Why do you think Conservatives imagine themselves akin to the founders?

Maybe because their ideals are based on the original ideals of the founders, whether or not modern conservatism reflects the roots.

Delusions of grandeur?

…progressive actions and writings of the founders…historical progressive action…

What do you mean?

@bkcunningham
Democracy, rebellion against monarchy, rejection of the divine right of kings.

@bkcunningham taking the property of the British landholders, dividing it up and giving it to peasant farmers, does not seem like modern conservatism to me. Ending Christian theocratic dominance does not seem like modern Conservative religious thought.

That is my problem. I do not fathom why modern conservatives see any link in their beliefs to those of the founders.

It’s just political posturing. The imagined endorsement of cultural heroes makes for powerful rhetoric—and rhetoric could not care less about trivial little things like historical accuracy.

That’s a really interesting question. I recently watched a movie where Bill Maher specifically pointed out with numerous quotes and historical references that our founding fathers were not especially Christian or religious men —yet most Americans don’t question it when the Religious Right lay claim to the founding fathers. It surprises me that no one is pointing out that facts don’t support their claims.

It sure seems like the Conservative Right likes to lay claim to the founding fathers and to claim that we’re a “Christian Nation” from our inception…but it appears to me that they’re twisting history to serve their purposes. Sure,our founding fathers intended for us to have religious freedom…but Conservatives seem to interpret “Religious Freedom” = “Ability to Push Christianity on Others”... which..um, doesn’t mean Religious Freedom to me.

I think it comes from this:
Conservatives who can so blithely twist the scriptures to suit their views (like, hey, let’s cherry pick some old testament verses to suit our purposes and say that being gay is wrong..when really the Bible is FAR more clear about Divorce being wrong and there is far less condemnation—basically NO condemnation of committed gay relationships in the Bible)..can just as easily twist historical stories to suit their beliefs.

Once you get used to taking advantage of people’s lack of in-depth knowledge in the Bible and Biblical history…and you become a master of being able to put a little kernel of the actual truth and then warp it with your own opinions..well, why not do it with history, too?

To me.. expecting someone to vote for you (I’m looking at you, Michelle Bachmann) because you “represent Christian values” is like saying you’d make a good car mechanic because you’ve read the book of Genesis.

Not really a conservative problem so much as American (or human), but it’s generally easier to imagine the founders as some fairly homogeneous group with few substantial differences that allowed them to be True Moralists, instead of a group of politicians that differed greatly on many Big And Important Issues, and that compromised a lot and played politics just as much as we do now.

@Aethelflaed I’m sorry, but your insistence on viewing the Founders as complex human beings has necessitated that we report you to the House Committee on Un-American Activities. ~

Who were these British landholders and what property was divided up and given it to peasant farmers, @Imadethisupwithnoforethought?

@bkcunningham we can start with the King I guess.

@SavoirFaire Yeah, I figured it would. That’s why I only say these things drunk…

As @Aethelflaed points out, considering that there was an incredible amount of dissention, disagreement, conflict, both personally and ideologically, among “the founders,” I don’t think any group, of any political bent, can claim to be “akin to the founders.” They were not a ideologically homogeneous bunch; all marching in unison.

Damn, I had to edit my comment to add the “As @Aethelflaed points out” when I realized she already said pretty much the same thing. I’ve got to read this threads more often.

Sam Adams, known as the “Father of the American Revolution” wrote: The Rights of the Colonists as Christians. . . . may be best understood by reading and carefully studying the institutes of the great Law Giver and Head of the Christian Church, which are to be found clearly written and promulgated in the New Testament.

Samuel Adams, The Life and Public Services of Samuel Adams, William V. Wells, editor (Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1865), Vol. I, p. 504.

“There was no anarchy. . . . The people of the North American union and of its constituent states were associated bodies of civilized men and Christians in a state of nature but not of anarchy. They were bound by the laws of God (which they all) and by the laws of the Gospel (which they nearly all) acknowledged as the rules of their conduct.

John Quincy Adams, An Address Delivered at the Request of the Committee of Arrangements for the Celebrating the Anniversary of Independence at the City of Washington on the Fourth of July 1821 upon the Occasion of Reading The Declaration of Independence (Cambridge: Hilliard and Metcalf, 1821), p. 28.

http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=2336

@bkcunningham I think you make valid points about these men. But as others have pointed out, and I am now thinking over, they were not unified in their thinking.

Why is it so important as a conservative to draw a line from their thinking to current political arguments?

Perhaps these conservatives you are talking about like to think they are joining in the unifiying voices of these diverse men who wrote the Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution and other documents from this time in America’s history.

@bkcunningham Those are interesting quotes, but I find it more revealing to see what the Founders actually put into law:

From the First Amendment to the United States Constitution:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.

And from the Treaty of Tripoli:

The Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.

Many of the Founders had religious beliefs, but that does not make them like modern conservatives. Most modern liberals also have religious beliefs, and both sides have their share of non-theistic and non-religious members. The majority of the Founders, however, were far more vigilant than the majority of conservatives when it comes to keeping religion out of the law. Some of the Founders may have believed that our society was best served by Christian beliefs, but they weren’t willing to codify those beliefs as a result. This is a distinct contrast with a significant number of modern conservatives.

When someone starts a post with ” I’m not trying to start a XXXXXXXX” that usually is exactly what they are trying to do.

@MollyMcGuire Do you think I was rude to BK?

As @SavoirFaire points out, whatever the “founding fathers” religious beliefs may have been, they had an opportunity to start and construct a nation, and a nation base on laws and the Constitution. They could have put God and religion into it all, they certainly had that option, but they made a conscious, deliberate choice to leave God, religion in general and Christianity in particular, out of the whole business, except for provisions constricting religion in government, not proscribing it. I believe Patrick Henry once stormed out of “the room,” I don’t recall the exact circumstances, upset and angry about the creation of “a godless Constitution.” Religion is conspicuous in it’s absence, when it comes to the Constitution and in the construction of our nation. That is what matters, not the founders personal beliefs, whatever they may have been.

As has been pointed out, it’s rhetoric and modern politics. To some degree I imagine at least some of the Founding Fathers would’ve agreed with modern day conservatives. On the flip side I know some of them would have agreed with modern-day liberals….. But for some reason conservatives like to paint themselves as the defenders of our history and country, and make everyone think that a group of guys who’ve been dead for over 200 years would side with them undoubtedly…. it makes for good politics.

Come Lord, Jesus, our guest to be and Bless this food Bestowed by Thee.

Now everybody forgive Fox Pews for destroying “The Grand Good Old Boys Party”, and the Country. I hope Karl Rove and everyone he’s ever touched can be healed.

Amen

@tedd Indeed. It’s a little like asking what Hippocrates would have said about AIDS. He may have been the “father of Western medicine,” but the medical issues we face today are quite removed from anything he could have imagined. Trying to find an unambiguous answer in his writings is simply a fool’s errand. His goal was to pass on a basic, but solid framework so that his successors could improve upon it as times changed and information accumulated.

The same thing is true of the Founders, of course. They left us a form of government that was forward-thinking and pliable, but not so easily changed that the merest whim could undo the whole thing. The Constitution is the result of serious deliberation by intelligent men, and we should be wary about altering it. Yet the Constitution was also passed on to us in the full knowledge that it would have to change with the times. If anything does the Founders a disservice, then, it is the obsequiousness with which some approach them.

Anybody else want to the “Short Bus” with me?