Founders: Great Men. Not Gods.
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One of the ideas that Glenn Beck cultists and Tea Party attendees have championed in the last year or so is the perfection of the founding fathers. It’s a convenient trope for people who are – after supporting eight years of Bush – suddenly very concerned at the supposed harm Obama and the Democrats are doing to the constitution.
Putting aside that fantasy (Obama and the Dems have hewed probably too close to the old way of doing things than anything, allowing GOP procedural roadblocks to work in concert with the whims of conservative Democrats to halt the legislative process), the fetishism of the founders ignores important history.
Were they brave and bold, standing up to the British Empire and declaring independence? Absolutely. And the form of government they championed turns out to be among the world’s best and most durable (I would say the best).
But America was flawed at the founding. These brave and brilliant men owned other human beings and kept the levers of power away from women and those who weren’t wealthy landowners. From its inception the reality of America has not lived up to the ideals laid out in its founding documents.
Our history has been a constant struggle of moving towards the realization of that goal. But we do a disservice to our history when we act as if the America the founders created was perfect at its conception. It ignores the struggles of those who improved upon the founder’s foundations, and the strides we’ve made – progressive strides – towards a better America.
The founders were great men. The likes of which the world had never seen. And we were lucky for them to intersect at that time and that place. But they were men, not gods, and imperfect.
33 Responses to “Founders: Great Men. Not Gods.”
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One of the ideas that Glenn Beck cultists and Tea Party attendees have championed in the last year or so is the perfection of the founding fathers.
Except Jefferson, that godless bastard!
Cons think the civil rights movement is the worst thing that ever happened to America
Evidently the Glenn Becker’s of the world don’t see slave ownership nor suffrage restrictions as a bad thing.
If I may quote from one of my favorite musicals/movies of all time, 1776, from the final scene of the intense negotiations (and deal making, and arm twisting!!) to get representatives to sign on to the Declaration of Independence – Thomas Jefferson, Edward Rutledge, John Adams and Ben Franklin discuss the removal of the public option, er, the removal of the clause condemning slavery in order to win the votes of the South. Franklin, the pragmatist (P.T.D.B.!) feels the slavery clause must go, and Adams (the Firebagger) disagrees…
Never thought I’d say this, but I wish the South’s representatives today were as reasonable as the slaveowner Ned Rutledge!
I wonder why it is so important for liberals to write these things? Let me ask you: Where on earth would you have found, in 1776, ” … brave and brilliant men … ” who did not own other human beings? Where were “the levers of power” handed over to women or “those who weren’t wealthy landowners”?
Nowhere at all.
Next, you’ll be saying that if they had only included Universal Health Care in the Bill of Rights, then they would have been perfect.
Damn good article.
…the struggles of those who improved upon the founder’s foundations, and the strides we’ve made – progressive strides – towards a better America.
Progressive strides indeed but so painfully slow. The progress we have made to date should have happened in the first fifty years. Progress is such a long and difficult struggle because of the dead weight the rest of us have to pull along.
Next, you’ll be saying that if they had only included Universal Health Care in the Bill of Rights, then they would have been perfect.
Frank, did you hear a whizzing sound when you wrote this?
It was Oliver’s point sailing right over your head.
Fafaroo: I often find it prudent not to humor Oliver when his mind goes a-wandering, like when he makes up a story about conservatives making Gods of the Founding Fathers, or even more laughable, the idea that “the Dems have hewed probably too close to the old way of doing things than anything…”
I ‘got’ his point, but I was ignoring it.
But it’s always better to criticize me than to address the issue, isn’t it?
like when he makes up a story about conservatives making Gods of the Founding Fathers
Go to any teabag rally. Turn on Beck. It’s all founding father fetishism nowadays on the right.
who did not own other human beings
Not all the founders owned slaves, did they?
Where were “the levers of power” handed over to women or “those who weren’t wealthy landowners”
As others have pointed out, the point sailed right over your head. There weren’t any democratic republics of significance at the time either, were they? The ideas in the declaration and constitution were… revolutionary. Yet your argument is, we should ok the injustices because that was happening everywhere at the time. But yet, nobody else was doing what we were doing.
How is it possible for you to reach the keyboard under all that BS?
When I taught American history to high school kids we’d show that movie on the bus on our way to Philadelphia for our annual field-trip.
Good times.
Had now idea what a sex-machine Jefferson was.
Theocracies were not a new idea in 1776. If the Founding Fathers had wanted to establish America as an explicitly Christian nation they could have done so right in the Constitution. It’s not that hard, really. Iran and Saudi Arabia have done it.
But they didn’t, because even though many of them were Christian, they were all deeply aghast at the violence and corruption of the established churches in Europe (Roman Catholicism and the Anglican Church).
On whole, they were pretty brilliant guys even if their primary motivation was to avoid paying taxes. And the idea that you can understand American history without grappling with the complexity of a great thinker like Jefferson is only valid in a back-water like Texas.
…like when he makes up a story about conservatives making Gods of the Founding Fathers …”
Oliver mentioned Beck and Tea Partiers.
So tell me, Frank, what religion is Glenn Beck?
Because Mormons do, in fact, believe that the Constitution was divinely inspired and that God used the Founding Fathers as his instruments on earth
instrument:
And as for the tea partiers, here’s the immortal, if paraphrased, words of Dick Armey, speaking at the National Press Club:
http://npc.press.org/wire/article.cfm?id=1986
Would you care to rephrase your comment now, Frank?
In other words, Frank, I often find it prudent to just call you an idiot and move on.
My suggestion to everyone is to look through Don’t Know Much About History. Its not your standard textbook fare and it really gets to history, warts and all. Its kinda the point of the book and what is great about history. To much of our history is built on hero worship which clouds children’s learning.
Of course children like Glen Beck have bought into the hero worship stuff. I think if Oliver sent that picture with the Tiger fighting George Washington, he might just believe its true.
I find the radio show “The Thomas Jefferson Hour” (now available in podcast form!) to be a very good cure for the “Founding Fathers are Gods” myth. Clay Jenkinson is a Jefferson scholar, and he speaks as Jefferson off the cuff to modern-day listener’s questions. And it’s very clear that Jefferson a) has a distinct point of view, b) was dead wrong on some things [what those things are depends on your point of view, and c) was a guy trying to survive in a world and made some brilliant moves, some terrible choices, and some acts of idiocy. In olden times, the world was just as messy and just as confusing as it is today.
Good stuff.
But … but … they battled tigers on boats! I saw it on the Internets!
A.
Where on earth would you have found, in 1776, ” … brave and brilliant men … ” who did not own other human beings?”
John Adams, Sam Adams, Alexander Hamilton, and Thomas Paine were not slavers.
“Inspired by God” is only equal to God in the funny time world of Fafaroo, coming to a blog near you — soon!
You know, Fafaroo, the only thing worse than calling someone an idiot when they are not one, is when you are one.
Once you wander into the quicksand of the “imperfect Founding Fathers” (as if there is anyone, anywhere, who believes they were infallible), you have nowhere to go but down.
So, I repeat the question to which no answer will ever come : I wonder why it is so important for liberals to write these things?
Because cons are making a concerted effort to rewrite history and those of us who care about it refuse to stand for it.
Conservatives like Beck, etc. are in the business right now of founding father fetishism and its worth pointing out that they’re fallible.
I wonder why it is so important for liberals to write these things?
Because the founders knew they weren’t Gods since they left the constitution open to revision, even doing so themselves. The debate is over the amount of revision which changing times and learned experience over the years may or may not require. It’s a “liberal” thing – always looking for a better way.
Glenbeckians cannot only imagine better ways, they appear unable to discern if anything complicated is even broken or not.
That being the case, then I would have thought that a few examples of “Founding Father fetishism” would be in order, rather than “Founding Father Fallibility”.
I find it funny that many of these people who see the founders as flawless paragons of human existence do so in contradiction to their own supposed religious beliefs which suggest that humanity itself is flawed (sinful) to its very core (Ecclesiastes 7:20, Proverbs 20:9 and Psalms 130:3 to name just a few scripture verses that show this). So, they simply ignore the scripture (allegedly the basis for everything this country stands for and was founded upon) where it says no one is without sin? Just way too many inconsistencies here to even tabulate.
Where on earth would you have found, in 1776, ” … brave and brilliant men … ” who did not own other human beings?”
Boston?
Progress is such a long and difficult struggle because of the dead weight the rest of us have to pull along.
No offense, Frank et al.
I recommend the Cartoon History of the World.
It’s at least as credible as Joseph Smith and the Amazing Disappearing Golden Tablets.
Because cons are making a concerted effort to rewrite history and those of us who care about it refuse to stand for it.
And yet somehow, it’s Obama who’s the Stalinist.
“Inspired by God” is only equal to God in the funny time world of Fafaroo, coming to a blog near you — soon!
That’s awesome, Frank. Only what’s quoted in the text I linked to from the actual official LDS website are what the Mormons, and Glenn Beck, believe are the actual words of God:
You are the stupidest person who posts here. Bar none. Since Jay Tea packed up his trike and went home.
fafaroo… and you are the second most arrogant — mambochicken taking home the Golden Hubris. Only you could see your tenuous — yes, I said tenuous — connection between a citation from Mormon literature and an unproven , undemonstrated belief by Glen Beck that the Founding Fathers were “gods” or even ‘godlike’.
I am still waiting for any kind of evidence that Glen Beck or his “cultists”, or any “Tea Party attendees” hold the Founding Fathers to be “gods” or ‘godlike.’
Oh, yes, I forgot, sticks and stones may break my bones, but you’re a fuckin’ asshole.
It’s a subtle thing Frank, and you appear to need literalism.
No conservative would besmirch God by directly stating that the founders were gods. But within the belief continuum of Gods Great Men, conservative teabag cultists fall far more towards the “Gods” end than do liberals.
http://www.examiner.com/x-5738-Political-Buzz-Examiner~y2010m2d15-Video-Top-five-facts-Glenn-Beck-will-not-tell-you-about-the-Constitution-and-founding-fathers
In these two quotes, Beck insinuates that all progressivism is evil and that the founders only spoke truth:
Progressivism is the cancer in America and it is eating our Constitution, and it was designed to eat the Constitution, to progress past the Constitution. – G. Beck
the problem with schooling, public schooling is they are not teaching the truth anymore and our law schools are not even teaching the truth anymore. They are teaching case study. They are not teaching founding principles, what our founding fathers said. – B.Beck
He does not appear to want to debate his beliefs at all, but simply preach. This behavior implies that he sees the founders as godlike, and not merely great “classical liberal thinkers”, as many sane libertarians suggest.