When our last president was sworn into office, it marked the 42nd time Americans witnessed an orderly, peaceful and voluntary transfer of power and authority from one leader to another.

In the history of nations, that is a remarkable, unprecedented accomplishment. It is a testimony to the wisdom of the nation’s forefathers that the United States has enjoyed such a long, peaceful and prosperous history.

What principles were in the minds of the forefathers that allowed them to establish such a remarkably stable, farsighted system of government? On what values did they establish their new nation? An unbiased study of American history clearly shows that those values are based squarely on the book on which President George W. Bush placed his left hand as he took the oath of office—the Bible.

The United States was founded on Christian ideals and values, by men who were, for the most part, deeply religious.

The official oath of office as written by the founding fathers states: “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of the president of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

When George Washington was sworn in as the nation’s first president in 1789, he spontaneously added the words, “I swear, so help me God” and kissed the Bible. As near as historians can tell, every president since has followed Washington’s example in adding these words, “so help me God,” at the end of the presidential oath.

Growing disunity in the United States

Though you rarely read about it in today’s history books, the religious faith of the founding fathers guided their deliberations that formed the foundation of the United States’ legal system and established the standard by which they expected the nation to operate.

But today, rather than being the unifying glue that in past years bound the country and its leaders together, religion—especially living in accordance to the Bible—has become a point of division and contention.

The cabinet nominee who drew the sharpest criticism in Senate hearings, former Missouri governor and senator John Ashcroft, was denounced by a broad range of special-interest groups (and some senators) who argued that his Bible-based beliefs rendered him unfit for a position as the nation’s chief law-enforcement officer.

While many great things are taking place in the United States, and it remains the undisputed leader of the free world, we see many disturbing trends. What factors contributed to making this country great? But why does it seem we have now lost our way? Where are we going?

Building on the Bible

The greatness of the nation was once inseparably linked in its citizens’ minds with the nation’s purpose to God and the principles of morality and character taught in the pages of the Bible.

As delegates from the states met to craft a national constitution in the summer of 1787, Benjamin Franklin, governor of Pennsylvania, addressed the group: “If a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His [God’s] notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the Sacred Writings, that ‘except the Lord build the House, they labor in vain that build it.’”

Franklin then called on the group to offer regular, daily prayer to ask for God’s assistance and blessings in their deliberations (William Federer, America’s God and Country Encyclopedia of Quotations, 1996, pp. 248-249).

Presidents and politicians routinely made mention of God and biblical principles in their public statements. In 1778 James Madison, one of the primary architects of the Constitution and a future president of the United States, remarked: “We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it. We have staked the future of all of our political institutions ... upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves ... according to the Ten Commandments of God” (Federer, p. 411, emphasis added throughout).

The founders of the United States clearly wanted God’s blessing on their endeavor and recognized God’s laws. They knew the nation’s success and greatness would come in proportion to the favor God granted them.

Regrettably, we seldom find such statements by the founding fathers in modern history books. Most have been carefully expunged. But when you do find them, they reveal the thoughts and beliefs that motivated these men. Let’s notice a few such comments: Patrick Henry, member of the Continental Congress and five-time governor of Virginia, declared: “It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded ... by Christians; not on religions [i.e., denominations], but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ” (Federer, p. 289).

John Adams, member of the Continental Congress and second president of the United States, remarked: “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and a religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other” (Federer, pp. 10-11).

His son, John Quincy Adams, the sixth president, stated: “... The Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer’s mission upon earth ... it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity ...” (Federer, p. 18).

These men were bold and outspoken in declaring that the United States and its government were founded on Christian principles and beliefs. They were not the only ones.

Political science professors at the University of Houston assembled 15,000 writings from the founding fathers in a research project that lasted 10 years. They isolated 3,154 direct quotes cited by the founding fathers. They discovered that they quoted from the Bible four times more often than any other source.

More than a third of their quotes came directly from the Bible. Another 60 percent of their quotes were taken from men like William Blackstone (who wrote the then-standard text on law) who had used the Bible in their conclusions. All told, they found that 94 percent of their quotes had some biblical foundation!

Government modeled after the Scriptures

The Bible and its principles were integral to the thinking and acting of the majority of our founding fathers. It even influenced the structure of the government.

For example, historical sources show that the founding father’s concept of three branches of government was inspired by Isaiah 33:22: “For the LORD is our Judge, the LORD is our Lawgiver, the LORD is our King ...” From this they derived the idea for judicial, legislative and executive branches of government.

Their inspiration for separation of powers into three equal branches of government also came from Jeremiah 17:9: “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” (New International Version). Recognizing what the Bible said about the condition of the human heart, they did not want to vest too much power in the hands of one man or a small group.

They even decreed that government should exempt churches and religious organizations from taxation based largely on Ezra 7:24: “... You have no authority to impose taxes, tribute or duty on any of the priests, Levites, singers, gatekeepers, temple servants or other workers at this house of God” (NIV). The Congressional Record of Sept. 25, 1789, showed that a discussion of 2 Chronicles 6—Solomon’s dedication of the temple—led to declaring the first Thanksgiving holiday.

John Quincy Adams said in 1821 that “the highest glory of the American Revolution was this; it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity” (Federer, p. 18).

The United States Supreme Court, in a decision in an 1892 case, declared: “Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teachings of the Redeemer of mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise; and in this sense and to this extent our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian” (Federer, p. 599).

Their decision quoted 87 precedents, including quotes from the founding fathers, acts of the founding fathers and those of the congresses and state governments. At the end of the list, the justices said they could cite many more, but that 87 should be plenty to show that the nation’s laws must be based on and include the teachings of the Bible.

Separation of church and state?

Today, however, we’re told the founding fathers wanted separation of religious principles from our laws and the operation of our government. As we have seen, nothing could be further from the truth. These farsighted men knew that taking God out of the picture—separating religious principles from our government and society—would lead to disaster. President Washington, in his 1796 farewell address, reminded the people of what had brought success and warned the nation what must be done to continue it. Several of his warnings—points he considered essential for the nation’s future success—were overtly religious. He pointed out that the two foundations for political prosperity in America were religion and morality, and no one in America could ever be called a patriot “who should labor to subvert these great Pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and Citizens” (Federer, p. 661).

That statement alone makes it hard to reconcile today’s concept of the separation of church and state with the original path suggested by the “father” of our country.

The state of the union

Washington repeatedly mentioned God and the need for His blessing in his farewell address. A little more than 200 years later, Bill Clinton, in his farewell address, reflected on the condition of the nation and told the American people:

“You have made our social fabric stronger, our families healthier and safer, our people more prosperous ... Our families and communities are stronger ... Our economy is breaking records ... Incomes are rising across the board ... America is in a strong position to meet the challenges of the future ... [I’m] confident that America’s best days lie ahead.”

No doubt the United States is a more prosperous nation today than a decade ago. The nation has seen the greatest economic growth in history over recent years. And while the economy has slowed, it remains an enormously powerful economic engine. America’s people enjoy one of the highest standards of living in history.

But what of our social fabric? What of our families? Are they indeed healthier today, as former president Clinton claimed? While it is needful for a leader to sound a positive and hopeful tone, we should also ask what this hopefulness is based on. Without God in the picture, truly that is a hope built on sand.

Where does God fit in the picture in today’s society? Regrettably, He is relegated to the churches, and not even allowed out in public.

As recently as 1957 an act of Congress made “in God we trust” our national motto. Today we can’t imagine such a proposal coming to the floor of Congress, much less being accepted. A similar motto adopted by the state of Ohio, “With God all things are possible,” was declared unconstitutional because, said one of the ruling judges, it was “an endorsement of the Christian religion.”

What has happened? How have we moved so far, from a time when debates on the floor of the Congress, and even arguments before the Supreme Court, were settled by references to Scripture, to the present, where even alluding to the Bible is cause for having a case thrown out of court?

Have the courts’ decisions to change national policy and separate God’s principles from its rulings had any effect on the course of our country?

One of the warnings George Washington listed in his farewell address was this: “... Let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion ... Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle” (Federer, p. 661).

Did Washington’s prediction prove true in regard to morality? If we take the 1963 Supreme Court decision removing Bible classes and religious instruction from public schools as the point at which religious principles were effectively separated from our public and educational policy, what do we see? Statistics cited by David Barton in the 1993 video, “America’s Godly Heritage” show that among students, pregnancies of girls ages 10 to 14 increased 553 percent from 1963 to 1987, and births to unwed girls ages 15 to 19 have increased every year since 1963. Rates for both had been stable for decades before 1963. Infections of sexually transmitted diseases among high school students shot up 226 percent in only 10 years.

Among American families, divorce rates, which had been declining before 1963, begin to skyrocket, climbing 117 percent in 15 years. Single parent families are up 140 percent and unmarried couples living together up 536 percent.

In schools, Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores dropped each year for 18 consecutive years beginning in 1963. Today there is an 80-point difference in average SAT scores compared to 1941 (we’ve used the same test since then).

In American society, violent crimes are up 794 percent.

Which way is better?

Jeremiah 6:16 has good advice: “Thus says the LORD: ‘Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, where the good way is, and walk in it; then you will find rest for your souls. But they said, “We will not walk in it.”’”

The Pennsylvania and Vermont constitutions required that “each member [of the legislature], before he takes his seat, shall make and subscribe the following declaration ...: ‘I do believe in one God, the Creator and Governor of the universe, the rewarder of the good, and punisher of the wicked ...” (Federer, p. 504, 623). In other words, it was a public proclamation that a politician acknowledged that he wouldn’t answer only to voters—he would be accountable to God for what he had done in office. Other state constitutions were similar. This was consistent with the first amendment because it did not require membership in a specific denomination.

People and nations accountable to God

It was clear to the founding fathers that an individual would answer to God. But they believed that a nation also would answer to God! On the floor of the constitutional convention in 1787, the difference between individual and national accountability was explained. An individual answers to God in the future, in the resurrection. But when a nation dies, it is forever dead. So when does a nation answer to God? Virginia delegate George Mason, known as the father of the Bill of Rights, explained: “As nations cannot be rewarded or punished in the next world, so they must be in this. By an inevitable chain of causes and effects, Providence punishes national sins, by national calamities” (Federer, p. 423). The founders felt a nation would directly answer to God for its sins and rejection of its Creator.

As students of the Scriptures, they understood its many lessons. They knew God was patient with the kingdom of Israel for more than 200 years. They understood that He was patient with the kingdom of Judah even longer. But eventually the day of reckoning arrived. They wanted the United States to be a Christian nation—in substance, not just in name only—to forestall a similar day of reckoning.

The prophet Daniel was no stranger to the rise and fall of kingdoms. He lived through the fall of the kingdom of Judah and the downfall of mighty Babylon. God prophesied through him that, at the end of this age, “there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation, even to that time” (Daniel 12:1).

Other biblical prophecies detail the rise of new international powers—and the fall of existing powers, including the United States and other English-descended nations.

Jesus Christ similarly predicted that the time of the end will be marked by “great distress, unequalled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again.” He explained what that meant: Unless that time of world upheaval and terror is cut short, no living thing will survive (Matthew 24:21-22).

God is patient both with people and nations, “not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). When we consider whether we are still “one nation under God,” we would do well to heed not only the warnings of the founding fathers and biblical prophets, but also the lessons of history. Separation of Church and State?

The first amendment of the U.S. Constitution states: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof ...”

The first 10 amendments, known as the Bill of Rights, were adopted by the first U.S. Congress in 1791. The first amendment went through extensive discussions and nearly a dozen drafts. They show the intent of the founding fathers—that they didn’t want one denomination running the nation. They did, however, believe Christianity and biblical principles should be a part of American life.

The courts clearly recognized this. For example, in a unanimous 1799 decision, the Maryland Supreme Court declared: “By our form of government, the Christian religion is the established religion; and all sects and denominations of Christians are placed on the same equal footing, and are equally entitled to protection in their religious liberty” (William Federer, America’s God and Country Encyclopedia of Quotations, 1996, p. 422).

In 1801 a Danbury, Connecticut, Baptist church wrote to President Thomas Jefferson after hearing a rumor that Congregationalism was to be made the national religion. Jefferson wrote back assuring them that the first amendment built “a wall of separation between church and state.”

For a century and a half, the clear understanding of the first amendment was that it prohibited establishing a single national denomination. It was to keep government out of religion, not the other way around. Policies and rulings reflected that understanding.

For example, in 1854 a report of the House of Representatives judiciary committee stated: “At the time of the adoption of the Constitution and its amendments, the universal sentiment was that Christianity should be encouraged, but not any one sect [denomination] ... In this age, there is 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” (David Barton, America’s Godly Heritage video, 1993).

The same committee later stated that “the great vital and conservative element in our system [the component that conserves and holds our system together] is the belief of our people in the pure doctrines and the divine truths of the Gospel of Jesus Christ” (Barton).

In the 1870s a group tried to have specific Christian principles removed from government. The courts cited Jefferson’s letter not to support that removal, but to prove that it was permissible to maintain Christian values, practices and principles in official policy. For the next 15 years during that controversy, the courts used Jefferson’s letter to insure that Christian principles remained a part of government.

Jefferson’s letter was then largely ignored until 1947 when, in the case of Everson v. Board of Education, the U.S. Supreme Court quoted Jefferson’s letter. However, they only quoted his phrase about separation of church and state, not the context. They wrote: “The first amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable.”

This was a new philosophy for the courts. The phrase began to be used repeatedly as an indication of the wishes and intent of the founding fathers. In 1962 the Supreme Court made its first ruling (Engel v. Vitale) which completely separated Christian principles from education when it struck down school prayer. The case was over the use of a voluntary, 22-word nondenominational prayer in school: “Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers and our country.”

This prayer only acknowledged God once. It didn’t mention Jesus Christ. The prayer acknowledged God as many times as the Pledge of Allegiance. The Declaration of Independence acknowledges God four times. But somehow this prayer was unconstitutional!

In this 1962 case the court redefined the meaning and application of the word “church.” Before this time the court had defined “church” as being a federally established denomination. Observes David Barton: “Now the word was redefined to mean any religious activity performed in public. Now the first amendment would not simply prohibit establishing a federal denomination, it would prohibit religious activities in public settings.”

School prayer was the first casualty of this new definition. Engel v. Vitale was the first case in Supreme Court history to use zero court precedents! Within 12 months, in two more court cases, they removed Bible classes and religious instruction from public schools. In explaining their reasoning, the court stated: “If portions of the New Testament were read without explanation, they could be and ... had been psychologically harmful to the child ...” (Barton). This was the second time in a year that the court issued a ruling without any legal precedent being cited for its decision.

The courts continued to expand their “separation” doctrine in subsequent years. In 1967 the court even declared a four-line nursery rhyme unconstitutional in a kindergarten class. Why? Because, though the word “God” was not mentioned, if someone were to hear the rhyme he might think it was talking about God. So out it went.

Subsequent court rulings have gone so far as to declare it unconstitutional for a copy of the Ten Commandments to hang in a school hallway and for teachers to have a Bible visible on their desks. We increasingly no longer have freedom of religion, but rather freedom from religion.