    Hutson is also careful to point out that although many Christians argued against government endorsement of an official religion, they did not advocate a separation of Christian morality from the legislative process. For example, a committee of various Baptist associations informed the General Assembly of Virginia in 1785 that:
 

    The evangelicals who opposed the established denominations on issues of government funding for religious institutions did so out of a conviction that the official organs of the institution of the church should be separate from those of the government. However, all denominations joined in the nearly universal belief that there should be a unity of religion and patriotism, Hutson notes.

This is a truly great book.

I asked a handful of PHC students to react to my impressions of Religion and the Founding of the American Republic.

    John Vinci, a junior from Ohio, served as the legislative director for the Home Educators Association of Virginia during the recent legislative session in Richmond. Not only did he track bills of concern to home schoolers, but he also did an outstanding job for Patrick Henry College by monitoring a bill which could have given the State Council on Higher Education greater discretion in regulating private colleges. He wrote the following:
 

Marianne Wasson, a junior from Lawrence, Kansas, was one of the student directors

of a recent performance of Shakespeare's As You Like It. Her academic performance matches her performance on the state -- Marianne is regularly on the list of Presidential Scholars with a GPA of over 3.75. She made this observation:
 

    Freshman Kyle Pousson, originally from Louisiana, resides here in Loudoun County with his family. Kyle was a member of our moot court team, which performed exceptionally well at the national tournament at the University of Texas at Arlington. Kyle and his partner placed third in the nation. More importantly, they stood firm in refusing to argue in favor of homosexual rights even when pressured by the judges to do so. Kyle wrote:
 

    Abigail Hackman, a sophomore from Michigan, was another director of Shakespeare's As
You Like It. Abigail has also engaged in several interesting apprenticeship projects. She
has investigated the results of government funding of cancer research projects and the
links between countries to various terrorist organization. About "The Present Value of
Eternal Thinking," she wrote:

  It is difficult in our politically correct culture today to openly profess our Christian faith. Equally challenging is our behavior and the important decision that result from our faith. This is especially true in the political arena where we are confronted by the tension between our principles and the political necessity of compromise. This requires a steady hand, great wisdom, and a direct line to God. Most importantly it requires weighting the consequences, not just in the future earthly world, but also the weight our decisions bear in eternity. So many foolish decisions that cause our nation great pain could have been prevented had the leaders taken the time to consider the eternal value of their present decision. PHC is teaching me to consider the eternal consequences of my actions.

    Daniel Chapin, a freshman from Oregon, was also a member of our successful moot court team. Daniel's current apprenticeship project is to develop an outline for a book on Government, written for high school students. He has already caught the vision for teaching others what he has learned. Daniel commented on the role of Scripture in political decision making:
 

    After hearing from our students, I hope you will agree with me that Patrick Henry College is off to a great start. Their words help give you an insight into the inner working of the hearts of the student body -- which is the real goal of our instruction.

Sometimes we tend to focus on the objective evidence of achievement. And we are very glad for two recent strong indicators of our success:
 

 

    I trust that you will catch a glimpse of my excitement as you read about these students. It is fairly easy to demonstrate that we have young people with a lot of God-given talent that has been nurtured by their parents and now by their professors. But we believe that the long-range success of Patrick Henry College will be demonstrated when these students graduate and take their convictions and a consistent life of faith into the public square.

John, Marianne, Kyle, Abigail, and Daniel are truly representative of the student body as a whole. They have vision. They have commitment. And they have tremendous potential so long as they remain faithful.

I hope that you are now excited about two things: Dr. Hutson's book, Religion and the Founding of the American Republic; and the potential impact (on our nation and our world) of dedicated young lives.