The US legal system -- corrupt almost beyond recognition!
Toto
recognition, Judge Edith Jones of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
Fifth Circuit, told the Federalist Society of Harvard Law School on
February 28.
She said that the question of what is morally right is routinely
sacrificed to what is politically expedient. The change has come
because legal philosophy has descended to nihilism.
"The integrity of law, its religious roots, its transcendent quality
are disappearing. I saw the movie 'Chicago' with Richard Gere the
other day. That's the way the public thinks about lawyers," she told
the students.
"The first 100 years of American lawyers were trained on Blackstone,
who wrote that: 'The law of nature … dictated by God himself … is
binding … in all counties and at all times; no human laws are of any
validity if contrary to this; and such of them as are valid derive all
force and all their authority … from this original.' The Framers
created a government of limited power with this understanding of the
rule of law - that it was dependent on transcendent religious
obligation," said Jones.
She said that the business about all of the Founding Fathers being
deists is "just wrong," or "way overblown." She says they believed in
"faith and reason," and this did not lead to intolerance.
"This is not a prescription for intolerance or narrow sectarianism,"
she continued, "for unalienable rights were given by God to all our
fellow citizens. Having lost sight of the moral and religious
foundations of the rule of law, we are vulnerable to the destruction
of our freedom, our equality before the law and our self-respect. It
is my fervent hope that this new century will experience a revival of
the original understanding of the rule of law and its roots.
"The answer is a recovery of moral principle, the sine qua non of an
orderly society. Post 9/11, many events have been clarified. It is
hard to remain a moral relativist when your own people are being
killed."
According to the judge, the first contemporary threat to the rule of
law comes from within the legal system itself.
Alexis de Tocqueville, author of Democracy in America and one of the
first writers to observe the United States from the outside
looking-in, "described lawyers as a natural aristocracy in America,"
Jones told the students. "The intellectual basis of their profession
and the study of law based on venerable precedents bred in them habits
of order and a taste for formalities and predictability." As
Tocqueville saw it, "These qualities enabled attorneys to stand apart
from the passions of the majority. Lawyers were respected by the
citizens and able to guide them and moderate the public's whims.
Lawyers were essential to tempering the potential tyranny of the
majority.
"Some lawyers may still perceive our profession in this flattering
light, but to judge from polls and the tenor of lawyer jokes, I doubt
the public shares Tocqueville's view anymore, and it is hard for us to
do so.
"The legal aristocracy have shed their professional independence for
the temptations and materialism associated with becoming businessmen.
Because law has become a self-avowed business, pressure mounts to give
clients the advice they want to hear, to pander to the clients' goal
through deft manipulation of the law. … While the business mentality
produces certain benefits, like occasional competition to charge
clients lower fees, other adverse effects include advertising and
shameless self-promotion. The legal system has also been wounded by
lawyers who themselves no longer respect the rule of law,"
The judge quoted Kenneth Starr as saying, "It is decidedly unchristian
to win at any cost," and added that most lawyers agree with him.
However, "An increasingly visible and vocal number apparently believe
that the strategic use of anger and incivility will achieve their
aims. Others seem uninhibited about making misstatements to the court
or their opponents or destroying or falsifying evidence," she claimed.
"When lawyers cannot be trusted to observe the fair processes
essential to maintaining the rule of law, how can we expect the public
to respect the process?"
Lawsuits Do Not Bring 'Social Justice'
Another pernicious development within the legal system is the misuse
of lawsuits, according to her.
"We see lawsuits wielded as weapons of revenge," she says. "Lawsuits
are brought that ultimately line the pockets of lawyers rather than
their clients. … The lawsuit is not the best way to achieve social
justice, and to think it is, is a seriously flawed hypothesis. There
are better ways to achieve social goals than by going into court."
Jones said that employment litigation is a particularly fertile field
for this kind of abuse.
"Seldom are employment discrimination suits in our court supported by
direct evidence of race or sex-based animosity. Instead, the courts
are asked to revisit petty interoffice disputes and to infer invidious
motives from trivial comments or work-performance criticism.
Recrimination, second-guessing and suspicion plague the work place
when tenuous discrimination suits are filed … creating an atmosphere
in which many corporate defendants are forced into costly settlements
because they simply cannot afford to vindicate their positions.
"While the historical purpose of the common law was to compensate for
individual injuries, this new litigation instead purports to achieve
redistributive social justice. Scratch the surface of the attorneys'
self-serving press releases, however, and one finds how enormously
profitable social redistribution is for those lawyers who call
themselves 'agents of change.'"
Jones wonders, "What social goal is achieved by transferring millions
of dollars to the lawyers, while their clients obtain coupons or token
rebates."
The judge quoted George Washington who asked in his Farewell Address,
"Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the
sense of religious obligation desert the oaths … in courts of
justice?"
Similarly, asked Jones, how can a system founded on law survive if the
administrators of the law daily display their contempt for it?
"Lawyers' private morality has definite public consequences," she
said. "Their misbehavior feeds on itself, encouraging disrespect and
debasement of the rule of law as the public become encouraged to press
their own advantage in a system they perceive as manipulatable."
The second threat to the rule of law comes from government, which is
encumbered with agencies that have made the law so complicated that it
is difficult to decipher and often contradicts itself.
"Agencies have an inherent tendency to expand their mandate," says
Jones. "At the same time, their decision-making often becomes
parochial and short-sighted. They may be captured by the entities that
are ostensibly being regulated, or they may pursue agency
self-interest at the expense of the public welfare. Citizens left at
the mercy of selective and unpredictable agency action have little
recourse."
Jones recommends three books by Philip Howard: The Death of Common
Sense, The Collapse of the Common Good and The Lost Art of Drawing the
Line, which further delineate this problem.
The third and most comprehensive threat to the rule of law arises from
contemporary legal philosophy.
"Throughout my professional life, American legal education has been
ruled by theories like positivism, the residue of legal realism,
critical legal studies, post-modernism and other philosophical
fashions," said Jones. "Each of these theories has a lot to say about
the 'is' of law, but none of them addresses the 'ought,' the moral
foundation or direction of law."
Jones quoted Roger C. Cramton, a law professor at Cornell University,
who wrote in the 1970s that "the ordinary religion of the law school
classroom" is "a moral relativism tending toward nihilism, a
pragmatism tending toward an amoral instrumentalism, a realism tending
toward cynicism, an individualism tending toward atomism, and a faith
in reason and democratic processes tending toward mere credulity and
idolatry."
No 'Great Awakening' In Law School Classrooms
The judge said ruefully, "There has been no Great Awakening in the law
school classroom since those words were written." She maintained that
now it is even worse because faith and democratic processes are
breaking down.
"The problem with legal philosophy today is that it reflects all too
well the broader post-Enlightenment problem of philosophy," Jones
said. She quoted Ernest Fortin, who wrote in Crisis magazine: "The
whole of modern thought … has been a series of heroic attempts to
reconstruct a world of human meaning and value on the basis of … our
purely mechanistic understanding of the universe."
Jones said that all of these threats to the rule of law have a common
thread running through them, and she quoted Professor Harold Berman to
identify it: "The traditional Western beliefs in the structural
integrity of law, its ongoingness, its religious roots, its
transcendent qualities, are disappearing not only from the minds of
law teachers and law students but also from the consciousness of the
vast majority of citizens, the people as a whole; and more than that,
they are disappearing from the law itself. The law itself is becoming
more fragmented, more subjective, geared more to expediency and less
to morality. … The historical soil of the Western legal tradition is
being washed away … and the tradition itself is threatened with
collapse."
Judge Jones concluded with another thought from George Washington: "Of
all the dispositions and habits which lead to prosperity, religion and
morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the
tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these great pillars
of human happiness - these firmest props of the duties of men and
citizens."
Upon taking questions from students, Judge Jones recommended Michael
Novak's book, On Two Wings: Humble Faith and Common Sense.
"Natural law is not a prescriptive way to solve problems," Jones said.
"It is a way to look at life starting with the Ten Commandments."
Natural law provides "a framework for government that permits human
freedom," Jones said. "If you take that away, what are you left with?
Bodily senses? The will of the majority? The communist view? What is
it - 'from each according to his ability, to each according to his
need?' I don't even remember it, thank the Lord," she said to the
amusement of the students.
"I am an unabashed patriot - I think the United States is the
healthiest society in the world at this point in time," Jones said,
although she did concede that there were other ways to accommodate the
rule of law, such as constitutional monarchy.
"Our legal system is way out of kilter," she said. "The tort
litigating system is wreaking havoc. Look at any trials that have been
conducted on TV. These lawyers are willing to say anything."
Potential Nominee to Supreme Court
Judge Edith Jones has been mentioned as a potential nominee to the
Supreme Court in the Bush administration, but does not relish the
idea.
"Have you looked at what people have to go through who are nominated
for federal appointments? They have to answer questions like, 'Did you
pay your nanny taxes?' 'Is your yard man illegal?'
"In those circumstances, who is going to go out to be a federal judge?
People who have accomplished nothing. In other words, federal
employees."
Judge Edith H. Jones has a B.A. from Cornell University and a J.D.
from the University of Texas School of Law. She was appointed to the
Fifth Circuit by President Ronald Reagan in 1985. Her office is in the
U.S. Courthouse in Houston.
The Federalist Society was founded in 1982 when a group of law
students from Harvard, Stanford, the University of Chicago and Yale
organized a symposium on federalism at Yale Law School. These students
were unhappy with the academic climate on their campuses for some of
the reasons outlined by Judge Jones. The Federalist Society was
created to be a forum for a wider range of legal viewpoints than they
were hearing in the course of their studies.
From the four schools mentioned above, the Society has grown to
include over 150 law school chapters. The Harvard chapter, with over
250 members, is one of the nation's largest and most active. They seek
to contribute to civilized dialog at the Law School by providing a
libertarian and conservative voice on campus and by sponsoring
speeches and debates on a wide range of legal and policy issues.
The Federalist Society consists of libertarians and conservatives
interested in the current state of the legal profession. It is founded
on three principles: 1) the state exists to preserve freedom, 2) the
separation of governmental powers is central to our Constitution and
3) it is emphatically the province and duty of the judiciary to state
what the law is, not what it should be.
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Author withheld
Quintin
Superiority Of The Former Over The Latter
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[This article appeared in The Prospect of June 30, 1804]
Every person, of whatever religious denomination he may be, is a DEIST in
the first article of his Creed. Deism, from the Latin word Deus, God, is the
belief of a God, and this belief is the first article of every man's creed.
It is on this article, universally consented to by all mankind, that the
Deist builds his church, and here he rests. Whenever we step aside from this
article, by mixing it with articles of human invention, we wander into a
labyrinth of uncertainty and fable, and become exposed to every kind of
imposition by pretenders to revelation.
The Persian shows the Zend-Avesta of Zoroaster, the lawgiver of Persia, and
calls it the divine law; the Bramin shows the Shaster, revealed, he says, by
God to Brama, and given to him out of a cloud; the Jew shows what he calls
the law of Moses, given, he says, by God, on the Mount Sinai; the Christian
shows a collection of books and epistles, written by nobody knows who, and
called the New Testament; and the Mahometan shows the Koran, given, he says,
by God to Mahomet: each of these calls itself revealed religion, and the
only true Word of God, and this the followers of each profess to believe
from the habit of education, and each believes the others are imposed upon.
But when the divine gift of reason begins to expand itself in the mind and
calls man to reflection, he then reads and contemplates God and His works,
and not in the books pretending to be revelation. The creation is the Bible
of the true believer in God. Everything in this vast volume inspires him
with sublime ideas of the Creator. The little and paltry, and often obscene,
tales of the Bible sink into wretchedness when put in comparison with this
mighty work.
The Deist needs none of those tricks and shows called miracles to confirm
his faith, for what can be a greater miracle than the creation itself, and
his own existence?
There is a happiness in Deism, when rightly understood, that is not to be
found in any other system of religion. All other systems have something in
them that either shock our reason, or are repugnant to it, and man, if he
thinks at all, must stifle his reason in order to force himself to believe
them.
But in Deism our reason and our belief become happily united. The wonderful
structure of the universe, and everything we behold in the system of the
creation, prove to us, far better than books can do, the existence of a God,
and at the same time proclaim His attributes.
It is by the exercise of our reason that we are enabled to contemplate God
in His works, and imitate Him in His ways. When we see His care and goodness
extended over all His creatures, it teaches us our duty toward each other,
while it calls forth our gratitude to Him. It is by forgetting God in His
works, and running after the books of pretended revelation, that man has
wandered from the straight path of duty and happiness, and become by turns
the victim of doubt and the dupe of delusion.
Except in the first article in the Christian creed, that of believing in
God, there is not an article in it but fills the mind with doubt as to the
truth of it, the instant man begins to think. Now every article in a creed
that is necessary to the happiness and salvation of man, ought to be as
evident to the reason and comprehension of man as the first article is, for
God has not given us reason for the purpose of confounding us, but that we
should use it for our own happiness and His glory.
The truth of the first article is proved by God Himself, and is universal;
for the creation is of itself demonstration of the existence of a Creator.
But the second article, that of God's begetting a son, is not proved in like
manner, and stands on no other authority than that of a tale.
Certain books in what is called the New Testament tell us that Joseph
dreamed that the angel told him so, (Matthew i, 20): "And behold the angel
of the Lord appeared to Joseph, in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of
David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which is conceived
in her is of the Holy Ghost."
The evidence upon this article bears no comparison with the evidence upon
the first article, and therefore is not entitled to the same credit, and
ought not to be made an article in a creed, because the evidence of it is
defective, and what evidence there is, is doubtful and suspicious. We do not
believe the first article on the authority of books, whether called Bibles
or Korans, nor yet on the visionary authority of dreams, but on the
authority of God's own visible works in the creation.
The nations who never heard of such books, nor of such people as Jews,
Christians, or Mahometans, believe the existence of a God as fully as we do,
because it is self-evident. The work of man's hands is a proof of the
existence of man as fully as his personal appearance would be.
When we see a watch, we have as positive evidence of the existence of a
watchmaker, as if we saw him; and in like manner the creation is evidence to
our reason and our senses of the existence of a Creator. But there is
nothing in the works of God that is evidence that He begat a son, nor
anything in the system of creation that corroborates such an idea, and,
therefore, we are not authorized in believing it.
What truth there may be in the story that Mary, before she was married to
Joseph, was kept by one of the Roman soldiers, and was with child by him, I
leave to be settled between the Jews and Christians. The story however has
probability on its side, for her husband Joseph suspected and was jealous of
her, and was going to put her away. "Joseph, her husband, being a just man,
and not willing to make her a public example, was going to put her away,
privately." (Matt. i, 19).
I have already said that "whenever we step aside from the first article
(that of believing in God), we wander into a labyrinth of uncertainty," and
here is evidence of the justness of the remark, for it is impossible for us
to decide who was Jesus Christ's father.
But presumption can assume anything, and therefore it makes Joseph's dream
to be of equal anthority with the existence of God, and to help it on calls
it revelation. It is impossible for the mind of man in its serious moments,
however it may have been entangled by education, or beset by priestcraft,
not to stand still and doubt upon the truth of this article and of its
creed.
But this is not all. The second article of the Christian creed having
brought the son of Mary into the world (and this Mary, according to the
chronological tables, was a girl of only fifteen years of age when this son
was born), the next article goes on to account for his being begotten, which
was, that when he grew a man he should be put to death, to expiate, they
say, the sin that Adam brought into the world by eating an apple or some
kind of forbidden fruit.
But though this is the creed of the Church of Rome, from whence the
Protestants borrowed it, it is a creed which that Church has manufactured of
itself, for it is not contained in nor derived from, the book called the New
Testament.
The four books called the Evangelists, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, which
give, or pretend to give, the birth, sayings, life, preaching, and death of
Jesus Christ, make no mention of what is called the fall of man; nor is the
name of Adam to be found in any of those books, which it certainly would be
if the writers of them believed that Jesus was begotten, born, and died for
the purpose of redeeming mankind from the sin which Adam had brought into
the world. Jesus never speaks of Adam himself, of the garden of Eden, nor of
what is called the fall of man.
But the Church of Rome having set up its new religion, which it called
Christianity, invented the creed which it named the Apostles's Creed, in
which it calls Jesus the only son of God, conceived by the Holy Ghost, and
born of the Virgin Mary; things of which it is impossible that man or woman
can have any idea, and consequently no belief but in words; and for which
there is no authority but the idle story of Joseph's dream in the first
chapter of Matthew, which any designing imposter or foolish fanatic might
make.
It then manufactured the allegories in the book of Genesis into fact, and
the allegorical tree of life and the tree of knowledge into real trees,
contrary to the belief of the first Christians, and for which there is not
the least authority in any of the books of the New Testament; for in none of
them is there any mention made of such place as the Garden of Eden, nor of
anything that is said to have happened there.
But the Church of Rome could not erect the person called Jesus into a Savior
of the world without making the allegories in the book of Genesis into fact,
though the New Testament, as before observed, gives no authority for it. All
at once the allegorical tree of knowledge became, according to the Church, a
real tree, the fruit of it real fruit, and the eating of it sinful.
As priestcraft was always the enemy of knowledge, because priestcraft
supports itself by keeping people in delusion and ignorance, it was
consistent with its policy to make the acquisition of knowledge a real sin.
The Church of Rome having done this, it then brings forward Jesus the son of
Mary as suffering death to redeem mankind from sin, which Adam, it says, had
brought into the world by eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge. But as
it is impossible for reason to believe such a story, because it can see no
reason for it, nor have any evidence of it, the Church then tells us we must
not regard our reason, but must believe, as it were, and that through thick
and thin, as if God had given man reason like a plaything, or a rattle, on
purpose to make fun of him.
Reason is the forbidden tree of priestcraft, and may serve to explain the
allegory of the forbidden tree of knowledge, for we may reasonably suppose
the allegory had some meaning and application at the time it was invented.
It was the practice of the Eastern nations to convey their meaning by
allegory, and relate it in the manner of fact. Jesus followed the same
method, yet nobody ever supposed the allegory or parable of the rich man and
Lazarus, the Prodigal Son, the ten Virgins, etc., were facts.
Why then should the tree of knowledge, which is far more romantic in idea
than the parables in the New Testament are, be supposed to be a real tree?
The answer to this is, because the Church could not make its new-fangled
system, which it called Christianity, hold together without it. To have made
Christ to die on account of an allegorical tree would have been too
barefaced a fable.
But the account, as it is given of Jesus in the New Testament, even
visionary as it is, does not support the creed of the Church that he died
for the redemption of the world. According to that account he was crucified
and buried on the Friday, and rose again in good health on the Sunday
morning, for we do not hear that he was sick. This cannot be called dying,
and is rather making fun of death than suffering it.
There are thousands of men and women also, who if they could know they
should come back again in good health in about thirty-six hours, would
prefer such kind of death for the sake of the experiment, and to know what
the other side of the grave was. Why then should that which would be only a
voyage of curious amusement to us, be magnified into merit and suffering in
him? If a God, he could not suffer death, for immortality cannot die, and as
a man his death could be no more than the death of any other person.
The belief of the redemption of Jesus Christ is altogether an invention of
the Church of Rome, not the doctrine of the New Testament. What the writers
of the New Testament attempted to prove by the story of Jesus is the
resurrection of the same body from the grave, which was the belief of the
Pharisees, in opposition to the Sadducees (a sect of Jews) who denied it.
Paul, who was brought up a Pharisee, labors hard at this for it was the
creed of his own Pharisaical Church: I Corinthians xv is full of supposed
cases and assertions about the resurrection of the same body, but there is
not a word in it about redemption. This chapter makes part of the funeral
service of the Episcopal Church. The dogma of the redemption is the fable of
priestcraft invented since the time the New Testament was compiled, and the
agreeable delusion of it suited with the depravity of immoral livers. When
men are taught to ascribe all their crimes and vices to the temptations of
the devil, and to believe that Jesus, by his death, rubs all off, and pays
their passage to heaven gratis, they become as careless in morals as a
spendthrift would be of money, were he told that his father had engaged to
pay off all his scores.
It is a doctrine not only dangerous to morals in this world, but to our
happiness in the next world, because it holds out such a cheap, easy, and
lazy way of getting to heaven, as has a tendency to induce men to hug the
delusion of it to their own injury.
But there are times when men have serious thoughts, and it is at such times,
when they begin to think, that they begin to doubt the truth of the
Christian religion; and well they may, for it is too fanciful and too full
of conjecture, inconsistency, improbability and irrationality, to afford
consolation to the thoughtful man. His reason revolts against his creed. He
sees that none of its articles are proved, or can be proved.
He may believe that such a person as is called Jesus (for Christ was not his
name) was born and grew to be a man, because it is no more than a natural
and probable case. But who is to prove he is the son of God, that he was
begotten by the Holy Ghost? Of these things there can be no proof; and that
which admits not of proof, and is against the laws of probability and the
order of nature, which God Himself has established, is not an object for
belief. God has not given man reason to embarrass him, but to prevent his
being imposed upon.
He may believe that Jesus was crucified, because many others were crucified,
but who is to prove he was crucified for the sins of the world? This article
has no evidence, not even in the New Testament; and if it had, where is the
proof that the New Testament, in relating things neither probable nor
provable, is to be believed as true?
When an article in a creed does not admit of proof nor of probability, the
salvo is to call it revelation; but this is only putting one difficulty in
the place of another, for it is as impossible to prove a thing to be
revelation as it is to prove that Mary was gotten with child by the Holy
Ghost.
Here it is that the religion of Deism is superior to the Christian Religion.
It is free from all those invented and torturing articles that shock our
reason or injure our humanity, and with which the Christian religion
abounds. Its creed is pure, and sublimely simple. It believes in God, and
there it rests.
It honors reason as the choicest gift of God to man, and the faculty by
which he is enabled to contemplate the power, wisdom and goodness of the
Creator displayed in the creation; and reposing itself on His protection,
both here and hereafter, it avoids all presumptuous beliefs, and rejects, as
the fabulous inventions of men, all books pretending to revelation.
-Thomas Paine
Quintin
Founding Fathers Religion Debate and Poll
PRO 1
At the time of the adoption of the Constitution and the Amendments, the
universal sentiment was that Christianity should be encouraged, not any one
sect. In this age there can be no substitute for Christianity. That was the
religion of the founders of the republic, and they expected it to remain the
religion of their descendants. The great vital and conservative element in our
system is the doctrines and divine truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ."
CON 1.1
Although, many of America's colonial statesmen practiced Christianity, our
most influential Founding Fathers broke away from traditional religious
thinking. The ideas of the Great Enlightenment that began in Europe had begun
to sever the chains of monarchical theocracy. These heretical European ideas
spread throughout early America. Instead of relying on faith, people began to
use reason and science as their guide. The humanistic philosophical writers of
the Enlightenment, such as Locke, Rousseau, and Voltaire, had greatly
influenced our Founding Fathers.
PRO 2
President George Washington, September 17th, 1796
"It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible"
His Prayer At Valley Forge "Almighty and eternal Lord God, the great Creator
of heaven and earth, and the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; look
down from heaven in pity and compassion upon me Thy servant, who humbly
prorate myself before Thee."
"Bless O Lord the whole race of mankind, and let the world be filled with the
knowledge of Thee and Thy Son, Jesus. "Of all dispositions and habits which
lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable
supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should
labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props
of the duties of men and citizens."
"To the distinguished character of a Patriot, it should be our highest glory
to add the more distinguished character of a Christian."
CON 2.1
Much of the myth of Washington's alleged Christianity came from Mason Weems
influential book, "Life of Washington." Weems, a Christian minister portrayed
Washington as a devote Christian, yet Washington's own diaries show that he
rarely attended Church.
Washington revealed almost nothing to indicate his spiritual frame of mind,
hardly a mark of a devout Christian. In his thousands of letters, the name of
Jesus Christ never appears. He rarely spoke about his religion, but his
Freemasonry experience points to a belief in deism. Washington's initiation
occurred at the Fredericksburg Lodge on 4 November 1752, later becoming a
Master mason in 1799, and remained a freemason until he died.
To the United Baptist Churches in Virginia in May, 1789, Washington said that
every man "ought to be protected in worshipping the Deity according to the
dictates of his own conscience."
After Washington's death, Dr. Abercrombie, a friend of his, replied to a Dr.
Wilson, who had interrogated him about Washington's religion replied, "Sir,
Washington was a Deist."
CON 2.2
When John Murray (a universalist who denied the existence of hell) was invited
to become an army chaplain, the other chaplains petitioned Washington for his
dismissal. Instead, Washington gave him the appointment. On his deathbed,
Washington uttered no words of a religious nature and did not call for a
clergyman to be in attendance.
From:George Washington and Religion by Paul F. Boller Jr.,
CON 3
Thomas Paine was a pamphleteer whose manifestos encouraged the faltering
spirits of the country and aided materially in winning the war of
Independence:
I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman
church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church,
nor by any church that I know of...Each of those churches accuse the other of
unbelief; and for my own part, I disbelieve them all." From: The Age of Reason
by Thomas Paine
To Paine belongs the honor of naming our country the United States of America.
He was the first to use the name in print, and it was his own creation.
PRO 4 Patrick Henry
"It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was
founded not by religionists but by Christians, not on religion but on the
Gospel of Jesus Christ. We shall not fight alone. God presides over the
destinies of nations."
CON 4.1
Patrick Henry, made a number of statements suggesting that our nation was
founded on belief in God, and that it was important to acknowledge God in
civic affairs, but Henry lost the battle to put religion in the Constitution.
More to the point, Henry was an anti-federalist, and vigorously opposed the
Constitution when Virginia discussed ratification. Quoting Henry to prove
things about the constitution is like quoting the chairman of the Republican
National Committee to prove things about the platform of the Democratic party.
PRO 5
Benjamin Franklin Address at the Constitutional Convention Thursday June 28,
1787
"I have lived, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs
I see of this truth -- that God Governs in the affairs of men. And if a
sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an
empire can rise without His aid?
CON 5.1
Although Franklin received religious training, his nature forced him to rebel
against the irrational tenets of his parents Christianity. His Autobiography
revels his skepticism, "My parents had given me betimes religions impressions,
and I received from my infancy a pious education in the principles of
Calvinism. But scarcely was I arrived at fifteen years of age, when, after
having doubted in turn of different tenets, according as I found them combated
in the different books that I read, I began to doubt of Revelation itself.
". . . Some books against Deism fell into my hands. . . It happened that they
wrought an effect on my quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the
arguments of the Deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much
stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a through Deist."
PRO 6 President John Adams
"The highest story of the American Revolution is this: it connected in one
indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of
Christianity."
CON 6.1
As I understand the Christian religion, it was, and is, a revelation. But how
has it happened that millions of fables, tales, legends, have been blended
with both Jewish and Christian revelation that have made them the most bloody
religion that has ever existed?"
Letter to F.A. Van der Kamp, Dec. 27, 1816
CON 6.2
In his, "A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of
America" [1787-1788], John Adams wrote:
"The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of
governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now
sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture,
hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their
history. Although the detail of the formation of the American governments is
at present little known or regarded either in Europe or in America, it may
hereafter become an object of curiosity. It will never be pretended that any
persons employed in that service had interviews with the gods, or were in any
degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or
houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; it will forever be
acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason
and the senses.
PRO 7 President Thomas Jefferson
"The reason that Christianity is the best friend of Government is because
Christianity is the only religion that changes the heart."
CON 7.1
Even most Christians do not consider Jefferson a Christian. In many of his
letters, he denounced the superstitions of Christianity. He did not believe in
spiritual souls, angels or godly miracles. Although Jefferson did admire the
morality of Jesus, Jefferson did not think him divine, nor did he believe in
the Trinity or the miracles of Jesus. In a letter to Peter Carr, 10 August
1787, he wrote, "Question with boldness even the existence of a god."
Jefferson believed in materialism, reason, and science. He never admitted to
any religion but his own. In a letter to Ezra Stiles Ely, 25 June 1819, he
wrote, "You say you are a Calvinist. I am not. I am of a sect by myself, as
far as I know."
CON 7.2
Jefferson went so far as to produce a revised New Testament deleting all
references to miracles and portraying Jesus as just a extraordinary man and a
powerful moral leader.
PRO 8 President John Quincy Adams
"It is no slight testimonial, both to the merit and worth of Christianity,
that in all ages since its promulgation the great mass of those who have risen
to eminence by their profound wisdom and integrity have recognized and
reverenced Jesus of Nazareth as the Son of the living God."
CON 8.1
John Quincy Adams was a Unitarian.
PRO 9 John Jay, 1777 The first Chief Justice of the United States
"Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the
duty, as well as the privilege and the interest, of a Christian nation to
select and prefer Christians for their rulers."
PRO 10 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 our political
institutions upon the capacity of mankind for 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." David Barton's book The
Myth of Separation
CON 10.1
The only problem with the above is, no such quote has ever been found among
any of James Madison's writings. None of the biographers of Madison, past or
present have ever run across such a quote, and most if not all would love to
know where this false quote originated. Apparently, David Barton did not check
the work of the secondary sources he quotes.
CON 10.2
Called the father of the Constitution, Madison had no conventional sense of
Christianity. In 1785, Madison wrote in his Memorial and Remonstrance against
Religious Assessments:
"During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity
been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride
and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity; in both,
superstition, bigotry and persecution."
"What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society?
In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the
ruins of the civil authority; on many instances they have been seen upholding
the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have they been the guardians
of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty
may have found an established clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just
government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not."
CON 11 Ethan Allen (1737-1789) American Officer in the Revolutionary War
"I have generally been dominated a Deist, the reality of which I never
disputed, being conscious I am no Christian, except mere infant baptism makes
me one; and as to being a Deist, I know not strictly speaking, whether I am
one or not."
CON 12
No one disputes the faith of our Founding Fathers. To speak of unalienable
Rights being endowed by a Creator certainly shows a sensitivity to our
spiritual selves. What is surprising is when fundamentalist Christians think
the Founding Fathers' faith had anything to do with the Bible. The faith of
many of our Founding Fathers was deist, not theist. It was best expressed
earlier in the Declaration of Independence, when they spoke of "the Laws of
Nature" and of "Nature's God."
Quintin
Christianity is a myth. Many of the Founding Fathers and Revolutionary War
leaders were Deists, and upheld a firm separation of church and state.
Webster’s New World Dictionary — Third College Edition
Deism: (1) The belief in the existence of a God on purely rational grounds
without reliance on revelation or authority; especially in the 17th and 18th
centuries. (2) The doctrine that God created the world and its natural laws,
but takes no further part in its functioning.
“Point for point, the Founding Fathers’ argument for liberty was the exact
counterpart of the Puritans’ argument for dictatorship — but in reverse,
moving from the opposite starting point to the opposite conclusion. Man, the
Founding Fathers said in essence (with a large assist from Locke and others),
is the rational being; no authority, human or otherwise, can demand blind
obedience from such a being — not in the realm of thought or, therefore, in
the realm of action, either. By his very nature, they said, man must be left
free to exercise his reason and then to act accordingly, i.e., by the guidance
of his best rational judgment. Because this world is of vital importance, they
added, the motive of man’s action should be the pursuit of happiness. Because
the individual, not a supernatural power, is the creator of wealth, a man
should have the right to private property, the right to keep and use or trade
his own product. And because man is basically good, they held, there is no
need to leash him; there is nothing to fear in setting free a rational animal.
“This, in substance, was the American argument for man’s inalienable
rights. It was the argument that reason demands freedom.”
—Leonard Peikoff, “Religion vs. America,” The Voice of Reason
United States Constitution
The First Amendment
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion...”
Article VI, Section 3
“...no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office
or public trust under the United States.”
John Adams (the second President of the United States)
Adams signed the Treaty of Tripoli (June 7, 1797). Article 11 states:
“The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the
Christian religion.”
From a letter to Charles Cushing (October 19, 1756):
“Twenty times in the course of my late reading, have I been upon the point of
breaking out, ‘this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no
religion in it.’”
From a letter to Thomas Jefferson:
“I almost shudder at the thought of alluding to the most fatal example of the
abuses of grief which the history of mankind has preserved — the Cross.
Consider what calamities that engine of grief has produced!”
Additional quotes from John Adams:
“Where do we find a precept in the Bible for Creeds, Confessions, Doctrines
and Oaths, and whole carloads of trumpery that we find religion encumbered
with in these days?”
“The Doctrine of the divinity of Jesus is made a convenient cover for
absurdity.”
“...Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural
authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and
which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of
the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind.”
Thomas Jefferson (the third President of the United States)
Jefferson’s interpretation of the first amendment in a letter to the Danbury
Baptist Association (January 1, 1802):
“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man
and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship,
that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not
opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole
American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law
respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise
thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between church and State.”
From Jefferson’s biography:
“...an amendment was proposed by inserting the words, ‘Jesus Christ...the holy
author of our religion,’ which was rejected ‘By a great majority in proof that
they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the
Gentile, the Christian and the Mohammedan, the Hindoo and the Infidel of every
denomination.’”
Jefferson’s “The Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom”:
“Our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, more than on
our opinions in physics and geometry....The legitimate powers of government
extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury
for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my
pocket nor breaks my leg.”
From Thomas Jefferson’s Bible:
“The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being
as his father, in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the
generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter.”
Jefferson’s Notes on Virginia:
“Reason and persuasion are the only practicable instruments. To make way for
these free inquiry must be indulged; how can we wish others to indulge it
while we refuse ourselves? But every state, says an inquisitor, has
established some religion. No two, say I, have established the same. Is this a
proof of the infallibility of establishments?”
Additional quotes from Thomas Jefferson:
“It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by
itself.”
“They [the clergy] believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be
exerted in opposition of their schemes. And they believe rightly: for I have
sworn upon the alter of god eternal hostility against every form of tyranny
over the mind of man.”
“I have examined all the known superstitions of the word, and I do not find in
our particular superstition of Christianity one redeeming feature. They are
all alike founded on fables and mythology. Millions of innocent men, women and
children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured,
fined and imprisoned. What has been the effect of this coercion? To make one
half of the world fools and the other half hypocrites; to support roguery and
error all over the earth.”
“In every country and in every age the priest has been hostile to liberty; he
is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for
protection to his own.”
“Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every
opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there
be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded
fear....Do not be frightened from this inquiry by any fear of its
consequences. If it end in a belief that there is no God, you will find
incitements to virtue on the comfort and pleasantness you feel in its exercise
and in the love of others which it will procure for you.”
“Christianity...[has become] the most perverted system that ever shone on
man....Rogueries, absurdities and untruths were perpetrated upon the teachings
of Jesus by a large band of dupes and importers led by Paul, the first great
corrupter of the teaching of Jesus.”
“...that our civil rights have no dependence on religious opinions, any more
than our opinions in physics and geometry.”
James Madison (the fourth President of the United States)
Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments:
“Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every
noble enterprise....During almost fifteen centuries has the legal
establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More
or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and
servility in laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution.”
Additional quote from James Madison:
“Religion and government will both exist in greater purity, the less they are
mixed together.”
Benjamin Franklin
From Franklin’s autobiography, p. 66:
“My parents had given me betimes religious impressions, and I received from my
infancy a pious education in the principles of Calvinism. But scarcely was I
arrived at fifteen years of age, when, after having doubted in turn of
different tenets, according as I found them combated in the different books
that I read, I began to doubt of Revelation itself.”
From Franklin’s autobiography, p. 66:
“...Some books against Deism fell into my hands....It happened that they
wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the
arguments of the Deists, which were quote to be refuted, appeared to me much
stronger than the refutations, in short, I soon became a thorough Deist.”
Thomas Paine
From The Age of Reason, pp. 8–9:
“I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman
church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church,
nor by any church that I know of....Each of those churches accuse the other of
unbelief; and of my own part, I disbelieve them all.”
From The Age of Reason:
“All natural institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish,
appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave
mankind, and monopolize power and profit.”
From The Age of Reason:
“The most detestable wickedness, the most horrid cruelties, and the greatest
miseries that have afflicted the human race have had their origin in this
thing called revelation, or revealed religion.”
From The Age of Reason:
“What is it the Bible teaches us? — rapine, cruelty, and murder.”
From The Age of Reason:
“Loving of enemies is another dogma of feigned morality, and has beside no
meaning....Those who preach the doctrine of loving their enemies are in
general the greatest prosecutors, and they act consistently by so doing; for
the doctrine is hypocritical, and it is natural that hypocrisy should act the
reverse of what it preaches.”
From The Age of Reason:
“The Bible was established altogether by the sword, and that in the worst use
of it — not to terrify but to extirpate.”
Additional quote from Thomas Paine:
“It is the duty of every true Deist to vindicate the moral justice of God
against the evils of the Bible.”
Ethan Allen
From Religion of the American Enlightenment:
“Denominated a Deist, the reality of which I have never disputed, being
conscious that I am no Christian.”
Copyright © 2000 by the Ayn Rand Institute. All rights reserved. Privacy
policy. Questions and comments about this site: webm...@aynrand.org.
http://religion.aynrand.org/quotes.html
Bush Busta
>The American legal system has been corrupted almost beyond
>recognition, Judge Edith Jones of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
>Fifth Circuit, told the Federalist Society of Harvard Law School on
>February 28.
Ah...the Federalist society.
This should be good and reactionary.
>She said that the question of what is morally right is routinely
>sacrificed to what is politically expedient. The change has come
>because legal philosophy has descended to nihilism.
Like sacrificing lives for oil?
>"The integrity of law, its religious roots, its transcendent quality
>are disappearing. I saw the movie 'Chicago' with Richard Gere the
>other day. That's the way the public thinks about lawyers," she told
>the students.
Her legal argument involves a movie as a citation?
>"The first 100 years of American lawyers were trained on Blackstone,
>who wrote that: 'The law of nature … dictated by God himself … is
>binding … in all counties and at all times; no human laws are of any
>validity if contrary to this; and such of them as are valid derive all
>force and all their authority … from this original.' The Framers
>created a government of limited power with this understanding of the
>rule of law - that it was dependent on transcendent religious
>obligation," said Jones.
These right wing assholes seem to enjoy the concept that they get to
define what "god" believes.
This would be funny if these reactionary fools were not the ones
picking Bush judicial nominees.
--BB
--
"It still confuses many Americans that, in a world full of vicious slimeballs,
we're about to bomb one that didn't attack us on 9/11 (like Osama); that
isn't intercepting our planes (like North Korea); that isn't financing Al Qaeda
(like Saudi Arabia); that isn't home to Osama and his lieutenants (like Pakistan);
that isn't a host body for terrorists (like Iran, Lebanon and Syria)."
--Maurene Dowd, "Bush: The Xanax Cowboy"
http://nytimes.com/2003/03/09/opinion/09DOWD.html
Jas
> As the quotes on this page illustrate, the claim that America was founded
on
> Christianity is a myth. Many of the Founding Fathers and Revolutionary War
> leaders were Deists, and upheld a firm separation of church and state.
good idea (unless you worship allah ! )
Toto
>As the quotes on this page illustrate, the claim that America was founded on
>Christianity is a myth. Many of the Founding Fathers and Revolutionary War
>leaders were Deists, and upheld a firm separation of church and state.
Even if this is true, it's irrelevant to the core issue described in
the article -- that general loss of moral guidelines, HAVE resulted in
a sham legal system. All we have left is the PRETENSE of due process
(except, of course in high profile cases, where due process is heeded
more rigorously because so many folks are watching).
XCobraJock
"Toto" <nos...@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:E9941FA4F50748AB.CCEEA799...@lp.airnews.net...
Someday you will realize that any legal "system" is bound to result in
a sham because it must necessarily be run by humans, and inevitably
the worst kind -- those whose insatiable desire to control others is
eclipsed only by their greed and self-importance. The religious
background of such folks has no bearing on that.
--XCobraJock
Toto
wrote:
You're probably correct. However, we have little choice but to hope
and pray that America (and the world) soon re-discovers of the
importance of moral principle -- because without that insight and the
behavior that follows it, we are doomed -- regardless of ANYTHING else
we do or think.
XCobraJock
> >Someday you will realize that any legal "system" is bound to result in
> >a sham because it must necessarily be run by humans, and inevitably
> >the worst kind -- those whose insatiable desire to control others is
> >eclipsed only by their greed and self-importance. The religious
> >background of such folks has no bearing on that.
>
> You're probably correct. However, we have little choice but to hope
> and pray that America (and the world) soon re-discovers of the
> importance of moral principle -- because without that insight and the
> behavior that follows it, we are doomed -- regardless of ANYTHING else
> we do or think.
When that happens, it will mean the end of any such thing as a "legal
system."
--XCobraJock
Toto
wrote:
If that's what it takes, then fine.