Topics: Bibles & Religion

On June 9th, 1994 the ADL (Anti-Defamation League) published unsubstantiated and scurrilous slanders against more than a dozen major Christian leaders including Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Dr. James Dobson, Dr. D. James Kennedy, Donald Wildmon, Phyllis Schlafly, Jay Sekulow, and David Barton.

The title of the now thoroughly discredited publication was “The Religious Right: The Assault on Tolerance and Pluralism in America.” Its contention, expressed in incendiary and intemperate language, was that adherence to Christian faith represented an “assault on tolerance and pluralism in America.”

David Cantor, the ADL researcher who wrote the report, and soon thereafter sought employment elsewhere, admitted to the New York Times that he never contacted any of the individuals or groups he slandered for their statements or reactions. Furthermore, he confessed that his report comprised almost entirely statements about the selected Christian leaders that had been written by their opponents. In a flagrant violation of journalistic ethics, he conducted no direct interviews of his subjects.

The abhorrence felt toward this baseless attack upon some of Judaism and Israel’s staunchest friends provoked a firestorm of criticism against the ADL in the mainstream Jewish community. A number of ADL leaders and board members made their objections widely known or resigned their positions in protest. This included well-respected leaders like Carl Pearlston, Phillip Aronoff, Fred Zeidman, and Houston attorney Gary Polland who later told New York magazine that “the liberal Jewish community is the enemy” and “the intellectual backbone of everything that’s wrong in this country.”

On August 2nd, responding to the ADL, the organization I had established and was privileged to lead, Toward Tradition, placed a large paid advertisement on a page of the New York Times. The headline read “Should Jews Fear The Religious Right?” and continued, “We are a group of Jews who wish to make it known that we reject the implications of this report and deplore its publication.” This national indictment of the ADL was signed by eighty-nine prominent Jewish leaders and made clear that most American Jews condemned the Anti-Defamation League for engaging in defamation of its own in its attack on leaders of the religious right.

In response to a vigorous protest by Pat Robertson, on August 3rd, the ADL’s National Director, Abraham Foxman wrote a letter to the evangelical leader in which he admitted to major inaccuracies and slanders in the report. Foxman’s letter also retracted the accusation found in the ADL report that in a 1980 staff meeting Robertson had referred to Jews as “spiritually deaf” and “spiritually blind.”

Syndicated columnist, Mona Charen, wrote, “The ADL has committed defamation. There is no other conclusion to be reached after reading its new report, The Religious Right: the Assault on Tolerance and Pluralism in America. It is sad that an organization with a proud history of fairness should have descended to this kind of character assassination and name calling.”

During the summer of 1994, Minnesota Senator, Rudy Boschwitz, who had been an honorary vice-chairman of the ADL wrote: “I always believed that the ADL considered diverse opinions permissible …. Indeed, they have just produced a scathing report about a group they maintain doesn’t allow such diversity. Could it be that our own ADL is itself assaulting pluralism and tolerance in America?”

The Jewish newspaper, The Forward, reported that William Kristol, son of Jewish intellectual Irving Kristol, and who was Vice President Dan Quayle’s chief of staff, said, “It is so shortsighted and self-destructive for a Jewish organization like the ADL to unjustly and gratuitously alienate Christian conservatives.” Kristol also said that the ADL is part of the Democratic Party’s strategy to “demonize religious conservatives.”

Herb Zweibon, head of Americans for a Safe Israel said the ADL report is a “slap in the face” to friends of Israel and indicated “that the ADL has veered off course and adopted a new ultra-liberal agenda that has nothing to do with ADL’s stated purposes.” He praised the Christian right for standing by Israel when others turned out to be “fair-weather friends.”

The September 1994 issue of Commentary magazine published by the American Jewish Committee carried a stinging denunciation of the ADL and its, by then, notorious report. It was written by Midge Decter the distinguished fellow at the Institute on Religion and Public Life.

A son-in-law of Midge Decter, Elliot Abrams who had served in both the Reagan and Bush administrations termed the ADL report “despicable.”

By the end of 1994, virtually the entire Jewish community had rejected the report as not only false and evil but also as stupid and a self-serving act of unconscionable ingratitude to some of the Jewish community’s greatest friends.

Originally created to combat the extensive anti-Semitism prevalent in the early twentieth century, ninety years later the ADL had become enormously successful with an annual budget of about fifty million dollars. Many have asked how the ADL could possibly have embarked upon this ill-advised adventure, defaming the friends and allies of the Jewish community and bringing embarrassment to itself. The answer offered by most Jewish commentators and by former members of the ADL is that by the 1990s, active anti-Semitism in America was largely extinct and the organization was becoming irrelevant.

In order to redesign its purpose and rediscover relevance, it repackaged itself as a national advocate of secular liberalism. It was chiefly responsible for popularizing the equation that Judaism equals liberalism, thus allowing the demonization of all anti-liberals (conservatives) as anti-Semites.

For this reason, the ADL declined to support then Jewish Dr. Laura Schlesinger in the attempts by the homosexual community to destroy her broadcasting career. The ADL also flouted Jewish tradition and values by taking public positions in favor of homosexual marriage and in favor of aggressive gun control, arguing against the conventional understanding of the 2nd Amendment. In the attack against the Boy Scouts of America mounted by the homosexual community, the ADL backed the homosexual plaintiffs all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In its nationwide partnership with Barnes and Noble in the program Hate Hurts the ADL endorsed the books Heather Has Two Mommies and Steve Has Two Daddies as suitable tools for teaching tolerance to young children. In short, as anti-Semitism declined in America, the ADL found a new reason to exist and a new reason to raise large sums of money for its headquarters and staff. (Abraham Foxman, national director of ADL earns annual compensation of about half a million dollars and was disgraced by his role in persuading President Bill Clinton to issue a pardon for tax fugitive Marc Rich, a major ADL contributor.)

In conclusion, few of prominence and respectability in the Jewish community today regard the ADL as a responsible voice for Judaism. Wags dismiss the ADL as the circumcised wing of the Democratic Party.

The reputations of all those maligned in the hateful 1994 report have suffered no setbacks and if anything, the Jewish community looks toward those named with appreciation and gratitude for their staunch defense of those values that have made the United States of America the most tranquil and prosperous haven Jews have experienced in the past two millennia.

As someone who has been a rabbi and Jewish community leader for several decades, the undersigned wishes personally to thank David Barton of Wallbuilders along with the other leaders defamed in that sixteen-year-old mistake for all they have done for Judeo-Christian values in America and to express his willingness to be contacted personally by anyone seeking further information on this shameful episode in the history of a once proud and valuable organization, the Anti-Defamation League.

Rabbi Daniel Lapin

The American Alliance of Jews and Christians.

In August 2002, construction began on the Capitol Visitor Center (CVC), and in 2004, we were asked by leading Members of Congress to help them monitor the content of the hundreds of displays and exhibits in the proposed CVC. Those leaders understood the importance of presenting accurate information throughout the CVC, for 15,000 people go through the Capitol each day, including thousands of school children.

We were given full access to the proposed content for the CVC and we closely monitored those materials, filing regular reports with congressional leadership. We found much objectionable content including not only inaccurate historical facts but especially a deliberate omission and even censoring of the rich religious history of the Capitol. An astute government researcher accurately noted that historical omission is one of the most effective means of producing a slanted bias:

[L]iberal and secular bias is primarily accomplished by exclusion. . . . Such a bias is much harder to observe than a positive vilification or direct criticism, but it is the essence of censorship. It is effective not only because it is hard to observe (it isn’t there) and therefore hard to counteract, but also because it makes only the liberal, secular positions familiar and plausible.

We detailed for the congressional leaders the many omissions and the liberal left secular bias evident across the hundreds of displays in the CVC. Much of the objectionable content was changed and the inaccurate material corrected – until congressional leadership changed following the 2006 elections. Since that time, there has been a full reversion to the liberal bias and historically inaccurate content originally evident in the displays.

Several House Members intervened with specific attempts to correct some of those problems – including former Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave (R-CO), who in October 2007 introduced HR 3908:

 

To direct the Architect of the Capitol to ensure that the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag and the national motto “In God We Trust” are each displayed prominently in the Capitol Visitor Center on a permanent basis and to prohibit the Architect from removing or refusing to include language or other content from exhibits and materials relating to the Capitol Visitor Center on the grounds that the language or content includes a religious reference or Judeo-Christian content.

The new congressional leadership refused to act on her bill – or to act on additional recommendations offered by other Members.

Those Members therefore concluded that the general public needed to be made aware of the situation within the CVC so that they could apply pressure to Congress. To that end, in early July 2008, we began work on an 8-minute video to highlight some of the many problems with the CVC. (That short video – “The War on God in America” – can be viewed on YouTube.)

While working on that DVD, on July 23, 2008, we were asked to give a formal briefing about the problems within the CVC to a group of several dozen House Members. Eight days later on July 31, 2008, 108 House Members sent a letter to the Architect of the Capitol (responsible for the construction of the CVC), expressing their deep concern over what they saw (or rather, what they did not see) in the CVC, explaining:

We have been troubled to learn in recent weeks that some aspects of the new CVC – including displays, videos, and historic interpretations – may be historically incomplete and reflect an apathetic disposition toward our nation’s religious history. . . . It is clear that those who designed and developed the displays produced products excluding any significant references to God or faith. . . . In fact, not only is our national motto, “In God We Trust,” not a central theme of the CVC, it has been totally excluded from any effective presentation. . . . Some omitted facts are so glaringly obvious that to exclude them offers a distorted view of American history that is not acceptable to us and that we believe will ultimately not be acceptable to the American taxpayers. None of us should want to construct a $621 million shrine to political correctness that does not accurately reflect a significant part of American history.

Under this growing pressure, the Architect promised to make changes – including the addition of the National Motto. Amazingly, the part of the Visitor Center designed to replicate the actual House Chamber omitted its prominent phrase “In God We Trust,” even though it’s boldly displayed in the actual House Chamber (and it is also displayed in the actual Senate Chamber). However, despite the promises, no changes were made by the Architect. (The Architect had previously been a central figure in the national controversy about prohibiting the word “God” from the personal flag certificates that Members of Congress award to individuals to commemorate notable achievements and events.)

Shortly after that letter was sent to the Architect, our “War on God in America” video was released. Many Members posted it on their own websites and even showed it at town hall meetings to urge citizens to put pressure on congressional leadership. Media stories and viral marketing also spread the word, thus further increasing the public pressure. In September 2008, an opportunity finally arose in Congress to make positive changes.

When the CVC was originally proposed in the 1990s, it was projected to be a $71 million structure. By 2000, the proposed price had risen to $265 million, and when construction finally began in 2002, the predicted price tag had soared to $368 million, with construction to be finished in 2004. However, construction was not finished until late 2008, and the price tag was $621 million – four years late and hundreds of millions of dollars over budget. Because of the numerous cost overruns, the CVC repeatedly returned to Congress seeking more money, and in September 2008 they sought the final monies necessary to finish the facility and open it to the public in December 2008. Additionally, HR 5159 was introduced to transfer the permanent administrative authority over the CVC from the congressional oversight committees and move it to the Architect of the Capitol. This situation offered Members an opportunity to leverage positive changes in the CVC.

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), supported by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) and Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), placed a hold (that is, a complete stop) on the CVC transfer bill unless specific positive additions regarding religious content were made. Although Senate leadership warned DeMint that “Delaying the opening of the CVC has serious security implications . . . [and] significant financial consequences,” Sen. DeMint held firm.

On September 25, 2008, DeMint agreed to release the measure if (1) the National Motto and the Pledge of Allegiance were engraved in stone in the CVC, and (2) the errant declaration was removed that E Pluribus Unum was the national motto. On September 26, Senate leadership agreed to his terms (although complaining that adding the National Motto and the Pledge would cost an additional $150,000). Having achieved this victory, on September 27, Sen. DeMint took to the Senate floor to announce the agreement and highlight some of the problems within the CVC:

In touring the CVC, I found the exhibits to be politically incorrect, left leaning, and secular in nature. The secular aspects were especially surprising because of the deep connection between faith and the Capitol and our Judeo Christian traditions. . . . The first thing you are confronted with once you have entered the CVC is the phrase “E. Pluribus Unum” engraved in stone above a mockup of the Capitol dome. A panel next to the dome describes E. Pluribus Unum as our Nations’ motto. This is not only completely false but also offensive to the 90 percent of Americans who approve of our Nation’s actual motto “In God We trust,” signed into law by President Dwight Eisenhower in 1956. Unfortunately, nowhere in the CVC will you find the words “In God We Trust” engraved in stone. The acknowledgment of God and our Nation’s motto has been left out of the CVC. In fact, the massive replica of the House Chamber omits the “In God We Trust” from above the Speaker’s chair. We are now told they are planning to fix this “mistake,” but on my tour 2 days ago, it was still missing. Also missing are the words to our Pledge of Allegiance – the only words spoken each morning by both Chambers of Congress.

The Architect of the Capitol, under increasing pressure and media attention, finally relented and placed “In God We Trust” in pinned bronze letters above the section in the Visitor Center designed to replicate the actual House Chamber.

Over on the House side, Congressman Louie Gohmert (R-TX) declared that the CVC was a “$600 million dollar godless pit,” and the108 Members of the House who had earlier written the Architect of the Capitol authorized Rep. Randy Forbes (R-VA) – head of the Congressional Prayer Caucus – to negotiate on their behalf with House leadership. On September 26, 2008, Randy laid out their demands for the CVC, explaining:

As Chairman of the Congressional Prayer Caucus, I am writing on behalf of over 100 Members of Congress who recently contacted the Acting Architect of the Capitol sharing our concerns about the historical inaccuracies in the Capitol Visitor Center (CVC). Specifically, we are concerned about the lack of content that accurately represents our nation’s religious history and the principles on which our nation was founded. . . . We are requesting that the following changes be made to the new CVC before it opens on December 2, 2008:

• That the phrase “Our Nation’s Motto” be removed from the plaque describing the engraving of E. Pluribus Unum;
• That “In God We Trust” be engraved in stone in a prominent location within the CVC and that the panel describing the engraving include the proper recognition of this phrase as our national motto;
• That the Pledge of Allegiance be engraved in stone in a prominent location within the CVC;
• That there be a significant permanent display of religious history in the U. S. Capitol, reflecting the rich tradition that prayer, acknowledgment of God, and Judeo-Christian traditions have played throughout the history of the Capitol, and comparable in size relative to other themed displays; and
• That there be an ongoing effort to investigate and correct historical inaccuracies throughout the Center.

On October 1, 2008, Randy submitted eight essential items to be included in the permanent display on the Judeo-Christian religious history in the Capitol, including:

1. History of the Chaplaincy of the House and Senate, to include a list of the chaplains who have served and the different faith backgrounds of each.

2. History of the Capitol as a Church, including the fact that (1) religious services took place in the Capitol when Congress was in session and was an official function of Congress, and (2) that in 1867 the Capitol was the largest church in Washington with 2000 people attending weekly.

3. A list of the “firsts” who preached or prayed at the Capitol and excerpts of their text, such as: Dorothy Ripley – first woman to preach in the Capitol (1806) [President Jefferson was in attendance]; Bishop John England – first Catholic to preach in Capitol (President John Quincy Adams present, 1826); Morris Raphall – first Jewish Rabbi to open the House in prayer (1860); Henry Highland Garnet – first African American to speak in Congress, and he preached a sermon…just two weeks after the 13th Amendment passed (February 12, 1865);

4. “God Bless America” sung in unison by the Members of Congress on the steps of the Capitol on 9-11 after the terrorist attacks.

5. Photos/reference to Members reading during the Annual Bible Reading/National Day of Prayer events;

6. Congressional Resolutions Requesting Presidential Proclamations for days of Thanksgiving and Prayer (Washington and Lincoln’s Thanksgiving Proclamations);

7. The Aitken Bible of 1782 – “Bible of the Revolution” (with an informational placard explaining that it is the first English Bible printed in America and the first Bible ever to be printed as an Act of Congress);

8. Lincoln’s Bible and his 2nd Inaugural address next to the table at his side during the speech.

On October 2, 2008, House leadership agreed to Randy’s demands (just as the Senate had agreed to Sen. DeMint’s demands), but when the CVC opened two months later on December 2, 2008, still nothing had been done – the engravings had not been added, nor was there a permanent display of Judeo-Christian influence in the history of the Capitol.

National media outlets (such as The Washington Post, The Hill, National Review, The Washington Times, the Seattle Times, and many others) covered the CVC opening and talked candidly about its anti-religious bias and historical content problems. Senator DeMint also issued a press release that strongly criticized the CVC for ignoring its agreement to include the National Motto and the Pledge of Allegiance. He noted that the new structure “fails to appropriately honor our religious heritage that has been critical to America’s success. . . . You cannot accurately tell the history of America or its Capitol by ignoring the religious heritage of our Founders and the generations since who relied on their faith for strength and guidance. . . . The CVC’s most prominent display proclaims faith not in God, but in government.” Many pro-family groups (including the American Family Association, the Family Research Council, and others) also spread the word; citizens responded and called congressional leaders, but still nothing happened.

On May 20, 2009, Congressman Dan Lungren (R-CA)
quietly introduced a measure (very similar to Marilyn Musgrave’s original 2007 proposal) that would embody the agreements reached by the Senate and the House regarding the engravings in the CVC (at least 160 other Members of the House co-signed his measure). Working diligently with leaders of a few specific committees, but in a low-key unpublicized manner, Dan was able to garner agreement in both the House and Senate to pass H.Con.Res.131: “Directing the Architect of the Capitol to engrave the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag and the National Motto of `In God we trust’ in the Capitol Visitor Center.” That measure was approved by the House on July 9, 2009, and by the Senate on July 10, 2009. (Because it was not a public law but only a decision by Congress of the policy to be followed within its own building, the measure did not require the president’s signature.)

As soon as the measure passed, the Freedom From Religion Foundation (located in Madison, Wisconsin) promptly filed suit in federal court to prevent the phrases from being inscribed inside the CVC. However, on September 21, 2009, the day that the Architect of the Capitol was officially served with the lawsuit, the phrase “One Nation Under God” had already been finished. And before the lawsuit was scheduled for trial before a federal judge, by November 25, the Pledge of Allegiance had also been engraved inside the CVC.

Consequently, if any federal judge orders those phrases to be removed, they will literally have to tear down part of the CVC in order to remove the acknowledgments of God from the building! Many have joked about how Washington, D. C. would have to be sandblasted if the acknowledgment of God were ever ordered removed from public buildings, and the CVC is now another in the already long list of such structures (e.g., the Library of Congress, the Jefferson Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Memorial, the White House, the federal courts building, the U. S. Supreme Court, Union Station, etc.).

The Capitol Visitor Center is the latest in a lengthy tradition of federal buildings in Washington, D., C., including public acknowledgments of God. The fact that this tradition has continued is due to the hard work and committed leadership of several Members of Congress in both the House and Senate, including Sen. Jim DeMint, Rep. Randy Forbes, Rep. Dan Lungren, and others.

For generations, America recognized an equality of individualism that made the carpenter as important as the university president and the shopkeeper the equal of the statesman. But today, under the influence of Poststructuralism, America has begun to divide itself into groups based not only on identity (e.g., black/white/Latino, straight/gay, union/right-to-work, conservative/liberal, etc.) but also on distinctions such as economic income, social standing, and even degree of academic knowledge – and especially in the latter category as pretentious scholars in law and academics claim exclusive knowledge they believe places them above ordinary citizens.

For example, I repeatedly hear legislators urge that a bill be passed so that they can find out from the judges whether or not it is constitutional. They apparently believe that only a small group is capable of unraveling the meaning of the Constitution and have forgotten that it is actually a very simple document that can be read in its entirety in less than twenty minutes. In fact, it is so easy to understand that for decades, school children took an annual written exam to demonstrate their mastery of its content; and popular texts included the 1828 Catechism on the Constitution by Arthur Stansbury – a work for elementary students. Thankfully, citizens have begun bypassing America’s frequently haughty academic aristocracy – evidenced by the fact that two recent modern-language editions of The Federalist Papers have become national best-sellers.

And just as they have done with the Constitution, academic elitists have also tried to make themselves the sole caretakers of historical knowledge, holding that history is too complicated, with too many intricacies for the average person to understand. They even become intolerant of those who try to break through these false barriers and open history to the average citizen. I personally know this to be true, for I often find myself the object of their attacks.

I have penned numerous best-selling history works, and characteristic of each is a heavy reliance on primary-source documentation. Across the past twenty years, I have amassed a collection of some 100,000 originals (or certified copies of originals) predating 1812, including hand-written documents and works of those who framed and signed the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. Not many individuals in America have read more original works (or fewer modern ones) than I have; and the general public has responded enthusiastically to this history based on original documentation.

In fact, notice how these types of history books regularly appear on the New York Times bestseller list. Whether it is David McCullough’s John Adams, Glenn Beck’s Being George Washington, Newt Gingrich’s Valley Forge, or my own The Jefferson Lies, people are willing to pay good money to learn the simple uncomplicated history that used to be taught in school.

Conversely, typical history works by modern elitist professors generally sell very poorly; and seeing their own influence wane, they often lash out and condescendingly criticize the more popular documentary works. But this practice is not new. After all, when the Apostle Paul began to attract a growing following, some of the intellectuals of his day who were losing standing “went wild with jealousy and tore into Paul, contradicting everything he was saying,” “sowing mistrust and suspicion in the minds of the people” (Acts 13:44-45, 14:2).

After The Jefferson Lies, rose to a New York Times best-seller, similar attacks were launched against it from academic elitists. I will address three of these attacks below, but first, I must tackle their oft-repeated talking-point that I am not a qualified historian – a claim they make to cast a shadow of doubt over all the facts I present. However, this charge, like their others, is completely false. After all, I am:

• Recognized as an historical expert by both state and federal courts;
• Called to testify as an historical expert by both the federal and state legislatures;
• Selected as an historical expert by State Boards of Education across the nation to assist in writing history and social studies standards for those states;
• Consulted as an historical expert by public school textbook publishers, helping write best-selling history texts used in public schools and universities across the nation.

Their real objection is that I make history uncomplicated, and thus make them irrelevant. In fact, the very point of The Jefferson Lies was to allow Jefferson to speak for himself through his 19,000 letters, thereby eliminating the need for the educational elitists who for the past fifty years have anointed themselves as Jefferson’s sole interpreters.

Consider some of their objections against The Jefferson Lies.

Warren Throckmorton and Michael Coulter

A common mantra for today’s academics is “Publish or die.” Believing that if they are not publishing something new that their academic career is regressing, they therefore regularly “discover” something they believe to be a new revelation on some obscure micropoint of history, and then, as if having received an earth-shattering revelation, write an article or book giving their personal opinions about it. Significantly, however, the public does not respond well to these works, for publishers claim that with few exceptions most academic scholars’ books sell only two hundred or so copies a year.¹

Professors Warren Throckmorton and Michael Coulter, in their work penned against The Jefferson Lies, begin by candidly admitting that they are critiquing “Barton and religious conservatives in general,”² thereby openly confessing their hostility toward me and my personal religious beliefs. As they acknowledge up front, and as will be evident below, their real problem with The Jefferson Lies is much more about its worldview than its historical content.(Throckmorton is a psychology professor at Grove College currently writing about sexual orientation and identity, and Coulter teaches political science there.)

For example, early in the book I applaud American Exceptionalism, which I define as “the belief that America is blessed and enjoys unprecedented stability, prosperity, and liberty as a result of the institutions and policies produced by unique ideas such as God-given inalienable rights, individualism, limited government, full republicanism, and an educated and virtuous citizenry.”³ But Throckmorton and Coulter launch into a lengthy exegesis, quoting a number of liberal professors to prove that American Exceptionalism is a bad thing, not something good.⁴ So from the start, these two make clear that they object to the philosophy I set forth that America’s blessings, prosperity, and liberties are the result of God-given rights and ideas.

Another insightful moment in their critique occurs when these two try to explain away those 100,000 originals that form much of the basis of my historical works. They attempt to dismiss those works by stating, “While he [Barton] does have a nice collection of Bibles and signatures, he also has a lot of old newspapers which have little relevance to the claims he makes.”⁵

Notwithstanding the fact that they’ve never seen my collection and therefore don’t know what I do have, their comment about old newspapers is particularly revealing. Every genuine historian knows that old newspapers have great significance; in fact, it is hard to underestimate the importance of old newspapers in the way that these two have done. While newspapers do not replace primary source writings when such are available, there are definitely many times that newspapers themselves become the primary source documents and therefore cannot be dismissed out of hand as these two professors have done.

Significantly, many of the writings of the Founding Fathers, including the indispensable Federalist Papers, first appeared as newspaper articles; and old newspapers regularly contain noteworthy historical information found in no other source. For example, nowhere in George Washington’s writings does he say that he leaned over and kissed the Bible at his inauguration, but numerous old newspapers reporting those proceedings establish that fact (along with reporting the six other religious activities that occurred at his inauguration). So, contrary to their preposterous claim, old newspapers do have much relevance, not only to my claims but also those made by many other historical writers as well.

Furthermore, while my collection does include a “nice collection of Bibles and signatures,” it also has scores of full-length books by Founding Fathers as well as countless legal works, court rulings, religious sermons, military writings, original documents from black history, women’s history, and writings in scores of other areas. Yet even if it were nothing more than a “nice collection of Bibles and signatures,” that would still be significant, for that collection contains Bibles such as the John Thompson Bible of 1798, which documents Jefferson’s role in helping print that Bible – an aspect of Jefferson’s actions that these professors foolishly dismiss as being insignificant.

But aside from their flawed view about the importance of specific types of original documents, consider some of the absurdities contained in their critique. For example, Throckmorton and Coulter object to my statement that, “In 1803, President Jefferson signed a treaty with the Kaskaskia tribe to provide them Christian ministry and teaching.”⁶ To prove their objection, they quote the treaty, including the part stating:

And whereas, the greater part of the said [Kaskaskia] tribe have been baptised [sic] and received into the Catholic church to which they are much attached, the United States will give annually for seven years one hundred dollars towards the support of a priest of that religion, who will engage to perform for the said tribe the duties of his office and also to instruct as many of their children as possible in the rudiments of literature. And the United States will further give the sum of three hundred dollars to assist the said tribe in the erection of a church.⁷

This treaty is signed at the bottom by President Thomas Jefferson and Secretary of State James Madison.

So, let’s see: I state that Jefferson signed a treaty “with the Kaskaskia tribe to provide them Christian ministry and teaching,” and the two provide the part of the treaty proving that it does. I made the simple statement; they show documentation that the statement was correct; end of story, right? Hardly! After proving that the treaty does indeed have that provision, they then launch into a lengthy explanation attempting to show why that provision is really not important. It is amusing to see the lengths to which they go in their convoluted attempts to explain why historical documents do not really mean what they actually say.

Similarly, I state that “Other presidential actions of Jefferson include . . . closing presidential documents with the appellation, ‘In the year of our Lord Christ’.”⁸ I then include in the book a picture of such a signed document. But Throckmorton and Coulter dismiss that document with the statement that “we know of no other document signed by Jefferson with the phrase ‘in the year of our Lord Christ’ printed on the form.”⁹ So apparently, since they personally know of no other similar documents, then the one I showed apparently means nothing (at least to them). Significantly, however, we personally own other such Jefferson documents; and literally scores, if not hundreds, of similar Jefferson documents are contained in other libraries and archives. But because these professors don’t personally know about them, then they apparently don’t exist! Clearly, so strong are their own personal predilections about Jefferson that they won’t even allow what they see with their own eyes to alter their predetermined conclusions.

Throckmorton and Coulter also object to my statement that “in 1798, Jefferson personally helped finance the printing of one of America’s groundbreaking editions of the Bible. That Bible was a massive, two-volume folio set that was not only the largest Bible ever published in America to that time, but it was also America’s first hot-pressed Bible.”¹⁰ That Bible, published by John Thompson, is known as the Thompson Bible; but Throckmorton and Coulter claim that Jefferson subscribing, or helping fund this Bible, is an insignificant and irrelevant thing:

At the completion of the effort [the Bible], the printers compiled a list of subscribers for placement at the end of the second volume. . . . [A]ccording to the subscriber’s list, 1272 people paid to receive one [sic] these Bibles, with Jefferson’s name listed among the subscribers. . . . Certainly, several Founders subscribed. . . . The subscribers were not investors in the project. The investors in the project were printers, John Thompson and Abraham Small.¹¹

As they do so often throughout their critique, they entirely miss the primary point obviously being made in that section of the book – which is that individuals associate their name and money only in projects with which they have a general philosophical agreement, as Jefferson did here. But if they are right that being a subscriber is trivial and irrelevant, then if we should someday see a racist anti-Semitic publication with Throckmorton’s name listed as a subscriber, we should dismiss it as meaningless??? Hardly! Being a subscriber to a work tells us something of what that person believes and supports – which is why it is significant that Jefferson’s name appeared in the Thompson Bible and that he also offered to help finance other Bibles as well.

Furthermore, the Thompson Bible was one of many examples I provided to demonstrate occasions where Jefferson helped promote/fund/print the traditional unedited Bible. But Throckmorton and Coulter deliberately ignore this broader point and devolve into a pointless discussion about what a subscriber is. On multiple occasions, these two acknowledge that the particular fact I set forth did indeed happen but then try to shift the focus away from the self-evident simplicity of that which appears in the original documents.

(By the way, contrary to their errant claim, subscribers definitely were investors, for frequent was the occasion when printers were unable to publish a work due to a lack of subscribers.¹² It was common that if printers or authors did not have sufficient up-front, in-hand funds from subscribers, the work was not printed; so subscribers definitely were investors in the work.)

Another of their oft-repeated complaints is that I don’t include enough of what they personally consider to be negative things about Jefferson. But part of the reason I wrote my book was to reintroduce the numerous good things about Jefferson that so many of today’s Deconstructionist scholars refuse to acknowledge. Strikingly, if most of today’s academics were to write a biography about the Biblical David, they would undoubtedly include what occurred with Bathsheba, Uriah, Absalom, and Adonijah but completely ignore David’s role as the courageous shepherd who slew the lion and the bear, the fearless youth who defeated Goliath, the beloved leader venerated by his nation, and the tender and repentant individual who was a devout worshipper of God – they would highlight the bad and downplay the good.

Sadly, many of today’s academics miss the big things in history and focus on the miniscule. They would have fit well into medieval times, when the scholars of that era vigorously debated what they believed to be the compelling issues of that day – such as how many angels would fit on the point of a needle,¹³ or whether God in His majesty could create a rock so big that God in His power could not move it. They were completely out of touch with society and even accelerated its decline by remaining focused on meaningless trivia and minutia – or as Jesus said, they were able to find what they believed to be the microscopic speck of sawdust in someone else’s eye but completely miss the obvious plank in their own.

Clay S. Jenkinson

Clay Jenkinson also wrote a scathing review of The Jefferson Lies. He is described as “an American humanities scholar, author, and educator” who “co-hosts public radio’s The Jefferson Hour” and “lectures at Dickinson State University and Bismarck State College.”¹⁴ Interestingly, to prove me wrong, Jenkinson uses the very historical malpractices that my book is written to expose – including lifting very short phrases from lengthy historical writings and making them say the reverse of what they actually say.

For example, I provide scores of Jefferson’s own writings and declarations to conclusively demonstrate that he was not a deist; but Jenkinson completely dismisses all of that documentation on the basis of six words that Jefferson told his nephew: “Question with boldness the existence of God.” However, I also used that same six-word phrase in my book – only I printed the entire part of that letter (several pages long) containing that phrase. Jefferson explained that if someone was willing, with an open mind, to “question with boldness the existence of God,” that he would end up proving beyond any shadow of a doubt that there truly was a God.¹⁵ But Jenkinson lifted and used the six-word phrase completely out of context to make it say the opposite of what Jefferson said.

Additionally, Jenkinson, like Throckmorton and Coulter, admits major points I make in The Jefferson Lies but then also tries to explain them away. For example, I show that even though modern scholars repeatedly claim that Jefferson omitted everything related to the Divine and the supernatural from his so-called “Jefferson Bible,” that he actually included Jesus raising the dead, healing the sick, casting out demons, calling Himself the Son of God, speaking of His Second Coming, etc.¹⁶ Jenkinson admits that Jefferson did include these passages but then dismisses them as unimportant by (1) first pointing out that all other scholars similarly dismiss those passages, and (2) then giving his own personal opinion that Jefferson really didn’t believe what he included in that work.¹⁷ This ploy is called “psychohistory,” and results when a modern so-called “psychological” analysis is applied to the actions of a person long dead; “psychobabble” is the result of such an analysis. This trick enables folks like Jenkinson (and scholars like him) to assert that he personally knows what Jefferson was secretly thinking two centuries ago, so therefore whatever Jefferson actually said or did should be completely ignored.

Strikingly, Jenkinson’s attempt to prove me wrong involves: (1) lifting short phrases out of context from Jefferson’s lengthy works; (2) imputing to Jefferson sinister motives that lack historical evidence and can be proven only in the inner workings of Jenkinson’s own mind; and (3) invoking what other academics say about Jefferson rather than using Jefferson’s own words – the very historical malpractices that The Jefferson Lies was written to combat.

Alan Pell Crawford

Alan Crawford, a journalist and author, also penned a review very critical of The Jefferson Lies; and like the others, he, too, resorts to the tools of modern historical malpractice in order to discount the clear message of historical documents. For example, in summarizing my views about Jefferson, Crawford claims:

That Jefferson might have been what we would think of as a deist or even a Unitarian, as many historians believe, Mr. Barton also disputes. Jefferson was “pro-Christian and pro-Jesus,” he says, although he concedes that the president did have a few qualms about “specific Christian doctrines.” The doctrines Jefferson rejected – the Divinity of Christ, the Resurrection, the Trinity – are what place him in the camp of the deists and Unitarians in the first place.¹⁸

Significantly, in the chapter on Jefferson’s religious beliefs, I document that Jefferson went through several religious phases during his life. In the first half of his life, he held orthodox Christian views, and in his “Notes on Religion, 1776,” he consistently expounded what orthodox Christians still believe today. In middle life, his faith faltered when his beloved wife unexpectedly died, but he eventually retained his orthodox beliefs. But many decades later in the last years of his life, he embraced what was known as Christian Restoration or Christian Primitivism, which promoted Unitarianism and called into question some orthodox Christian doctrines, thus reversing his beliefs of earlier decades.

But Crawford, ignoring Jefferson’s many writings documenting his changing religious phases, instead asserts that Jefferson was a Unitarian for his entire life. On what grounds does he claim this? – on the basis of any Jefferson writing? No. Rather, he says it is because “many historians believe . . .” So, like the other critics, Crawford refuses to allow Jefferson to speak for himself but instead believes that only modern academics like himself can speak for Jefferson.

Crawford further claims that “No Jefferson scholar to my knowledge has ever concluded that Jefferson was an ‘atheist,’ as Mr. Barton suggests.”¹⁹ But by this claim, Crawford proves that he has not even read the book he is critiquing, for I begin each chapter with a list of documented quotations from modern writers and scholars repeating a particular lie about Jefferson, and I certainly did that in this chapter as well. But Crawford, like Throckmorton and Coulter, says “to my knowledge,” thus again limiting historical truth to his own personal experience rather than to objective documents and facts.

I find it refreshing and uplifting that ordinary citizens today are hungry to be reconnected with their simple and clearly-documented history – they want to rediscover America’s greatness, find a renewed national purpose, and learn how to get the nation back on track; but just like the citizens in Nehemiah 3:5, Americans have likewise found that most of today’s academics are like the “nobles who would not put their shoulders to the work.” Indeed, far too many scholars, rather than helping restore the nation, insist on destroying American Exceptionalism – on teaching students why they should apologize for America rather than appreciate it. But most Americans today definitely do not agree with these academic elitists – which is why the published attacks of Throckmorton et. al. do not sell well but books like The Jefferson Lies do.

For those who may have been influenced by seeing a negative critique of The Jefferson Lies, I urge you to read the book yourself, examine its 756 footnotes, and allow Jefferson to speak on his own behalf. I predict that if you do, you will be persuaded by the abundance of primary source documentation and will quickly see through the shallow motives behind the critics’ self-serving and disingenuous attacks.

Endnotes

¹ See, for example, “How many copies does an average university press book sell?” Political Science Job Rumors (accessed on July 9, 2012); “Sales Statistics,” How Publishing Really Works, March 17, 2009; Steven Piersanti, “The 10 Awful Truths about Book Publishing,” Berrett-Koehler Publishers, July 26, 2007; etc.

² Warren Throckmorton and Michael Coulter, Getting Jefferson Right: Fact Checking Claims about Our Third President (Grove City, PA: Warren Throckmorton, 2012), “On getting American history wrong.”

³ David Barton, The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You’ve Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2012), xix.

⁴ Throckmorton and Coulter, Getting Jefferson Right (2012), “On getting American history wrong.”

⁵ Warren Throckmorton and Michael Coulter, “The Book David Barton Doesn’t Want You To Read,” Religion Dispatches, June 11, 2012.

⁶ Barton, The Jefferson Lies (2012), 71.

⁷ Throckmorton and Coulter, Getting Jefferson Right (2012), “Did Jefferson provide missionaries to the Kaskaskia Indians?”

⁸ Barton, The Jefferson Lies 2012), 136.

⁹ Throckmorton and Coulter, Getting Jefferson Right (2012), “Did Jefferson sign presidential documents “In the Year of Our Lord Christ?”

¹⁰ Barton, The Jefferson Lies (2012), 68.

¹¹ Throckmorton and Coulter, Getting Jefferson Right (2012), “Most Beautiful Production of Its Nature Hitherto Seen.”

¹² See, for example, “Art by the Book,” The Age, July 22, 2006; “Phillis Wheatley,” Answers.com (accessed on July 11, 2012); Richard Gray, A History of American Literature (West Sussex: Blackwell Publishers, 2012), 155; “A Pair of Albums, Each Titled ‘Sketches of Custome by Coke Smyth,’ Containing Original Watercolours,” AbeBooks.com, book description for John Richard Coke Smyth, A Pair of Albums, Each Titled Sketches of Costume, 1835, accessed on July 11, 2012; “William Hogarth Biography,” Hogarth Biography, accessed on July 11, 2012; and many others.

¹³ Richard Baxter, The Reasons of the Christian Religion (London: R. White, 1667), 530.

¹⁴ “Clay S. Jenkinson,“ Wikipedia, accessed on July 6, 2012.

¹⁵ Barton, The Jefferson Lies (2012), 61-63, quoting Thomas Jefferson, Memoirs, Correspondence, and Miscellanies, ed. Thomas Jefferson Randolph (Boston: Gray and Bowen, 1830), 2:216-218.

¹⁶ Barton, The Jefferson Lies (2012), 73, 80.

¹⁷ Clay S. Jenkinson, “Review of David Barton’s Book The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You’ve Always Believed about Thomas Jefferson,” The Thomas Jefferson Hour, June 3, 2012.

¹⁸ Alan Pell Crawford, “A Still Unsettling Founding Figure,” The Wall Street Journal, April 13, 2012.

¹⁹ Alan Pell Crawford, “A Still Unsettling Founding Figure,” The Wall Street Journal, April 13, 2012.

* This article concerns a historical issue and may not have updated information.