In our last episode
<Pine.OSF.3.96.1050317233739.1493Y-100000@alpha1.csd.uwm.edu>, Carol Lee
Smith pirouetted gracefully and with great fanfare proclaimed:

Who is David Burton?

David Barton (Gastrich can't even spell the name of his hero correctly) is
a Christian right propagandist who's been repeatedly caught distorting
history. He's at least been forced to admit that *some of the quotes he
uses to "prove" this "Christian nation" lie are questionable, if not
entirely false:

http://www.positiveatheism.org/writ/founding.htm#MYTHING

Gastrich still refuses to remove from his website even the Barton quotes
*Barton* has conceded are questionable or false...

Separation of church and state, the principle, where can it be found, or
can it be found in the Constitution?

"Jason Gastrich" <usenetspam1@yahoo.com> wrote:

johac wrote:

In article <ZZv_d.3501$4Y.1064@twister.socal.rr.com>,
"Jason Gastrich" <usenetspam1@yahoo.com> wrote:

johac wrote:

In article <vrQZd.40921$VD5.30999@twister.socal.rr.com>,
"Jason Gastrich" <usenetspam1@yahoo.com> wrote:

Did anyone catch Faith Under Fire? It aired Saturday, but I
just watched it, tonight.

WOW. David Burton whooped Annie Laurie Gaylor from the Freedom
From Religion Foundation. He gave all kinds of evidence that
the U.S. should be considered a Christian nation; past and
present.

I like how you said the U.S. is between 82-89% Christian. If
another nation had this many Muslims, we'd call it a Muslim
nation. Therefore, it would make sense to call the U.S. a
Christian nation.

He also did a great job of explaining the often misunderstood
Treaty of Tripoli phrase about this not being a Christian
nation. If you continue reading the document (like atheists
never seem to do), it is clarified and defined. It was a
treaty with a Muslim nation and we were simply telling them
that we weren't going to set up a theocracy or be like an
oppressive, Christian nation in Europe.

Fantastic job by Barton. Gaylor had trouble getting out of the
starting gates. She used the handful of old, tired arguments
that you read on usenet. Tsk, tsk. She also resorted to a
distasteful personal attack on Barton.

Regards,
Jason Gastrich

The people who wrote our Constitution were neither clods nor
illiterates. If they wanted the US to be a 'Christian Nation'
they would have said so. There is no mention of Christianity in
the Constitution. No mention of gods. The only reference to
religion is that no religious test shall be required for
holding office. And of course there is the First Amendment
which guarantees government neutrality in matters of religion.
There is no evidence in the Constitution of any intent to found
a theocracy.

Your last sentence shows that you don't understand my argument,
Barton's argument, or the current controversy.

Nobody is claiming that the U.S. was designed to be a theocracy.

These people were

God is in Government

which also contains among many other pieces of evidence the following:
Therocrats past and present

as well as the modern day radical religious right

You doubt that study the folloing in detail (you won't of course)

God is in Government

we

are affirming the faith of the founders and framers, though.
They SURELY didn't want God to be absent from the public eye.

Not exactly:

* Christian Orthodoxy And The Founders
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/orthodox.htm

Separation of church and state, the principle, where can it be found,
or can it be found in the Constitution?

One might consider the following:

====================================================================
Directly, the unamended constitution, Article VI, Section III
" but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to
any office or public trust under the United States."
-----------------------------
"The remaining part of the clause declares, that 'no religious test
shall ever be required, as a qualification to any office or public
trust, under the United States.' This clause is not introduced
merely for the purpose of satisfying the scruples of many respectable
persons, who feel an invincible repugnance to any test or
affirmation. It had a higher object; to cut off for ever every
pretence of any alliance between church and state in the national
government. The framers of the constitution were fully sensible of
the dangers from this source, marked out in history of other ages
and countries; and not wholly unknown to our own. They knew, that
bigotry was unceasingly vigilant in its own stratagems, to secure to
itself an exclusive ascendancy over the human mind; and that
intolerance was ever ready to arm itself with all the terrors of
civil power to exterminate those, who doubted its dogmas, or
resisted its infallibility." (COMMENTARIES ON THE CONSTITUTION OF THE
UNITED STATES, by Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story, Vol III, (1833)
pg 705)

------------------------------------------------------
Then, indirectly the entire document (unamended constitution) as a
whole.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
James Madison on Separation of Church and State
Direct references to separation to be found in the writings of James
Madison
----------------------------------------
OCTOBER 1, 1803

Notes for annual message, Oct. 17, 1803: alterations and additions,
etc [1] (3) after "assure"-are proposed "in due season, and under
prudent arrangements, important aids to our Treasury, as well as," an
ample etc. Quere: if the two or three succeeding paragraphs be not
more
adapted to the separate and subsequent communication, if adopted as
above suggested.
(4) For the first sentence, may be substituted "In the territory
between the Mississippi and the Ohio another valuable acquisition has
been made by a treaty etc."[3.] As it stands, it does not
sufficiently distinguish the nature of the one acquisition from that
of the other, and seems to imply that the acquisition from France was
wholly on the other side of the Mississippi
May it not be as well to omit the detail of the stipulated
considerations, and particularly that of the Roman Catholic Pastor.
The jealousy of some may see in it a principle, not according with the
exemption of Religion from Civil power. In the Indian Treaty it will
be less noticed than in a President's speech.[4.]
FOOTNOTES:
[1.] For TJ's third annual message to Congress, Oct. 17, 1803, see
Ford, VIII, pp. 266-7)
[3.] TI's message announced the acquisition of territory by treaty
from the Kaskaskia Indians; see
Ford, VIII, pp. 269-70.
[4.] TJ accepted JM's suggestion to omit any discussion of Indian
treaty requirements to maintain a Roman Catholic priest, leaving the
stipulations in the treaty to "the competence of both
houses.... as soon as the senate shall have advised its
ratification"; see ibid.
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: James Madison to Thomas Jefferson,
Washington, Oct. 1, 1803, Notes for annual message, Oct. 17, 1803:
alterations and additions, etc.[1.],
The Republic of Letters, the Correspondence between Thomas Jefferson
and James Madison, 1776-1826, Edited by James Morton Smith, Vol. II,
1790 -1804, W. W. Norton & Company, New York, London, (1995) pp
1297-98)

---------------------------------------------------
JUNE 3, 1811

"To the Baptist Churches on Neal's Greek on Black Creek, North
Carolina I have received, fellow-citizens, your address, approving my
objection to the Bill containing a grant of public land to the
Baptist Church at Salem Meeting House, Mississippi Territory. Having
always regarded the practical distinction between Religion and Civil
Government as essential to the purity of both, and as guaranteed by
the Constitution of the United States, I could not have other wise
discharged my duty on the
occasion which presented itself"
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Letter to Baptist Churches in North Carolina,
June 3, 1811. Letters And Other Writings of James Madison Fourth
President Of The United States In Four Volumes Published By the Order
Of Congress, Vol..II, J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia, (1865)
pp 511-512)

-----------------------------------------------------------
MARCH 2, 1819

"The civil Government, though bereft of everything like an associated
hierarchy, possesses the requisite stability, and performs its
functions with complete success, whilst the number, the industry, and
the morality of the priesthood, and the devotion of the people, have
been manifestly increased by the total separation of the church from
the State." (SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Excert of a letter to Robert
Walsh from James Madison. MARCH 2, 1819 Letters and Other writings
of James Madison, in Four Volumes, Published by Order of Congress.
VOL. III, J. B. Lippincott & Co. Philadelphia, (1865), pp 121-126.
James Madison on Religious Liberty, Robert S.Alley, Prometheus Books,
Buffalo, N.Y. (1985) pp 82-83)

----------------------------------------------------------
1817-1833

"Strongly guarded as is the separation between religion and Gov't in
the Constitution of the United States the danger of encroachment by
Ecclesiastical Bodies, may be illustrated by precedents' already
furnished in their short history"
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Excerpt from Madison's Detached Memoranda.
This document was discovered in 1946 among the papers of William
Cabell Rives, a biographer of Madison. Scholars date these
observations in Madison's hand sometime between 1817 and 1832. The
entire document was published by Elizabeth Fleet in the William and
Mary Quarterly of October 1946.

--------------------------------------------------------------------
JULY 10, 1822

"Every new and successful example, therefore, of a perfect separation
between the ecclesiastical and civil matters, is of importance; and I
have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one
has done, in showing that religion and Government will both exist in
greater purity the less they are mixed together"
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Excerpt of letter to Edward Livingston from
James Madison, July 10, 1822. Letters and Other writings of James
Madison, in Four Volumes, Published by Order of Congress. VOL. III,
J. B. Lippincott & Co. Philadelphia, (1865), pp 273-276. James
Madison on Religious Liberty, Robert S.Alley, Prometheus Books,
Buffalo, N.Y. (1985) pp 82-83)

--------------------------------------------------------------
SEPTEMBER 1833

"I must admit moreover that it may not be easy, in every possible
case, to trace the line of separation between the rights of religion
and the civil authority with such distinctness as to avoid collisions
and doubts on unessential points. The tendency to a usurpation on one
side or the other or to a corrupting coalition or alliance between
them will be best guarded against by entire abstinence of the
government from interference in any way whatever, beyond the
necessity of preserving public order and protecting each sect against
trespasses on its legal rights by others". (SOURCE OF INFORMATION:
Letter written by James Madison to Rev. Jasper Adams, September,
1833.Writings of James Madison, edited by Gaillard Hunt, [not sure
what the volume number is but have enough information presented here
to locate the letter] microform Z1236.L53, pp 484-488. )
*********************************************************************
* Representative Thomas Tucker on Church and State
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/basic2a.htm

* Madison's vetoes: Some of The First Official Meanings Assigned
to The Establishment Clause (1811)
http://candst.tripod.com/madvetos.htm

For the

most part, these were Bible-believing men and women.

Some were some weren't. However, the facts remain, they separated
religion (church) and Government (state).

* Christian Orthodoxy And The Founders
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/orthodox.htm

Study Guide: The Roots of American Democracy
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/studygd8.htm

Study Guide: Separation of Church and State - Indepth
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/studygd0.htm

Roots of American Law
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/histlaw.htm

The Christian Bible and the Foundations of the U. S.
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/biblfoun.htm

How often did the founders quote the Bible?
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/tnppage/arg9.htm

Did Montesquieu base his theory of separation of powers on the Bible?
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/tnppage/montesquieu.htm

* Jonathan Dayton and the Ben Franklin Prayer/Chaplain myth
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/franklin.htm

DAVID BARTON CAUGHT IN ERROR (should we say lie) AGAIN

NOW FOR FUN

We caught David Barton in another lie:

The fraud doesn't do his homework, but most don't do their homework.
They don't personally verify things

NOTE:

http://www.wallbuilders.com/resources/search/detail.php?ResourceID=70

James Madison and Religion in Public

by David Barton

[snip]

George Washington provides a succinct illustration. During his
inauguration, Washington took the oath as prescribed by the
Constitution but added several religious components to that official
ceremony. Before taking his oath of office, he summoned a Bible on
which to take the oath, added the words "So help me God!" to the end
of the oath, then leaned over and kissed the Bible. [27] His
"Inaugural Address" was filled with numerous religious references,
[28] and following that address, he and the Congress "proceeded to
St. Paul's Chapel, where Divine service was performed." [29]

[snip]

[27] 4 Washington Irving, Life of George Washington 475 (New York: G.
P. Putnam & Co., 1857); Mrs. C. M Kirkland, Memoirs of Washington 438
(New York: D. Appleton & Company, 1870); Charles Carleton Coffin,
Building the Nation 26 (New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers,
1882); etc.

[28] 1 Richardson, Messages and Papers 51-54 (April 30, 1789).

[29] 1 Annals of Congress 29 (April 30, 1789).

[snip]
********************************************************************
NOW FOR THE FACTS:

26 BUILDING THE NATION. CHAP. L

Flags wave from every window, not only the stars and stripes, but the
flags of all nations-from window, door-way, and the roofs of houses.
Never has there been such a gathering of people in the western
hemisphere.
Hotels, private houses, all are full. Fields and pastures are thick
with tents. People from the country spend the night wrapped in
blankets beneath their wagons.

The great day came, April 30th, on which Washington was to be
inaugurated. At nine o'clock in the morning all the church bells
rung, and the multitude thronged the meeting-houses while prayer was
offered that the blessing of Almighty God might rest upon the people,
and upon the President whom they had chosen. Once more the military
paraded and marched in procession to Federal Hall, where, upon the
balcony, in presence of a great multitude, filling Broadway and Pearl
Street, thronging every window, and standing upon all the house-tops,
the President swore to uphold the Constitution, kissing the Bible to
manifest his sincerity.

"lt is done." The Chancellor who had administered the oath said it,
and up from the multitude, swelling in mighty chorus, carne the
shout, ~ Long live George Washington, President of the United States!"

With the uttering of that solemn oath the Republic took its place
among the nations.

SOURCE:
BUILDING THE NATION

EVENTS IN THE

HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES

FROM THE REVOLUTION TO THE BEGINNING OF
THE WAR BETWEEN THE STATES

BY

CHARLES CARLETON COFFIN

AUTHOR OF
"THE BOYS OF '76" "THE STORY OF LIBERTY" "OLD TIMES IN THE COLONIES"
ETC.

NEW YORK AND LONDON
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
1900
Copyright, 1882, by Harper & Brothers
Page 26
*******************************************************
Also note

[27] 4 Washington Irving, Life of George Washington 475 (New York: G.
P. Putnam & Co., 1857)


Well, kindly note (but I do have to say here I have seen other
sources that also list the page as being 474 so a whole bunch of
people are too lazy to do their homework and verify)

474 LIFE OF WASHINGTON. [1785.

dances. There were balls in camp, in some of the dark times of the
Revolution. " We had a little dance at my quarters," writes General
Greene from Middlebrook, in March, 1779. "His Excellency and Mrs.
Greene danced upwards of three hours without once sitting down. Upon
the whole we had a pretty little frisk.*

A letter of Colonel Tench Tilghman, one of Washington's
aides-de-camp, gives an instance of the general's festive gayety,
when in the above year the army was cantoned near Morristown. A large
company, of which the general and Mrs. Washington, general and Mrs.
Greene, and Mr. and Mrs. Olney were part, dined with colonel and Mrs.
Biddle. Some little time after the ladies had retired from table, Mr.
Olney followed them into the next room. A clamor was raised against
him as a deserter, and it was resolved that a party should be sent to
demand him, and that if the ladies refused to give him up, he should
be brought by force. Washington humored the joke, and offered to head
the party. He led it with great formality to the door of the
drawing-room, and sent in a summons. The ladies refused
to give up the deserter. An attempt was made to capture him. The
ladies came to the rescue. There was a melee ; in the course of which
his Excellency seems to have had a passage at arms with Mrs. Olney.
The ladies were victorious, as they always ought to be, says the
gallant Tilghman.+

* Greene to Col. Wadsworth. MS.

+ This sportive occurrence gave rise to a piece of camp scandal. It
was reported at a distance that Mrs. Olney had been in a violent
rage, and had told Washington that, " if he did not let go her hand
she would tear his eyes out, and that though he was a general, he was
but a man."
Mr. Olney wrote to Colonel Tilghman, begging him to refute the
scandal. The latter gave a true statement of the affair, declaring
that the whole was done in jest, and that in the mock contest Mrs.
Olney had made use of no expressions unbecoming a lady of her good
breeding, or such as were taken the least amiss by the general.



1755.] WASHINGTON IN SOCIAL LIFE. 475

More than one instance is told of Washington's being surprised into
hearty fits of laughter, even during the war. We have recorded one
produced by the sudden appearance of old General Putnam on horseback,
with a female prisoner en troupe. The following is another which
occurred- at the camp at Morristown. Washington had purchased a young
horse of great spirit and power. A braggadocio of the army, vain of
his horsemanship, asked the privilege of breaking it. Washington gave
his consent, and with some of his officers attended to see the horse
receive his first lesson. After much preparation, the pretender to
equitation mounted into the saddle and was making a great display of
his science, when the horse suddenly planted
his forefeet, threw up his heels, and gave the unlucky Gambado a
Somerset over his head. Washington, a thorough horseman, and quick to
perceive the ludicrous in these matters, was so convulsed with
laughter that we are told the tears ran down his cheeks.*

Still another instance is given, which occurred at the return of
peace, when he was sailing in a boat on the Hudson, and was so
overcome by the drollery of a story told by Major Fairlie of New
York, of facetious memory, that he fell back in the boat in a
paroxysm of laughter. In that fit of laughter, it was sagely pre-


* Notes of the Rev. Mr. Tuttle. MS.
Life of George Washington by Wahington Irving, Vol IV, New York G.P.
Putnam &