The American Founding Fathers And God

Read this at Skeptical Eye. A post titled, "We don't need conservatism" by Tom Mullen.

I'm not convinced the Founding Fathers weren't or didn't possess conservative tendencies. It's an interesting exercise tracing back the ideological lineage of the Founding Fathers. There's no shortage of debates about it in the blogosphere. They were very much a product of the Englightenment period and their whole political ethos, indeed Western culture, is based on liberal doctrines (not to be confused with the hacks at Huffington Post and other pseudo-liberal rags). However, they did, I submit, possess a mean classical conservative streak.

Take the concept of inalienable rights and how it relates to God. If privileges (driver's license, universal health care, education etc.) come from the government (and once upon a time Princes and Monarchs) and were subject to being revoked, then rights, which rank higher and are said to come with the sovereign individual at birth, come from a higher being - God.

Where it gets a little tougher to accept is the notion that the idea of freedom began and ended with the Founding Fathers. It didn't as the Magna Carta in 1215 proves. However, what they do deserve credit for is for building a nation that was the first to codify and defend such beliefs and values. Up until 1776, the world only knew of despots (enlightened or otherwise), Monarchs and other assortment of rulers. America was the first republic with a representative democracy predicated on the idea of freedom.

 I think the FF saw it that way. It may seem irrational, especially with the rise of atheism, to us these days but consider these:

"...We are not in a world ungoverned by the laws and power of a superior agent..." Thomas Jefferson

About the new nation. "...(The United States) seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency." George Washington

"...the Bible is the best book in the world. It contains more philosophy than all the libraries I have seen." John Adams

"Here is my Creed. I believe in one God, the Creator of the Universe. That he governs it by his Providence. That he ought to be worshipped..." Benjamin Franklin

"I believe in one God and no more..." Thomas Paine

"Statesmen my dear Sir, may plan and speculate for liberty, but it is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand." John Adams

"The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time." Jefferson

BUT, their believe in God didn't preclude them from coercing others into falling in line with their views nor did they believe it was the place of government to intrude on the rights of others to engage in their own beliefs:

"It does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty Gods, or no God." Jefferson.

"Government has no right to hurt a hair of the head of an Atheist for his Opinions. Let him have a care of his practices." John Adams.

"I have never attempted to make a convert, nor wished to change another's creed..." Jefferson.

Seems to me the FF were a far more pragmatic and tolerant bunch (despite obvious contradictions - they were slave owners) than the intolerant, hacks running modern governments. 

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Which, interestingly enough, leads me to the decision by Montreal police to allow Muslim women to wear a niqab (full veil) during a mugshot. Outside the idea that this decision befits a sketch on 'The Kids in the Hall,' it's best to distinguish between rights and privileges.

It is my contention this is not a person's right to bypass established law and order codes and rules where the public interest is at stake. The person may wear the niqab in public spheres and in the privacy of their own homes, but where one enters a contract with a host nation to benefit from the privileges bestowed upon them, it is reasonable to ask for conformity within reason in the interest of the collective.

It imparts little logic to photograph a person in full veil for passports, driver's license and other privileges. It's not intolerance nor is it a question of reasonable accommodation - nor should the idea of multiculturalism be permitted to confuse rights and privileges. If a secular, Christian citizen is asked to remove their ear rings for a pass port, then it stands to reason a Muslim woman should be expect to be asked to remove head gear.

I don't need law enforcement to give into political correctness. 

Then there's the whole issue of whether the niqab is an optional feature in Islam. From what I hear and read, the hijab is required but not the niqab.