The Founding Fathers and the Debate Over Religion in Revolutionary America: A History in Documents

Whether America was founded as a Christian nation or as a secular republic is one of the most fiercely debated questions in American history. Historians Matthew Harris and Thomas Kidd offer an authoritative examination of the essential documents needed to understand this debate. The texts
included in this volume - writings and speeches from both well-known and obscure early American thinkers - show that religion played a prominent yet fractious role in the era of the American Revolution.

In their personal beliefs, the Founders ranged from profound skeptics like Thomas Paine to traditional Christians like Patrick Henry. Nevertheless, most of the Founding Fathers rallied around certain crucial religious principles, including the idea that people were created equal, the belief that
religious freedom required the disestablishment of state-backed denominations, the necessity of virtue in a republic, and the role of Providence in guiding the affairs of nations. Harris and Kidd show that through the struggles of war and the framing of the Constitution, Americans sought to
reconcile their dedication to religious vitality with their commitment to religious freedom.


Author: Matthew Harris
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Published: 11/11/2011
Pages: 206
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.45lbs
Size: 8.10h x 5.40w x 0.60d
ISBN: 9780195326505

Review Citation(s):
Choice 04/01/2012

About the Author

Matthew L. Harris is Associate Professor of History and Director of the Graduate Program in History at Colorado State University-Pueblo.

Thomas S. Kidd is Associate Professor of History at Baylor University and Senior Fellow at the Institute for Studies of Religion. He is the author of God of Liberty: A Religious History of the American Revolution (2010) and other books.

This title is not returnable