University of Iowa
Iowa Research Online
Theses and Dissertations
Summer 2012
Varieties of religious Americanism: religion,
historical writing and political advocacy in the latenineteenth century
Annie Parker Liss
University of Iowa
Copyright 2012 Annie Parker Liss
This dissertation is available at Iowa Research Online: http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/3340
Recommended Citation
Liss, Annie Parker. "Varieties of religious Americanism: religion, historical writing and political advocacy in the late-nineteenth
century." PhD (Doctor of Philosophy) thesis, University of Iowa, 2012.
http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/3340.
Follow this and additional works at: http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd
Part of the History Commons
VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS AMERICANISMS: RELIGION, HISTORICAL
WRITING, AND POLITICAL ADVOCACY IN THE LATE-NINETEENTH
CENTURY
by
Annie Parker Liss
An Abstract
Of a thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of
Philosophy degree in History in the Graduate College of The University of Iowa
July 2012
Thesis Supervisors: Associate Professor Douglas C. Baynton
Professor Jeffrey L. Cox
1
ABSTRACT
Despite the prevailing rhetoric of religious liberty in the nineteenth century,
Protestant religious values dominated historical and public policy discourses. Histories
celebrated Anglo-Saxon Protestant triumphalism, while laws regarding blasphemy,
temperance, Sunday observance, polygamy, and religious instruction in public schools, as
well as the Federal Indian mission policy, amply demonstrated Protestant influence on
various levels of American government. My dissertation examines intersections of
religion, historical writing, and political advocacy in the late nineteenth century. I focus
my study on the Gilded Age (1865-1900) because of the importance American history
assumed during this time. American history became an established part of public school
curricula and university studies, and amateur and professional historical studies
flourished as individuals sought to understand and preserve American national identity. I
argue that historical writing by religious thinkers played a central role in the construction
of religious nationalisms in the late-nineteenth century, while also informing the public
policy position of their adherents. Using a case-study approach, I examine key thinkers
representing mainstream Protestantism, Roman Catholicism, Seventh-day Adventism,
Quakerism and Reform Judaism. These religious intellectuals wielded the new historical
sensibility to comment, from the perspective of their religious beliefs, on the nature of
American public and private institutions, immigration restriction, Sabbath laws, race
relations, and questions of war and pacifism. Their aim was to construct a vision of
America’s past, present, and future that would allow believers to wholeheartedly embrace
an American national identity without compromising their beliefs.
Current historical literatures on religion and nationalism criticize prevailing
Anglo-Saxon Protestant views of the nation in the Gilded Age yet frequently fail to
address how others in the period understood themselves and their place in American
2
society. In contrast, this study provides a balance of views including outsider
contributions to American political culture. Methodologically, a comparative and
thematic approach provides an analytical alternative to historical narratives that either
focus on dominant coherent narratives or those that present the “messy realities” of
American national culture. Moreover, in contrast to current historical literatures which
claim that marginalized religious groups in America constructed variant nationalisms
based on binary “insider” or “outsider” identities, I argue that these classifications
overlook significant subtleties. Finally, rather than simply focusing on “conflict” or
“exclusion,” this study demonstrates negotiation and participation. While strategic
choices varied, grounding national identity in history and theology ensured the
persistence of religious components in American political cultures.
Abstract Approved: ____________________________________
Thesis Supervisor
____________________________________
Title and Department
____________________________________
Date
____________________________________
Thesis Supervisor
____________________________________
Title and Department
____________________________________
Date
VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS AMERICANISMS: RELIGION, HISTORICAL
WRITING, AND POLITICAL ADVOCACY IN THE LATE-NINETEENTH
CENTURY
by
Annie Parker Liss
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy
degree in History in the Graduate College of The University of Iowa
July 2012
Thesis Supervisors: Associate Professor Douglas C. Baynton
Professor Jeffrey L. Cox
Copyright by
ANNIE PARKER LISS
2012
All Rights Reserved
Graduate College
The University of Iowa
Iowa City, Iowa
CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL
___________________________
PH.D. THESIS
____________
This is to certify that the Ph. D. thesis of
Annie Parker Liss
has been approved by the Examining Committee for the thesis requirement for the Doctor
of Philosophy degree in History at the July 2012 graduation.
Thesis Committee: _______________________________________________________
Douglas C. Baynton, Thesis Supervisor
_______________________________________________________
Jeffrey L. Cox, Thesis Supervisor
_______________________________________________________
Tom Arne Midtrod
_______________________________________________________
Colin Gordon
______________________________________________________
Raymond A. Mentzer
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
During my long and arduous journey of writing a dissertation, I have incurred
numerous debts to individuals who have provided invaluable support and assistance.
First, I would like to thank the teachers and mentors who inspired me to pursue a career
in history. My undergraduate advisors Betty Jo Wallace and Paul Conkin introduced me
to the thrill of historical studies by their passion and by challenging me intellectually.
Their high standards of teaching and scholarship were only exceeded by their compassion
and support for a struggling student who had discovered meaningful engagement with the
past in their classes.
I owe a tremendous debt to my graduate school mentors. I began this project
under the direction of Dwight Bozeman, whose close and careful readings of my
prospectus and early chapters were invaluable. The always excellent Jeff Cox has been a
mentor in the fullest sense of the word in my teaching and in my scholarship. Through
his high energy, sense of humor, and dedication to the highest teaching and research
standards he has inspired me to continually strive for excellence. As my co-advisor, he
has enthusiastically challenged me to critically review my research and writing, and has
gone above and beyond the call of duty in his attempts to improve my work. The always
generous Doug Baynton stepped into the role as my co-advisor with grace and aplomb in
the middle of my dissertation writing. Without his continual encouragement and support
it would have been impossible for me to finish.
For their research assistance, I offer my warm appreciation to the librarians and
archivists of the Philip Schaff Library at Lancaster Theological Seminary, the Andrews
University Archives at the Center for Adventist Research, the Special Collections
Research Center at Georgetown University, and Haverford College’s Quaker and Special
Collections (who were the “friendliest” archivists of all!).
ii
Many of my friends and colleagues have provided sympathy, advice, and read and
commented on chapters. I am grateful for the support of Margie Anderson, Meghan
Mettler, John McKerley, Matt Conn, Matt Gilchrist, Sabrina Sanchez and Daniel Tyx.
Moreover, my colleagues at the South Texas College History Department provided a
writing colloquium for those of us working on writing projects, and adapted my course
schedule and teaching load to allow time for research and writing.
I owe perhaps the most to those in my personal life who have borne more than
their share of the burdens of dissertation writing. The dissertation has been hanging over
my head for my entire married life, and my husband John Liss has unselfishly agonized
and rejoiced with me with every setback and mark of progress. My mother Linda Parker,
in addition to providing emotional support, accompanied me on research trips when I was
ill, and has tirelessly and cheerfully been a parent to my son while I was working. My
son Johnny entered my life during chapter three, and from the moment of his arrival he
refused to share me with my books or computer. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Every undivided moment we have spent together has been precious.
iii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................... 1
Selection of Sources ............................................................................... 3
Periodization ........................................................................................... 5
Theory ................................................................................................... 13
Historiography ...................................................................................... 15
Philip Schaff (1819-1893) and “Mainstream” Protestants ................... 24
John Shea (1824-1892) and Conservative Catholicism in
America ................................................................................................ 25
Uriah Smith (1832-1903) and Seventh-day Adventists ........................ 25
Simon Wolf (1836-1923) and Reformed Judaism ................................ 26
Isaac Sharpless (1848-1920) and Quakers ............................................ 27
Significance .......................................................................................... 28
CHAPTER
I. “VARIETY IN UNITY, UNITY IN VARIETY”: PHILIP SCHAFF’S
VISION OF AND ADVOCACY FOR A PROTESTANT MAJORITY .......... 30
Schaff’s History .................................................................................... 34
Schaff’s View of the Present ................................................................ 52
The Reunion of Christendom, 1893...................................................... 64
II. “GOOD CATHOLICS, GOOD CITIZENS”: JOHN SHEA’S
CATHOLIC CRITIQUES AND CLAIMS REGARDING AMERICA ............ 68
The Meaning of Religious Liberty and Citizenship in American
History .................................................................................................. 75
The Meaning of American Sunday Laws, Indian Missions, and
Religion in Public Institutions .............................................................. 86
Current Threats to America ................................................................ 109
Conclusion .......................................................................................... 114
III. “HUMAN LAWS VS. DIVINE”: URIAH SMITH AND
SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTIST OPPOSITION TO SUNDAY LAWS ........ 116
Millerite Backgrounds of Seventh-day Adventists Apocalyptic
Theology and Oppositional Identity ................................................... 120
Literature Review: Adventists as Outsiders and the Role of
Apocalyptic Beliefs in Their Identity Formation............................... 123
Smith’s Apocalyptic Writings ............................................................ 130
Adventists and Politics ....................................................................... 141
IV. “A BETTER AND MORE PATRIOTIC CITIZENSHIP”: SIMON WOLF
AND REFORMED JUDAISM IN AMERICA .............................................. 155
Wolf’s Historical Vision ..................................................................... 162
Wolf and the Present ........................................................................... 177
Wolf’s Early Lobbying ....................................................................... 178
Church and State ................................................................................. 180
Jews in Eastern Europe and Russia .................................................... 191
iv
Conclusion .......................................................................................... 208
V. “FRIENDLY IDEAS, AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS”: ISAAC
SHARPLESS’S QUAKER HISTORIES AND ADVOCACY FOR PEACE
IN AMERICAN POLITICS ............................................................................ 210
Histories of Penn’s Holy Experiment ................................................. 217
Quakers, Indians and Peace ................................................................ 225
Abolition: Equality, Peace and Citizenship ........................................ 230
American Revolution and Peace ......................................................... 233
Political Ideals .................................................................................... 237
Conclusion .......................................................................................... 249
CONCLUSION ...................................................................................................... 251
BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................. 258
v
1
INTRODUCTION
Humans do not create worlds of meaning ex nihilo. Out of lived and shared
experiences, people develop concepts and symbols to understand the world and their
place in it. National and religious ideologies are significant components of some
worldviews. Nationalism has fallen into moral disrepute among scholars, and is usually
portrayed as a raw means of attaining and legitimating power. Religious nationalism is
also viewed negatively as “pre-modern” or “extremist,” a conception of the world that
commands irrational obedience. However, exertion of control is not the only function that
these ideologies perform. Religious nationalisms must be polemical and persuasive
because they offer the benefit of possessing true understanding of the (socially
constructed) world. Examining intersections of religious and national ideas in latenineteenth historical and political writings, this dissertation demonstrates how
intellectuals “Americanized” their religious beliefs, and simultaneously infused faith into
nationalism. These ideologies created intellectual spaces that reconciled religious
adherence with national loyalty and called for specific actions to achieve distinctive
visions of America.
This dissertation analyzes multiple views of American religious and national
identities during the “Gilded Age” (1870-1910) by examining the works of five authors
who addressed intersections of religious, historical and political ideas. I focus my study
on the Gilded Age (1865-1900) because of the importance American history assumed
during this time. American history became an established part of public school curricula
and university studies, and amateur and professional historical studies flourished as
individuals sought to understand and preserve American national identity. The authors
who represented each of these groups articulated both critical and accommodationist
perspectives on late nineteenth century arguments regarding church and state relations.
Each addressed the meaning of religious liberty as central to America’s past, and relied
2
on interpretations of that past to assert their positions on current and future issues in
America. The dissertation argues that intellectual articulations of the past, present and
future role of these various religious groups created conceptual spaces for embracing an
American national identity and engaging in political activity without compromising
religious identity and beliefs.
Writing in 1885, notable American church historian Phillip Schaff enthused:
“America was predestined from the very beginning for the largest religious and civil
freedom.” Yet for Schaff, as for many American Protestants, Constitutional separation of
church and state did not diminish the Christian character of the nation. Despite the
prevailing rhetoric of religious liberty, Protestant religious values infused prominent
historical and public policy discourses. Nineteenth century histories celebrated AngloSaxon Protestant triumphalism, while laws regarding blasphemy, temperance, Sunday
observance, polygamy, and religious instruction in public schools, as well as the Federal
Indian mission policy, amply demonstrated Protestant influence on various levels of
American government.
The first chapter of my dissertation examines the historical writings of Philip
Schaff (1819-1893) to exemplify “mainstream” religious history. The four chapters that
follow detail “marginal” views of religious and national identities from historians within
religious traditions: John Shea, a Catholic; Uriah Smith, a Seventh-day Adventist; Simon
Wolf, a Reformed Jew; and, Isaac Sharpless, a Quaker. Each of these authors
emphasized American history and presented their religious group’s historical experience
as central to the development and character of America. Moreover, each advocated
particular public policies related to their religious and American identity. While utilizing
a Romantic and celebratory style, they included specific social and political criticisms of
certain aspects of American society and government. These dynamic combinations of
celebratory history and civic reform represented the integration of religious and national
ideals.
3
Selection of Sources
I chose to select authors who published during the Gilded Age because of the
proliferation of historical writing during the period, which was highly imaginative and in
the process of professionalization. Then, I looked for authors who dealt comprehensively
with America’s past, present, and future through the lens of their particular religious
tradition. Finally, I selected authors from various religious traditions to provide a range
of perspectives on American history and political culture. I opted for one author who is
considered representative of religious histories during the period, and four who are not.
The five authors surveyed provide a variety of particular perspectives on how certain
groups viewed their loyalties to religion vis-à-vis the nation. I have selected two authors
who came from religious denominations that were relatively new during the period,
having separated from older religious traditions in the first half of the nineteenth century:
Simon Wolf was a Reformed Jew and Uriah Smith was a Seventh-Day Adventist.
Reform Judaism was a liberal movement establishing itself as separate from Orthodox
Judaism, and Seventh-Day Adventism was a conservative movement establishing itself in
opposition to more prevalent branches of Protestantism. I have selected three additional
authors from long-standing religious traditions in America: Philip Schaff’s practical
efforts toward ecumenism place him on the liberal end of the spectrum within the
Reformed Protestant tradition; Isaac Sharpless’s adjudication of liberal and conservative
agendas at Haverford College place him as a moderate within Orthodox Quakerism; and
John Shea’s advocacy for cooperation between church and state in America demonstrate
his conservatism within Catholicism. Moreover, Schaff represents what current scholar
generally refer to as a “mainstream” religious group, while the other four authors
represent “marginalized” groups. The particular ways that each group perceived its
relation to the larger American society shaped the selected authors’ emphases in both
their historical writing and public policy positions.
4
Two regrettable exclusions from this project are the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter Day Saints (Mormons) and African American religious denominations. Because I
wished to examine intellectuals who made explicit connections between American
religion, history and politics, authors who focused on religious liberty in America’s past
and applied the lessons they drew in the present were my first choice. Mormons and
African Americans were more concerned with civil rights than religious rights during this
period. In the 1890s, Mormons renounced the central aspects of their religious
distinction and struggle for liberty – plural marriage and the theocratic structure of
politics in Utah – to obtain statehood.1 Wilford Woodruff, President of the church from
1889-1898 and official historian, was the articulator of the 1890 Manifesto that revoked
plural marriage. African American histories during the period emphasized racial
equality. For example, from African American and Baptist minister George Washington
Williams’ A History of Negro Race in America (1883) and Alexander Daniel Payne’s
History of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (1891) it is evident that the issue of
civil equality entirely eclipsed religious liberty in these volumes.2 While these are
fascinating and important stories of “outsiders” in American society at the time, their
struggles took them down a different path from those in my research. Because I am
interested in those who advocated a particular place for religion in history and politics at
the time, I have excluded these from my discussion.
1 R. Lawrence Moore, Religious Outsiders and the Making of Americans, (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1986), 42.
2 See George Washington Williams, A History of the Negro Race in America, (New York: Putnam and
Sons, 1883); Alexander Daniel Payne, History of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, (Nashville:
Publishing House of the A.M.E. Sunday-School Union, 1891).
5
Periodization
Historical writing and interpretations proliferated in the United States and Europe
during the nineteenth century.3 Registering the impact of the French and American
Revolutions, the industrial revolution, and large-scale social changes, nineteenth-century
American and European historians had a sharpened awareness of historical change.4 By
mid-century, the first archival collections were assembled and put to use.5 Nationalism
often provided a focus for the telos of history, although some writers emphasized
“liberty,” “democracy,” or “socialism.” The early years of colonization and American
independence received much emphasis in the story of nationalism, such that historian
Harry Elmer Barnes describes this period as “surrounded by a halo.”6 Regardless of their
conclusions, historians tended to emphasize some sort of progress, although a few
suggested decline.7
I am focusing my study of American history and identity on the Gilded Age, as
the nation experienced dramatic historical changes and an increased awareness of the
importance of history during this period. Industrialization, urbanization, immigration,
and expansionism altered the social, economic, and political face of the nation, and,
consequently, how its citizens perceived themselves.8 After the Civil War, a new
awareness of national history emerged in the public sphere, and American history became
3 Paul K. Conkin and Roland N. Stromberg, Heritage and Challenge: The History and Theory of History,
(Arlington Heights, Ill.: Forum Press, 1989), 64.
4 Ibid.
5 These archives tended to be national in Europe and local in the United States, see Ibid., 64.
6 Harry Elmer Barnes, A History of Historical Writing, (New York: Dover, 1963), 231.
7 Conkin and Stromberg, Heritage and Challenge, 69.
8 John A. Garraty, Introduction, The Transformation of American Society, 1870-1890, (Columbia, S.C.:
University of South Carolina Press, 1969), 1.
6
part of curricula in public schools across the country.9 The development of university
research seminars in history began in the 1870s, and American history classes became a
regular part of college coursework in the 1880s.10 The American Historical Association
was founded in 1884, and the American Society of Church History in 1888.
Additionally, Americans of Jewish, Irish, and Italian descent “and a whole host of other
minorities were then founding ‘historical societies’ to argue that men and women of their
kind, and not the Protestant settlers alone, had helped fashion America.”11 Indeed,
historians Conkin and Stromberg assert that “The fact that no movement or creed or
intellectual position was without its historical writings suggests the enormous authority
people accorded history in the nineteenth century.”12
In the early nineteenth century, American historians tended to write in a
‘Romantic’ style. Characterized by emotional and dramatic rhetoric, romantic histories
also emphasized the unique and organic development of national cultures.13 As history
developed into an academic profession toward the end of the nineteenth century, a
“scientific” style became more prevalent. The scientific style was iconoclastic and
revisionist, emphasized observable evidence, and rejected a priori approaches –historians
mimicked the methods of natural sciences and used a sparse “objective” tone.14 The
9 Michael Kraus and David D. Joyce, The Writing of American History, (Norman: University of Oklahoma
Press, 1985), 136.
10 Henry Warner Bowden, Church History in the Age of Science: Historiographical Patterns in the United
States, 1876-1918, (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1971) 7, 11.
11 Arthur Hertzberg, The Jews in America: Four Centuries of an Uneasy Encounter: A History, (New
York: Simon and Schuster, 1989), 179. Regarding the flourishing of historical societies and archives, see
Krauss and Joyce, The Writing of American History, 137.
12 Conkin and Stromberg, Heritage and Challenge, 83.
13 Bowden, Church History in the Age of Science, 43; and Harry Elmer Barnes, A History of Historical
Writing, (New York: Dover Publications, rep. 1962 [1937]) 178-179.
14Kraus and Joyce, The Writing of American History, 136-137; Bowden, Church History in the Age of
Science, xiii.
7
romantic style remained dominant in popular histories and both styles were present in the
academy into the twentieth century. 15 Despite clear aesthetic differences, both styles are
teleological by today’s historical standards. Bowden notes that nineteenth century
scientific historians, despite their restraint in expression, revisionist mode, and
meticulous use of sources, simply presented narratives of the inevitable rise and
flourishing of Anglo-Saxon culture in America rather than “Providence” in shaping
America’s history.16
While current historians analyze late-nineteenth century historical writing in
terms of how it reinforced the status quo through patriotic and sentimental appeals, the
authors I examine used similar appeals to advocate for change. Shirley Samuels has
recently suggested a model for exploring uses of sentimental rhetoric. According to
Samuels, sentimentality in nineteenth-century America was not just a “genre” or
superficial construction, but a rhetorical mode that used emotional appeals to achieve
connections across race, class, and gender boundaries.17 Samuels concludes that
sentimental rhetoric is critical to the understanding of American national culture in the
nineteenth century.18 In this study, I will examine how the authors’ use of sentimental
rhetoric served their purposes of bridging the gap between their religious and national
identities. The authors I examine couched their critiques and political claims in
celebratory and patriotic language.
15 Kraus and Joyce, The Writing of American History, 136; Julie Des Jardins, Women and the Historical
Enterprise in America: Gender, Race, and the Politics of Memory, 1880-1945, (Chapel Hill: University of
North Carolina Press, 2003), 6; Joyce Appleby, Lynn Hunt, and Margaret Jacobs, Telling the Truth About
History (New York: Norton, 1994) chap. 2, 52-53; Peter Novick, That Noble Dream: The “Objectivity
Question” and the American Historical Profession (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 21.
16 Bowden, Church History in the Age of Science, 22.
17 Shirley Samuels, ed., The Culture of Sentiment: Race, Gender, and Sentimentality in NineteenthCentury America, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), 6.
18 Ibid., 8.
8
When scholars of American religion discuss the power of mainstream
Protestantism in the late nineteenth century, a number of topics make the top of the list.
These include Sunday laws, religious instruction in public schools, missions to Native
Americans, the proposal for a Constitutional Amendment acknowledging God in 1874,
and the Supreme Court decision in Holy Trinity Church v United States (1892) that
defined America as a Christian nation. These issues represented the beliefs of many that
America was a Christian (Protestant) nation, and raised lively debates about religious
liberty from those who disagreed. The section below outlines some of the details of these
movements in America to provide historical context for the debates in the chapters.
Sunday laws had been on the books in America since colonial times, but by the
mid-nineteenth century they long had been regarded as “dead letters.”19 A number of
Sabbath Committees formed in the mid and late nineteenth century, such as the New
York Sabbath Committee (1857-1905), lobbied to revive and enforce these laws.
Sabbatarian rhetoric took a variety of forms. One prominent argument appealed to
anxieties about Americanizing immigrants, who spent their “continental Sabbath”
drinking and gambling.20 Some nineteenth century advocates promoted Sunday as a
secular holiday, and labor reformers (even Samuel Gompers, the Jewish leader of the
American Federation of Labor) promoted such legislation as a way to prevent
overworking laborers.21 Other Sabbatarian arguments appealed to the role of Sunday
laws in preserving America’s cultural heritage. For example, a New York Times report
(1881) on a speech by the Secretary of the New York Sabbath Committee noted that “An
eminent legal authority says that a nation has a right to its customary institutions as it has
19 Sidebar, New York Times (1857-Current file); January 1, 1883, 1; Proquest Historical Newspapers The
New York Times (1851-2003), p. 1.
20 See Batya Miller, “Enforcement of the Sunday Closing Laws on the Lower East Side, 1882-1903,”
American Jewish History 91:2 (2003), 272.
21 Ibid., 281.
9
a right to its development, for they are the very form of its reason, and it must act
according to them. A main purpose of government is to protect and enforce them.”22
Customary institutions, in this case, referred to Protestant Christian institutions. The
Sunday law movement reached its apex in the late 1880s when Senator Henry W. Blair of
New Hampshire twice introduced a National Sunday Rest bill in Congress (neither bill
passed). Moreover, when Chicago hosted the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893,
Protestant leaders lobbied for a Sunday closing of the exposition which was written into
the enabling legislation. After some conflict, the fair was open on Sundays, although
most exhibits were closed.23
In early America, religious instruction was considered a vital aspect of school
curriculum and it was frequently, especially in New England, doctrinal in nature. The
Bible was used in schools because it was central to Protestant beliefs, and because it was
the most common and accessible printed text.24 However, during the antebellum era,
Horace Mann’s work on the Board of Education in Massachusetts served as a model for
other states to follow. A textbook law in 1827 banned a great deal of religious literature
in classrooms as a way of countering sectarian schooling. Yet, Mann and other
educational reformers remained dedicated to keeping Bible reading as part of education.
Read without commentary or doctrinal interpretation, many believed that sola scriptura,
the doctrine underlying Protestantism, would impart virtues and religious values to
students without raising doctrinal issues. However, the Protestant Bible was not the
22 “Liberty and Sunday Laws: an Interesting Address to Working Men by the Rev. W. W. Atterbury,” New
York Times (1857-Current file); March 14, 1881; ProQuest Historical Newspaper, The New York Times
(1851-2003), p 8.
23 “Sunday Closings,” Encyclopedia of Chicago, editors Janice L. Reiff, Ann Durkin Keating, and James
R. Grossman. The Newberry Library, 2004. http://encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/1221.html
24 Paul C. Gutjahr, An American Bible: A History of the Good Book in the United States, 1777-1780
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999), 118.
10
Catholic Bible. Over the course of the nineteenth century, Bible reading declined in
school use. However, public rhetoric supporting its use remained strong.25
Euro-Americans had promoted Christianity as central to civilizing Native
Americans from earliest settlement. This idea found institutionalization in Grant’s Peace
Policy, which he proposed in 1869 and remained in effect until 1899. In response to
criticism from religious and humanitarian reformers, military officers, and some
Congressmen the policy transferred power over Indian populations from the military to
missionaries, with the expectation that they would do a better job of “civilizing.”26 The
reservation system, initiated in 1851 with the Indian Appropriations Act, expanded
greatly under Grant’s administration. Federally appointed Euro-American agents not
only assumed total responsibility for negotiating between tribes and the United States, but
also exercised complete discretionary power over the Indians. Methodists, Presbyterians,
Baptists, and Episcopalians took the largest share of the responsibility. In contrast,
Catholics who had expected to receive thirty-eight agencies based on their previous
mission work, received only seven. In addition to the unfair allotment, newly established
Protestant agencies sought to exclude Catholics entirely from those areas in which they
had exerted a historical presence.27 The debates the authors in this dissertation engaged
in regarding Grant’s Peace Policy were not about Indians, ultimately. In keeping with the
imperialist rhetoric of the time, arguments over Indian missions were a way for AngloAmericans to define their beliefs about themselves and their government.
25 R. Lawrence Moore, “Bible Reading and Nonsectarian Schooling: The Failure of Religious Instruction
in Nineteenth Century Public Education,” The Journal of American History 86:4 (March 2000), 1582.
26 Robert H. Keller, Jr., American Protestantism and United States Indian Policy, 1869-1882 (Lincoln,
NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1983), 1, 17.
27 On the origins and specific features of Grant’s peace policy see Keller, American Protestantism and
United States Indian Policy, 1-30; Francis Paul Prucha, American Indian Policy in Crisis: Christian
Reformers and the Indian, 1865-1900 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1976), 30-71. For an
analysis of the policy’s impact on Catholic missions see Peter J. Rahill, The Catholic Indian Missions and
Grant’s Peace Policy, 1870-1884 (Washington: Catholic University Press, 1953).
11
The push for a Constitutional Amendment acknowledging God grew out of
challenges to religion in official spheres. The National Reform Association (NRA)
formed in 1869 led the way in advocating for a religious amendment. According to the
organization’s founding statement, the need for such an amendment was amply
demonstrated by public opposition to Bible reading in public schools, Sabbath laws,
Congressional prayers, and days of fasting and thanksgiving.28 State laws regarding
religion were forced to rely on “common law” rather than on an official endorsement of
Christianity. A Constitutional amendment would provide a remedy for the problem of
legal impediments to Christian laws. The NRA denied seeking religious establishment,
asserting that its aim was to secure support for general Christian principles rather than
state support for a particular denomination. A rhetorical device that helped the NRA to
gain prominence was linking elimination of political corruption to their aims. They
argued that their campaign would counteract corruption in politics, and when their aims
became connected with moral reform, the movement gained in popularity.29
Protestants, who viewed public education as a vital component of Americanizing
and Protestantizing Catholic immigrants, made eliminating state funds for parochial
schools a national issue by the 1870s.30 President Grant’s 1875 state of the union
speech, which advocated eliminating funds for “sectarian” religious institutions,
represented the height this movement achieved. Grant used the term “non-sectarian,” as
had become common practice for Protestants since massive Catholic immigration in the
28 David McAllister, The National Reform Movement (Philadelphia: Aldine Press Co., 1890), 24-26. See
also Eugene F. Durand, Yours in the Blessed Hope, Uriah Smith (Washington, DC: Review and Publishing
Association, 1980), 148.
29 Eric Syme, A History of SDA Church-State Relations in the United States, (Mountain View, Calif.:
Pacific Press Publishing Association, 1973) 22.
30 Stephen K. Green, “The Blaine Amendment Reconsidered,” American Journal of Legal History 36:1
(January 1992), 42-43.
12
1830s, to indicate common ground that Protestants shared.31 Within two weeks of
Grant’s speech, Republican Congressman James G. Blaine introduced a Constitutional
amendment, to correct what he viewed as a “constitutional defect,” extending federal
enforcement of first amendment rights regarding establishment over the states.32 This
proposal was in direct response to repeated Catholic objections to Protestant religious
education in public schools, and requests for public funding for parochial schools or
exemption from taxation.33 Grant’s proposal effectively aligned the Republican Party
with anti-Catholic interests on the school debates, sparking bitter partisanship over the
issue with Democrats, who depended heavily on Catholic voting populations.34 Public
response to the Amendment was favorable, although Catholics generally viewed the
measure as a thinly veiled attack on their schools and charitable institutions.35 The
Amendment passed the House overwhelmingly, but the Senate rejected it. Proponents of
the Amendment subsequently focused their efforts at the state level, and by 1890, 29
states had incorporated similar amendments into their constitutions.36 Although the
31 See Philip Hamburger, The Separation of Church and State, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 2001).
32 Quoted in Joseph P. Viteritti, “Blaine’s Wake: School Choice, the First Amendment, and State
Constitutional Law” Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy 21 (1997-1998), 671. Judicial
incorporation of the bill of rights through the fourteenth amendment did not occur until Chicago,
Burlington & Quincy Railway Co. v. Chicago, 166 U.S. 226 (1897); federal courts did not incorporate
freedom of religion until Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296 (1940) and religious establishment until
Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1 (1947); see Henry J. Abraham and Barbara A. Perry, Freedom
and the Court : Civil Rights and Liberties in the United States, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1967).
33 Stephen K. Green, “The Blaine Amendment Reconsidered,” American Journal of Legal History 36:1
(January 1992), 41.
34 Vitteritti, “Blaine’s Wake,” 670-672.
35 Green, “The Blaine Amendment Reconsidered,” 48.
36 Vitteritti, “Blaine’s Wake,” 673.
13
Blaine Proposal had specifically protected the use of Bible reading in schools, the
practice declined steadily in the last two decades of the nineteenth century.37
For Protestants who wished to see their understanding of Christianity upheld by
American law, a Supreme Court case in the 1890s appeared to affirm their aspirations by
declaring that America was a Christian nation. The case, Holy Trinity Church v United
States (1892), dealt with a church which had hired a minister from another country in
perceived violation of US immigration laws prohibiting importing contract labor.
Overruling the decision of the lower courts, the Supreme Court declared that the
immigration law was directed toward manual labor, and ruled in favor of the church. In
Justice Brewer’s written opinion, he diverted to the topic of the religious nature of the
United States to prove a particular point: “no purpose of action against religion can by
imputed against any religion, because this is a religious people.”38 Citing support for
religion in the founding of the American colonies, and in the constitutions and laws of its
states, the opinion also mentioned the findings of the Pennsylvania supreme court in
Updegraph v Commonwealth (1824) which stated "Christianity, general Christianity, is,
and always has been, a part of the common law of Pennsylvania; . . . not Christianity with
an established church and tithes and spiritual courts, but Christianity with liberty of
conscience to all men."39 The decision nevertheless was primarily remembered, with
either celebration or criticism, for claiming Christianity for America.
Theory
The relationship of history to national identity is one fraught with complexity.
Ernest Renan, an influential nineteenth century philosopher, wrote that “To forget and – I
37 R. Lawrence Moore, “Bible Reading and Nonsectarian Schooling,” 1595-7.
38 Church of the Holy Trinity v United States, 143 US 457, 465 (1892).
39 Church of the Holy Trinity v United States, 143 US 457, 465 (1892).
14
will venture to say – to get one’s history wrong are essential factors in the making of a
nation.”40 Unlike other political philosophers of the day who defined nationality by race
or language, Renan asserted that nationality was based on perceptions – frequently
erroneous – of commonality among a group of people. According to Renan, the
“advancement of historical studies” – more persuasively accurate or critical studies –
endangered established notions of nationality. In light of Renan’s warning, the critical
aspects of the historical work in this dissertation are perhaps surprising.
The idea of nationality as perception has become more widely accepted among
scholars since Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities (1983). In this book,
Anderson argues that “nationality” is a “cultural artifact,” and one that commands
“profound emotional legitimacy.”41 He notes three paradoxes in the study of nationalism.
First, the modernity of nations to the historian, as opposed to their antiquity in the eyes of
nationalists. Second, the naturalization of the concept that everyone “can, should, will
‘have’ a nationality, as he or she ‘has’ a gender.”42 And thirdly, the political power of
nationalisms in contrast to their philosophical poverty or incoherence.
In other words, unlike most other isms, nationalism has never produced its own
grand thinkers: no Hobbeses, Tocquevilles, Marxes, or Webers. This ‘emptiness’
easily gives rise, among cosmopolitan and polylingual intellectuals, to a certain
condescension. Like Gertrude Stein in the face of Oakland, one can rather
quickly conclude that there is “no there there.”43
The “there” of American nationalism is difficult to pinpoint. Indeed, as the
historiographical section of this paper suggests, American nationalism as a unified and
dominant ideology in the nineteenth century may well be the invention of historians. The
40 Ernest Renan, “What is a Nation?” [1882] in Alfred Zimmern, Modern Political Doctrines (Oxford
University Press: New York, 1939), 190.
41 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, (New
York: Verso, 2003 [1983]), 4.
42 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities, 5.
43 Ibid.
15
political imaginings of the elite may have had little impact on popular perceptions of the
nation. Moreover, the extent to which the authors in this dissertation achieved
philosophical coherence in their articulations is remarkable.
The level of critical analysis in historical writing and philosophical coherence in
the authors I am examining indicates that they were drawing on cultural ideas of
“natural” nationality and their particular theological beliefs to construct a coherent
“worldview,” a way of thinking about and understanding the world and one’s place in it.
Philosophers assert that comprehensive worldviews cover the following philosophical
endeavors: ontology (What is reality?), etiology (Where does it come from?), futurology
(Where are we going?), axiology (What is good and what is bad?), praxiology (How
should we act?), and epistemology (What is true and what is false?).44 Each of the
authors that I examine in this dissertation broached these questions. Each grappled with
the “reality” of America’s providential rise to power in the world, the historical narratives
that support the reality they proposed, their expectations for America’s future, what
determined a good or a bad American, what Americans must do to be good citizens, and
examined historical texts through a theological lens to determine “true” answers to these
questions.
Historiography
I will begin this literature review by assessing themes of “Manifest Destiny,”
“democracy,” and “nativism” in current histories of nineteenth-century American
nationalism and national culture in the period. In contrast to sentimental visions of
44 These categories of “worldviews” were first articulated in Leo Apostel and Jan Van der Veken,
Worldviews: From Fragmentation to Integration (Brussels: VUB University Press, 1994). I have taken the
breakdown of philosophical endeavors in a worldview from Clement Vidal, “Wat is een
wereldbeeld?”[What is a Worldview?], in Van Belle, H. & Van der Veken, J., Editors, Nieuwheid denken.
De wetenschappen en het creatieve aspect van de werkelijkheid, p71–85. Acco, Leuven. Translated into
English on website: http://cogprints.org/6094/
16
historical progress in the nineteenth century, historiographical trends over the past twenty
years have stressed a negative and critical theme of regression from democratic values in
American nationalism over the nineteenth century. Secular histories of late-nineteenth
century American history now frequently present narratives of an increasingly exclusive
nationalism that stressed “Americanization” and imperialism and culminated in
ethnocentric or elitist idealizations of American identity. However, this kind of
interpretation emphasizes the centrality of Anglo-Saxon subjects through its critique.
Even narratives that focus on “conflict” reinforce this tendency. Next, I will discuss how
religious historians have stressed the prevalence and cultural power of Anglo-Saxon
Protestantism in the late nineteenth century, yet have made concerted efforts to include
others into the master narrative. Many historians of religion are now struggling to
fashion coherent narratives of American history which reverse the emphases on “center”
and “periphery.” Most rely on some version of Anglo-Saxon Protestant cultural
dominance for coherence.
One way in which historians have sought to understand Americanism is through
the theme of “Manifest Destiny.” Several historians have used the theme of “manifest
destiny” to argue that ideologies of nation and mission have been central to American
foreign policy and intervention from the Revolution to the twentieth century. Moreover,
they emphasize themes of exceptionalism and destiny in America as thinly veiled
justifications for economic self-interest and Anglo-Saxon ethnocentrism.45 However,
these approaches omit how religious or ethnic outsiders addressed themes of
exceptionalism and destiny in American society.
45 See Sam W. Haynes and Christopher Morris, eds., Manifest Destiny and Empire: American Antebellum
Expansionism (College Station, Tex.: Published for the University of Texas at Arlington by Texas A&M
University Press, 1997); Reginald Horsman, Race and Manifest Destiny, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press, 1981); Albert Katz Weinberg, Manifest Destiny: a Study of Nationalist Expansionism in
American History (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1963); Anders Stephanson, Manifest Destiny: American
Expansionism and the Empire of Right (New York: Hill and Wang, 1995).
17
Anders Stephanson, in Manifest Destiny: American Expansionism and the Empire
of Right (1995), argues that the Civil War revitalized confidence in the American
mission. Destiny expanded beyond the continent and became less “manifest.” During
the Gilded Age, expansion was seen as a solution to domestic and economic problems,
and a variety of Christian and pseudoscientific discourses supported a civilizing mission.
Stephanson examines the ideas of Josiah Strong, who wrote Our Country (1885). As a
precursor to the Progressive Era, Strong emphasized evangelical missions, and the social
gospel in his justification for imperialism. A secular author, historian and evolutionist
John Fiske (who published in the 1870s through the 1890s), phrased manifest destiny in
terms of civilization and barbarism. In addition, Alfred T. Mahan, a naval captain, wrote
The Influence of Sea Power upon History (1890), which utilized a rhetoric of civilization
to justify conquest and uplift.
Current historical narratives addressing “democracy” tell a similar story of
America’s degradation over the course of the nineteenth century. George M.
Fredrickson, in his essay “Nineteenth Century American History,” notes that the
historiography of the period, particularly post-Civil War, “comes close to turning the
theme of democratic progress on its head.”46 Previous histories which lauded democratic
participation have been replaced with histories of groups excluded from Jacksonian
definitions of the “people”: primarily women, Indians, and blacks. Now, we learn, the
rise of corporate capitalism in the late nineteenth century estranged those who had
participated in politics previously. According to Fredrickson, recent labor and social
history charts a decline from the flourishing of workingmen’s parties and agrarian
radicals in the mid-century decades to the demise of the Knights of Labor and the
46 George M. Fredrickson, “Nineteenth-Century American History,” in Anthony Mohlo and Gordon S.
Woods, eds., Imagined Histories: American Historians Interpret the Past (Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 164.
18
Populist Party in the 1890s.47 Even historians of the Frontier, who once proclaimed the
West as the source of America’s exceptionalism and democratic individualism, have
rewritten their narratives in terms of ethnic conflict rather than as a “source of consensual
American values.”48 Although these historians have argued persuasively for ethnic
conflict as a center of American experience, they leave us with an incomplete narrative of
how various groups conceptualized their American experience.
Similarly, John Higham, in Strangers in the Land: Patterns of American Nativism,
1860-1925 (1988), argues that “nativism,” which he defines as an unfavorable opinion of
outsiders, was a constant attitude in American culture that expanded or contracted with
shifting economic, political, and psychological factors. The major themes of nativism
that Higham explores are anti-Catholicism, fear of foreign radicals, and racism. He
defines the 1880s as a crisis point, in which economic depression and class conflict
fostered a patriotism that was increasingly critical of immigrants. Higham cites specific
examples of nativist anxieties to support his argument. Josiah Strong’s Our Country
(1885) exemplified these concerns in its call for domestic missions, while vilifying
immigrants.49 Attempts to legislate immigration restrictions, define work contract laws
47 Fredrickson cites the following works as examples within these fields. Regarding democratic values
and practices, Alan Trachtenberg, The Incorporation of America: Culture and Society in the Gilded Age
(New York: Hill and Wang, 1982), Michael McGerr, The Decline of Popular Politics: the American North,
1865-1928 (New York, 1986), and Richard L. McCormick, From Realignment for Reform in New York
State, 1893-1910 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1981). Regarding labor history, Sean
Wilentz, Chants Democratic: New York and the Rise of the Working Class, 1788-1850 (New York, 1986);
Alan Dawley, Class and Community: The Industrial Revolution in Lynn (Cambridge, 1976); Charles
Sellers, The Market Revolution: Jacksonian America, 1815-1846 (New York, 1991); Leon Fink,
Workingmen’s Democracy: The Knights of Labor and America Politics (Urbana, 1991); David Roediger,
Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class (London, 1991).
48 Fredrickson, “Nineteenth Century American History,” 165. Regarding western and frontier history,
Fredrickson cites Patricia Nelson Limerick, The Legacy of Conquest: The Unbroken Past of the American
West (New York, 1987); and “Turnerians All: The Dream of a Helpful Historian in an Intelligible World,”
American Historical Review 100 (1995): 697-716.
49 John Higham, Strangers in the Land: Patterns of American Nativism, 1860-1925, (New Brunswick:
Rutgers University Press, 1988), 39.
19
in a time of labor unrest, and the creation of many secret anti-Catholic societies also
reflected anxieties over immigrant populations in America.50
Historians of religion frequently refer to Protestant attempts to influence
American culture during the Gilded Age. Robert Handy argues in A Christian America
(1984) that Anglo-Saxon Protestant visions of America, most often articulated in the
rhetoric of “civilization,” grew in strength over the nineteenth century and anticipated
fulfillment near the close of the century.51 Handy claims that Evangelical Christian
leaders identified their faith with “national destiny” and “civilization.” Such claims
about the culture of the nation provided “the real bond” for Protestant unity, despite
denominational divisions after the Civil War.52 One of the primary concerns for
Protestant denominations in the nineteenth century was increasing immigration,
particularly after 1880. Handy states that, between 1880 and 1900, two and a half million
Catholics from southern and eastern Europe, along with approximately 750,000 Jews
from eastern Europe entered the United States, raising anxieties among evangelical
leaders over the fate of a Protestant America.53
Handy identifies two primary ways in which evangelical Protestants reasserted
their cultural dominance in politics. One was in the promotion of Blue, or Sabbath
observance laws. Religious leaders were explicit in linking neglect of Sabbath
observance to immigrants from Europe.54 The Sabbath Committee of New York was
formed in 1869, the National Congregational Council on Churches passed a resolution
50 See chapter 4, “The Nationalist Nineties,” John Higham, Strangers in the Land, 68-104.
51 Robert T. Handy, A Christian America: Protestant Hopes and Historical Realities, 2nd ed., (New York:
Oxford University Press, [1971] 1984), 105.
52 Ibid., 96-97.
53 Ibid., 65.
54 Ibid., 74.
20
promoting Sabbath observance as central to “citizenship” in 1871, and the Northern
Methodist Committee on the State of the Church declared in 1884 that Sabbath keeping
was “‘one of the chief cornerstones in the foundation of the Church and of our Christian
civilization.’”55 Another was in the promotion of religious instruction in schools through
the nineteenth century, despite the objections of Jewish and Catholic leaders, who saw
these measures as overtly Christianizing and Protestantizing, respectively.56
Furthermore, Mark Noll finds in the Protestant temperance movement after the Civil
War, marked by the organization of the Prohibition party in 1869 and the Women’s
Christian Temperance Union in 1874,57 the strongest evidence of “then lingering power
of the nation’s public Protestants – generally evangelical, almost all white, largely of
British background – to translate their moral vision into the law of the land.”58
Despite these assertions of the cultural prominence of Protestants in American
religious history, historians have made concerted efforts to include other religious groups
in their analyses. In 1970, Sydney E. Ahlstrom argued in an historiographical essay that
the “melting pot” metaphor in American religious history had been replaced by an
emphasis on pluralism.59 By 1993, Martin Marty could assert in a review of American
religious history that
The most striking feature…is this: for all the talk about the ‘hegemony’ of
mainstream Protestant denominations in the eyes of historians; the historians’
55 Handy, A Christian America, 73-74.
56 Regarding Catholics and public schools, see Patrick W. Carey, Catholics in America: a History,
(Westport, CT: Praeger, 2004), 36; regarding Jews, see Jonathan D. Sarna and David G. Dalin, introduction
to Religion and State in the American Jewish Experience (South Bend, Indiana: University of Notre Dame
Press, 1997), 17-19.
57 Handy, A Christian America, 77.
58 Mark A. Noll, The Old Religion in a New World: The History of North American Christianity, (Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, c2002), 135.
59 Sydney E. Ahlstrom, “The Problem of the History of Religion in America,” Church History 39 (1970),
231.
21
predilection for telling the story of ‘the center and not the periphery’; the
accusation that they marginalize many and assign ‘outsider’ status to those who
have not been members of that (or the Catholic) mainstream, the actual literary
production of historians during the decade showed such prejudicing to be
anything but the case.60
Marty concluded, “‘Outsiders’ have come to have their day; the margins have moved to
the historians’ center.”61
Replacing the “center” with the “periphery” has more recently raised the issue of
how to compose coherent narratives of American religious history. Due to the profusion
and complexity of various recent approaches to American religious history, a panel at the
annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion in 2000 addressed the question:
“Is there a center to American religious history?”62 Stephen J. Stein suggested a market
model.63 Amanda Porterfield advocated a pragmatic model, that is, “self-consciousness
about the effects of stories we tell and the arguments we advance.”64 In contrast, William
Vance Trollinger, Jr. suggested that, given the diversity of American religious
experience, one interpretive paradigm will never fully suffice. Instead, he asserted that
he found “the state of the field – with the attention to diversity, overlapping narratives,
multiple perspectives, and lack of clear boundaries, and the lack of an analytical center –
to be exhilarating and in keeping with the messy realities of American religion.”65
60 Martin E. Marty, “American Religions History in the Eighties: A Decade of Achievement,” Church
History 62 (1993), 336.
61 Ibid., 337.
62 The papers presented were published in Church History 71:2 (June 2002), 368-390. See also, Jay P.
Dolan, “The Immigrants and Their Gods: A New Perspective in American Religious History,” Church
History 57:1 (March 1988), 61-72.
63 Stephen J. Stein, “American Religious History – Decentered with Many Centers,” Church History 71:2
(June 2002), 379.
64 Amanda Porterfield, “Does American Religion Have a Center?” Church History 71:2 (June 2002), 373.
65 William Vance Trollinger, Jr., “Is There a Center to American Religious History?” Church History 71:2
(June 2002), 384.
22
A number of works in American religious history have contributed compelling
narratives of multiple perspectives on American religious experience rather than
emphasizing Anglo-Saxon Protestant visions.66 One of the most striking attempts to
construct a new narrative is R. Lawrence Moore’s Religious Outsiders and the Making of
Americans (1986). Moore argues that “outsiderhood is a characteristic way of inventing
ones Americanness.” 67 Moore criticizes the Turner thesis, arguing that since most
Americans did not literally go to the frontier, they gained a sense of their national identity
“by turning aspects of a carefully nurtured sense of separate identity against a vaguely
defined concept of mainstream of dominant culture.”68 Rather than contradicting the
Turner thesis, however, Moore conceptually reframes it. Moore centers national identity
within the margins of religious traditions, or nonconventional “outsiders,” instead of
geographical margins as the “Frontier.”
Moore examines religious writings of marginalized religious groups – Mormons,
Catholics, Jews, Christian Science, Premillennialists, Fundamentalists, and African
American churches. He finds that these groups articulated their dissenting positions as
central to their understanding of themselves as Americans, and asserts that historians
must make “dissent” central to their understanding of American history as well.69 Moore
reviews the works of two nineteenth century authors to reveal the myth of Protestant
hegemony in America – a myth that he thinks historians have continued to promote up
66 See for example, William R. Hutchison, Religious Pluralism in American: The Contentious History of a
Founding Ideal (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003); Jonathan D. Sarna, ed., Minority Faiths and the
Protestant American Mainstream (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1998); and Walter H. Conser Jr. and
Sumner B. Twiss, eds., Religious Diversity and American Religious History: Studies in Traditions and
Cultures (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1997).
67 Moore, Religious Outsiders, xi; see also “Insiders and Outsiders in American Historical Narrative and
American History,” American Historical Review 87 (April 1982): 390-412.
68 Ibid., xi.
69 Ibid.
23
until today. According to Moore, Robert Baird, who wrote Religion in America (1844),
and Philip Schaff, who wrote America. A Sketch of its Political, Social, and Religious
Character (published in German in 1854 and then in English in 1855), organized their
discussions of religion in America around providential design. Furthermore, both authors
dismissed perceived threats of sectarianism and Catholicism as merely obstacles along
the path to the ultimate triumph of evangelical Christianity, which they viewed as the
foundation of “national growth.”70 However, Moore limits his discussion of nineteenth
century historians to criticizing current historical narratives. His use of Baird and Schaff
to illustrate the origins of current historical emphases on certain “central” subjects fails to
complement his analysis of outsiders, because he pays scant attention to outsider
religious historians during the period.
The shifting centers of late-nineteenth century historiography – whether presented
as critique, “conflict,” or “pluralism” – remain dependent on the foil of the Anglo-Saxon
and Protestant mainstream. For example, the otherwise excellent collection of essays in
Minority Faiths and the American Protestant Mainstream (1998) relies heavily on a
paradigm that pits minorities against the majority. Similarly, Hutchison’s Religious
Pluralism in America (2003) relies on an approach that includes “an enormously
dominant and influential Protestant establishment.”71 Ahlstrom’s vision of a new
pluralism in American religious history has resulted in a new binarism.
This dissertation offers a narrative of nineteenth century political culture that
avoids oversimplifying various conceptions of the nation in binary terms, one that
explores connections as well as differences. Within the overlapping and divergent views
70 Moore, Religious Outsiders, 7.
71 William R. Hutchison, Religious Pluralism in American: The Contentious History of a Founding Ideal
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003), 3.
24
under study lie multiple points at which we may discern valiant efforts to define
American ideals and civic responsibilities.
Philip Schaff (1819-1893) and “Mainstream” Protestants
This chapter argues that even those religious groups that scholars have typically
assigned “insider” status in America felt the pressure of competing world views and
sought to defend their religious identity as central to Americanism. Philip Schaff,
typically promoted by scholars as an exemplar of “mainstream” religious history,
produced and promoted religious history in America, establishing it as a respected
discipline by the 1890s. His insistence on combining discussions of the divine with
empirical research, along with hopes of fostering ecumenical cooperation led him to
organize the American Society of Church Historians (ASCH) as a separate entity from
the American Historical Association (AHA) in 1888. His writings advocated increased
cooperation between the church and state in certain spheres: Sunday laws, public
schooling, and private Protestant charities. However, to prevent potential religious
liberty abuses, he opposed the National Reform Association’s call for a Constitutional
amendment declaring the United States a “Christian” nation. Instead, he asserted
ecumenical cooperation was the best route to preserve America’s Christian character.
Despite his celebration of religious liberty in America, and his emphasis on unity, he
glorified the role of Anglo-Saxon Reformed and evangelical Protestants in America’s
past, present and future. Moreover, this chapter challenges other current assessments of
Schaff that praise his contributions to church history. While the master narrative that he
created may have been the most prominent at the time, it reflects the challenges posed by
competing narratives; in itself, it provides an incomplete picture of relationships among
religious groups in America and conceptions of national identity at the time. He glossed
over differences between “mainstream” denominations, and his vacillating positions on
religious liberty indicate the difficulty of bridging the gap between his vision of a unified
25
Protestant majority and freedom of religion in America. Moreover, in light of the
chapters that follow, his accomplishments in history and analysis of religious liberty in
American culture seem less singular.
John Shea (1824-1892) and Conservative Catholicism
in America
In chapter 2, we turn to examine John Shea, the “Father of American Catholic
history.” In contrast to scholarly characterizations of conservative Catholics as retreating
from Americanism during this period, Shea directly confronted Protestants’ claims to
American history and identity. In telling the story of American Catholic history, he
critiqued Protestant influence on American culture as “un-American,” portraying
Catholics as “better” Christian and Americans both. He rewrote American Protestant
triumphalism as declension. Shea presented Catholics as the best stewards of religious
liberty in the colonies, as centrally united behind the American Revolution, and as
supporting unity over separation during the Civil War. Sunday laws made a farce of
American religious liberty by enforcing Protestant observance of a Catholic decree. He
also criticized US Indian policies as racist, and anti-American in denying citizenship and
religious liberty. Furthermore, he asserted that Protestants had opened the door for
infidelity (or what we would call secularism) by refusing to grant Catholics equal footing
with Protestants in social institutions – he predicted the end result would be secular
institutions. Ultimately, he portrayed Protestantism as untrue to the principles it claimed
to espouse, while Catholics remained devoted to a true Americanism.
Uriah Smith (1832-1903) and Seventh-day Adventists
In chapter 3, we explore the writings of Uriah Smith, a Seventh-Day Adventist.
Scholars have explored the origins of nineteenth century Adventist political advocacy for
separation of church and state for two reasons. One is that they are a “catastrophic
26
millennialist” group – their view of the future is an imminent catastrophic end to the
world, which is usually associated with apolitical behavior. Also, as a fundamentalist
group that currently advocates for separation of church and state, their political behavior
has been a matter of interest to scholars. This chapter explains Adventist political
behavior in terms of their theological and historical claims to Americanism and
Protestantism. Because Saturday observance and religious liberty were central to their
religious and national identities, they advocated against Sunday laws to defend their
identity and to raise public consciousness as a means of evangelism. Furthermore,
Smith’s apocalyptic theology offered a profoundly negative forecast for America. In his
apocalyptic scenario, “apostate” Protestants and Catholics would unite and transform
America into a religious persecuting power, ultimately enforcing the death penalty on
those who refused to worship on Sunday. The only resolution in this account was
Christ’s second coming, which would rescue the elect, destroy the wicked, and replace
earthly kingdoms with a heavenly one. Only Seventh-day Adventist would remain true
Protestants to the end, by rejecting Sunday worship and the doctrine of soul immortality,
and true Americans, by resisting efforts to join church and state in America. Several
scholars have maintained that Adventists advocated for separation of church and state to
postpone the end-world scenario, buying time to save more souls. This chapter argues
that political advocacy was a component of defining Adventism as true Protestantism and
Americanism, both of which were essential to solidifying Adventist identity and
converting others.
Simon Wolf (1836-1923) and Reformed Judaism
Chapter 4 examines the writings and advocacy of Reform Jewish leader Simon
Wolf. In the nineteenth century, American Reformed Jews took the stance that
Jewishness was a religion and not a race. However, scholars have noted disjunctions
between rhetoric about race and religion as identity, suggesting that the religious
27
definition was a matter of polemics – it was easier to defend religious difference than
racial difference in America. Scholars have noted in particular that Wolf used the terms
race and religion almost interchangeably. One scholar suggests that it was not until the
term ethnicity was coined in the interwar period that American Jews were able to
conceptualize their identity in complete terms. Wolf was a staunch proponent of the
“religious” label of Judaism and lobbied against labeling of Jews as religious
discrimination. However, he did not dismiss “ethnology,” – the term used to study race
at the time based on language – entirely. Thus it seems plausible that when he used the
term race he was referring to the overlap in ethnology and religion. However, he
articulated a strong definition of cultural difference of Jews based on their religion, one
that he asserted made Jews patriots and powerful advocates of religious liberty in
America. For Wolf, this sense of patriotism and duty was born out of study of the Torah,
and experiences of religious persecution.
Isaac Sharpless (1848-1920) and Quakers
Chapter 5 demonstrates that Isaac Sharpless’s historical and political writings
offered a distinct vision of American religious identity for Quakers. As in the other
chapters, historical preoccupations with the origins of American values of freedom and
equality, and the place of the war and military service figured prominently in his
narratives. Political interests involving intersections of church and state such as Indian
policy and public schooling also figured similarly to other chapters. However,
Sharpless’s emphasis and perspective on peace indicate a distinctive contribution and
critique of American institutions. Moreover, the ambiguous place of Quakers in the usual
insider/outsider binary scholarly formulation demonstrates the impracticality of such
classifications. Suggesting that Quakers were either “in” or “out” of mainstream
evangelicalism at the end of the nineteenth century ignores the ways in which they
understood their relationship to other religious groups. Sharpless felt Quakers had an
28
important and unique message to offer the nation and other religions, as well as stressing
their commonalities with the larger society.
Significance
Historians and sociologists in the 1950s understood the relationship between
religion and nationalism in the late nineteenth century as part of an evolutionary process
that would ultimately result in secularization and separation of church and state. Yet,
recent theoretical studies examining modern religion and nationalism indicate that while
religious identities may be transformed by nation-building and secularization processes,
they remain an integral part of national identity. My dissertation contributes to
theoretical fields of religion and nationalism by analyzing this process of transformation.
In the cases I examine, I argue that the process involved historical revisionism that placed
each religious group at the center of the American experience, as well as political
engagement that explicitly identified intersections between a religious group’s historical,
theological and political stances for their target audiences.
The historical literatures that criticize prevailing views of the nation in the Gilded
Age frequently fail to address how others in the period understood themselves and their
place in American society. This study will provide a balance of views in contrast. Josiah
Strong’s nativist and imperialist view of America’s mission in Christian terms was not
the only option for religious thinkers at the time, as the chapters demonstrate. A
comparative and thematic approach provides an analytical alternative to historical
narratives that focus on dominant coherent narratives and those that present the “messy
realities” of American national culture. Moreover, this study emphasizes outsider
contributions to American political culture in the late nineteenth century. Rather than
simply focusing on “conflict” or “exclusion,” this study will also demonstrate negotiation
and participation. Finally, Moore’s argument ignores the inherent contradiction in
classifying as “insiders” those who were scrambling just as hard as “outsiders” to assert
29
their Americanness. The five historical writers whom I analyze in this paper forthrightly
presented themselves and their religious communities as insiders, and actively
participated in democratic processes to achieve goals in the larger society that reflected
their religious views.
30
CHAPTER I
“VARIETY IN UNITY, UNITY IN VARIETY”: PHILIP SCHAFF’S VISION OF
AND ADVOCACY FOR A PROTESTANT MAJORITY
In a speech delivered shortly before his death, Philip Schaff (1819-1893)
declared: “Variety in unity and unity in variety is the law of God, in nature, in history and
in his Kingdom.”1 Schaff focused his intellectual energies on issues of variety and unity
in American religion for his entire career. His early work criticized American religious
diversity; his later writings embraced diversity, as a necessary historical phase, while
envisioning future unity. Schaff conceptualized, articulated, and sought to achieve
institutionally, coherence among American Protestants – what scholars would later call
“mainstream Protestantism.” This chapter argues that Schaff’s emphasis on unity in
American Protestantism indicates the challenges posed by diversity; his increasing
tolerance of some groups and criticisms of others over time demonstrates that unifying
Protestantism in America necessarily meant marginalizing other groups in both his
history of the nation and his vision of its present and future. Despite his celebratory and
teleological narrative of religious liberty in America, and his emphasis on unity, he
prioritized the role of Anglo-Saxon Reformed and evangelical Protestants in America’s
past, present and future. Moreover, this chapter challenges other current assessments of
Schaff that praise his contributions to church history. While the master narrative that he
created may have been the most prominent at the time, it reflects the challenges posed by
competing narratives, and in itself provides an incomplete picture of the relationship
among religious groups in America and their national identities.
In some ways, Schaff is an odd choice to represent mainstream Protestantism in
America. Born in Switzerland and educated in Germany, he immigrated to America at
1 Philip Schaff, “Denominationalism and Sectarianism,” The Independent (November, 1893), 5.
31
the age of 25 in 1844. He himself wrote that he was only American “by adoption.”2
Moreover, Schaff was a minister of the tiny German Reformed Church, not one of the
denominational powerhouses in the late nineteenth century like Baptists or Methodists.
But the theological classification of Reformed churches,3 which included some Baptists,
had a history of a numerical majority and claims to cultural dominance in America.4
Perhaps even more than those in denominations like Methodists or Baptists, those in
smaller branches of the Reformed tradition had a stake in regaining their cultural sway in
America through Protestant unity. Of the most often cited religious historians of the
nineteenth century – Schaff, Robert Baird, Leonard Woolsey Bacon, and Daniel
Dorchester – three came from the Reformed tradition, and one, Dorcester, was a
Methodist.5
Because of the extent to which Schaff embraced American culture and identity,
analyzed and wrote about American religion, and his central position in the
professionalization of church history, many scholars agree that he was the most
prominent and influential American religious historian of his time. Moreover, Schaff was
2 Philip Schaff, America, a Sketch of its Political, Social, and Religious Character, [translated from the
German], ed. by Perry Miller, (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1961), 36.
3 By “Reformed,” I am referring to churches which followed Calvin rather than Luther during the
Reformation. This classification includes German and Dutch Reformed, Congregationalists, Presbyterians,
and Calvinist Baptists. Examples of excluded denominations relevant to this chapter are Lutherans,
Catholics, Quakers, Moravians, and freewill Baptists. While Methodists in early America occupied a
oppositional position in regards to Reformed churches, this polarity began to break down in the early
nineteenth century when “Methodism began to look, behave, and feel more like its Reformed and other
mainstream denominational compatriots.” See Russell E. Richey, and sources cited there, “American
Methodists on Calvinism and Presbyterianism,” The Bulletin for the Institute of Reformed Theology, 6:2
(Fall 2006): 1. Because of the cooperation between Methodists and Reformed leaders in the nineteenth
century Paul K. Conkin classifies Methodists as part of the Reformed center in America, The Uneasy
Center: Reformed Christianity in Antebellum America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
1995), ix-xvi.
4 Conkin, The Uneasy Center, ix.
5 Philip Schaff, German Reformed; Robert Baird, Presbyterian; Leonard Woolsey Bacon,
Congregationalist; Daniel Dorchester, Methodist.
32
not only an observer of American religious life, he was also an actor in the field, lobbying
for Sunday laws on the Sabbath Committee of New York City, promoting ecumenical
cooperation through the Evangelical Alliance for the United States, and organizing the
American committee of revisions for the American Standard Version of the Bible.
Schaff is hailed by scholars for his contributions to church history. In the three
decades after the Civil War, Schaff’s historical writing and advocacy moved the position
of church history in theological studies from marginal to prominent.6 Schaff’s
conception of history combined historical research with ascertaining divine intervention. 7
Because of his insistence on discussions of the divine in history, he organized the
American Society of Church Historians as a separate entity from the American Historical
Association in 1888. He also hoped to foster ecumenical activity through bringing
together historians from various traditions.8
A brief overview of the scholarly works on Schaff demonstrates the importance
attributed to him in the field of church history and theology. James H. Nichols, in
Romanticism in American Theology: Nevin and Schaff at Mercersburg (1961), explored
Schaff’s view of the organic process of historical development: one that would ultimately
eliminate the evangelical individualism of American Protestantism, and culminate in
what Schaff called an “ecumenical catholicism.” Nichols suggested that Schaff’s ideas
anticipated the agenda of twentieth century ecumenical movements. Henry Bowden
addressed Schaff’s theology of history in Church History in the Age of Science (1970)
and attributed the development of American church historiography to him. George
Shriver’s Philip Schaff: Christian Scholar and Ecumenical Prophet (1987) emphasized
6 Henry Warner Bowden, Church History in the Age of Science: Historiographical Patterns in the United
States, 1876-1918, (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1971), 36, 42.
7 Ibid., 44.
8 Ibid., 60.
33
his importance to contemporary scholars of ecumenism, and argues that his devotion to
the idea of “ecumenical catholicism” informed all his writings and his efforts on behalf of
Sunday laws, Bible revision, and interdenominational work. David Lotz’s essay “Philip
Schaff and the Idea of Church History” (1988) characterized Schaff as the “Hegel” of
church history and argued that his attempts to unite theology, philosophy and church
history have remained “unsurpassed” by modern scholars.
Stephen R. Graham’s Cosmos in the Chaos (1995) updated the previous literature
by tracing changes over time in Schaff’s analysis of American religion. Graham begins
with Schaff’s ordination sermon of 1844 in which Schaff warned of three threats to
American religion: sectarianism, Romanism, and rationalism. Comparing his views in
1844 to his later writings demonstrates some significant shifts in his views. While he
initially decried the proliferation of “sects” in America, he later came to appreciate what
he called denominationalism, and modified his idea of unity from ecclesiastical to
spiritual union. Indeed, he even came to privilege “diversity in unity” as the highest
phase of Christianity historically, and a direct result of separation of church and state in
America. Schaff’s early work was militant in its attack on Romanism, particularly after
the Roman declaration of infallibility in 1870. However, his rhetoric softened after Pope
Leo XIII’s reforms, beginning in 1878. Later, he distinguished between Romanism and
“popery,” offered a historical appreciation for the accomplishments of the Catholic
church, insisted that unbelief was a greater threat in America than Catholicism, and
argued that American Catholicism had much to offer in the evangelical church that
Schaff envisioned for the future. Thirdly, he initially found American religion illprepared to meet the challenge of rationalism as it was sorely lacking in intellectual
defenses. He also found the freedom of the press as a contributor to ideas being put
forward that could undermine religion. Later, he concluded that freedom of speech and
religion meant that religion would inevitably conquer rationalism in the US because
34
religion offered a better return in the marketplace of ideas to its listeners. He found
religious instruction in public education an important way to combat rationalism as well.
This chapter argues that, in tandem with the shifts outlined by Graham in Schaff’s
thought, he was less inclined to credit “outsiders” in the historical development of
America after he came to embrace the idea of religious liberty and separation of church
and state. Once he saw religious liberty as the result of progress and the way of the
future, he refused to credit early American religious groups – Catholics, Quakers,
Baptists, and Moravians – with any developmental role in America’s religious history.
The same list of denominations continues to appear in Schaff’s writings: Episcopal,
Reformed, Presbyterian, Methodist, and Baptist. Lutherans were included in his
discussions of present significant denominations. Sometimes Quakers were included in
the present, indicating their ambiguous relationship with large denomination in the latenineteenth century. Catholics were included in the future of Christianity, but only if they
became more progressive and “Protestant.” The denominations that Schaff stressed in
history were the same ones that he tried to unite in the present (with the addition of
Lutherans), and that he predicted would constitute the religion of the future in America.
Schaff’s History
About ten years after Schaff came to America, he returned on sabbatical to
Europe for a year, and presented a series of lectures about American religion which he
published as America. A Sketch of the Political, Social and Religious Character of the
United States (1855). Like other American religious (and “secular”) historians, Schaff
stressed the role of Providence in the founding of America. Separation of church and
state, while not divinely ordained, was a practical necessity due to America’s religious
diversity. He saw separation of church and state as merely a transition to something
35
better – a future unified church that would not require this accommodation.9 He also
stressed the significance of Protestant Anglo-Saxons as critical to the founding and
success of America. In his early version of American religious history, Schaff credited
Quakers, Baptists, and Catholics with promoting religious liberty first, and implied that
their policies influenced, on practical if not principled terms, the writing of the
Constitution. Despite Constitutional promotion of religious liberty and separation of
church and state, Schaff stoutly maintained that America was a Christian nation, in the
practices of its people and its government.
Schaff located the origin and identity of America in Protestant Anglo-Saxon
culture. The settlement of America was an outgrowth of the Protestant Reformation;
religious motives, “in great part,” determined the early settlements.10 Furthermore,
America was most influenced by Anglo-Saxon culture. These roots made the US “best
fitted for universal dominion,” and one based on freedom, not despotism; Anglo-Saxons
have an “impulse towards freedom and the sense of law and order [that] are inseparably
united, and both rest on a moral basis.”11 Schaff identified this moral basis as
Protestantism, which he claimed no other race or nation was more influenced by than the
Anglo-Saxon.12
As evidence of the dominance and success of Protestants in the western
hemisphere, he compared North America to South America, with its primarily Roman
Catholic origins. South American countries were stagnant, while North America “has
developed itself with unexampled rapidity, and will become in fifty years more of such
9 As noted by Moore, Religious Outsiders, 8, and Stephen R. Graham, Cosmos in the Chaos: Philip
Schaff’s Interpretation of Nineteenth-Century American Religion, (Grand Rapids, Mich: Willam B.
Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1995), 33.
10 Schaff, America, 86.
11 Ibid., 55.
12 Ibid.
36
progress, nay, is already, one of the largest and most powerful nations of the earth.”13
Schaff offered further evidence of the United States’ superiority in winning the MexicanAmerican War (1846-8), “where glowing patriotism and national pride supplied in a few
weeks the want of a standing army, threw hosts of volunteers into the heart of their
hostile neighbors’ country, achieved victory after victory over the Spaniards, and planted
the star-spangled banner of the Union in the palace of Montezuma.”14 Schaff’s views of
the Mexican-American War were consistent with prominent views of “manifest destiny”
at the time, which justified US economic self-interest and Anglo-Saxon ethnocentrism.
Schaff deemphasized the religious significance of the Catholic colony of
Maryland, which he claimed had no “ecclesiastical influence on the character of the
country.”15 Maryland was founded by the Catholic Lord Baltimore in 1634 was notable
for embracing religious liberty from its founding, and for passing the Maryland
Toleration Act of 1649, the first religious liberty legislation in the colonies. The fact that
Maryland was founded on religious liberty, Schaff found to be an “anti-Roman, and
essentially Protestant” principle.16 Furthermore, Schaff attributed the important and
shaping factors to the following Protestant religious groups:
Far more important and influential were the settlements of the Puritans in New
England, the Episcopalians in Virginia, the Quakers in Pennsylvania, the Dutch
[Reformed] in New York, in the course of the seventeenth century, the
Presbyterians from Scotland and North Ireland, and the German Lutherans and
Reformed from the Palatinate, in the first half of the eighteenth. These have given
the country its spirit and character.17
13 Schaff, America, 28-9.
14 Ibid., 36.
15 Ibid., 87.
16 Ibid.
17 Ibid.
37
This list of American religious groups is strikingly close to Schaff’s delineation of
important American religious groups whenever he listed them throughout his career,
though this grouping included Quakers and excluded Baptists.18
According to Schaff, a distinct aspect of church history of America that was
directly due to Protestant influence was the separation of church and state. He
acknowledged that religious toleration was not the case in New England, but originated in
other colonies:
there prevailed in other North American colonies from their foundation, therefore
long before the Revolution of 1776, entire freedom of faith and conscience; as in
Rhode Island, founded by the Baptist, Roger Williams, who was banished from
Massachusetts for heresy, and thus set by bitter experience against religious
intolerance; in Pennsylvania, which the Quaker, William Penn, originally
designed as an asylum for his brethren in faith, but to which he soon invited also
German Reformed and Lutherans from the Palatinate, guaranteeing equal rights to
all, and leaving each to the guidance of the ‘inward light;’ and, finally, in
Maryland, founded by Lord Baltimore on the same basis of universal religious
toleration.19
After the Revolution, the Federal Constitution and, gradually, the states adopted “this
posture” of religious freedom. Schaff’s narrative implies causation from the early
experiments in religious liberty in the American colonies to the United States’
Constitution and state constitutions which later separated church and state.
In 1855, Schaff had yet to embrace separation of church and state. As he noted,
“We would by no means vindicate this separation of church and state as the perfect and
final relation between the two.”20 But he found that liberty suited America’s religious
interests, given the diversity of the early settlers.
To counter Constitutional separation of church and state, he presented two types
of evidence that America was predominantly a Christian nation. One was in the
18 Schaff added Catholics to this list as a significant American group in the nineteenth century.
19 Schaff, America, 89-90.
20 Ibid., 90.
38
religiosity of its people: observance of Sunday, the number of churches and religious
schools, and attendance, Bible and Tract societies, support of missions, and revivals –
“all expressions of the general Christian character of the people, in which the Americans
are already in advance of most of the old Christian nations of Europe.”21 The other
evidence was in governmental acknowledgment of religion: Congress appointed
chaplains for itself, the army and navy, opened each session with prayer, and held
worship services in its chambers on Sunday.22
Moreover, state laws variously
prohibited “blasphemy, atheism, Sabbath-breaking, polygamy, and other gross violations
of general Christian morality.”23
Schaff asserted that America’s diverse collections of Christianity were “only a
state of transition to something higher and better.”24 Listing the eight largest
denominations in the United States in the nineteenth century – Roman Catholic,
Episcopal, Congregational, Presbyterian, Lutheran, German and Dutch Reformed,
Methodist, and Baptist – Schaff suggested that none would become “exclusively
dominant… but rather, that out of the mutual conflict of all something wholly new will
gradually arise.”25
Schaff’s 1884 essay “The Development of Religious Liberty” represented his
fully developed views on American history; it placed the United States on the cusp of
21 Schaff, America, 91.
22 A number of federal buildings, including Congress, have been used for church services from Jefferson’s
presidency until after the Civil War. See Religion and the Founding of the American Republic, Religion
and the Federal Government, VI, Library of Congress online exhibit:
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel06-2.html
23 Schaff, America, 91. Nineteenth-century state laws that restricted atheism include those which required
religious oaths to testify in court or to hold public office. See B. H. Hartogensis, “Denial of Equal Rights
to Religious Minorities and Non-Believers in the United States,” Yale Law Journal, 39:5 (March 1930),
666-673.
24 Ibid., 97.
25 Ibid.
39
progress in the world through its innovation of religious liberty. Schaff’s progressive
view of history was in contrast to other Protestant views which took a primitivist
approach to history, believing that the Catholic Church had corrupted the true religion
and that certain members of the faith had always kept the truth alive, returning to a
previous state of the church.26 Instead, Catholicism fulfilled a developmental role (in
European history), rather than a corrupting influence, historically. According to Schaff,
the prevailing view of religious liberty during the medieval period was “intolerance and
persecution.” Recounting the unification of state and religion in Constantinople in the
fourth century, Schaff attributed this institution to heathen origins.27 He found in the
sixteenth century Reformation the first “principle of religious and civil liberty,” but noted
that reformers sought religious freedom for themselves only, and not for separation of
church and state.28 Similarly, he noted that when the American colonies were formed,
many of them recognized state churches. While modern Europe came to espouse the
notion of religious “toleration” characterized by Schaff as merely a “matter of
expediency” granted by men,29 the United States promoted “religious liberty and
equality.”30 Thus, he saw America as fulfilling the perfect law of God through its
freedom of religion laws. For Schaff, in 1884, religious liberty was clearly “the
providential aim of the settlement of the country by colonists from all nations and
26 For a brief overview of some traditional Protestant objections to Schaff’s view of the historic role of the
Catholic Church see Graham, Cosmos in the Chaos, 61-63. Or, see James H. Nichols, Romanticism in
American Theology: Nevin and Schaff at Mercersburg, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1861).
27 Philip Schaff, “The Development of Religious Liberty,” The North American Review, (April 1884), 349.
28 Ibid., 351.
29 Philip Schaff, “Toleration and Liberty,” The Independent, (April 18, 1889), 1.
30 Ibid.
40
churches of Europe, seeking freedom from persecution for the sake of their religious
convictions.”31
In 1884 Schaff excluded several American colonies that promoted religious
liberty from significance in his developmental scheme, in striking contrast to his earlier
admiration. These religions played no role in his developmental scheme. The Catholic
colony of Maryland, with its religious liberty provisions, he ignored entirely. Those
groups he named that espoused religious liberty – Quakers, Baptists, and Moravians – he
relegated to a marginal status as “those which never had the power to persecute.”32 He
implied that had they been more powerful they would have persecuted the same as other
religious groups. Moreover, they had no lasting impact on the nation’s development of
religious liberty, which came out of practical necessity, due to competing religions within
states and in the Republic, and the “Providential” aims for America.33
The shift between 1855 and 1884 in Schaff’s interpretation of Quakers and others
who supported religious liberty in early America suggests two possibilities. While Schaff
could happily concede the origin of religious liberty in America to other groups in 1855,
after he embraced religious liberty he realigned his narrative to emphasize those
denominations he saw as most important. It is also possible that this shift was in reaction
to those other “denominational histories we have in abundance,”34 which he claimed
failed to show a comprehensive history of religion in America. As the other chapters in
this dissertation demonstrate, other denominations were staking their claim to the origins
of religious liberty in America through historical works in this period.
31 Schaff, “The Development of Religious Liberty,” 359.
32 Philip Schaff, “The Discord and Concord of Christendom,” The Independent (September 11, 1884), 1.
33 Schaff, “The Development of Religious Liberty,” 358-9.
34 Schaff, “American Church History,” The Independent, (December 22, 1892), 1.
41
Schaff repeated his assertions from America (1855) that the separation of church
and state as institutions did not mean the separation of the nation from religion. He noted
that American people expressed their religiosity voluntarily through support for their
churches, benevolent societies, missions, observance of Sunday as a day of rest, and
reverence for the Bible and publications of countless books and periodicals of religious
nature. Moreover, he noted evidence of America being a Christian nation in offering
chaplains in the military, opening Congressional sessions with prayer, fast days declared
at various points in its history (Cholera epidemic in 1849, Lincoln’s assassination, and
death of President Garfield),35 and the yearly Thanksgiving Day observance. “Indeed,
religion, it may be justly claimed, has all the more hold upon the American character, just
because it is left to the personal conviction and free choice of every man. Religion
thrives best in the atmosphere of freedom. This is the lesson of American Church
history.”36 The lessons he drew from America’s religiosity were quite different in 1884
than in 1855. While he had previously found the separation of church and state to be a
practical transitory phase for America, it now represented an apex in the history and
progress of the world.
Finally, Schaff’s 1892 essay, “American Church History,” omitted Quakers,
Baptists and Moravians entirely from its early history. However, Schaff went to some
length to demonstrate his assertion that the true American Church history was AngloSaxon and Protestant, rather than Spanish and Catholic. While he was forced to
acknowledge the early influence of the discovery of America and early missions to the
Spanish and French, he quickly dismissed any long term influence. Spain’s influence in
35 Eleven governors proclaimed fast days in their states in 1849 to combat the cholera epidemic, though
most were careful to state that these proclamations were recommendations, not decrees. See Charles E.
Rosenberg, The Cholera Years: The United States in 1832, 1849, and 1866 (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1962), 52-3.
36 Schaff, “The Development of Religious Liberty,” 362-3.
42
the “new world” he characterized as a “disgrace,” but for the (unelaborated) efforts of a
few Franciscan and Dominican missionaries. Instead, he cited Bartolome de las Casas’
sixteenth-century critique of Spanish activity in the Caribbean. He used the example of
the Taino chief Hatuey, who charged that the real god of Spaniards was gold, and turned
down the offer of salvation with the response that he would not wish to go to heaven if
there were Spaniards there.37 Schaff defined “American” church history as that of the
United States, and stressed the role of Anglo-Saxon Protestants in its progress: “chiefly
discovered and settled by the Anglo-Saxon race, and predestinated principally for the
Protestant religion. It was built up by Protestant enterprise and energy. It has far
outstripped South America in progress, prosperity and world-historical importance, and
now fairly rivals Europe as a theater of history. American Church History is therefore
chiefly a Church history of the United States.”38
Schaff’s final project, which he did not live to see completed, was the American
Church History series (13 volumes, published 1893-1908). While denominational
histories of America flourished, there was “no worthy history of American Christianity;
which represents it as an organic whole, in its genesis and growth, its connections with
the Mother Churches in Europe, its characteristic peculiarities and its great mission for
the future.”39 Moreover, he saw this as an important step toward greater religious unity
in the United States. The American Society for Church History published the volumes,
and as a report on the upcoming series claimed in 1891, it was to be “a uniform series of
denominational histories, written, as far as possible, in the spirit of Dr. Schaff's general
37 Schaff, “American Church History,” 44. See also Bartolome de las Casas, A Brief Account of the
Destruction of the Indies, [1552] (Middlesex: The Echo Library, 2007), 9.
38 Ibid.
39 Schaff, “American Church History,” 1.
43
history, and, in a sense, forming a continuation of that work.”40 The volumes included
separate histories on the following denominations: Baptists, Congregationalists,
Evangelical Lutherans, Presbyterians, Protestant Episcopal, Dutch and German
Reformed, Moravians, Roman Catholic, Unitarian, Universalist, Disciples of Christ,
Society of Friends, and United Brethren of Christ.
The final volume was a synthetic history of American Christianity by Leonard
Woolsey Bacon. Bacon was a longtime Congregationalist minister who had been active
in the abolition movement, and more recently in Sunday law reform and issues of
American religious history and unity. In addition to sharing a background in Reformed
religion, Bacon’s views were in line with Schaff’s regarding ecumenical movements and
historical approach. Both saw in the World’s Parliament of Religions in the World
Columbian Exposition in Chicago, 1893, important signs of progress towards unity,
though this was not the only or even most prevalent view.41 Schaff and Bacon had
similarly critical responses to Vatican Council I’s declaration of papal infallibility too. 42
Bacon’s volume stressed many of the themes that Schaff’s historical work had
previously, including ideas of manifest destiny, Anglo-Saxon Protestant superiority, and
the primary and positive impact of major Protestant religions determining the religious
and national identity. More explicitly than any of Schaff’s work, however, Bacon read
the history of major Protestant groups uncritically and diminished the impact of Quakers
and Catholics in American history.
40 Albert Henry Newman, “Report on a Proposed Series of Denominational Histories to be published
under the Auspices of the American Society of Church history,” Papers of the American Society of Church
History, 3 (1891): 209.
41 Richard Hughes Seager, “Pluralism and the American Mainstream: The View from the World’s
Parliament of Religions,” The Harvard Theological Review 82:3 (July 1989), 316.
42 See James H. Smylie, “American Protestants Interpret Vatican Council I,” Church History, 38:4
(December 1969), 459-474.
44
Bacon began his volume with an explanation of the “providential” preparations
for the discovery of America. According to Bacon, the Reformation needed to occur in
Europe before the discovery of the “New World” so that the religions transplanted there
would be of a higher grade than medieval Christianity. While Bacon admitted that the
first century of American history belong to Spanish Catholics and not Protestants, his
overview of early Spanish and French missions concluded with their “extinction.”43
While he acknowledged that his recounting of three centuries of Spanish religious history
in America was “absurdly brief,” he explained this by saying “it has strangely little
connection with the extant Christianity of our country.”44 Bacon’s assessment of French
Catholic history in America was more positive, including conversion of Native
Americans by faith rather than the sword, yet he saw in the demise of the French empire
in America “the manifest intent of divine Providence that the field of the next great
empire in the world’s history should not become the exclusive domain of an old-world
monarchy and hierarchy.”45
In recounting the history of Maryland colony, Bacon avoided crediting any
significance to its Catholic origins and early espousal of religious liberty. According to
Bacon, Lord Baltimore sought to make his colony a financial success, and religious
liberty was merely a means to that end. “Lord Baltimore may not have been a profound
political philosopher or a prophet of the coming era of religious liberty, but he was an
adroit courtier… and he was not in the least disposed to allow his religious predilections
43 Leonard Woolsey Bacon, A History of American Christianity, American Church History Series, volume
XIII (London: James Clark and Company, 1899), 29
44 Ibid., 14.
45 Ibid., 24.
45
to interfere with business.”46 Moreover, Bacon credited Puritan influences in the
Maryland colony with the Maryland Toleration Act of 1649.47
Bacon downplayed Puritan religious persecution in New England colonies,
presenting a sympathetic and apologetic narrative. While he acknowledged that the
principles that the leaders of New England espoused were exclusive (meaning they
punished dissidents), he maintained that they were nonetheless “large-minded and
generous men.”48 Furthermore, he claimed “a rigorously exclusive selection of men likeminded is the best seed for the first planting of a commonwealth in the wilderness.”49
The benefits of the New England civil experiment that he noted were the first constitution
(in Connecticut), “self-government,” and “pure democracy.” A causal link between
Calvinism and democracy was largely taken for granted in the nineteenth century.50
Referring to the end of local church-state establishment with the royal revoking of New
England’s charters in the 1680s, Bacon assured his readers that the unity of church and
state would have ended eventually on its own, but that it lasted long enough to provide a
model of democracy for other states.51
Bacon’s apologetic approach to New England is particularly apparent in his
portrayal of Roger Williams’ expulsion from Massachusetts as a mutually beneficial
experience. Roger Williams was convicted of sedition and heresy by the Massachusetts
authorities in 1635 on a number of charges related to his belief in freedom of conscience.
46 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 57.
47 Ibid., 59.
48 Ibid., 102.
49 Ibid., 108.
50 See Winthrop S. Hudson, “Democratic Freedom and Religious Faith in the Reformed Tradition,”
Church History 15:3 (Sept. 1946), 177.
51 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 108.
46
Williams was banished from the colony and forbidden from returning. Though he was
granted an extension on account of illness, he continued to express his views openly and
was forced to flee alone on foot for 14 weeks during the winter until some friendly
Wampanoag Indians took him in.52 According to Bacon’s retelling, Williams’ message
was simply incompatible with Puritan hierarchy at the time, so he was removed from
their jurisdiction “to the great advantage of both parties and without loss of mutual
respect and love.”53 After Williams’ expulsion, he rejected infant baptism, and became
one of the most important early American Calvinistic Baptists. For a Reformed historian,
who wished to include Baptists in his view of Protestant unity, retelling this story from a
conciliatory perspective was imperative.
Bacon’s version of the Massachusetts Colony’s prosecutions against Ann
Hutchinson in the eighteenth century and against Quakers went further in suggesting that
these were persons who disturbed the peace and deserved civil, though not ecclesiastical,
trials. He characterized Hutchinson as “a willful and persistent nuisance…. there were
good reasons for wanting to be rid of her, and right ways to that end. They took the
wrong way and tried her for heresy.”54 Similarly, Bacon suggested Quakers should have
been prosecuted for “overt offenses against the state, disorderly behavior, public
indecency, contempt of court, sedition,” rather than for their religious beliefs.
By
attacking others for their religious beliefs, he argued that Massachusetts’ colonial leaders
were not only taking the wrong approach, but were “conceding to their adversaries that
crown of martyrdom for which their souls were hankering and to which they were not
52 Edwin S. Gaustad, Roger Williams (Oxford University Press, 2005), 13-14.
53 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 101.
54 Ibid.
47
fully entitled.”55 Thus, for Bacon, the worst result of the Massachusetts’ persecution of
dissidents was its inadvertent promotion of unworthy individuals.
According to Bacon, New England’s contributions to the nation in terms of its
history were numerous and significant. He noted the first Constitution, written by
Thomas Hooker for Connecticut in 1639.56 After a hundred years of settlement, he
characterized Massachusetts and Connecticut as liberally “planted with towns, each selfgoverning as a pure democracy, each with its church and educated minister and its system
of common schools.”57 Moreover, his assessment of New England’s wars with Indians,
which included vicious battles and massacres which contributed to the near extinction of
several tribes,58 simply valorized Puritan bravery: “History has no nobler record to show,
of courage and fortitude in both men and women, than that of New England in the Indian
wars.”59
Bacon’s summary of the Quaker colony of Pennsylvania was generally favorable,
though brief. He gave William Penn credit for his “Holy Experiment” by noting his
assurances of religious and civil liberty from the founding of the colony in 1638.
However, his history of Pennsylvania emphasized the significance of non-Quaker
contributions to the colony. For example, Bacon characterized George Keith’s
disownment by Quakers in Pennsylvania as a “notable” aspect of Church history, since
55 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 101.
56 Ibid., 102. For more on Connecticut’s Constitution, see Christopher Collier, “Fundamental Orders of
Connecticut and American Constitutionalism,” Connecticut Law Review 21 (1988/1989), 863-870.
57 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 102-3.
58 Conflicts such as the Pequot War (1634-8) and King Philip’s War (1675-6) have sparked lively debate
among scholar today over whether these encounters constituted acts of genocide by the New England
settlers. See Michael Freeman, “Puritans and Pequots: The Question of Genocide,” The New England
Quarterly 68 (June 1995): 278-93; Steven T. Katz, “Pequots and the Question of Genocide: a Reply to
Michael Freeman,” The New England Quarterly 68 (December 1995): 641-649; James Drake, “Restraining
Atrocity: The Conduct of King Philip’s War,” The New England Quarterly 70:1 (March 1997): 645-657.
59 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 105.
48
Keith was later ordained as a Episcopalian and returned in 1702 to America as the first
missionary for the newly organized Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign
Parts (1701). Moreover, after William Penn’s sons abandoned the Society of Friends for
Anglicanism, “it was the church promoted by the proprietary interest; withal it proved
itself, both then and afterward, to hold a deposit of truth and of usages of worship
peculiarly adapted to supplement the defects of the Quaker system.”60 Another “great
beginning” in American religious history that he noted was the development of German
Lutheran and Reformed churches in Pennsylvania.61 Finally, Bacon declared that
Pennsylvania’s “greatest consequence” was a steady stream of Scotch-Irish immigration,
“out of which was to spring the sturdy growth of American Presbyterianism, as well as of
other Christian organizations.”62
Bacon also characterized the history of Pennsylvania as “paradoxical” in its
history of Indian relations. He noted that it was founded “on principles of mutual good
will with the Indians and tender regard for Indian rights, of religious liberty and
interconfessional amity, and of a permanent peace policy.”63 Despite these measures
taken, in “good faith,” Bacon suggested that the Quaker policy of “resist no evil” had led
to an unparalleled amount of dispute over land in the colony. “Its history has been
characterized, beyond that of other States, by foul play toward the Indians, and protracted
Indian wars, by obstinate insurrections against public order, and by cruel and
exterminating war upon honest settlers.”64 It is unclear from Bacon’s retelling whether
60 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 119.
61 Ibid., 120.
62 Ibid., 120-121.
63 Ibid., 144.
64 Ibid.
49
he thought Quakers’ peace policy led to war with the Indians, or to their loss of power to
other groups in government (who then initiated war with Indians).
Despite the similarly meager results of both Protestant and Catholic missions to
Indians in North America, Bacon found long-term significance in Protestant missions.
The “success” he found in Protestant missions, was a legacy of “faithful missionaries
[which] has never failed from that day to this.”65 The results that were significant were
mission efforts, not converts. Protestant attempts to convert Indians, he overgeneralized,
were thwarted by Indian violence: “always just when the project seemed most hopeful, an
indiscriminate massacre of missionaries and converts together swept the enterprise out of
existence. The experience of all was the same.”66
On the question of slavery – a historical question of heightened significance in the
wake of the Civil War – Bacon originated abolition movements in New England rather
than in Pennsylvania. He cited John Eliot, missionary to Indians in Massachusetts, who
warned that enslaving Indians was evil in 1675; also, Samuel Sewell, a Puritan magistrate
in Massachusetts, asserted in a pamphlet in 1700 that Africans must be treated as brothers
and warned that conversion efforts among them would be unsuccessful until slavery was
abolished. Moreover, Bacon noted that in 1701 Boston took measures “to put a period to
negroes being slaves.”67 “Such endeavors after universal justice and freedom, on the part
of the Christians of New England, thwarted by the insatiable greed of British traders and
politicians, were not to cease until, with the first enlargement of independence, they
should bring forth judgment to victory.”68
65 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 151.
66 Ibid., 150-151.
67 Ibid., 153.
68 Ibid., 153.
50
Regarding early anti-slavery efforts of Quakers and Mennonites, Bacon asserted
that “The voice of New England was echoed from Pennsylvania. The Mennonites of
Germantown, in 1688, framed in quaint and touching language their petition for the
abolition of slavery, and the Quaker yearly meetings responded one to another with
unanimous protest.”69 By focusing on early rhetoric in New England, the narrative
suggests that New England was more important than Pennsylvania in the history of the
abolition movement. In fact, the Quaker Yearly Meeting in Philadelphia required its
adherents to free their slaves in 1758; New England churches never made abolition a test
of fellowship. Moreover, there were slaves in New England until a few years after the
Revolution when a judicial decision made slavery illegal. Moreover, New England
merchants profited from the slave trade until it was abolished by the federal government
in 1808. Pennsylvania’s history of abolition was no mere “echo” of New England antislavery sentiment.70
Another issue regarding slavery that Bacon attempted to explain was what he
called “the southern apostasy,”71 or the support of the institution of slavery among
southern churches beginning in the 1830s. While he attributed some causation to
economic interest, and reaction to radical abolitionists, he found Nat Turner’s rebellion of
1831 to be the most significant factor: “demonstrably the chief cause of this sudden
change of religious opinion – one of the most remarkable in the history of the church –
was panic terror. In August, 1831, a servile insurrection in Virginia, led by a crazy
negro, Nat Turner by name, was followed (as always in such cases) by bloody vengeance
69 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 153.
70 For an overview of colonial Quakers and slavery see Thomas E. Drake, Quakers and Slavery in
America, (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1950), 1-99.
71 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 277.
51
on the part of the whites.”72 This violence was followed by the southern churches being
“terrified into ‘an unexampled unanimity’” in supporting slavery. Such an argument
excused white Christians of their responsibility for owning slaves. A conciliatory
position was necessary, even for an old abolitionist like Bacon, if he valued the future
union of white churches in America.
Despite his apologetics regarding white churches in the South, Bacon insisted that
in the North, it was the “steadfast fidelity of the Christian people that saved the nation
from ruin.”73 He cited the reaction of New England clergy to the Nebraska-Kansas Act
of 1854 in writing a memorial to Congress protesting the bill, with 3,050 signatures.74
Presumably, had the nation continued to hold slaves in part of its states, it would have
doomed the entire nation to a loss of divine favor.
Bacon also located his overview of contemporary Sunday law movements in the
history of New England. Bacon found the justification for the Sunday as Sabbath in the
Westminster Confession75 which stipulates observing the first day of the week, refraining
from work and recreation, and spending the time in public and private worship and good
deeds. According to Bacon, “This interpretation and expansion of the Fourth
Commandment has never attained to more than a sectarian and provincial authority; but
the overmastering Puritan influence, both of Virginia and of New England, combined
with the Scotch-Irish influence, made it for a long time dominant in America.”76 The
72 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 279. This general line of argument is echoed by modern
scholars today, see Charles F. Irons, The Origins of Proslavery Christianity: White and Black Evangelicals
in Colonial and Antebellum Virginia, (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2008).
73 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 284.
74 Ibid., 284.
75 Drawn up in 1646 by the Church of England, it became a staple of Calvinist religious traditions such as
Congregationalists, Presbyterians, and Baptists.
76 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 371.
52
event that Bacon interpreted as undermining Sunday dominance in American society was
during the Civil War, when Sunday went unobserved in the military, and began to be
overlooked in homes as well. “The social change which is still in progress along these
lines no wise Christian patriot can contemplate with complacency. It threatens, when
complete, to deprive us of that universal quiet Sabbath rest which has been one of the
glories of American social life, and an important element in its economic prosperity, and
to give in place of it, to some, no assurance of a Sabbath rest at all, to others, a Sabbath of
revelry and debauch.”77
Since Schaff died before the publication of Bacon’s history of religion in
America, it is impossible to gauge what his reaction to the narrative might have been.
Certainly, Bacon’s version did not demonstrate, to our modern perspective, the kind of
history that Schaff championed, “with charity toward all and malice toward none.”78
However, it did proceed in a way that mirrored Schaff’s writings in particular ways. It
located the origin of religious liberty among Reformed Protestant groups, while
marginalizing Catholics, and to some extent Quakers. It was generous to white Southern
churches, and excluded black churches entirely. Perhaps it went further than Schaff
would have hoped in its exclusivity, but it upheld the same spirit of uniting Reformed
Protestant churches with other large white denominations of the day that Schaff’s
writings’ promoted.
.Schaff’s View of the Present
Schaff’s histories glorified the role of religion in making America great, but he
warned that such greatness required constant vigilance. Writing in 1879, he reminded his
77 Bacon, A History of American Christianity, 271-272.
78 Philip Schaff, “The Reunion of Christendom,” in John Henry Barrows, ed., The World’s Parliament of
Religions, volume II (Chicago: The Parliament Publishing Company 1893), 1198.
53
readers that America’s unique situation as the vanguard of religion and Anglo-Saxon
height of civilization carried with it a heavy responsibility. The challenges he saw
America facing were similar to broad concerns that many had during the time period.
These included “infidelity,” rationalism, materialism, labor issues, race relations, poverty,
crime and political corruption. The answer to these issues was “not education,” but
religion.79 He supported private measures to combat current challenges to the nation,
such as temperance, domestic missions in cities and new territories and states in the west,
Sunday-Schools, and Bible societies. These “social gospel” activities were efforts that he
felt also unified Christians. America’s greatness must be also be safeguarded through
appropriate governmental limits to religious liberty in addition to enthusiastic private
religious activities. Moreover, Christians who were united in their efforts would see the
best results.
The primary way in which Schaff hoped to achieve his ideal of Christian unity
was through the Evangelical Alliance. The World Evangelical Alliance was organized in
London in 1846. It grew out of interdenominational cooperation in evangelical voluntary
societies in the early nineteenth century, as well as a sense of concern over religious and
cultural diversity and its resulting tensions.80 The first attempt at an American
Evangelical Alliance in 1846 died out in the 1950s over abolition issues. It was revived
after the Civil War, and Schaff was one of the “prime movers” of the American
Evangelical Alliance from its organization in 1865 until his death in 1893.81 He also was
79 Philip Schaff, “Progress of Christianity in the United States” Princeton Review 5 (September 1879),
214. Schaff may be responding to Horace Mann’s well-known assertions, in founding state-supported
commons schools, that knowledge was the solution to society’s problems. See Horace Mann, “Twelfth
Annual Report (1848),” in Lawrence A. Cremin, ed., The Republic and the School: Horace Mann on the
Education of Free Men (New York: Columbia University Teachers College, 1957), 98-112.
80 Philip D. Jordan, The Evangelical Alliance for the United States, 1847-1900, (New York: Edwin Mellon
Press, 1982), 13.
81 Ibid., 75.
54
one of the primary articulators of the Alliance’s views promoting religious liberty. In
practice, however, the organization defended the religious freedom evangelical
missionaries abroad and the status quo in America, with contradictory results.82 For
example, the Alliance opposed state-support of any Catholic charitable institution, while
actively lobbying for public funds for evangelical charities in America. The historian
Philip Jordan characterizes the logic of the institution as follows: “the true ‘American
Citizen’ must be evangelical and anti-Catholic because the bulk of Roman Catholics
could be neither democratic nor evangelical.”83 Schaff was also involved in the World
Alliance of Reformed Churches after its formation in 1875, and tried unsuccessfully to
form a consensus creed for that organization.84
In 1870, Schaff organized first international meeting of the Evangelical Alliance
in the United States. He explained that the aims of the organization were “to exhibit,
maintain and strengthen Christian union and fellowship, to counteract infidelity and
popery, and to promote religious liberty throughout the world. It does not aim to create
union, but is based on the existing spiritual union of all true believers.”85 Some of the
particular concerns of the organization that he described were the place of religion in
public education, labor issues, immigration to America, and “the ways and means to win
the alienated masses of the population, especially in large cities, back to Christianity.”86
Schaff described the work of the Evangelical Alliance as part of what we would call a
82 Jordan, The Evangelical Alliance, 75
83 Ibid., 117.
84 Klaus Penzel, Philip Schaff: Historian and Ambassador of the Universal Church, (Macon, GA: Mercer
University Press, 1991), 219.
85 Philip Schaff, “The New York General Conference of the Evangelical Alliance,” The American
Presbyterian Review (Jan. 1870), 68.
86 Ibid., 80-1.
55
“globalizing” movement today, suggesting that it worked parallel to “modern inventions
and improvements in binding together the ends of the earth for commercial and social
intercourse.” The end result of the Evangelical Alliance would be greater unity of
Christians, “for its [unity’s] own sake as well as for a more effectual testimony against
the common foe.”87 The foes that he identified were state limitations to religious liberty,
and social limitations to religious liberty, “the infidelity of the age, and every tendency
which, under the specious name of liberty, undermines the divine honor of Christ, the
authority of God’s work, and the interest of vital religion.”88
When Schaff heard of plans to revise the Authorized or King James Version of
the Bible in Great Britain he advocated for the cooperation of an American committee to
make the new version as useful as possible in the English-speaking world. In 1871,
Schaff selected 32 scholars to comprise the American committee. These included
representatives of nine different denominations: “Episcopalians, Presbyterians,
Congregationalists, Baptists, Methodists, Reformed, also one Lutheran, one Unitarian,
and one Friend.”89 This endeavor Schaff too saw as furthering Christian unity: “The
Anglo-America Revision is the noblest monument of Christian union and co-operation in
this nineteenth century.”90
A challenge Schaff acknowledged facing religion in America was that of race
relations. A recent scholar has praised Schaff’s progressivism in his views toward
immigration in America, his optimism about the ability of America to absorb vast
87 Schaff, “The New York General Conference of the Evangelical Alliance,” 87-8.
88 Ibid., 89.
89 Philip Schaff, A Companion to the Greek Testament and the English Version, (New York: Harper and
Brothers 1883), 395.
90 Ibid., 494.
56
numbers of immigrants.91 His ideas, however, merely reflected common views on “the
Anglo-Saxon race.” Nineteenth-century philologists92 saw the Anglo-Saxon race as a
“mixed-race” with the ability to incorporate and absorb other races, while producing
something superior.93 Schaff’s was not the ardently nativist view of Josiah Strong, for
example, but it prioritized an assimilationist model of European races in America rather
than pluralism. Blacks, Asians and Native Americans were excluded from this ideal of
assimilation. Instead, he favored colonization for blacks, and hoped that Chinese
immigrants would return to their native country, taking Christianity back with them.
Native Americans he saw as on the brink of extinction, a common view at the time.94 He
supported missions to these groups but saw no future for them in his vision of Christian
unity in America.
While Schaff came to embrace religious liberty in America as the result of
progress and divine intervention in history, he never supported total separation of church
and state. While his general position never changed, in his later writings he consistently
named three areas –monogamous marriages, Sunday laws, religious instruction in public
schools – that represented limits to religious liberty in America and that must be enforced
to promote the religious culture that empowered the nation.95 On these particular issues,
Schaff determined that total separation of church and state was impossible.
91 Graham, Cosmos in the Chaos, 179.
92 In the nineteenth century, “language was assumed to be the most vital criterion of nationality,” and
provided an impetus to the study of philology, and determining racial origins through language. See Harry
Elmer Barnes, A History of Historical Writing, (New York: Dover, 1963), 179.
93 See, for example, nineteenth-century British scholar Thomas William Shore, Origins of the Anglo-Saxon
Race: A Study of the Settlement of England and the Tribal Origin of the Old English People, (London:
Elliot Stock, 1906), Anglo-Saxon race a product of commingled races, 393; similar process occurring in
America, 9.
94 Schaff, “Progress of Christianity in the United States,” 224.
95 Ibid.; “Church and State,” The Christian Advocate (May 17, 1888), 331; Church and State in the United
States: the American Idea of Religious Liberty and its Practical Effects, (New York: Charles Scribner’s
Sons, 1889), 69.
57
Schaff’s defense of monogamous marriage was explicitly in response to the
challenge posed by Mormonism, which had no place in his vision of Christian unity. The
growth of Mormonism demonstrated “the power of fanaticism” in springing up quickly,
but he blithely concluded that it was on the decline and would soon fade.96 Mormonism
would not be able to “resist much longer the pressure of the surrounding civilization and
churches.”97 He argued that polygamy was demeaning to women, appealing to current
views of femininity to assert that “No cultivated and high-minded American lady would
willingly choose so degrading a position.”98 Schaff stated confidently that “Congress has
expressly prohibited polygamy, and the Supreme Court has affirmed the constitutionality
of this law. Utah Territory will not be admitted into the confederacy of independent
States until this poisonous plant is uprooted.”99 Mormonism was the only American
religious tradition that he explicitly excluded from promoting and preserving the
“national peace and welfare.”100
Schaff demonstrated an early interest in promoting Sunday laws in the United
States, serving on the New York Sabbath Committee from 1863-1870. In 1863, Schaff
delivered a paper at the National Sabbath convention, on invitation from the New York
Sabbath Committee. His presentation, “The Anglo-American Sabbath,” asserted the
national importance of protective Sunday legislation. He claimed that Sunday
observance in Britain and in America combined an “evangelical” and “legalistic”
96 Philip Schaff, “Three Days Among the Mormons,” The Independent, (July 25, 1878), 3.
97 Ibid., 4.
98 Schaff, “Three Days Among the Mormons,” 3.
99 Schaff, “Progress of Christianity in the United States of America,” 225. The Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act
(1862) made polygamy illegal. It was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in Reynolds v United States
(1878).
100 Philip Schaff, “The Development of Religious Freedom,” The North American Review, (April 1884),
356.
58
approach. It was evangelical in that it celebrated Christ’s resurrection from the dead, and
legalistic in that it affirmed the injunction to keep the Sabbath in the Biblical narrative of
creation and the 4th of the Ten Commandments.101 He also linked Sunday observance to
national greatness. According to Schaff, “It is an undeniable fact that the two nations
which keep the Sabbath most strictly – Great Britain and the United States – are the
wealthiest and the freest on earth.”102
Schaff’s later writings continued to press for legislated Sunday observance as
critical to America’s strength and power in the future. Reverence for Sunday, along with
churches and the Bible, were what he termed “the three pillars of American society.
Without them… God will raise up some other nation or continent to carry on his designs;
but with them it will continue to prosper notwithstanding all hindrances from without and
within.”103 Schaff described Sunday observance as a “national custom” in America;
rooted in the Puritan colonies. He described Sunday laws as “protective” rather than
coercive; they did not compel attendance at religious services, but protected those who
wished to observe Sunday “in their enjoyment of the Sunday rest and the privilege of
public worship as well as in the enjoyment of any other right.” Furthermore, he
promoted Sunday laws as protecting workers, “who otherwise would become slaves to
heartless capital.”104
Schaff cited numerous instances of Sunday laws in the United States that
established its place in the common law. Legislative and judicial proceedings are
suspended on Sunday; no political elections are held on Sunday; the President’s
inauguration is moved to Monday if March 4th falls on a Sunday; the Constitution
101 Philip Schaff, The Anglo-American Sabbath, (New York: American Tract Society, 1863), 4-5.
102 Philip Schaff, The Anglo-American Sabbath, 7.
103 Schaff, “Progress of Christianity in the United States of America,” 214.
104 Ibid., 225.
59
exempts Sunday from the workdays in which the President signs a bill of Congress; the
nation celebrates the 4th of July on the 5th if it falls on a Sunday.105
Like other evangelical Protestants in America in the second half of the nineteenth
century, Schaff found protective Sunday legislation necessary due to the high number of
immigrants who held different standards for Sunday observance. The threat to the
American custom of Sunday originated with “foreigners from the Continent, who would
like to turn it into a day of secular amusement, and to substitute the theatre and beer
saloon for the church and Sunday-school.”106 Nevertheless, by 1879 he felt that the
Sabbath Committee of New York had “done great work in this direction and stimulated
similar efforts in other large cities.”107
In Church and State (1888), Schaff rather brashly proclaimed that the only people
who might have a case to protest Sunday laws were Jews and Seventh-day Baptists, “But
they are a small minority, and must submit to the will of the majority, as the government
cannot wisely appoint two weekly days of rest.” He apparently did not see a problem
with people from these religious groups observing two weekly days of rest. However, he
did offer the example of New York, which had granted an exemption for those who
worshipped on the seventh day of the week, “provided that their labor does not ‘interrupt
or disturb other persons in observing the first day of the week as holy time.’”108
While Schaff acknowledged that religious instruction in public schools
constituted a problem area regarding religious liberty in the United States, he ardently
supported religious instruction. He exempted it, along with monogamous marriage and
105 Schaff, “Progress of Christianity in the United States of America,” 224.
106 Ibid., 226.
107 Ibid.
108 Schaff, Church and State in the United States, 72-3.
60
Sunday laws, from the general rule of “rendering unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto
God what is God’s.”109
Schaff cited Judge Theodore Dwight, president of Columbia Law School, as
saying that religious instruction in public schools is evidence of the fact that Christianity
is part of the common law in America.110 Schaff found that the practice of beginning
school with reading the Bible, singing, and prayer had been part of the practice of the
earliest public schools in New England.111 The problem, as it were, was that the practice
was “violently and persistently assailed by infidels, Jews, and especially by Roman
Catholics.”112
He outlined various plans that had been proposed to deal with the issue of religion
in public school and explained why he found them inadequate or inappropriate. One plan
would be to abandon common schools and leave education and religion both in the
private school. However, he noted that education was too vital to the maintenance of a
“self-governing republic” to abandon public education.113 Another plan might be to
divide public funds among denominations to form schools and teach religion as they saw
fit. However, he found this inappropriate because Protestants would end up paying for
Catholic schools since they were the majority. Moreover, he felt it would increase
animosity between religions rather than moderate them – he felt that the present public
education system tended to “raise a homogenous generation.”114 Another plan would be
109 Philip Schaff, “Statecraft and Priestcraft,” The North American Review, (November 1885), 436.
110 Schaff, “Progress of Christianity in the United States,” 226-7.
111 Ibid.
112 Ibid., 227.
113 Ibid.
114 Ibid., 228.
61
to eliminate religion in public schools and leave it to Sunday schools to accomplish
religious education. However, he stated that “Absolute indifference of the school to
morals and religion is impossible; it must be either moral or immoral, religious or
irreligious, Christian or anti-Christian.”115 An education without religion “would raise a
heartless and infidel generation of intellectual animals.”116
The present situation of the public schools was what Schaff termed the “local
option plan,” in which local school boards dealt with questions of religious instruction
according to the wants and needs of its population. He claimed that this was the system,
“likely to prevail,” and seemed most advantageous in a heterogeneous society. He
proposed one final alternative, which he claimed had “not yet received sufficient
consideration”: leave religious education to churches, and allow students to choose which
and whether or not to attend religious classes.117 The latter proposition became his
favored plan, as evidenced by the whole-hearted endorsement that he gave to such a plan
in his 1888 book Church and State.118
Schaff objected to a religious Amendment to the Constitution acknowledging God
for several reasons that he outlined in Church and State (1888). He suggested that
mentioning God in a purely political document made no more sense than doing so in “a
mathematical treatise” or “statutes of a bank or railroad corporation.”119 Moreover,
explicit acknowledgment of God does not make the institution holy. He noted that “the
title ‘Holiness’ does not make the Pope of Rome any holier than he is, and it makes the
115 Schaff, “Progress of Christianity in the United States,” 228.
116 Ibid.
117 Ibid., 229.
118 Schaff, Church and State, 76-77.
119 Ibid., 49.
62
contradiction only more glaring in such characters as Alexander VI.”120 Moreover, the
Confederate States’ Constitution did insert God into their preamble, yet “The name of
God did not make it more pious or justifiable.”121 Moreover, because of his views of
history, he felt that religious liberty could only have originated in “Christian civilization
and culture.”122 Thus, religious liberty was alike granted to Jews and “infidels” so long
as they did not “disturb the peace.”123
Schaff’s “chief objection” to the amendment was “that it rests on a false
assumption, and casts an unjust reflection upon the original document as if it were hostile
to religion. But it is neither hostile nor friendly to any religion; it is simply silent on the
subject, as lying beyond the jurisdiction of the general government.”124 Schaff felt a
religious Amendment was redundant, that the Constitution already acknowledged God in
substance, and the government did so in practice. The examples he provided here to
demonstrate the American government’s Christian nature were requiring oaths which
recognize “the Supreme Being” of officers of all three branches of government,
exempting Sunday from a day in which the President signs bills, and the use of the phrase
“the year of our Lord,” the last of which “implies that Jesus Christ is the turning-point of
history and the beginning of a new order of society.”125 Acknowledging that the
Constitution needed an explicit reference to God would undermine all of Schaff’s
arguments regarding the inherent Christian foundation of the nation and common law. It
120 Schaff, Church and State, 49.
121 Ibid.
122 Ibid., 40.
123 Ibid., 58.
124 Ibid., 39.
125 Ibid., 41.
63
would amount to admitting that the nation was founded on secular instead of religious
principles.
Schaff offered as the “only” example in which the U.S. government could be
construed as being hostile to religion as the wording of a treaty between America and
Tripoli in 1796 “in which it is said – perhaps unguardedly and unnecessarily – that the
government of United States is ‘not founded on the Christian religion,’ and has no enmity
against the religion of a Mohammedan nation.”126 But for Schaff, because this treaty was
signed by Washington it could not have been intended to demean Christianity, but simply
meant that “the United States is founded, like all civil governments, in the law of nature,
and not hostile to any religion.”127
Schaff contrasted the efforts to obtain a religious Amendment with the efforts of
the National Liberal League to remove Christianity from the American government.
“The former aims to Christianize the Constitution and the nationalize Christianity; the
latter aims to heathenize the Constitution and to denationalize Christianity.”128 In a
sense, he viewed the National Liberal League as better understanding the Constitution, as
he thought it was unnecessary to “make” the nation Christian. He did not view an antiChristian Amendment as any serious threat, but voiced concern that “some good religious
people” mistakenly supported the absolute separation of church and state, and as a result,
favored excluding the Bible and religious teachings from public schools.129 This
statement is in strange tension with his plan for making religious instruction optional and
outside of the public schooling system. One can only surmise that Schaff had difficulty
promoting a consistent policy in this regard.
126 Schaff, Church and State, 41.
127 Ibid., 42.
128 Ibid., 43.
129 Ibid., 44.
64
He also referenced Blaine’s Amendment, which would limit state money from
being appropriated to “sectarian purposes.”130 This event emerged from the issue of the
state of New York occasionally appropriating funds to Catholic institutions through their
legislature or city government “owing to the political influence of the large Irish vote.”131
This was an issue in which Schaff acknowledged the need for consistency: “The State
must, above all things, be just, and support either all or none of the religious
denominations.”132 When it came to the issue of granting funds to Catholic schools,
Schaff suddenly took an all or nothing stance on religious funding and equality.
Schaff’s view of the present reflected concerns that many had at the time. The
answers to these questions were grounded in his view of the past and his view of the
future unity of Christians in America. American Christians must join with other
Christians if they wanted to maximize their efforts in their common causes and concerns.
While he welcomed European immigrants into America’s fold, he found it hard to
envision blacks, Chinese, or Indians as playing any important role in America’s future.
He thought Christians needed to defend Sunday laws and religious education in public
schools, but saw no need for a Constitutional Amendment.
The Reunion of Christendom, 1893
Although Schaff was in bad health at the time of the World Parliament of
Religions in Chicago, part of the Columbian Exposition of 1893, he attended and
presented a speech entitled “The Reunion of Christendom.” In this speech, Schaff
reiterated his view that the church was united, had been one originally, and although
unity had been “marred and obstructed” historically, “The one invisible church is the soul
130 Schaff, Church and State, 48.
131 Ibid.
132 Ibid.
65
which animates the divided visible churches.”133 He argued that Providence had played a
role in the present division of churches, which he distinguished as “denominationalism”
as opposed to “sectarianism,” the former which he saw as a kind of division of labor, and
the latter as a jealous hindrance to Christianity. Given his view of history, Schaff
rejected any kind of “negative” union which would destroy denominational distinctions,
“and thus undo the work of the past. Variety in unity and unity in variety is the law of
God in nature, in history, and in his kingdom. We must, therefore, expect the greatest
variety in the church of the future.”134
Some of the bonds of union that he noted were the English version of the Bible
(both the King James and Revised editions), and the practice of church history.
According to Schaff, “church history has undergone of late a great change… The study of
history – ‘with malice toward none, but with charity for all’ – will bring the
denominations closer together in an humble recognition of their defects and grateful
praise for the good which the same Spirit hath wrought in them and through them.”135
He also cited the importance of cooperation, not competition, in philanthropic and
missionary endeavors.
Schaff’s speech closed with brief odes to denominations, citing each as “glorious”
and hailing its positive attributes. Although began with a tribute to the Greek Orthodox
Church and the Roman Catholic Church, he gave particular emphasis to the Protestant
traditions by introducing them with an ode to the Reformation: “We hail the Reformation
which redeemed us from the yoke of spiritual despotism, and secured us religious liberty
– the most precious of all liberties – and made the Bible in every language a book for all
133 Philip Schaff, “The Reunion of Christendom,” in John Henry Barrows, ed., The World’s Parliament of
Religions, volume II (Chicago: The Parliament Publishing Company 1893), 1193.
134 Schaff, “The Reunion of Christendom,” 1194.
135 Ibid., 1198.
66
classes and conditions of men.”136 Then he listed and gave credit to the following
Protestant denominations: Lutheran, Reformed, Episcopal, Presbyterian, Congregational,
Baptist, Methodist, and Society of Friends. He also included some groups which he
characterized as those considered “heretics”: Waldenses, Anabaptists, Socinians,
Unitarians, and Universalists. Schaff closed by stating “There is room for all these and
many other churches and societies in the Kingdom of God, whose height and depth and
length and breadth, variety and beauty, surpass human comprehension.”137
What Schaff created was a more or less internally coherent narrative of America’s
past, present, and future that drew on ideas of a mainstream Protestant Christianity in
America and made it central to this worldview. Schaff’s view of the past played on
popular themes of Providence in its founding, raised religious liberty to reverential status
as the height of Anglo-Saxon Protestant civilization, and stressed the role of certain
Protestant groups over others. These same Protestant denominations were those stressed
in Bacon’s general history that accompanied Schaff’s American Church History series.
The same religious groups were those Schaff included in his American committee for
revising the Bible, and were presumably his audience for combating perceived threats to
late-nineteenth American society. He stressed the same “dominant” evangelical churches
in his final speech, as being at the forefront of history and the way toward unity in the
future.
Schaff claimed his worldview was inclusive; it was not. Bacon’s history, the heir
apparent to his philosophy, fell even shorter. Schaff’s view of Catholics as a group that
could be absorbed into Protestantism glossed over serious theological differences
between Catholics and Protestants, as well as ignoring the discrimination Catholics
experienced in nineteenth-century America. Seventh-Day Adventists did not appear in
136 Schaff, “The Reunion of Christendom,” 1199.
137 Ibid., 1201.
67
any of Schaff’s writings. We may assume, given the short shrift they received in the
American Church History series (a few pages), that they constituted one of the smaller
sects that he thought should be absorbed into a larger denomination. That Schaff
sometimes included Quakers in his majority demonstrates their ambiguous place in the
evangelical Protestant mainstream. No doubt Schaff viewed them as a group which, if
brought into more churchly form, curbing the excesses caused by their emphasis on
spiritualism, could be a part of the mainstream Christianity he envisioned. Jews only
received brief and passing notice from Schaff. They deserved freedom to practice their
religion so long as it did not “disturb the peace,” but he saw no true place for them in
America’s future. But Schaff was not alone or unique in crafting a worldview out of the
past, present, and future of America that made his view of religion central. His
observations and analysis of American culture were no more incisive than those that
follow in this dissertation. We turn now to see how those outside of Schaff’s definition
of mainstream viewed their place in American history, contemporary politics, and future
glory (or disaster).
68
CHAPTER II
“GOOD CATHOLICS, GOOD CITIZENS”: JOHN SHEA’S CATHOLIC
CRITIQUES AND CLAIMS REGARDING AMERICA
Writing in 1876, John Gilmary Shea (1824-1892) extolled the promise of
American liberty, asserting that the Catholic Church “has, in unison with this genuine
American system, labored to give the State good citizens by making good Catholics.”1
For many Americans, who viewed Catholics as a foreign (immigrant) community with
ties to a foreign power (the Vatican), such an assertion contradicted reason and reality.
Although the Catholic Church was the largest single denomination in America by midcentury, institutionalized discrimination marginalized its cultural status. Through his
historical and political claims, Shea underscored the role of Catholicism in shaping and
preserving America’s tradition of religious toleration. While contemporary Protestant
histories lauded the triumph of Anglo-Protestant values in America, Shea criticized this
legacy as one of religious and ethnic discrimination. He claimed that America had failed
to deliver on its promises of religious freedom, that the state favored Protestantism
repeatedly, and that its attempts to further exclude Catholicism from public institutions
fostered greater negative attitudes in American society toward religion in general. His
scathing critiques of both historical publications and governmental policies unmasked
inconsistencies in the prevailing rhetoric and practice of religious liberty. For Shea,
Catholicism provided the only viable model for unifying and preserving American
society in the face of secularism, and he urged Catholics to assume their rightful place as
defenders of true Americanism.
Shea, the “Father of American Catholic History,” wrote prolifically in the decades
following the Civil War, addressing a broad spectrum of issues in American history,
religion and politics. Born in New York to Irish immigrant parents, he earned a legal
1 John Shea, “The Catholic Church in American History,” American Catholic Quarterly Review [hereafter
ACQR] 1:1 (January 1876), 156.
69
degree and was admitted to the bar in 1846. The following year, he entered the novitiate
of the Society of Jesus in New York, and remained a member of the order for six years.
After leaving the Society for health reasons in 1852, he began a systematic study of early
Catholic missions to Indians in America, a task that commenced his lifelong work as a
historian of American Catholicism. Shea produced almost one hundred volumes, which
in addition to historical studies included translations, Native American grammars and
dictionaries, and devotional works, as well as a large set of articles for Catholic
magazines.2 He was instrumental in forming the United States Catholic Historical
Society in 1884 along with its serial publication The United States Catholic Historical
Magazine, and he also wrote the first official history of Catholics in America, published
in four volumes from 1886-1892. In 1926, Shea’s biographer Peter Guilday (1884-1947)
asserted that, 34 years after his death, Shea’s works remained the foundation for all
scholars of American Catholic history.3
Commissioned to write a “sufficient” history of the Catholic Church in America
at the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore in 1884, Shea subsequently published his fourvolume series History of Catholics in the United States of America (1886-1892). A
recurring theme at the Council was the “progress of the Church,” such that historian Jay
Dolan has characterized the event as American Catholic “boosterism.”4 Fully one-fourth
of the Council’s legislation pertained to Catholic education, and the Church affirmed that
developing Catholic institutions was its first priority in the United States.5 This move
signaled an unwillingness to try to further cooperate with American institutions, and the
2 Peter Guilday, John Gilmary Shea: Father of American Catholic History, 1824-1892 (New York: United
States Catholic Historical Society, 1926), 54.
3 Ibid,, 8.
4 Jay P. Dolan, In Search of American Catholicism: a History of Religion and Culture in Tension, (New
York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 71.
5 Patrick W. Carey, The Roman Catholics, (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1993), 54.
70
desire to develop and strengthen enclaves of Catholic communities. The Church had
already developed vast networks of private schools and social institutions, yet the ever
growing Catholic population, fueled by immigration, necessitated further expansion.
Shea’s four volumes reflected this necessity, as he chronicled the American Catholic
Church’s “providential” growth and predicted future expansion, despite Protestant
interference and discrimination. Shea’s histories appealed to a sense of Americanism in
its readers by presenting Catholics as model citizens, promoting true American values
and enduring encroachments on their religious liberties with long-suffering tolerance and
patience.
This chapter will survey Shea’s later writings, including his History of the
Catholic Church in the United States (1886-1892), and articles from the American
Catholic Quarterly Review published from 1876-1891 on historical and political topics.
This chapter examines four themes in his writings: the meaning of religious liberty and
citizenship in American history, contemporary political issues and their history,
contemporary threats to the nation, and forecasts of America’s future. These themes
were common preoccupations for many Protestant writers in the late nineteenth century.
By contesting the meanings of these popular historical and contemporary issues, Shea
presented a uniquely Catholic perspective on Americanism. His writings are significant
in that he interpreted the meaning of these issues through the lens of conservative
Catholicism. While there was a liberal pro-Americanist movement during the late
nineteenth century among Catholics that boldly embraced American ideals, Shea’s
espousal of American themes involved more revisionism. Rather than an unreserved
Americanism, Shea engaged with American themes and interpreted them in strictly
conservative Catholic terms.
Presenting his narratives as “historical fact,” Shea portrayed conservative
Catholicism and true Americanism as inextricably linked. First, he responded to
stereotypes of Catholicism as antithetical to liberty by asserting that Catholic colonial
71
Maryland, and not Protestant New England, was the cradle of American religious
freedom. Secondly, addressing accusations of disloyalty, or foreign loyalties, he
recounted Catholic military service in American wars. Thirdly, in light of new Sunday
laws and accusations of lax Catholic Sunday observance, he explained Sunday worship as
a distinct affirmation of Catholic authority and Protestant Sunday observance as Old
Testament legalism. Fourthly, new public interest in Indian policy following the
publication of Helen Hunt Jackson’s A Century of Dishonor (1881) provided an
opportunity to characterize the new Indian Peace Policy as religious establishment and as
a constitutional violation of Indian rights. Finally, in response to discussions of the
“Catholic threat” to American public schools and institutions, he presented a story of
unheeded Catholic pleas for religious liberty.
Shea reiterated constantly that there was no divide in Catholic loyalty between
America and Rome. While he critiqued American institutional discrimination, he
suggested that long-suffering patience, uncompromising beliefs, and the development and
expansion of Catholic institutions were essential to Catholic success in America. His
assertions that American public institutions had failed to live up to true American ideals
provided a justification for separate Catholic institutions. Citing Protestant fears of
secularization in American culture and law, Shea assured Catholics that they would soon
be the sole inheritors and protectors of the dream of a Christian America. This chapter
argues that Shea’s rewriting of America’s past, present, and future offered an opportunity
for conservative Catholics to embrace an American national identity without
compromising their beliefs.
Shea’s writing reflected contemporary Catholic concerns over the “threat” of
liberalism, as he stressed the distinction between liberty and license, the necessity of
upholding the common good in society, and the state’s inevitable connection with
religion. Changing political structures in Europe during the second half of the nineteenth
century necessitated outlining a coherent Catholic position on church and state. Pope Leo
72
XIII, who reigned from 1878 to 1903, articulated the authoritative Catholic stance in a
number of encyclicals.6 These documents aimed to counteract the secularism of liberal
and rationalist political theories by asserting that all authority, law, and liberty come from
God. In Aeterni Patris (1878) Leo XIII called for a return to the study of Thomas
Aquinas to acquire the true use of reason to combat liberal understandings of liberty
which were “dangerous to the peaceful order of things and to public safety.”7 Thomist
theory distinguished between liberty and license; liberty meant proper laws which
provided safety and support for citizens to fulfill their duties, while license meant
anarchy.8 In Immortale Dei (1885), regarding government, any form of political rule was
acceptable, provided that it directs all to “strive for the common good.”9 Moreover, the
state was “clearly bound to act up to the manifold and weighty duties linking it to God,
by the public profession of faith.”10 In some cases, the state may make allowances for
non-Catholic faiths as necessary for the common welfare, yet separation of church and
state was condemned as ultimately leading to “religious indifference” and atheism.11
During the 1880s and 1890s, the position of conservative American Catholics was
also shaped by the context of the Americanist controversy, a crisis in American
6 Encyclicals are letters written by the pope addressed to all Catholics and sometimes to all people. An
encyclical does not define doctrine, but interprets the teaching of the Church concerning new problems that
may arise. Since the pope is infallible on matters of faith, going against an encyclical would be a serious
error for Catholics. See Jay P. Corrin, Catholic Intellectuals and the Challenge of Democracy, (Notre
Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2002), see n. 3, page 407.
7 Pope Leo XIII, Aeterni Patris (1878), in Claudia Carlin, ed., The Papal Encyclicals, 1878-1903
(Willmington, NC: McGrath Publishing Company, 1981), 25; see also Immortale Dei (1885), in Ibid., 114;
Libertas Praestantissimum, (1888) Ibid., 177; For an overview of Leo XIII’s impact on Catholic political
theory, see Corrin, Catholic Intellectuals and the Challenge of Democracy, 59-81.
8 Pope Leo XIII, Aeterni Patris (1878), in Carlin, The Papal Encyclicals, 25.
9 Pope Leo XIII, Immortale Dei (1885), in Carlin, The Papal Encyclicals, 108.
10 Ibid.
11 Ibid.
73
Catholicism that publicly divided leaders of the church into two major parties over a
number of issues involving religious liberty and church-state relations. Archbishop John
Ireland of Minneapolis, Bishop John Lancaster Spalding of Peoria, and Cardinal James
Gibbons of Baltimore suggested that America’s policy of separation of church and state
was ideal, and that Catholics must endeavor to integrate themselves more fully into
American society by eschewing beliefs or practices that suggested foreignness or
antipathy to American institutions. In contrast, American Catholic leaders Archbishop
Michael Corrigan of New York, Bishop Bernard McQuaid of Rochester, and Father
Anton Walburg, a priest in Cincinnati, were more pessimistic about the Catholic place in
America. They wanted Catholic neighborhoods, parochial schools, and foreign language
parishes. The majority of clergy and lay Catholics were aligned with the conservative
position, yet the liberals’ prominence seemed to threaten the unity of the American
Church.12
Given the Church’s position on church-state relations and the high profile of
liberals during the Americanist controversy, the papacy intervened and forged a response
in support of the American conservatives. An encyclical in 1895, Longinqua Oceani,
while acknowledging that American religious liberty allowed Catholicism to flourish,
unambiguously declared that it was “erroneous to draw the conclusion that in America is
to be sought the type of the most desirable status of the church, or that it would be
universally lawful or expedient for State and Church to be, as in America, dissevered, and
divorced.”13 According to Patrick Carey, the “final blow” against Americanism occurred
with Leo XIII’s brief Testem Benevolentiae (1899), addressed to Cardinal Gibbons.14
12 See Dolan and sources cited there, In Search of American Catholicism, 104.
13 Quoted in Patrick Carey, Catholics in America: a History, (Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 2004), 61;
see also Chester A. Gillis, Roman Catholicism in America, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999),
65-66; Carey, The Roman Catholics, 49-63
14 Carey, Catholics in America, 65.
74
The brief differentiated between “theological Americanism,” which it condemned, and a
“political Americanism” which it praised because it “reflected the characteristic qualities,
laws and customs of the country.”15 Echoing the Leonine distinction between “liberty”
and “license,” the brief identified the danger inherent in theological Americanism as its
application of principles of religious liberty to the church, rather than the “fuller and freer
kind, that liberty, namely, by which Christ hath made us free.”16 The Americanists were
duly chastened and subsequently qualified their praise of American institutions.
During the 1960s, some historians stressed the liberal side of the Americanist
controversy and “Americanization” as the “grand theme” in American Catholicism.17
These historians viewed the condemnation of Americanism as a major setback in the
progress of the Church in America. In response, several scholars critiqued latenineteenth century liberals in American Catholicism for displaying an Anglo-American
bias, or even simply for irrelevance – American Catholics were already
“Americanized.”18
Scholarly studies of American Catholicism in the last decade or so
give a more even-handed estimate of conservatives as also patriotic. Dolan claimed that
conservatives “were patriotic,” yet asserted that for them “being Catholic” was irrelevant
15 Carey, Catholics in America, 65.
16 Pope Leo XIII, Testem Benevolentiae (1899), in The State and the Church ed. by John Augustine Ryan
and Moorhouse F. X. Miller, ( New York: The McMillan Company, 1922), 250.
17 R. Lawrence Moore, Religious Outsiders and the Making of Americans, (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1986), 48-9. For examples, see Thomas T. McAvoy, A History of the Catholic Church in the United
States (Notre Dame, ID: University of Notre Dame Press, 1969); John Tracy Ellis, American Catholicism
(Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1969); Andrew M. Greeley, The Catholic Experience: an
Interpretation of the History of American Catholicism (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1967).
18 See for example, Daniel Bell, “Ethnicity and Social Change,” in Nathan Glazer and Daniel P.
Moynihan, eds., Ethnicity: Theory and Experience (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1975);
Peter K. Eisinger, “Ethnicity as a Strategic Option: an Emerging View,” Public Administration Review 38
(January-February 1978): 89-73; David J. O’Brien, The Renewal of American Catholicism (New York:
Oxford University Press, 1972); Philip Gleason, ed., Contemporary Catholicism in the United States (Notre
Dame, ID: University of Notre Dame Press, 1969).
75
to being “American.”19 Carey also claimed that conservatives were patriotic, “but
criticized what they considered an excessive American nationalism,” believing that
Catholicism “was separate from many values in American society.”20 This interpretation
of American Catholic separatism inaccurately portrays conservative Catholic attempts to
merge their religion with American nationalism. For example, Moore provides a portrait
of conservative A. H. Walburg as unequivocally patriotic and yet prepared to distinguish
between a false and true Americanism in his pamphlet The Question of Nationality in its
Relation to the Catholic Church in America (1889).21 Moreover, he suggests that all
Catholics, not just liberals, sought to recover and affirm the place of Catholics in
American history.22 It is this historical project of conservative Catholicism, as well as its
application to late-nineteenth century political and religious questions that this chapter
seeks to demonstrate through Shea’s writings.
The Meaning of Religious Liberty and Citizenship
in American History
In this section I will first overview Shea’s historical assessment of the practice of
religious liberty in early American history; specifically, his assertions that religious
liberty originated in the Catholic colony of Maryland and not in Puritan New England.
Next I examine Shea’s emphasis on Catholic military service in America; he stressed the
loyalty of Catholic citizens in fulfilling their duties as citizens in American wars, despite
facing religious discrimination. Contrary to Protestant assertions that Catholics were
anti-American, Shea wove a narrative of American history that presented Catholics as
19 Dolan, In Search of American Catholicism, 103-104.
20 Carey, The Roman Catholics, 60.
21 Moore, Religious Outsiders, 65.
22 Ibid., 58.
76
central actors in American history and exemplary models of citizenship. By contrasting
the theme of the “common good” in Catholic Maryland’s government with the
exclusionary New England “covenant,” Shea’s retelling of America’s past placed
Catholics at the center of America, and marginalized Protestants as hypocritical and
flawed stewards of American values.
Parallel to contemporary Protestant histories that began narratives of the English
colonies by recounting stories of religious persecution of Puritans in England, Shea began
by discussing the anti-Catholic laws of Elizabeth I, stating “Protestantism is essentially
intolerant.”23 In this context, “it occurred to the leading men among the Catholic body,
who had still friends at court, to seek a refuge for their oppressed countrymen out of
England.”24 Although Catholic Maryland was anomalous in the Catholic world for its
pragmatic espousal of religious liberty, Shea portrayed this measure as taken in the
interest of “common good,” echoing the language of Leo XIII’s political theory in
Immortale Dei (1885), rather than as a strategic measure. Maryland’s era of toleration
ended with the “Glorious Revolution” of 1688, after which the king replaced the lord
proprietor of Maryland with a Puritan dominated assembly. Far from viewing this event
as “glorious,” Shea simply characterized the years from 1688 up to the Revolution as a
time of persecution for American Catholics, “gloomy beyond description.”25
The religious laws in Puritan colonies were of particular interest to Shea in his
aim to debunk historical claims that religious liberty originated in New England. In
1876, Shea published a review of James Hammond Trumbull’s apologetic work entitled
True-Blue Laws of Connecticut and the False Laws Forged by Samuel Peters (1876).
23 John Shea, History of the Catholic Church in the United States, Vol. 1 (New York: J. G. Shea, 18861892), 17.
24 Ibid., 19.
25 Ibid., 99.
77
Trumbull wrote the book in response to a controversy over popular perceptions of
American history dating back to the publication of Samuel Peters’ General History of
Connecticut (1781). Peters may have coined the term Blue Laws; his book, laced with
exaggerations and “malicious gossip,” was widely read and supposed to be historical. To
historians who valued the heritage of New England, including its legal tradition, Peters’
book was an affront.26 Trumbull designed his book as a “missionary work” to correct
false representations and misconceptions about Connecticut’s colonial legal tradition.27
In Shea’s words, Trumbull sought “an acquittal of the charge on which she [Connecticut]
has so long been arraigned, of having surpassed the other colonies in intolerance, in a
Draconian severity of laws, and in her disregard of personal rights.”28 Shea asserted that
Connecticut’s government was without excuse. Furthermore, he sought to demonstrate
that Catholic colonists in Maryland were obedient to English law and tolerant of other
religions, mindful of their status as a minority and desiring to promote the common good.
First, he wished to demonstrate the Connecticut had broken from its obligations to
English law. “Nothing in the first constitution of Connecticut, or the laws enacted under
it, nothing in the New Haven fundamental agreement, or its code and judicial action,
acknowledges in the slightest degree the existence of any power or sovereignty to which
they owed allegiance.”29 The Connecticut colony only approved Congregational
churches, and all others were excluded, including the Church of England. No member of
another church could acquire the right to vote except by applying for membership in an
approved church. He noted that many Americans viewed religious freedom as
26 Samuel Middlebrook, “Samuel Peters: A Yankee Munchausen,” New England Quarterly 20:1 (March,
1947), 75.
27 J. Hammond Trumbull, True-Blue Laws of Connecticut and the False Laws Invented by Samuel Peters,
(Hartford, 1876), preface.
28 John Shea, “Blue Laws of Connecticut,” ACQR 2:7 (July 1877), 476.
29 Ibid.
78
originating in the New England colonies, yet he claimed such a conclusion was
impossible without redefining the term, “unless we concede that religious freedom means
the right to set up peculiar theories of faith and church discipline, and compel your
neighbors to accept them. Now though some people call this religious freedom, is it
anything different from religious intolerance and persecution?”30 The motivation for
New England’s Blue Laws was “simply self-preservation and freedom from restraint” in
establishing a “robber band” society.31
Moreover, Connecticut was all the more responsible for its legal travesties
because “in other colonies, under Catholic and Quaker influence, we see something
higher, and nobler, and better.”32 Maryland’s Assembly was well aware of the gap
between British law and Catholic doctrine and discipline, according to Shea. However,
their sense of duty to uphold English law and order in society prompted them, although in
a new position of power, to treat other religions equally as necessarily required of them as
British citizens.
The [Catholic colonists’] position was new, and several cases of conscience
arising from it were submitted to Catholic ecclesiastical authority to know what,
under the circumstances they could do as Catholics without sin, and what, as
Englishmen loyal to their own country, they must do. It never entered into their
minds, or the minds of their clergy, to hold themselves absolved from all
allegiance, free to make any rules and laws that seemed good unto them, and to
enforce them even by the death penalty.33
Given this portrait of Catholic settlers as peace-loving, tolerant, and law-abiding, Shea
could conclude that the origins of religious liberty in America should be ascribed to the
Catholic settlers of Maryland, Lord Baltimore, and later to the period of influence of
James II (Catholic monarch who ruled from 1685-88) in New York and Pennsylvania.
30 Shea, “Blue Laws of Connecticut,” 479-80.
31 Ibid., 478-479.
32 Ibid., 497.
33 Ibid., 477-478.
79
Shea failed to comment on the pragmatic and strategic elements of Catholic religious
liberty in early America, so intent was he on showing Protestant religious discrimination
and Catholic religious freedom. Such an interpretation was in line with Leonine
teaching, which required religious toleration and obedience to laws in political settings in
which Catholics were a minority as necessary for the “common good.”
One of the aspects that Shea criticized in the Protestant colonies’ approach to
religious tolerance was that Protestant churches do not claim divine authority or
infallibility. Connecticut’s course of “setting aside all the laws of one’s country, of
abrogating exclusive sanctity and the absolute certainty of doctrine, with no proof of
consecutive title to a deposit of faith, or of a special mission supernaturally attested, is
very questionable.”34 In contrast, American Catholics in the colonies set an example of
obedience to laws, and tolerance for other beliefs.
Another theme Shea emphasized in his historical writings was Catholic
participation in American wars. Using a broad definition of citizenship – military service
– he asserted Catholic membership in American civil society. After the Revolution,
Americans frequently conceptualized citizenship as a “contractual allegiance,” entailing
the exchange of civil and political rights for the duties and responsibilities of
citizenship.35 The link between military service and citizenship was only strengthened
after the Civil War, as evidenced by successful claims for veteran benefits and citizenship
for African-Americans and immigrants who served.36 The liberal construction of
34 Shea, “Blue Laws of Connecticut,” 478.
35 James H. Kettner, Development of American Citizenship, 1608-1870 (Chapel Hill : Published for the
Institute of Early American History and Culture, Williamsburg, Va., by the University of North Carolina
Press, c1978), 247. On military service as part of this contract, see John G. A. Pocock, The Machiavellian
Moment: Florentine Political Thought and the Atlantic Republican Tradition (Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 1975), 544.
36 Kerber, No Constitutional Right to be Ladies: Women and the Obligations of Citizenship, (New York:
Hill and Wang, 1998), 243.
80
citizenship as a “contract” was not a traditional Catholic view. Yet it served a rhetorical
purpose by suggesting that Catholics had better upheld their end of the contract than
many Protestants, despite failure of the government to provide them with protection of
rights in exchange for their performed duties.
The American Revolution was a glorified period in American history in which
Shea sought to center Catholic citizenship. In his narrative, he characterized all Catholics
as Patriots or Whigs. Although historians today find this assertion exaggerated, all agree
that Catholics participated in the Revolutionary cause in significant numbers, mollifying
anti-Catholic sentiment for a time in the early Republic.37 According to Shea, “Catholics
everywhere were in full sympathy with the patriotic movement. A Protestant minister
might, like the Rev. Samuel Peters in Connecticut, draw down on himself the vengeance
of impetuous whigs, but no one raised a doubt as to the fidelity of the priests in Maryland
and Pennsylvania to the cause of America.”38 Peters was an Anglican minister who was
particularly odious to nineteenth century New England scholars for his book, General
History of Connecticut (1781) which lambasted, sometimes inaccurately, early colonial
moral laws. By contrasting Revolutionary Catholics with an unpopular Protestant
minister, Shea implied that responsible citizenship was neither the rule for nor the
exclusive province of American Protestants.
Shea also documented interactions between George Washington and Catholics to
underscore American Catholic loyalty during the Revolutionary period. First, because of
the contributions of American Catholics and of Catholic France in assisting the Patriots,
Washington issued a general order in 1775 for the Continental army to refrain from
37 Joseph A. Varacalli, The Catholic Experience in America, 28-29; see also James Terence Fisher,
Catholics in America, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000); John T. McGreevy, Catholicism and
American Freedom (New York: W. W. Norton, 2003).
38 Shea, History of Catholics in the United States, Vol. 2, 139.
81
observing Pope’s Day.39 In another example, Shea cited a letter that George Washington
sent to a number of Catholic leaders (March 1790) asserting his hopes that Americans
would continue to appreciate the efforts of Catholics for bearing their share of the
burdens of the community during the Revolution. There Washington expressed his hope
ever to see America among the foremost nations in examples of justice and
liberality; and I presume that your fellow-citizens will not forget the patriotic part
which you took in the accomplishment of their revolution, and the establishment
of their government, or the important assistance which they received from a
nation in which the Roman Catholic faith is professed.40
By presenting Washington, a revered American statesman, as recognizing and
appreciating Catholic loyalty, Shea sought to impress his reader that such an
acknowledgment of Catholic contributions was the appropriate and patriotic response.
In addition to recounting Washington’s appreciation for Catholic loyalty, Shea
informed his readers that anti-Catholic sentiment was a detrimental factor to American
aims during the period by documenting the Revolutionary leaders’ negotiations with
Canada. According to a paper Shea read for the Catholic Historical Society in 1889
Nothing less than the Continent satisfied the aspirations of the grand and noble
minds who planned the union of the colonies into a vast republic. Why then did
the close of the war find their plan defeated, the republic dwarfed, confined
between the northern lakes and shut off from the Gulf of Mexico, with England
holding Canada as a perpetual menace to her peace and prosperity? 41
For Shea, the answer to this question lay in the anti-Catholic “ravings” of John Jay, a
Continental Congress representative from New York. While the Continental Congress
sent a delegation (that included a Catholic priest) to Canada in 1774 to request their
39 Pope’s day, when effigies of the Pope were burned, was the American equivalent of Guy Fawkes’ Day.
Shea, History of the Catholic Church in the United States, Vol. 2, 147. George Washington, November 5,
1775, “General Orders,” The George Washington Papers, Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress,
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/gwhtml/gwhome.html
40 Shea, History of the Catholic Church in the United States, v2, 351. “George Washington to Roman
Catholic Committee, March 1790,” The George Washington Papers, Manuscript Division of the Library of
Congress, http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/gwhtml/gwhome.html
41 John Shea, “Why is Canada not a Part of the United States?” in United States Catholic Historical
Magazine 3:10 (1890), 13.
82
support, Jay’s “Address to the People of Great Britain” was printed and disseminated.
The Address assailed the British government for the Quebec Act of 1774 which allowed
French Canadians to retain their religious freedom and French law.42 According to Shea,
the mission of the delegation was completely undermined by Jay’s publication, and
Canada was lost to the United States. He described Jay’s anti-Catholic arguments as a
kind of madness: “We can almost picture him to ourselves in wild frenzy, with bloodshot
eyes, foaming at the mouth and gesticulating like a madman… the rigmarole of stupid
ignorance.”43 Furthermore, he suggested that the Revolution and the War of 1812 would
have had vastly different outcomes if Canada had joined the United States. “Deeply,
deeply has the country atoned in blood, for the error of 1774. Had the liberal and
Christian spirit… been able to counteract the malignant purblindness of Jay, the flag of
the United States would have floated for the last century over the Continent.”44 Had Jay
not assailed Canadian Catholics, America’s “manifest destiny” would have included
Canada’s vast territories, preventing further British aggression.
In Shea’s discussion of the Mexican-American War (1846-8), he stressed the
nativist discrimination that Catholics faced in the intervening years since the Revolution.
While the alliance with Catholic France during the Revolution, and American Catholic
participation in the war assuaged anti-Catholic sentiment for a time, increasing Catholic
immigration in the 1820s and beyond provoked fresh hostilities. The height of antiCatholic discrimination culminated with the rise of the Know-Nothing Party in the 1850s,
which emphasized the dangers of immigration and fears about a perceived foreign loyalty
42 See John Jay, “Address to the People of Great Britain,” in Frank Moore, American Eloquence: a
Collection of Speeches and Addresses by the Most Eminent Orators of America (New York: D. Appleton
and Co., 1857), 161.
43 John Shea, “Why is Canada not a Part of the United States?” 118.
44 Ibid., 127.
83
that Catholics held for Rome.45 In Shea’s account of the Mexican-American War, he
stressed that, in the rising anti-Catholic nativist movement of the 1840s and despite
discrimination in the army, Catholics still performed their military service loyally. He
characterized widespread anti-Catholic discrimination along with the willing acceptance
of Catholics in the army as hypocritical: “Catholics might be denied their religious rights
in public institutions, and many covertly encouraged attacks on their reputation and
property, but when there was a national call for volunteers for the war against Mexico,
none thought of excluding them from the ranks.”46 Moreover, after the annexation of
Texas, when war was imminent, “boasts were loudly made that our soldiers were to
enrich themselves with the spoils of the Catholic churches.”47 Catholic servicemen were,
“in utter disregard of the Constitution of the United States and the spirit of our
institutions, compelled, under threats of severe punishment, to attend the services of the
Protestant religion, established in the United States Army, and listen to violent
denunciations of their own faith.”48 This account stressed that although Catholics
willingly fulfilled their military obligations, they were still regarded as second-class
citizens, and faced religious discrimination at both social and institutional levels.
Shea’s account of the Civil War in his History of Catholics in the United States
presented Catholics as a body as loyal to their country and willing to fight, while denying
sectional loyalties. This differed greatly from his earlier writings during the Civil War,
45 For an overview of the rise and decline of the influence of the Know-Nothing party, see Ray Allen
Billington, The Protestant Crusade, 1800-1860: a Study of the Origins of American Nativism, (New York:
Rinehart, 1952), 380-436.
46 Shea, History of the Catholic Church in the United States, Vol. 4, 155.
47 Ibid., 31
48 Ibid.
84
which castigated the Confederacy for its disloyalty. 49 Like other Americans, Catholics
differed over their positions on slavery prior to the Civil War, yet few, if any, joined the
abolitionist movement because of its perceived connection to nativism.50 While many
Protestant denominations split along lines of north and south, Catholic leaders united in
recommending that slavery, as a civil institution, must be addressed through legislative
means. A Pastoral Letter issued after the 1852 Plenary Council in Baltimore, while
acknowledging the divisiveness of the issue, merely recommended “conscientious
religious respect for all public authorities.”51 In his later account, Shea was careful to
portray Catholic military service as simply fulfilling citizen obligations, while denying
Catholic sectional partisanship: “Catholics went into the war from purely patriotic
motives. They had no hostility to any section of the country.”52 This portrayal of
Catholic support for peace and unity, and then service when the time came, stood in stark
contrast to Shea’s image of Protestant sectionalism. Shea cited a letter to Congress
signed by three thousand Protestant ministers in the North who opposed the Missouri
Compromise, asserting “The very persons who should have labored for peace were
practically hurrying men to strife and bloodshed. They were the same class who had as
persistently and frantically inflamed the public mind against the Catholic church and its
adherents. Churches were rent asunder. Those at the North and South would hold no
communion with each other.”53 By conflating Protestant sectional conflict during the
49 See John Shea, ed., The Fallen Brave: a biographical memorial of the American officers who have given
their lives for the preservation of the Union, (New York: Charles B. Richardson and Co., 1861), 16.
50 Patrick Carey, The Roman Catholics, 44.
51 Ibid., 43. In the nineteenth century, the term "nativism" referred to white, native-born, Protestant
Americans’ hostility to European immigrants. Viewing the Catholic church as a foreign church, the
prejudice extended to all Catholics as well.
52 Shea, History of the Catholic Church in the United States, Vol. 4, 535.
53 Ibid., 384; see also Anson Phelps Stokes and Leo Pfeffer, Church And State in the United States, (New
York: Harper and Row, 1964), 287-289.
85
Civil War with 1850s nativism, Shea implied that Protestants were inherently divisive
and intolerant.54
Shea recounted how a predominantly Irish Catholic militia in Connecticut,
disbanded in 1855 when Know-nothings were prominent in the state legislature, was
reinstated when the Civil War broke out. When Captain Thomas W. Cahill, a former
Catholic militia leader, was given a commission during the Civil War, he protested
officially: “Five years ago I was captain of a company of volunteer militia, and a native
of new England. I was, with my comrades, thought unfit to shoulder a musket, and the
company was disbanded. The law still stands on the statute book.”55 A repealing act
went through the legislature in a single day, and Cahill subsequently accepted his
commission as colonel and raised the 9th Connecticut Volunteers.
In addition to military participation during the Civil War, Shea asserted that
Catholics participated in large numbers in other various support capacities, such as
Catholic clergy serving as chaplains, and nuns serving as nurses. 56 Indeed, according to
Patrick Carey, some seventy Catholic clergy served as military chaplains during the Civil
War, and as much as 20 percent of the nurses were nuns.57 Shea further asserted that
despite Catholic loyalty in the North, Protestants encouraged the destruction of Catholic
property in the South. “The fanatical spirit which had animated the men of the North…
led some of the officers and soldiers wantonly to injure and destroy the Catholic
churches, schools, and convents in the South where the faithful were few and poor.
54 Patrick Carey asserts this position as being the most prominent Catholic view of the Civil War in the
nineteenth century, The Roman Catholics, 44.
55 Shea History of the Catholic Church in the United States, Vol. 4, 525; corroborated in Thomas Duggan,
The Catholic Church in Connecticut (New York: The States History Company, 1930), 36; and Thomas
Hamilton Murray, History of the Ninth Regiment (New Haven, CT: The Price, Lee and Adkins Co., 1908),
16, 30-3.
56 Shea, History of the Catholic Church in America, Vol. 4, 385-386.
57 Carey, The Roman Catholics, 46.
86
Catholics and the Catholic Church had done nothing to cause the war; they did much to
mitigate its horrors, and keep Christian lessons before the soldiers; they suffered great
losses as their reward on earth.”58 In a recurring theme, Shea asserted that Catholic
contributions to the nation and fulfillment of citizenship obligations were rewarded with
discrimination and violation of their rights to property and liberty.
Shea’s histories of early American colonies and of Catholic participation in
American wars appealed to two very different conceptions of the public good. In the first
case, he asserted that Catholic promotion of the “common good” had led to the formation
of freer governments than those of the Protestant colonies. In the second case, he used
liberal notions of contract to persuade his readers that although Catholics were loyal and
dutiful citizens, they had suffered much discrimination rather than protection of their
rights as citizens. These two arguments implied that Catholics were better interpreters of
good government and good citizenship than Protestants, placing Catholics at the center
and marginalizing Protestants.
The Meaning of American Sunday Laws, Indian
Missions, and Religion in Public Institutions
In discussing current political topics of interest to Christians in the late nineteenth
century such as Sunday laws, Indian policies, religion in public schools and institutions,
Shea stressed the historical background of these issues, linking the historical and current
experiences of American Catholics. While Protestants and Catholics may have agreed in
spirit that religion was central to law, missions to Indians, and state schools and
institutions, he asserted that Protestants had consistently developed policies of exclusion
and discrimination against Catholics. Protestants employed the force of law because they
lacked an infallible authority by which to command obedience. His arguments on these
58 Shea, History of the Catholic Church in America, Vol. 4, 386.
87
issues demonstrate the stakes which Catholics held in these popular national and
Christian issues. Pitting Protestant incompetence against Catholic promise, he offered a
sustained critique of Protestants claims to religious liberty through violations of Catholic
religious rights.
Shea made explicit ties between colonial religious laws and the revival of Sunday
laws in nineteenth century America. On December 3, 1882, a new penal law went into
effect in New York City enforcing Sunday observance. As an article in the New York
Times commented “A cold chill has crept over New Yorkers…. So accustomed are they
to profaning the Sabbath, that any curtailment of what they have always regarded as their
rights is looked upon with positive dread.”59 The day the law went into effect, 137
people were arrested, primarily for carrying on some sort of trade. Shea responded to the
New York City law in an article published about a month later. Seeing it as a device of
Protestant religious establishment, he vigorously opposed the law. He did not find
Sunday laws objectionable per se, but found this particular law offensive because it
enforced a Protestant form of observance, and exemplified Protestant hypocrisy regarding
religious liberty. Furthermore, he asserted that only a religion that claimed infallibility
had the authority to impose their religious views on the state.
Shea found no scriptural basis for Sabbatarian claims. He pointed to the Council
at Jerusalem, recorded in Acts 15, in which the Christian leaders addressed the concerns
of Jewish believers regarding which parts of Jewish law Gentile believers should
embrace. The council asked that its converts “abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from
blood and strangled animals, and from fornication.”60 Since only these acts were
enumerated, the Council obviously meant to exclude Sabbath observance under the same
59 “Penal Code Provisions,” New York Times (1857-Current file); December 3, 1882; Proquest Historical
Newspapers The New York Times (1851-2003), p. 1.
60 Acts 15:29; quoted in John Shea, “The Observance of Sunday and Civil Laws for its Enforcement,”
ACQR (January 1883), 140.
88
law as sacrifices and circumcision – these were not binding on Gentile Christians.
Moreover, “if the Bible was the only rule of faith, so important a precept as the
observance of Sunday, if laid down at all, must be clearly and definitely expressed in the
New Testament.”61 Protestantism therefore “has no good reason for its Sunday theory
and ought, logically, to keep Saturday as the Sabbath, with the Jews and Seventh-Day
Baptists.”62 Thus, this line of argument disparaged Protestant claims to base their beliefs
solely on Biblical authority.
In addition to demonstrating the Bible’s silence on the Sunday Sabbath, Shea
asserted that Sunday observance was “part and parcel of the system of the Catholic
Church.”63 The tradition of observing Sunday as a memorial to Christ’s resurrection had
developed in the early Christian church. The epistles of St. Ignatius and St. Barnabus,
written in the second century AD, denoted Sunday as a day of worship in memorial of
Christ’s resurrection for Christians, yet did not require abstinence from labor as did the
Jewish Sabbath. The Council of Laodicea in 364 AD first called for Christians to rest on
that day. Constantine’s enforcement of Church regulations through civil law in the fourth
century AD was the first civil institutionalization of Sunday observance.64 He noted that
the New York City law prohibited “servile labor” on Sunday, a term that originated in the
Latin Vulgate and was incorporated into canon law regarding Sunday observance.65
By indicating that Sunday observance developed in early church tradition rather
than in scripture, and that the precedent for civil enforcement was set by the Catholic
61 Shea, “The Observance of Sunday and Civil Laws for its Enforcement,” 143-144.
62 Ibid., 149.
63 Ibid., 139.
64 Ibid., 141.
65 See, “servile labor,” Oxford English Dictionary; Shea, “The Observance of Sunday and Civil Laws for
its Enforcement,” 148.
89
Church, Shea suggested that Protestantism’s latest crusade was ironic. “Strange as it may
seem, the State, in passing laws for the due sanctification of Sunday, is unwittingly
acknowledging the authority of the Catholic Church, and carrying our more or less
faithfully its prescriptions.”66 However, the Catholic Church must follow its own
interpretation of Sunday: “she cannot accept the wild and exaggerated theories of those
who try to enforce her laws according to their own interpretation, while actually denying
her authority.”67 First, Catholic Sunday observance was inseparable from canon law
requiring attendance at mass. Next, he noted that the Greek word “eucharist” is akin to
“rejoice,” while the New York City law encouraged a morose and solemn observance of
Sunday, rather than a celebration of the Eucharist.68 An article in the New York Times
(1882) commented that, as far as legal activities New York City’s Sunday law permitted,
“Eating, drinking, sleeping, and attending religious services very nearly comprise the
list.”69 In neither the Jewish Sabbath nor the Catholic Sunday did Shea find precedent for
“moroseness and gloom,” or prohibitions against “genial conversation and innocent
enjoyments.”70 He suggested that Puritans legislated Sunday observance because they
lacked scriptural and traditional authority to compel church attendance, thus they resorted
to civil enforcement. Shea attributed the particular interpretation of Sunday observance
that New York had put into effect to a reincarnation of the Puritan colonies’
66 Shea, “The Observance of Sunday and Civil Laws for its Enforcement,” 139.
67 Ibid., 149; “The Pastoral Letter of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore,” ACQR (January 1885): 17.
For a scholarly explanation of the difference between Catholic and Protestant Sunday observance see
Alexis McCrossen, “Sunday: Marker of Time, Setting for Memory,” Time & Society 14:1 (2005), 25.
68 Shea, “The Observance of Sunday and Civil Laws for its Enforcement,” 142. Also, in 1885, Shea
reported on the Third Plenary Council regarding Sunday observance, “The Council… while
discountenancing the gloomy, puritanical methods of regarding it, urges Catholics to sanctify the day….”
John Shea, “The Pastoral Letter of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore,” ACQR (January 1885): 17.
69 “Penal Code Provisions,” New York Times (1857-Current file); December 3, 1882; Proquest Historical
Newspapers The New York Times (1851-2003), p. 1.
70 Shea, “The Observance of Sunday and Civil Laws for its Enforcement,” 141-142.
90
establishment of their faith. Thus, because he found American Sunday laws as deriving
from a Sabbath theory that originated with early Calvinist colonists, he saw it, in practice,
as an ironic affront to Catholic authority.
While many Sabbath reformers insisted they were lobbying for a civil or secular
Sabbath, Shea dismissed such arguments. “If it be a mere state holiday… it is a strange
holiday on which people are forbidden to enjoy themselves, under penalty of fine and
imprisonment. If it were merely this, it would make more sense to punish the man who
wore a long face, rather than the man who laughed.”71 The law’s prohibition of
amusements made it a strange state holiday indeed. Furthermore, as long as the civil
government was empowered to compel Sunday observance, it was a “sorry farce to tell us
that in this country there is separation of Church and State.”72
Shea referenced the impact of the Sunday law on Jews, as it required observant
Jews to refrain from work on two days a week.73 Identifying the effect of the law on
another religious group made Shea’s critique appear less partisan and more grounded in
universal principles. The Jewish population in New York City had expanded
exponentially through immigration, primarily from Eastern Europe due to anti-Semitic
legislation in czarist Russia.74 He cited the 1875 case City of Shreveport v. Levy in
which the court determined that granting Jews exemption from the law unfairly granted
them a preferential status under the law. In fact, when Jews did go to court to object to
the New York City law, the judge cited the Louisiana case in support of his decision to
71 Shea, “The Observance of Sunday and Civil Laws for its Enforcement,” 152.
72 Ibid.
73 Ibid., 150.
74 Esther L. Panitz, Simon Wolf: Private Conscience and Public Image, (Cranbury, NJ: Associated
University Presses, 1987), 14.
91
deny Jews an exemption.75 The complex issue of Sunday laws for American Catholics is
evident in Shea’s comment that Jews would be forced to comply until Sunday was
abolished in America, “and God forbid that we shall live to see the time when it will
be.”76 Why should Shea fear a time when the Protestant Sunday was no longer enforced?
It was not easy for him “to see on what ground the Sunday laws are to be maintained that
will continue to commend itself to the growing secularism fostered by our public schools
and state colleges.”77 Shea could not very well endorse the Sunday law because of its
promotion of a Protestant theory of Sunday observance. Yet, to reject the law entirely
was to endorse separation of church and state leaving a void that Shea thought could only
be filled with secularism.
Like the Sunday laws, federal Indian policy was another area in which religion
and the state cooperated in the late nineteenth century. Shea capitalized on public interest
in the so-called “Indian Question” in the late nineteenth century by presenting the
Catholic perspective on the debate, stressing that in this area too, Protestants were guilty
of religious establishment and had poorly carried out their obligations toward Indians.
Indian missions were of great interest to Protestants and Catholics both in the years after
the Civil War. The Indian Question had captured the interest of many reformers,
particularly Christian reformers, who thought the best way to assimilate Native
Americans into the larger American society was civilization through religious
conversion. Catholic Indian missions, whether in France, Spanish, or English colonies,
never experienced the success for which Catholics hoped. For a variety of reasons,
including the cession of Canada to England in 1763, English takeovers of Spanish
75 Batya Miller, “Enforcement of the Sunday Closing Laws on the Lower East Side, 1882-1903,”
American Jewish History 93:2 (June 2003), 270-271.
76 Shea, “The Observance of Sunday and Civil Laws for its Enforcement,” 150.
77 Ibid.
92
territory in Florida (1763) and Texas (1836), and Mexico’s achievement of independence
from Spain (1821), these areas lost the patronage that had supported the missions.
Moreover, many missions were ended by hostile attacks from Indian tribes who resented
their presence. Finally, for a variety of reasons, Catholic missionaries were never able to
develop their aim of establishing self-supporting missions run by Native Americans.78
Catholics in the mid-nineteenth century frequently responded to competition with zealous
Protestants for Indian missions by disparaging their ability to convert Native
Americans.79 For Shea, though, the demise of Catholic missions was caused by the
interference of the English government, “and to the inborn hostility of the Anglo-Saxon
race to the Indians.”80 He sought to demonstrate that Protestant treatment of Indians had
historically been imperialistic and racist, and that recent attempts to “civilize” the Indians
resulted in a regression to religious establishment and violation of Catholic Indians’
religious rights.
Shea’s historical perspective on Catholic Indian missions reiterated this
apologetic by extolling the efforts of Catholic missionaries and their treatment of Indians
in contrast to his portrayal of Protestants as imperialistic and racist. Shea portrayed
Catholic settlers as more accepting of Indians than other English settlers. According to
Shea, “During the period of Catholic influence in Maryland, the Indian converts in many
cases lived side by side with the white settlers. The chiefs adopted the usages of civilized
life; their daughters were educated and frequently married into families of the
colonists.”81 He also related the story of a Native American convert by French Jesuits in
78 Carey, The Roman Catholics, 8, 12.
79 Ibid., 33-34.
80 Shea, History of the Catholic Missions among the Indian tribes of the United States, 1529-1854 (New
York: P. J. Kennedy, 1882), 284.
81 Shea, History of Catholics in the United States, Vol. 1, 85.
93
early America, Catherine Tekakwitha, for whom the Church sought canonization at the
Third Plenary Council.82 Moreover, Shea claimed that Indians converted by John Eliot
and others in New England fled after King Philip’s War (1675-6) because the Puritans
“looked with suspicion and hostility on all Indians, even those who had been gathered in
villages for instruction by men like Eliot.”83 According to Shea’s narrative, the exiled
Indians were taken in by Jesuit priests, who “immediately undertook their instruction in
religion.”84
Although Euro-Americans had promoted Christianity as central to civilizing
Native Americans from earliest settlement, this idea was institutionalized in the late
nineteenth century through Grant’s Peace Policy, which he proposed in 1869 and
remained in effect until 1899. In response to criticism from religious and humanitarian
reformers, military officers, and some Congressmen, the policy transferred power over
Indian populations from the military to missionaries, with the expectation that they would
do a better job of “civilizing.”85 The reservation system, initiated in 1851 with the Indian
Appropriations Act, expanded greatly under Grant’s administration. Federally appointed
Euro-American agents not only assumed total responsibility for negotiating between
tribes and the United States, but also exercised complete discretionary power over the
Indians. Methodists, Presbyterians, Baptists, and Episcopalians took the largest share of
the responsibility. In contrast, Catholics who had expected to receive thirty-eight
agencies based on their previous mission work, received only seven. In addition to the
82 Shea, History of Catholics in the United States, Vol. 1, 307-309. In 1980, Pope John Paul II beatified
Catherine Tekakwitha. See K. I. Koppedrayer, “The Making of the First Iroquois Virgin: Early Jesuit
Biographies of the Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha,” Ethnohistory 40:2 (spring 1993): 277-307.
83 Shea, History of Catholics in the United States, Vol. 1, 336-7.
84 Ibid., 337.
85 Robert H. Keller, Jr., American Protestantism and United States Indian Policy, 1869-1882 (Lincoln,
NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1983), 1, 17.
94
unfair allotment, newly established Protestant agencies sought to exclude Catholics
entirely from those areas in which they had exerted a historical presence.86
Shea applied his historical analysis of Protestant and Indian interactions to latenineteenth century discussions of the “Indian Question.” In 1881 Shea reviewed Helen
Hunt Jackson’s A Century of Dishonor (1881), an indictment of the federal government’s
injustices against Native Americans, for the American Catholic Quarterly Review.
Jackson’s book ultimately influenced Congress to appoint a commission to investigate
Indian affairs, resulting in the Dawes Act (1893) that broke up reservation land into
individual plots. Shea took advantage of the interest Jackson’s book represented and
generated in the Indian question to add his own critiques to American Indian policy. Like
Jackson, he viewed the reservation system as inherently flawed. However, he
characterized the history of federal Indian policy as a train of human rights abuses that
found its ultimate expression in establishing Protestant religion on the reservations.
Shea’s first critique of Federal Indian policy related to its illegality in assuming
control of Indian reservations rather than integrating Indians as citizens in the states in
which they resided. In his view, the Constitution explicitly limited the Federal
government’s jurisdiction over the Indians to regulating commerce between Indian
nations and state governments. Shea noted that no legislative power over the Indians was
provided to Congress.87 Despite the lack of explicit Constitutional authorization, the
Federal government assumed jurisdiction over Indians after the Revolution, and began
negotiating treaties. Shea pointed out that inherent power differences made the use of the
86 On the origins and specific features of Grant’s peace policy see Keller, American Protestantism and
United States Indian Policy, 1-30; Francis Paul Prucha, American Indian Policy in Crisis: Christian
Reformers and the Indian, 1865-1900 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1976), 30-71. For an
analysis of the policy’s impact on Catholic missions see Peter J. Rahill, The Catholic Indian Missions and
Grant’s Peace Policy, 1870-1884 (Washington: Catholic University Press, 1953).
87 John Shea, “What Right has the Federal Government to Mismanage the Indians?” ACQR (July 1881),
524, 538.
95
term treaty a farce: “Sound thinkers even then objected to the use of the word treaty, as
implying an equality between the contracting parties, but no heed was paid, and a system
of Indian treaties began, extending from 1775 to a very recent date.”88 He rather blithely
concluded that, had states assumed legal jurisdiction over the Indians, assimilation would
have followed naturally.
Not only had the Federal government usurped state jurisdiction over Indians, it
had used that power tyrannically. Shea presented three arguments against the reservation
system that had created the “Indian Question”: lack of necessary resources, isolation
rather than assimilation, and the unconstitutional and un-American form of reservation
governance. 89 Shea characterized the removal of Indians to remote areas as “the very
acme of absurdity.”90 As he saw it, immigrants lived among other Americans and were
easily assimilated. In contrast, Indians were removed to reservations, where they faced
“wild tribes on the one side, and the lawless, unscrupulous frontiersman, often a fugitive
from civilization and an outlaw,” on the other, making assimilation impossible.91 This
interpretation reiterated Shea’s historical assertions of Protestant racism in promoting
separationist Indian policies in contrast to his portrayal of colonial Catholics living sideby-side peacefully with Indians
During the nineteenth century, the United States government did not recognize
Indians as American citizens, but as members of “domestic dependent nations” as defined
by Chief Justice Marshall in 1831. This legal definition effectively allowed the US
88 Shea, “What Right has the Federal Government to Mismanage the Indians?” 523.
89 Many Indian reservations lacked sufficient resources to support the population, requiring Federal aid for
subsistence; this policy led many Americans to believe that Indians were idle and unable to support
themselves. See George Pierre Castile and Robert L. Bee, State and Reservation: New Perspectives on
Federal Indian Policy (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1992).
90 Shea, “What Right has the Federal Government to Mismanage the Indians?” 538.
91 Ibid.
96
government to control the Indian population without admitting them as citizens.92 In
contrast, Shea pointed to Canada, where Indian policy had grown out of the Catholic
mission tradition and “French and Indian alike were subjects.”93 Shea asserted that the
reservation system was “a violation of every American principle,” warning that “if the
Indians ever learn to read the Declaration of Independence, they can bring heavier
charges against our government than our forefathers did against George III.”94 His
explicit parallel between the United States’ colonization of Indians to England’s
colonization of America appealed to readers’ sense of patriotism, and reiterated his claim
of American racism and imperialism in treatment of Native Americans.
In addition to critiquing the reservation system, Shea asserted that the Peace
Policy added a new element of tyranny to reservations by destroying religious liberty. He
referred to reservation agents as “satraps,” a Western term applied to ancient Persian
rulers that invoked Orientalist institutions and tyranny.95 The flawed system in which
agents acted as “sole law, legislature, judiciary and executive, enforcing their authority
by the military arm” violated the natural rights of Indians and was a mark of shame on
America’s history. Shea attributed all the difficulties of Euro and Native American
interaction on the reservations as the “natural result” of this “idiotic policy.”96 Moreover,
the Peace Policy, a “monstrous piece of folly, conceived in the strange brain of President
Grant,” transformed the “satrap” into a “grand lama in his little territory, authorizing or
92James H. Kettner, Development of American Citizenship, 1608-1870, 295-6, 299.
93 Shea, “What Right has the Federal Government to Mismanage the Indians?” 527.
94 Ibid., 534.
95 Shea, “What Right has the Federal Government to Mismanage the Indians?” 534. Edward Said has
identified such idioms referring to Oriental despotism as a major theme in Western literature, Orientalism,
(New York: Vintage Books, 1979), 203.
96 Ibid., 524.
97
prohibiting at his will the exercise of any other religion in the realm set up in defiance of
the Constitution of the United States.”97 Shea related multiple examples of Catholic
exclusion from Protestant-controlled reservations, including cases in which Catholic
Indians requested visits from priests and were denied.98 Thus, Shea asserted that Catholic
Indians experienced discrimination doubly – both religious and racial.
In addition to reiterating a kind of apologetic in regards to the waning of Catholic
Indian missions in North America, Shea’s arguments regarding government treatment of
Native Americans repeated his accusations regarding New England colonies that
Protestants were willing to promote illegal policies when it suited their interests. Using
the language of tyranny to describe the relationship of the federal government with
Native Americans, he argued that they must be afforded rights as citizens before the
Indian question would ever be resolved. Placing the Indian population under the control
of religious agents not only failed to address the most urgent needs of the Indians, but
added religious tyranny to the mix.
Compared to Sunday laws and federal Indian policy, religious instruction in
public schools was a broader and more egregious example of “institutional hypocrisy” in
prevailing American values and practice regarding religious liberty during the nineteenth
century.99 Most educational reformers followed the lead of Horace Mann in
Massachusetts in seeking to remove divisive doctrinal instruction while retaining “nonsectarian” religious instruction as a part of early nineteenth century common school
reforms.100 Yet, Mann and other educational reformers remained dedicated to keeping
97 Shea, “What Right has the Federal Government to Mismanage the Indians?” 526.
98 Ibid., 529-533.
99 Joseph P Viteritti, “Blaine’s Wake: School Choice, the First Amendment, and State Constitutional Law”
Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy 21 (1997-1998), 666.
100 Lloyd P. Jorgenson, The State and the Non-Public School, 1825-1925 (Columbia: University of
Missouri Press, 1987). 26.
98
Bible reading as part of education.101 The Bible was initially used in American public
schools because it was central to Protestant beliefs, and because it was the most common
and accessible printed text.102 Read without commentary or doctrinal interpretation,
many believed that sola scriptura, one of Protestantism’s underlying principles, would
impart virtues and religious values to students without raising doctrinal conflicts. Many
also felt that Bible reading was an important part of acculturation for immigrants.103
Although Catholics, who represented as much as half the population in some urban areas,
sought accommodations in common schools up to the mid-nineteenth century, such as
allowing students to read from Catholic Bibles, such requests were met with swift denial
by Protestant school boards or popular violence.104 Shea agreed with most educational
reformers in asserting the necessity of religious education for developing responsible and
moral citizens. However, he criticized religious instructional practice in public schools,
because it denied Catholics any alternative to Protestant dogma.
In discussing the historical development of public schools in America, Shea
stressed that a solution amenable to both Protestants and Catholics should have easily
been achieved. Most educators in the eighteenth century viewed religion as the
foundation of education, and thought that “the best citizens were those trained in the
101 For Mann’s position on church, state and public schools, and the importance of including the Bible in
public education see Horace Mann, “Twelfth Annual Report (1848),” in Lawrence A. Cremin, ed., The
Republic and the School: Horace Mann on the Education of Free Men (New York: Columbia University
Teachers College, 1957), 98-112.
102 Paul C. Gutjahr, An American Bible: A History of the Good Book in the United States, 1777-1780
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999), 118.
103 Viteritti, “Blaine’s Wake,” 668.
104 See Warren A. Nord, Religion and American Education, (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina
Press, 1995), 73; Rush Welter, American Writings on Popular Education, (New York: The Bobbs-Merrill
Company, Inc., 1971), 97-98; Jorgenson, The State and the Non-Public School, 75. Roger Finke and
Rodney Stark, The Churching of America, 1776-1990: Winners and Losers in our Religious Economy
(New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1992), 132.
99
religious spirit.”105 He identified this idea as “historically” American, and completely
compatible with Catholic ideals: “This idea was exactly that of the Catholic Church; and,
from the moment her children in the United States acquired freedom to this day, she has,
in unison with this genuine American system, labored to give the State good citizens by
making good Catholics.”106 Although Shea’s assertion that religion was essential to
responsible citizenship resonated with Protestant educators’ claims, his definition of the
“common good” required that students receive the religious education of their choice. For
Shea, this meant that because public schools offered Protestant religious instruction, taxes
should support Catholic schools as well.
In Shea’s view, early American values of religious education were effectively
applied in the New York system, which divided funds among religious denominations to
use for education as they saw fit until the 1820s.107 Shea explained that the school
leaders in New York found it “desirable” that each denomination should oversee the
religious instruction of its adherents. However, the New York legislature modified its
school system in 1826, in the context of the common school movement, making state
schools sole recipients of funds designated.108 Thereafter, schools implemented only
non-denominational Protestant religious instruction. By the late-nineteenth century,
many Americans viewed policies supporting denominational schools as “prejudicial.”109
105 Shea, “The Catholic Church in American History,” 155-156. On the religious nature of education in
colonial America, see Nord, Religion and American Education: Rethinking a National Dilemma, 64-71.
106 Shea, “The Catholic Church in American History,” 155-156.
107 See Timothy L. Smith, “Parochial Education and American Culture,” in Paul Nash, ed., History and
Education (New York: Random House, 1970), 206.
108 Welter, American Writings on Popular Education: the Nineteenth Century, 62.
109 John Shea, “Catholic Free Schools in the United States,” ACQR 9:36 (October 1884), 713.
100
Shea deplored the continuing popular belief that the First Amendment applied to
all the states. Citing Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience (1849) in which the author described
being fined for non-payment of taxes to support the church in Massachusetts, he noted
that this incident occurred fifty years after the signing of the Declaration of
Independence.110 Although many States ultimately mimicked the establishment clause in
their constitutions, the New England States were the slowest to acquiesce.111 Shea
denounced harshly the “New England system” of education in which taxes exclusively
supported schools that offered Congregational religious instruction until common school
reforms in the 1820s and 1830s. Although common school leaders had eschewed
Congregationalist instruction in schools as part and parcel of religious establishment, they
revamped religious instruction with various Protestant denominations in mind, not
Catholics. Shea portrayed non-sectarian religious instruction in public schools as the
legacy of New England Protestant establishment, the same establishment that common
school leaders had sought to abolish.
After common school reforms, moral education was embodied in the use of
Bibles in public schools without “note or comment,”112 or what Shea termed “a
perfunctory reading.” 113 Not only did Catholics object to this strategy as an ineffectual
110 Shea, “Catholic Free Schools in the United States,” 714; “The Blue Laws of Connecticut,” ACQR 2:7
(July 1877), 490. In fact, the Supreme Court had ruled in Barron v. Baltimore (1833) that the Bill of Rights
were not enforceable in the states; see A. E. Dick Howard, “The Wall of Separation: The Supreme Court as
Uncertain Stonemason,” in James E. Wood, Jr., ed., Religion and the State: Essays in Honor of Leo Pfeffer
(Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 1985), 86.
111 Of the original colonies that had established churches, disestablishment amendments were adopted as
follows, North Carolina (1776), New York (1777), Virginia (1776-1779), Maryland (1785), South Carolina
(1790), Georgia (1798), Vermont (1807), Connecticut (1818), New Hampshire (1819), Maine (1820), and
Massachusetts (1832-33). See Carl H. Esbeck, “Dissent and Disestablishment: The Church-State
Settlement in the Early American Republic,” Brigham Young University Law Review (2004): 1458.
112 United States Gazette January 14, 1843. Vincent P. Lannie, “Alienation in America: The Immigrant
Catholic and Public Education in Pre-Civil War America,” The Review of Politics 32:4 (October 1970),
508.
113 Shea, “Catholic Free Schools in the United States,” 717.
101
religious and moral practice, they also objected to using a Protestant version of the canon.
Shea was well versed in the differences between Protestant and Catholic views toward
the Bible, having written a bibliographical account of Catholic bibles in America in 1859,
and edited a new version of the Catholic Bible in 1878. “To the Catholic, the Bible is
neither a school-book, a ritual, nor a popular treatise on theology.”114 The Catholic
Council of Trent in 1546 had approved the Roman Catholic canon of scripture and dealt
with the issue of Tradition versus Scripture by placing both on an equal footing in
determining doctrine.115 The council approved vernacular translations of the Bible with
the provision that they include commentary and notes to affirm traditional interpretations
of the church. The resulting Douay or Douay-Rheims Bible, although it went through
many editions, remained the only approved Catholic version. American Protestants, in
contrast, particularly the New England Puritans, enthusiastically embraced the King
James Version, and from the 1640s through the nineteenth century it remained
overwhelmingly the preferred Protestant choice in America.116
Shea asserted that a system of religious instruction in public schools amenable to
both Protestants and Catholics could have been implemented along with other common
school reforms, but, over time, a solution had become “out of the question.”117 Such a
joint venture was implausible due to Protestant unwillingness to even consider
cooperating with Catholics. In keeping with Leonine teaching regarding tolerance in the
interest of the greater good, Shea noted that politics “should be guided by our
114 John Shea, Bibliographical Account of Catholic Bibles, Testaments and Other Portions of Scripture,
translated from the Latin Vulgate, and printed in the United States, 1859, (New York: Cramoisy Press,
1859), 3.
115 S. L. Greenslade, Cambridge History of the Bible: The West from the Reformation to the Present Day,
v2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963), 200.
116 Gutjahr, An American Bible, 91-92; see also Shea, “The Religious Rights of Catholics in Public
Institutions” ACQR (April 1882): 94.
117 Shea, “The Catholic Church in American History,” 159.
102
conscientious advocacy of all measure tending to [society’s] greatest good, the benefit of
the whole country, and the greatest amount of personal and local liberty consistent with
good government.”118 Since no such principle informed public school policy, he
concluded that it was impossible for Catholic students to participate in good conscience.
“As Americans we must deplore this, and the time will come when statesmen will look
back with wonder and regret at the folly which taxed a whole community for schools, and
then drive a large element out of them, merely to gratify a handful of fanatics, by making
the schools an instrument for proselytizing, for insulting and annoying any part of the
people.”119
At the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore (1889), fully one-fourth of the
legislation passed pertained to parochial schools. The leaders of the church demonstrated
that they found it impossible to try to cooperate with public schools any longer and
launched an aggressive initiative to expand parochial schools. Thus, Shea’s History
offered no hypothetical solutions to the Catholic issue in public schools, but rather
documented Catholic grievances, such as the 1844 Bible Riots in Philadelphia: a case in
which Catholics objected to Protestant Bibles in schools, and Protestants in turn accused
Catholics being simply “anti-Bible.”
Shea recounted the Philadelphia Bible Riots in his History, drawing the
conclusion that any kind of compromise between Catholics and Protestants regarding
religious instruction in public schools was impossible. His account characterized the
event as one of many attacks by anti-Catholic elements, including the Know-Nothing
party, which then was at its height.120 The incident began in November 1842, with
118 John Shea, “The Anti-Catholic Issue in the Late Election,” ACQR (January 1881), 50.
119 Ibid., 48-49.
120 For an overview of the rise and decline of the influence of the Know-Nothing party, see Billington, The
Protestant Crusade, 380-436.
103
Bishop Francis Patrick Kenrick’s121 request to the Board of Controllers of public schools
that Catholic students be allowed to read a Catholic version of the Bible while other
children were reading Protestant versions.122 In January, 1843, the school board granted
his request. The American Protestant Association, organized in 1842 and comprised of
over 80 Protestant ministers from Philadelphia, seized the opportunity to promote the
issue, and dissatisfaction developed slowly over the following year. A nativist pamphlet
misrepresented Kenrick’s request as a Catholic attempt to remove the Bible entirely from
public schools in March 1843. Kenrick responded to the pamphlet denying any intent to
remove Bibles from schools, reiterating his request for Catholic students to read their
own Bibles, and citing the Constitution of Pennsylvania which guaranteed the rights of
conscience.123 Kenrick clearly suggested a practical solution to the problem of Bible
reading that would allow both Protestants and Catholics to read from their own
prescribed versions. Shea stressed Kenrick’s peaceful and rational solution to the
problem of Bibles in schools, in stark contrast to the wanton violence and destruction of
property that Protestants later initiated in the riots.
Virulence in the anti-Catholic press escalated for about two months. On May 6,
1844, a group of nativists met and marched on an Irish section of Philadelphia, damaging
property and yelling insults. Irish resistance failed to quell the rioting. Over a period of
three days the rioting continued unabated, thirty Catholic houses and a few churches were
burned, and the state militia had to be called in to end the violence.124 Shea again quoted
121 Bishop of the Diocese of Philadelphia, 1830-51.
122 Billington, The Protestant Crusade, 221. For a focused historical overview of the riots see Vincent P.
Lannie and Bernard C. Diethorn, “For the Honor and Glory of God: The Philadelphia Bible Riots of 1840,”
History of Education Quarterly 8:1 (Spring 1968), 44-106.
123 Bishop Francis Kenrick, Catholic Herald March 14, 1844; qtd. in Shea, History of the Catholic Church
in America Vol. 4, 47-48.
124 Billington, The Protestant Crusade, 225.
104
Kenrick’s measured response urging Catholics to be patient and wait for legal redress of
their wrongs. However, in June 1844 when a grand jury assembled to investigate the
cause of the violence, it attributed the source to Catholic agitation against Protestants and
Bibles in schools.125
Although Catholics resisted what they perceived as forced indoctrination of their
children by being forced to read the Protestant Bible in schools, such efforts were futile.
Scholars have noted a prominent case in Boston in 1859 when a Catholic student was
flogged on the hands for thirty minutes because he refused to recite the Protestant form of
the Ten Commandments.126 The student’s parents brought their case to court, yet the
judge ruled that the teacher had the right to discipline the student in this way, for this
reason. The judge’s ruling set a precedent, after which schools expelled Catholic
students for refusing to participate in exercises using the Protestant Bible in both Boston
and New York. Shea related the Boston whipping incident in his History emphasizing
the imperative nature of the issue of Protestant indoctrination in public schools.
According to Shea, “the monstrous decision of the judge sustaining the cruelty showed
Catholics that no recognition of their religious rights could be expected from the State
schools.”127 Thus, Shea led his readers to his conclusion that Catholics had no peaceful
alternative other than establishing their own schools.
After the Bible Riots, Catholics focused on establishing a school system, and in
many states gained indirect state funding for their schools. Protestants, who viewed
public education as a vital component of Americanizing and Protestantizing Catholic
immigrants, made eliminating state funds for parochial schools a national issue by the
125 Lannie and Diethorn, “For the Honor and Glory of God,” 80. Omitted from Shea’s narrative was a
preceding series of skirmishes, as Irish laborers broke up meetings of American Republicans called to
address to threat posed by Catholics to schools. See Billington, The Protestant Crusade, 222.
126 Lannie, “Alienation in America,” 512-513; Billington, The Protestant Crusade, 293-294.
127 Shea, History of Catholics in the United States, v4, 513-514.
105
1870s.128 President Grant’s 1875 state of the union speech, which advocated eliminating
funds for “sectarian” religious institutions, represented the height this movement
achieved. Grant used the term “non-sectarian,” as had become common practice for
Protestants since massive Catholic immigration in the 1830s, to indicate common ground
that Protestants shared.129 Within two weeks of Grant’s speech, Republican
Congressman James G. Blaine introduced a Constitutional amendment, to correct what he
viewed as a “constitutional defect,” extending federal enforcement of first amendment
rights regarding establishment over the states.130 This proposal was in direct response to
repeated Catholic objections to Protestant religious education in public schools, and
requests for public funding for parochial schools or exemption from taxation.131 Grant’s
proposal effectively aligned the Republican Party with anti-Catholic interests on the
school debates, sparking bitter partisanship over the issue with Democrats, who depended
heavily on Catholic voting populations.132 Public response to the Amendment was
favorable, although Catholics generally viewed the measure as a thinly veiled attack on
their schools and charitable institutions.133 The Amendment passed the House
overwhelmingly, but the Senate rejected it. Proponents of the Amendment subsequently
128 Stephen K. Green, “The Blaine Amendment Reconsidered,” American Journal of Legal History 36:1
(January 1992), 42-43.
129 See Philip Hamburger, The Separation of Church and State, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 2001).
130 Quoted in Viteritti, “Blaine’s Wake,” 671. Judicial incorporation of the bill of rights through the
fourteenth amendment did not occur until Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railway Co. v. Chicago, 166 U.S.
226 (1897); federal courts did not incorporate freedom of religion until Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S.
296 (1940) and religious establishment until Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1 (1947); see Henry
J. Abraham and Barbara A. Perry, Freedom and the Court : Civil Rights and Liberties in the United States,
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1967).
131 Green, “The Blaine Amendment Reconsidered,” 41.
132 Viteritti, “Blaine’s Wake,” 670-672.
133 Green, “The Blaine Amendment Reconsidered,” 48.
106
focused their efforts at the state level, and by 1890, 29 states had incorporated similar
amendments into their constitutions.134
While neither Catholics nor Protestants sought a greater separation of church and
state in public schools, both inadvertently contributed to such an end through conflicts
over the “School Question.” Legislation and constitutional amendments that mimicked
the Blaine Proposal consequently introduced the specter of secularism into state public
school systems. Although the Blaine Proposal had specifically protected the use of Bible
reading in schools, the practice declined steadily in the last two decades of the nineteenth
century.135 In the wake of the violent school controversies of the 1840s, American
Catholic Bishops and Councils in the 1850s and 1860s shifted emphases from decrying
Protestant proselytism to condemning irreligion in public schools.136
Shea objected to how the Blaine Amendment hypocritically denied funds to
Catholic public institutions, while still supporting Protestant vestiges in State institutions,
yet he felt a constitutional amendment was in order to rectify the problem of Protestant
establishment in the states. According to Shea, Blaine’s proposed amendment
“prohibited…inculcating the doctrines of a sect, but was silent at the same time in regard
to a class of sects.”137 In an article written in 1882, Shea outlined state violations of
Catholic rights, and proposed a modified Blaine amendment that would ensure religious
liberty for Catholics in public institutions. Shea enumerated Catholic rights as follows:
The rights claimed by Catholics are: 1. To be free from compulsory attendance at
Protestant worship of any shape or kind, and to be allowed on Sundays to have the
Mass, the distinctive act of divine worship, offered for them so that they can
attend. 2. To be allowed before Mass and in sickness to go to confession to a
134 Viteritti, “Blaine’s Wake,” 673.
135 R. Lawrence Moore, “Bible Reading and Nonsectarian Schooling: The Failure of Religious Instruction
in Nineteenth Century Public Education,” The Journal of American History 86:4 (March 2000), 1595-7.
136 Lannie, “Alienation in America,” 515-516.
137 Shea, “The Religious Rights of Catholics in Public Institutions,” 207.
107
priest, without interference from any one, but with full respect for the privacy
required by the rules of the Church. 3. To have a priest in sickness to administer
the last sacraments.138
Concurrent with the mid-nineteenth century Catholic efforts to expand parochial schools
was the expansion of Catholic hospitals, orphanages, and asylums. According to Dolan,
in this case too the “Protestant sectarian atmosphere” of public institutions necessitated
parallel Catholic institutions.139 Amos Griswold Warner, a late-nineteenth century
pioneer in the field of social work, commented on the complexity of the issue of religious
organizations and public charities in his book American Charities (1894), which later
became a standard text for sociologists. He noted that there was no clear criterion for
establishing which institutions receiving public aid were “sectarian” or “nonsectarian.”
He also noted that while many institutions made no mention of religion in their charters
or by-laws, an openness to accept beneficiaries of any religion often stemmed from the
desire “to make proselytes.”140 Moreover, Warner commented
Protestants are willing to tease legislators for public money on behalf of a hospital
or an orphan asylum in which they are interested, urging that it is ‘doing good,’
and that it is preventing crime and pauperism, and so saving money to the
taxpayers. They do not see or will not acknowledge that the same could be said
of a parochial school, and that the claim which they set up that their own
institutions is ‘non-sectarian’ is equivocal and unfair….141
Warner further observed that in states where legislation prohibited public funds for
“sectarian” institutions, Protestants lobbied to define “Catholic” as sectarian.142 He
concluded that there was no clear guiding principle for public funding of religious
institutions in legislation, court cases, or practice.
138 Shea, “The Religious Rights of Catholics in Public Institutions,” 206.
139 Jay P. Dolan, “Immigrants in the City: New York’s Irish and German Catholics,” Church History 41:3
(Sept. 1972), 527-8.
140 Amos Griswold Warner, American Charities, (New York: Thomas Y. Crowell and Co. Publishers,
1908 [1894]), 407-8.
141 Ibid., 409.
142 Ibid.
108
As in his arguments about Sunday laws, Shea provided examples of the ways in
which Jewish freedom of religion was restricted in state-funded public institutions.
According to Shea, “We are welcoming the persecuted Jews from Russia with no little
self-laudation of our great moral grandeur and utter freedom from any spirit of
persecution, yet if the Russian Jew becomes an inmate of a state institution he will find
that he will be compelled to attend Protestant worship, and by punished as contumacious
[rebellious] if he resists.”143 Appeals to the religious rights of Jews furthered Shea’s
argument that religious liberty in America was an exclusive privilege for Protestant
Christians.
Paralleling his previous arguments regarding Sunday laws and Indian policies,
Shea asserted that American institutions consistently violated citizens’ inalienable rights
of religious liberty. He stated that, although some might argue that prison inmates had
surrendered certain rights in society, “The right to worship God according to the dictates
of his own conscience, the right not to be forced to join in a worship which he believes to
be unacceptable to God, is a right which the convict possesses, and of which no man has
a right to deprive him.”144 Moreover, he noted that Catholics in poorhouses were “simply
unfortunate, not criminal…[and] have done nothing to forfeit any right.”145 Shea also
cited a strange case in Pennsylvania involving the Western House of Refuge (the first
state-authorized institution for the confinement and reform of juveniles), which required
its students to attend “non-sectarian” religious services, but allowed priests’ access to
Catholic inmates in case of sickness. “There is no trace anywhere else of sick persons
having greater civil rights than the healthy, of any man gaining rights as he loses health,
143 Shea, “The Religious Rights of Catholics in Public Institutions,” 197.
144 Ibid., 195.
145 Ibid., 196.
109
and incurring, with health, any civil disability.”146 Shea’s pointed discussion of rights
identified the lack of any consistent guiding principle regarding religion and the state in
publicly funded social institutions.
In his discussion of current religio-political issues and their history, Shea asserted
that American Protestants had violated Catholic (and Jewish and Native American) rights
as citizens. He found public declarations of religious liberty to be sorely lacking in
practice. In contrast, the conservative Catholic promise to uphold the “common good”
appeared to offer more consistent toleration. The tension between American Protestant
beliefs in the religious foundations of social institutions and the liberal doctrine of
religious freedom resulted in inconsistent and irrational applications of liberty.
Current Threats to America
Although Catholic authors began stressing the theme of secularization in the
middle of the nineteenth century, following the public school debates, a number of
developments in the late nineteenth century heightened concerns over secularization in
society. First, Blaine amendments in many state constitutions excluded religion more and
more from state institutions. Although rhetoric regarding Bible reading remained strong,
actual Bible reading in public schools declined.147 A Pastoral Letter issued after the
Third Plenary Council warned that “skepticism and irreligion” had infected all aspects of
American culture and education. The Council warned that America had substituted “the
undisguised worship of mammon” for worship and honor of God.148 New historical and
146 Shea, “The Religious Rights of Catholics in Public Institutions,” 203.
147 See Moore, “Bible Reading and Non-Sectarian Schooling,” 1581-1599.
148 “Pastoral Letter of the Archbishops and Bishops of the United States Assembled in the Third Council
of Baltimore, to the Clergy and Laity of Their Charge,” The Memorial Volume, a History of the Third
Plenary Council of Baltimore, November 9-December 7, 1884 (Baltimore, MD: The Baltimore Pub. Co.,
1885), [3] 275. Quoted in John Shea, “The Pastoral Letter of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore,”
ACQR 10:37 (January 1884), 4.
110
literary-critical scholarship of the Bible created controversies regarding the inspiration of
scripture that threatened the unity of many Christian denominations. Darwin’s theory of
natural selection challenged religious thinkers to address perceived conflicts between
science and religion.149 Conservative Protestants and Catholics both used these issues to
assert the need to defend American culture against secularization.
While addressing current “threats” to America, Shea referenced Protestant fears
of secularism, Darwinism, and Catholicism. However, he saw secularism and Darwinism
as the natural result of the Protestant emphasis on individualism and rationalism. He also
referenced nativist fears, yet inverted the arguments about the “dangerous classes” by
suggesting that Protestant materialism, rather than immigration or urban working classes,
were the greatest threat to American society. These arguments placed responsibility on
Protestants for the major fears of nineteenth century Americans – he presented Catholics
as central to preserving true Christianity in America. His view of America’s future
predicted the ultimate demise of Protestantism, replacement of Protestantism with
secularism, and Catholicism standing alone as the defender of a Christian America.
One might expect that Shea and other American Catholics would welcome signs
of differentiation between the government and Protestantism as a new era of religious
freedom.
Indeed, Shea smugly suggested that Protestantism was facing its impending
demise in America. He cited several Protestant articles that decried a loss of religion in
American life and concluded: “Protestantism in reality never was able to live except by
employing the power of the state to enforce its doctrines and discipline. When that power
is taken away, it must decline; it has no doctrine which it can infallibly say men must
believe, nor ordinances which it can say men must practice to be saved.”150 Shea
149 Dolan, In Search of American Catholicism, 113-7; Carey, The Roman Catholics, 60.
150 John Shea, “The Rapid Increase of the Dangerous Classes in the United States,” ACQR (April 1879),
248.
111
attributed Protestant efforts to obtain a Constitutional amendment in the 1890s as part of
a well-intentioned, but weak solution to America’s spiritual crisis.
The project to put “God into the Constitution” seems to have sprung from a
glimmering of the real truth, that as a people we are living without God in the
world, but the remedy is not to put the name of the Creator into the paper
Constitution, but to imbue the whole social system with the supernatural, the idea
of God, its need of Him, its accountability to Him, and a loving desire to fulfil His
will.151
In other words, Shea’s solution to the problem of secularism was a “true” alignment of
religion with the state. Attempts to merge Protestantism with the state were destined to
fall short, because Protestantism was fallible.
Leonine teaching indicated that the state could not be neutral in its position
toward religion. A neutral state inevitably promoted evil rather than virtue. One of these
evils, noted by the Baltimore Plenary Council’s Pastoral Letter, was materialism.152 In an
article entitled “The Dangerous Classes,” a popular nineteenth century term for
immigrants (many of whom were Catholics), Shea argued that the true dangerous classes
were the wealthy, not the poor in America. In his critique of American materialism, he
asserted that an aspect of Protestantism was responsible for social problems in urban
America and corruption in politics. The Protestant work ethic had for too long confused
those who prospered with those who were worthy.153 In the perceived transition from
state Protestantism to secularism, Shea observed “worship of worldly prosperity and
success,” and asserted that wealth had become America’s “great true test of religion,”154
suggesting that America’s culture had completely undermined its Constitutional
prohibition of religious tests. He attributed this materialism to the prominence of the
151 Shea, “The Rapid Increase of the Dangerous Classes in the United States,” 241.
152 “Pastoral Letter of the Archbishops and Bishops of the United States,” 3. Quoted by Shea, “The
Pastoral Letter,” 4.
153 Shea, “The Rapid Increase of the Dangerous Classes in the United States,” 242.
154 Ibid.
112
Protestant work ethic, “in which the thrift, prosperity, and wealth of Protestant
communities are adduced as proof that Protestantism is the true religion, while poverty
stamps the Catholic communities as being far from Christ.”155
Shea attacked plans to build the Statue of Liberty during the 1880s as a new sign
of America’s devotion to secular patriotism, by raising an image to “liberty.” In language
that closely resembled Pope Leo XIII’s encyclicals regarding liberty, Shea warned that
the elevation of “liberty” to god-like status denied the divine source of human rights and
liberty: “men can be really free only ‘with the freedom wherewith He hath made us
free.’”156 In other words, secular freedom was impossible without the rules and
obligations of virtuous Christianity. According to Shea, a secular valorization of liberty
had been present in American politics since its earliest inception, due to influence by the
French Revolution.157 Yet, the building of the Statue of Liberty represented how this
secular ideology of freedom had made inroads into American thought in the latenineteenth century due to Protestantism’s failures.
Shea attributed the development of Biblical criticism to Protestantism’s emphasis
on rational study of the scriptures rather than relying on the authority of the Church in
interpreting scripture.158 According to Shea, unbelief in the scriptures was the natural
outgrowth from the rationalism and individualism of the Protestant Reformation.
Starting from an erroneous standpoint, making the Scriptures and their
translations of them as understood by private interpretation to be absolute truth,
the Reformers and their followers have come at last to reject the truth and
inspiration of the Scriptures, Their vagaries, from an almost idolatrous honor of
the material volume to the utter rejection of its letter and spirit, attest the necessity
155 Shea, “The Rapid Increase of the Dangerous Classes in the United States,” 242.
156 Shea, “Our Great Goddess and Her Coming Idol,” ACQR (October 1880), 588.
157 That the statue came from France, a secular republic at the time, reinforced this point.
158 Shea, “The Pastoral Letter of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore,” 6.
113
of an infallible, ever-abiding authority on earth, which could declare what was the
truth revealed by God to man.159
The emphasis on authority in Catholicism, according to Shea, exempted it from the
problems of historical criticism that threatened Protestant denominations. Moreover the
value Protestants placed on the Bible, changing to doubts about its historical authenticity
and inspirational nature were natural results of depending on individual interpretation.
Shea referred to controversies over natural selection as the “war of natural science
on faith,” yet he believed that the authority of the Catholic Church would prevent such a
war within Catholicism. Numerous Catholics discussed Darwin’s theory of natural
selection in the 1890s, and John Zahm attempted to reconcile Catholicism and theories of
evolution in his book Evolution and Dogma (1896),160 yet Catholicism did not experience
a rupture between modernists and fundamentalists as many Protestant denominations did
around the turn of the century.161 Shea felt that, given the current state of this rationalist
assault on faith within Protestant churches, “it is not rash to assert, that fifty years hence,
the catholic church will be on this soil almost the only compact Christian body, battling
for the Scriptures and the revealed Word of God, or recognizing Him as the Creator and
moral Governor of the Universe, a rallying point for all who shall claim to be
Christian.”162 Shea rather blithely concluded that Protestantism had brought ruin upon
itself by its emphasis on individual reason rather than an infallible divine authority, and
suggested that Catholics alone would continue the fight for a Christian nation in the
future.
159 Shea, “The Pastoral Letter of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore,” 6.
160 For more information on Zahm, see R. Scott Appleby, “Between Americanism and Modernism: John
Zahm and Theistic Evolution,” Church History 56:4 (December 1987): 474-490.
161 Dolan, In Search of American Catholicism, 113.
162 Shea, “The Catholic Church in American History,” 173.
114
In 1885, Shea summarized the Pastoral Letter after the Third Plenary Council for
the readers of the American Catholic Quarterly Review. The letter stressed dangers of
American materialism, rationalism and secularism, yet promoted American patriotism.
Shea stressed that the Fathers “wisely refute the idea that we Catholics need lay aside any
of our love of our country’s principles and institutions to be faithful Catholics.”163
Moreover, the letter urged the study of American history, among families, as well as at all
levels of education. “We must keep firm and solid the liberties of our country, by
keeping fresh the noble memories of the past and thus sending forth from our Catholic
homes, into the arena of public life, not partisans but patriots.”164
Conclusion
Conservative Catholics appeared to be withdrawn from the larger American
society in many ways in the late nineteenth century. Their vast networks of schools and
social institutions separated and segregated Catholics’ lives from many others in
American society. Papal condemnations of Americanism and Modernism in the 1890s
indicated a certain degree of separation from American society as well. Yet to
characterize Catholics at this time as “ghettoized” or withdrawn from American society
ignores the importance that many Catholics also placed on their identity and role as
American citizens. The Catholic leadership demonstrated its commitment to the study of
American history in the Third Plenary Council’s recommendations in the Pastoral Letter,
and its commission of Shea to write an American Catholic history. Shea’s writings
highlighted the importance of history to American Catholics, and presented uniquely
Catholic critiques of aspects of American culture that were un-American. Indeed, in
163 Shea, “The Pastoral Letter of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore,” 8.
164 “Pastoral Letter of the Archbishops and Bishops of the United States,” [20] 293. Quoted in Shea, “The
Pastoral Letter of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore,” 16.
115
many ways, Shea’s writings presented Catholics as “better” Christian Americans than
Protestants. He capitalized on popular American Protestant themes to turn the story of
Protestant triumphalism on its head. Shea presented Catholics as the best stewards of
religious liberty in the colonies, as centrally united behind the American Revolution, and
as supporting unity over separation during the Civil War. Sunday laws highlighted the
absurdity of American church-state relations by enforcing Protestant observance of a
Catholic decree. In addition to asserting that US Indian policies were racist and roundly
criticizing the system that denied citizenship to a portion of its population, Shea found
Grant’s Peace Policy to be a blatant case of religious establishment. He also asserted that
Protestants had, by refusing to grant religious options for Catholics in public schools and
other social institutions, paved the way for secularism to infect American society.
Finally, in light of the challenges facing Christianity in the late nineteenth century, Shea
saw Catholicism as uniquely suited to survive these challenges because of the doctrine of
infallibility. Although Shea critiqued Protestant aspects of American culture, he
presented Catholics as inheritors and defenders of a truer Americanism. Ultimately, he
portrayed Protestantism as a burden on America’s past and present, and a threat to its
future; it had been unable to deliver on its liberal and Christian promises. His writings
presented a comprehensive worldview – past, present, and future – integrating
conservative Catholicism with Americanism. In contrast to nineteenth century or current
characterizations of conservative Catholics during this period as retreating into the “dark
ages,” Shea’s writings demonstrated a high level of intellectual engagement with
contemporary ideas of nationalism and a compelling alternative for American Catholics.
116
CHAPTER III
“HUMAN LAWS VS. DIVINE”: URIAH SMITH AND SEVENTH-DAY
ADVENTIST OPPOSITION TO SUNDAY LAWS
In 1885, amidst various American Sunday law reform movements, Uriah Smith
unequivocally declared such legislation a violation of religious liberty. “Man may
legislate between man and man, but not between man and God. …[Sabbath observance]
should no more be enforced by law than baptism or the Lord’s supper.”1 Smith (18321903) was the foremost proponent of Seventh-day Adventist apocalyptic theology from
the 1860s to the 1890s. The Adventist denomination was a small group – about 18,000
adherents in 1885 – that originated in the Millerite movement of the 1830s in New
England. Fringe doctrines of vegetarianism, Saturday Sabbath observance, and “soul
sleep” (as opposed to immortality of the soul) distinguished Adventists from most
Protestant denominations. Furthermore, Smith’s apocalyptic theology offered a
profoundly negative forecast for America. In his apocalyptic scenario, “apostate”
Protestants and Catholics would unite and transform America into a religious persecuting
power, ultimately enforcing the death penalty on those who refused to worship on
Sunday. The only resolution in this account was Christ’s second coming, which would
rescue the elect, destroy the wicked, and replace earthly kingdoms with a heavenly one.
Only Seventh-day Adventist would remain true Protestants to the end, by rejecting
Sunday worship and the doctrine of soul immortality, and true Americans, by resisting
efforts to join church and state in America. Several scholars have maintained that
Adventists advocated for separation of church and state to postpone the end-world
scenario, buying time to save more souls. This chapter argues that political advocacy was
a component of defining Adventism as true Protestants and Americans, both of which
were essential to solidifying Adventist identity and to spurring evangelistic efforts.
1 Uriah Smith, “Let Us Understand Each Other,” Review and Herald 63:3 (January 20, 1885), 40.
117
Uriah Smith was born in New Hampshire in 1832. His mother Rebekah joined
the Millerites when he was about 10, and his experience with the movement left a great
impression on him. He later recalled angry mobs trying to break up Millerite meetings,
and also the Great Disappointment, when the Second Coming did not occur on the date
Miller predicted in 1844. At the age of 16, Smith entered Phillips Academy at Exeter,
New Hampshire. After completing his studies in 1852, he planned to study at Harvard;
however, the death of his father forced him to take a job as a wood engraver to support
his mother and siblings. During this time he became involved in the developing
Sabbatarian Adventist movement, along with his mother and sister, and began observing
the Saturday Sabbath. In 1853 he submitted a poem to the Advent Review and Sabbath
Herald2entitled “The Warning Voice of Time and Prophecy,” and the editor James White
subsequently offered Uriah a position on publishing staff. The following year Uriah was
made editor of the paper, a position he held for almost 50 years, until his death in 1903.
Under Smith’s editorial leadership of the Advent Review and Sabbath Herald
(later abbreviated to Review and Herald) the magazine went from a subscription of a few
hundred to 15,000 by the time of his death.3 According to Smith, the name of the serial
indicated its purpose to review the Biblical prophecies of Christ's second coming and
herald the seventh-day Sabbath.4 An unstated purpose of the magazine was to unify
doctrine and practice among the believers.5 Smith’s verse-by-verse exegesis of Daniel
and the Revelation (1882) established the church’s prophetic views; it is still in print and
2 In 1850, James White edited the paper from his home and printed it in Middleton, Connecticut; in 1855,
the publishing business moved to Battle Creek, Michigan where it remained until 1902 when it was moved
to Tacoma Park, Maryland; it was subsequently called the Review and Herald.
3 Eugene F. Durand, Yours in the Blessed Hope, Uriah Smith (Washington, DC: Review and Publishing
Association, 1980), 79.
4 Uriah Smith, “Editorial,” Review and Herald (October 30, 1856), 204.
5 Durand, Yours in the Blessed Hope, 61.
118
remains the denomination’s standard work on prophecy.6 Smith is considered one of the
most important early leaders of the Adventist church, along with James and Ellen G.
White.7 Ellen White, the early leader of the Advent movement credited with the gift of
prophesy, endorsed Smith’s works early on, writing that his “books must be regarded as
of special importance, and every effort should be made to get them before the people.”8
Smith first outlined the history and apocalyptic future of America in a series of articles in
the Review in 1871. The following year he wrote The United States in the Light of
Prophecy (1872). The book was reprinted three times from 1874-1883. Another version
of this book, The Marvel of Nations: Our Country, Its Past, Present, and Future (1885),
aimed at non-Adventist audiences, went through two additional printings by 1887.
Finally, his most complete apocalyptic volume, Thoughts on Daniel and the Revelation:
The Response of History to the Voice of Prophecy, was reprinted nine times by SDA
publishing houses between 1883 and 1912, with a version translated into German in 1887
and an additional printing at a British publishing house in 1888.9 During his lifetime,
more than half a million copies of these three books were sold.10
Smith’s construction of America’s past, present and future was filtered through
the lens of Adventist apocalyptic theology, making Adventists and America central to the
6 Durand, Yours in the Blessed Hope, 12.
7 Uriah Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, (Battle Creek, MI: Steam Press of the Seventhday Adventist Publishing Association, 1874, 1876, 1887), 13.
8 Ellen G. White, Evangelism: as set forth in the writings of Ellen G. White, (Washington: Review and
Herald Publishing Co., 1946), 366.
9 A separate volume on Revelations was published in 1867, and one on Daniel in 1872. Durand, Yours in
the Blessed Hope, 216-7. These volumes contain verbatim textual interpretations of the United States.
However, the combined volume Daniel and the Revelation included lengthy explanations of prophetic
interpretations reaching back to the Babylonian empire.
10 This number represents more than Adventists readers as the total population of the denomination only
numbered about however many thousand by the turn of the nineteenth century. Early Adventists stressed
colporteur work, or the door-to-door selling of Adventist literature as a primary method of proselytizing,
and Smith’s books were duly used for this purpose. See Durand, Yours in the Blessed Hope, 195.
119
climax of world events. The first section of this chapter analyzes his published works
about the history and apocalyptic future of America, including The United States in the
Light of Prophecy, The Marvel of Nations, and Thoughts on Daniel and the Revelations.
His characterization of American history was simplistic and uncritical, appealing to
popular patriotic and providential views of America’s greatness, which he saw as coming
from its religious liberty and republican government. “Freedom” had facilitated the
nation’s increase of population, both natural and through immigration, advances in
science and technology, wealth, and world power. Yet, Smith’s apocalyptic
interpretation led to a teleological argument forecasting America’s decline into a
religious persecuting power.
The second part of this chapter uses his editorials and articles published in the
Review and Herald 1872-1890, the section on current events in The Marvel of Nations,
and his book Modern Spiritualism (1897) to highlight his views on late-nineteenth
century events and their import to Adventists in America. His construction of America
defined Catholicism as a threat to the nation, reiterating a common Protestant
preoccupation. For Smith, all Protestants who observed Sunday were lumped together
with the familiar Catholic threat to American freedom. Smith attempted to unmask the
rhetoric of Sunday law reform as a thin veil for religious establishment. In his
apocalyptic scenario, in the near future America would enact a national Sunday law,
inaugurating a “time of trouble” for true believers culminating in the Second Coming and
the destruction of earthly kingdoms.
While the few recent scholarly works on nineteenth century Adventism assert that
Adventists lobbied for religious freedom to postpone an apocalyptic time of religious
persecution, Smith’s writings demonstrate also a desire to “sell” Adventism by raising
political consciousness. Smith designed his articulation of Americanism and Adventism
for evangelistic ends: to convert others, and to spur Adventists to fully embrace and share
their distinct message.
120
Millerite Backgrounds of Seventh-day Adventist
Apocalyptic Theology and Oppositional Identity
To understand Smith’s writings, it is necessary to have some familiarity with
Adventist apocalyptic theology. Smith himself did not originate the apocalyptic scenario,
but became the most prolific in publishing and disseminating it among Adventists.
Future Seventh-day Adventist leaders developed distinct views of their Protestant identity
and the apocalyptic destiny of the United States through their experience in the Millerite
movement of the 1830s and 1840s. The movement began with the attempts of a man
named William Miller (1782-1849) to reconcile his belief in reason with belief in an
inspired Bible. As a young man, Miller considered himself a deist. After his
participation in the war of 1812 and his return home to a small farm in New York, he
began to study his Bible diligently, searching for truth. He became fascinated with the
apocalyptic prophecies of Daniel, which convinced him of both the inspired and rational
nature of the scriptures. This Biblical book, attributed to the Jewish prophet Daniel
during the Babylonian captivity of Israel (6th century BCE), describes several of Daniel’s
visions concerning the future of the Jewish people and their oppression by a series of
beasts symbolizing tyrannical foreign states. A messenger in the vision tells Daniel that
the four beasts represent the kingdoms of Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and a fourth
unnamed oppressor. Finally, the kingdom of God is established in Israel and the Jewish
people gain freedom and peace. Most Biblical scholars agree now that the author of
Daniel wrote the book sometime in the second century BCE, between the desecration of
the temple by Antiochus and before the Maccabbean restoration, approximately 400 years
after the time of the Babylonian captivity.
11
But if one assumes that the prophecy was
actually written before the rise of the kingdoms of Medo-Persia and Greece, it seems a
miraculous foretelling of historical events. Miller interpreted the book literally, and as a
11
Frederic J. Baumgartner, Longing for the End: A History of Millennialism in Western Civilization, (New
York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997), 27.
121
Christian, Miller thought the restoration of Israel and the temple represented the second
advent of Christ. One of the verses in Daniel in particular caught his attention: “there
shall be two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed”
(Daniel 8:14). Combining this verse with another prophecy in Daniel, Miller decided that
the 2300 days began with the “decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem” (Daniel 9:24-25).
Miller set the beginning date at the Babylonian decree to rebuild Jerusalem as 457 BC,
and using the prophetic interpretation called the year-day principle, he concluded that
2300 years later would mark the end of the world: 1843.
Although Miller made his calculations as early as 1818, he did not begin to make
his ideas public on any scale until 1831.
12
Approximately 100,000 persons, mostly in
New England, accepted Miller’s message. The leaders of the “Millerites,” as they were
called, used various means of mass communication to spread their message: visual aids,
tent evangelism, printed tracts, and a published serial called Signs of the Times.
13
This
was the first time that mass media were used to spread millennialist doctrines, with great
success.
14
At first the Millerite followers maintained their connections with churches of
various denominations; Baptist, Methodist, and other evangelical groups.
15
But as the
date drew near, and the movement grew in numbers and intensity, ministers in these
churches began to object to Miller’s message. Millerites were a threat to established
denominations on several levels. First, Miller’s assertion that this “present truth” was
more important than doctrinal differences such as Calvinism and Arminianism struck at
the heart of orthodoxies in the Protestant mainstream. Second, Miller’s premillennial
12
Baumgartner, Longing for the End, 168.
13
Paul Boyer, When Time Shall Be No More: Prophecy Belief in Modern American Culture, (Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1992), 82.
14
15
Baumgartner, Longing for the End, 168.
David Morgan, Protestants and Pictures: Religion, Visual Culture, and the Age of America Mass
Production, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 134.
122
view of society was tragic, thus clashing with the reformist optimism of many evangelical
churches. Also, the apocalyptic symbols and the visual accoutrements of the Millerite
evangelists struck many as bizarre. A prophetic chart was developed in 1840 as a visual
aid for preaching; it included a timeline with illustrative symbols from the Biblical books
of both Daniel and Revelation to reproduce the chronology of nations leading up to the
final kingdom of God. In 1843, John Greenleaf Whittier described the Millerite
prophetic chart as portraying “oriental types and figures and mystic symbols translated
into staring Yankee realities, and exhibited like the beasts of a traveling menagerie.”
16
The strangeness of the apocalyptic message also contributed to many Millerites being
excommunicated for promoting Miller’s message.
17
In response, Millerite leaders formulated an apocalyptic explanation for their
expulsion from churches. In 1843, Charles Fitch preached a sermon entitled Come Out of
Her, My People which asserted that this division was foretold by a text in Revelation:
“Come out of her [Babylon], my people, that you share not in her sins and receive not of
her plagues” (Revelation 18:4).
18
For Fitch, Protestant churches that rejected the “present
truth” were represented by the apocalyptic symbol of Babylon which persecutes the
saints, a role Protestants previously ascribed to Catholicism. Protestants had a long
tradition of interpreting the Pope as antichrist and the Catholic church as Babylon.
However, Fitch’s application of the Antichrist symbol to both mainstream Protestantism
in America and Catholicism was an innovation that signaled the beginnings of what
16
Qtd. in Morgan, Protestants and Pictures, 147.
17
Stephen D. O’Leary, Arguing the Apocalypse: A Theory of Millennial Rhetoric, (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1994), 105; Malcolm Bull and Keith Lockhart, Seeking a Sanctuary: Seventh-day
Adventism and the American Dream (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2007, 2nd ed.), 38-39.
18
Morgan, Protestants and Pictures, 147
123
historian David Morgan calls an “oppositional consciousness” in the Millerite
movement.
19
The “oppositional consciousness” and distinct experience of Millerites was
exacerbated when the world did not end in 1843. When 1843 passed, Miller reset the
date of the Second coming for October 22, 1844, the Jewish Day of Atonement.
20
The
Millerites believed the day would bring freedom and peace; instead, the watchful group
received bitter disappointment in exchange for their “blessed hope.” From then on, the
little band of Advent believers referred to that day as the Great Disappointment.
After the Great Disappointment, the sabbatarian Advent leaders reformulated and
consolidated their doctrine, including an innovation regarding the role of the United
States in prophecy. John Loughborough and J. N. Andrews, who became leaders of the
Seventh-day Adventist denomination, inserted America into the end time scenario which
was first portrayed in an 1850 prophetic chart. While the 1840s Millerite chart ended the
chronology with the beast representing “Papal Rome,” or Catholicism, another beast was
added to the chronology in 1850. The two-horned beast of Revelation was portrayed and
labeled “Republicanism and Protestantism,” signifying the unique aspects of the United
States that would ultimately bring about its downfall.
21
Literature Review: Adventists as Outsiders and the Role
of Apocalyptic Beliefs in Their Identity Formation
Scholarly work on nineteenth century Adventism highlights a number of themes
relevant to this study. First, Malcolm Bull and Keith Lockhart provide an explanation for
19
Morgan, Protestants and Pictures, 165.
20
Paul K. Conkin, American Originals: Homemade Varieties of Christianity, (Chapel Hill, NC: University
of North Carolina Press, 1997), 121.
21
For a detailed discussion of the importance of the prophetic chart in SDA visual culture, see Morgan,
Protestants and Pictures, 123-198.
124
why Adventists developed an apocalyptic theology that focused on issues of
Protestantism, Catholicism and Americanism. According to these authors, Adventists
developed their apocalyptic theology to attribute more importance and distinction to their
role in American religion than was warranted by their unexceptional theological beliefs
and small numbers. Second, Jonathan Butler’s studies of early Adventism challenged
assumptions regarding catastrophic millennialists and apolitical attitudes. In his three
phase description, Butler outlines how early Adventists progressed from an
“otherworldly” and apolitical stance in the 1850s to incorporating political activism into
their apocalyptic beliefs in the 1880s. This chapter builds on Butler’s argument regarding
timeframe and subtle changes in apocalyptic theology during the 1880s; however, I
extend the argument to assert that Adventist leaders’ new political emphasis was
inextricably linked to increasing evangelistic efforts.
Bull and Lockhart argue that, beginning in the 1850s, Adventists developed
perspectives on Catholicism, Protestantism, and America that became central to their
identity. In terms of theology, Adventists were hardly distinct from other denominations
of the period. Yet, instead of a disappointed and insignificant sect, Adventist leaders
imagined their role as central to American religion and society. Bull and Lockhart
characterize Adventist apocalypticism as an “obvious inversion” of the present reality
Adventists faced: Adventists had not experienced a Second Coming in 1844; Protestant
churches were everywhere and influential; the Catholic church was gaining in numbers
and power; and spiritualism was gaining popularity.22 Adventist leaders’ views of the
end-time scenario, while conforming to the general pattern of catastrophic
premillennialism,23 explicitly gave Adventists a central role in opposing the major
22 Malcolm and Bull, Seeking a Sanctuary, 56.
23 Here I use Catherine Wessinger’s definition of catastrophic millennialism as “a pessimistic view of
humanity and society…. The millennial kingdom will be created only after the violent destruction of the
old world.” In contrast, progressive millennialism “involves an optimistic view of human nature that
became prevalent in the nineteenth century. Humans engaging in social work in harmony with the divine
125
religious and political powers in the United States. Moreover, Adventists leaders
proposed that the ways in which other Christians sought to initiate the millennium in
America, through upholding the nation’s “Christian” character, was the very way in
which Catholicism and apostate Protestantism would unite to make the American
government a persecuting power in a catastrophic turn of end-time events.
Adventist leaders’ emphasis on history was central to their understanding of their
identity and place in America. They acknowledged the providential origins of America,
yet pointed to its principles of liberty and many signs of growth and power as evidence of
God’s ordination that America had emerged as a “lamb” but would soon develop
“dragon-like” tendencies. Thus, with other historians of the time, they could laud
America’s accomplishments as part of God’s plan, yet with a vastly different ending.
Jonathan Butler begins his interpretation of Adventism in America by explaining
that scholars have identified a link between “progressivist” millennialism and the
American dream.24 Protestants of this stripe viewed America as a providentially chosen
nation, like Israel, ordained to lead to world to peace and prosperity. Butler directed
scholarly attention toward the relationship of ideas of national destiny and “catastrophic”
millennialism. Premillennialists have been characterized as “pessimistic, withdrawn, and
apolitical in relation to government, and yet since 1865 they typically have staked an
investment in the American destiny.”25 Butler characterizes the relationship of Seventhday Adventists to government in the nineteenth century as having three phases. First, the
Millerite Adventists embraced an “apolitical apocalyptic” in the 1840s that spurned
will can effect changes that non-catastrophically and progressively create the millennial kingdom.” How
the Millennium Comes Violently: From Jonestown to Heaven’s Gate (New York: Seven Bridges Press,
2000), 16-17.
24 See sources cited by Jonathan M. Butler, “Adventism and the American Experience,” in Edwin S.
Gaustad, ed., The Rise of Adventism: Religion and Society in Mid-Nineteenth Century America (New York:
Harper and Row, 1974), 173.
25 Butler, “Adventism and the American Experience,” 173.
126
engagement with the government in light of an imminent end of the world. Second, from
the 1840s to the 1870s, Adventists moved toward a “political apocalyptic” as they
articulated their denunciation of the world in the language of contemporary politics.
Third, in the 1880s and beyond Seventh-day Adventists began lobbying earnestly for
separation of church and state in what he labels a “political prophetic.”26
Drawing primarily on the writings of Ellen G. White (1827-1950), the
acknowledged prophetess of the Adventist movement, Butler identifies a shift in
Adventist views toward the end of the nineteenth century. Butler argued that while
Millerites and Adventists had always preached an imminent end to the world, an
intellectual shift occurred during the late 1880s when Adventists adopted a kind of
apocalyptic “arminianism” in which they could hasten or retard the end by their actions,
and thus could delay the end by lobbying for religious freedom. Delaying the end was
preferable in that it provided time to preach the Adventist message and save more souls.
Butler characterized this shift as follows: “[Adventists] wished to delay the end in order
to preach that the end was soon.”27 This assertion has been taken up by subsequent
authors as typifying Adventism during this period. 28
White’s earliest writings that explicitly formulated the divine deferral of the time
of trouble through political processes appeared in the Review and Herald in December,
1888.29 Her new emphasis on ‘delaying’ the end was published shortly after a meeting of
26 Butler, “Adventism and the American Experience,” 174.
27 Ibid., 194.
28 Ibid., 194. See also Douglas Morgan, Adventism and the American Republic: the Public Involvement of
a Major Apocalyptic Movement, (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2001), 30; Ronald Lawson,
“Church and State at Home and Abroad: The Evolution of Seventh-day Adventist Relations with
Governments,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 64:2 (Summer 1996), 286-7.
29 Ellen G. White, “The Approaching Crisis,” Review and Herald, Extra edition: “Relative to Foreign
Missions, and the Blair Amendment now Pending in Congress” (December 11, 1888), 4; “David’s Prayer,”
Review and Herald (December 18, 1888), 1-2.
127
the General Conference October 18-November 4, 1888 in which E. J. Waggoner and A.
T. Jones spelled out a new emphasis on righteousness by faith, a message that White fully
endorsed. This suggests that White’s inspiration for apocalyptic arminianism may have
had its roots in soteriological arminianism. Uriah Smith, along with George Butler
(General Conference president 1872-4, 1882-8), opposed Waggoner and Jones’
theological interpretation of grace and justification. Furthermore, Smith never alluded to
any sort of apocalyptic arminianism, continually affirming the views that he had
espoused during Butler’s second phase until he died.
A close reading of White’s writings in 1888 indicate that she used a rhetorical
construction of impending persecution in several ways. First, the December 11 article
urging efforts to resist Sunday laws and delay the time of trouble was preceded by an
article in which she made the same argument – “work while it is yet day, for the night
cometh when no man may work” – to encourage fiscal giving for foreign missions as she
did to promote political activism in the second article.30 The use of parallel arguments
suggests a larger concern for evangelistic efforts. Her emphasis on conversion was
explicitly addressed in her article on resisting Sunday laws, as she outlined the
importance of persecution in bringing “the truth” to new audiences:
…truth shall be brought to the front, and become a subject of examination and
discussion, even if it is through the contempt placed upon it. The minds of the
people must be excited. Every controversy, every reproach, every slander, will be
God’s means of provoking inquiry, and awakening minds that otherwise would
slumber.31
The other useful aspect of impending persecution was in its ability to spur Adventists to
know their beliefs. Her suggestion for end-time preparation was simple: “We need, then,
to study…that we may know why we believe the doctrines we advocate.”32 Finally, in
30 Ellen G. White, “The Inestimable Gift,” Review and Herald, Extra edition: “Relative to Foreign
Missions, and the Blair Amendment now Pending in Congress” (December 11, 1888), 4.
31 White, “The Approaching Crisis,” 4.
32 White, “David’s Prayer,” 2.
128
reference to a proposed religious amendment to the Constitution by the National Reform
Association in 1888, she asserted, “We do not think the time specified in prophecy, when
our liberties should be restricted, has fully come.”33 Her certainty suggests her reliance
on the apocalyptic chronology, rather than Adventist activism, to determine the position
of this event in the end-time scenario.
Although Adventists leaders rejected date-setting after the 1844 disappointment,
Uriah Smith’s Daniel and the Revelation (1882) and Ellen White’s The Great
Controversy (1888) provided a clear chronology of how the end would occur.34 These
works taught that the second set date in 1844, mistakenly supposed to mark the Second
Coming, actually marked the beginning of the “investigative judgment” in Heaven, by
which all the dead would be judged before the Second Coming. After this judgment
ended, “probation” for sinners would end, and a newly passed National Sunday law
would signal to the believers that the time of trouble – characterized by persecution of
Sabbath-keepers, and epidemics and natural disasters – would begin.35
Concurrent with these definitive articulations of apocalyptic theology in the
1880s, and Butler’s phase 3 of prophetic apocalyptic, were increased efforts and results in
proselytizing. From the early Millerite beginnings, evangelistic work had been a priority,
usually though itinerant ministers holding tent meetings and distributing tracts.
Adventists continued such evangelistic efforts and formally established the General Tract
Society in 1874.36 The tract society organized lay members in colporteur work, the doorto-door selling of Adventist literature as a method of proselytizing. In addition to tracts,
33 White, “David’s Prayer,” 2.
34 White’s own work that spelled out the apocalyptic scenario, The Great Controversy (1888), merely
borrowed from Smith’s eschatology, as demonstrated by Bull and Lockhart, Seeking a Sanctuary, 63.
35 Bull and Lockhart, Seeking a Sanctuary, 54.
36 Arthur Whitfield Spaulding, Captains of the Host: a History of Seventh-day Adventists, part I
(Washington, DC: Review and Herald, 1949), 411-412.
129
books written by Smith, Ellen White, and others were added to the fare.37 When the
denomination organized in 1863, membership was about 3,500. During the 1870s, the
membership rolls increased threefold, from about 5,000 to about 15,000.38 Foreign
missions officially began in 1874, when the leadership of the church sponsored J. N.
Andrews as a missionary to Switzerland, and in 1884, the General Tract Society was
renamed the International Tract Society. By 1890, the membership had nearly doubled
again and stood at just under 30,000.39
In light of the apocalyptic schedule spelled out by Smith and White in the 1880s,
their respective interpretations of the significance of contemporary political events, and
the increased emphasis and expansion of evangelistic methods during the same time, I
argue that a central Adventist aim in the 1880s and 1890s was to drive home the
importance and imperative of apocalyptic doctrine through political activities and
conversion efforts. Smith’s writings from the 1870s through the 1890s corroborate this
interpretation. Rather than urging Adventists to delay the end by resisting Sunday laws,
Smith’s writings celebrated the popular impact of such resistance. Brandishing “signs”
of the end, he urged Seventh-day Adventists to work harder and to buy more
subscriptions for Adventist books and serials. Sunday law disputes between Adventists
and governmental authorities spread the Adventist message to new audiences. Skirmishes
between Adventists and the government did not hamper but contributed to their
evangelistic work. Moreover, he distinguished carefully between local Sunday laws and
the prophetic national Sunday law that would indicate the close of probation.
This study draws on and seeks to add to the literature on early Adventism by
arguing that historical assertions were central to Adventist leaders’ constructions of an
37 Durand, Yours in the Blessed Hope, 195.
38 Bull and Lockhart, Seeking a Sanctuary, 138.
39 Spaulding, Captains of the Host, 414.
130
apocalyptic identity. Historical claims provided a starting point for assertions about
religious beliefs and political actions. In addition, this dissertation suggests a broader
informing principle for political action than simply “delaying the end.” The strong
evangelistic aims among Adventist leaders during the late nineteenth century, Adventist
beliefs in an end-time chronology, and Ellen G. White’s perspective add weight to
Smith’s interpretations of political skirmishes and conflicts over Sunday laws as
stimulating to the Adventist economy of ideas. What is clear is that whether Smith
believed that the apocalyptic timeline was unalterable, or White believed that Adventists
could exercise control in delaying the end, both agreed that advocacy was essential.
Advocacy showed Adventists what they believed and helped in the cause of evangelism.
I argue that the common factor here was in affirming Adventist identity and proselytizing
efforts through activism.
Smith’s Apocalyptic Writings
Smith’s apocalyptic works United States in the Light of Prophecy (1874) and The
Marvel of Nations (1885) were adaptations of his earlier Thoughts on Daniel and the
Revelation (the section on Revelation was first published separately in 1867, and the
section on Daniel in 1872) and intended for non-Adventist audiences. Rather than
affirming the unique experiences of Adventists in their Millerite heritage, the Great
Disappointment, and subsequent Sanctuary doctrine as Thoughts on Daniel and the
Revelation had done,40 United States in the Light of Prophecy and Marvel of Nations
emphasized broader understandings of religious liberty and fears of Catholicism as a
religious persecuting power. The line of argument in these books took an inductive form
and proceeded step by step to persuade audiences of the truth of Adventist apocalyptic
40 Smith, Thoughts on Daniel and the Revelation, (Battle Creek, Mich., Seventh-Day Adventist Publishing
Association, 1872), 293-223.
131
theology. Smith’s books began with uncritical affirmations of the United States as a
great nation, ordained by providence to offer its citizens liberty. He appealed to
Americanism by asserting that the nation’s greatness was foretold in prophecy and
identified by its two greatest characteristics: republicanism and Protestantism. In
delineating America’s apocalyptic future, he relied on anti-Catholic sentiment to
convince his audience that Catholic influences would transform America into a religious
persecuting power. Catholicism, viewed by many Protestants as anti-American, was
associated with mainstream Protestantism (those who worshipped on Sunday, the
Catholic-ordained day of worship). Furthermore, efforts toward ecumenism indicated the
beginning of the end. Two doctrines that most Catholics and Protestants held in
common, that of Sunday worship and the immortality of the soul, he characterized as
papal in origin.
The United States in the Light of Prophecy and The Marvel of Nations appealed to
a common understanding and tradition of the United States as an object of divine
providence.41 Invoking the terms “progress,” “empire,” and “manifest destiny,” he
described America’s expansion after the Revolution. America’s experience was unique;
the “main features of its history have no parallel since the distinction of nations existed
among men.”
42
The United States’ sudden and inexplicable rise to power and prestige in
the world, its religious freedom, intellectual (scientific) progress, immigration, population
growth, and “principles of justice so pure and undefiled” all heralded its place as a nation
ordained by God.
43
To further support his claim that the United States had a providential
trajectory in history, Smith quoted the words of European historical figures regarding
41 Uriah Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, (Battle Creek, Mich. : Steam Press of the
Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association, 1874), v-vi.
42
43
Ibid., 11.
Ibid.
132
America, such as Thomas Pownal, colonial governor of Massachusetts, Alexis de
Tocqueville, and Adam Smith, stating that “the progress of empire to this land was long
ago expected.”44 Moreover, America’s progress since the Revolution was such that “This
infant of yesterday stands forth to-day a giant, vigorous, active and courageous, and
accepts with dignity its manifest destiny at the head of powers and civilizations.”45 These
appeals to standard American exceptionalism ensured broad agreement with his audience
at the opening of the book.
Having established the providential nature of United States history, Smith then
argued that the nation was prefigured in the prophecies of the book of Revelation.46 He
appealed to the ego of his American reader by querying whether such a great nation
would be omitted from God’s plan. “Does the prophetic pen which has so fully
delineated the rise and progress of all the other great nations of the earth, pass this one
[America] by unnoticed? What are the probabilities in this matter?”47 It is important to
note the interpolative aspect of Smith’s writings. Scholars have noted the “readerliness”
of apocalyptic texts:
…arcane and full of secret allegories at whose original reference we can only
guess, it (apocalyptic texts) has offered all the more opportunity to researchers
who can with impunity discover within its pages the message they themselves put
there out of a sense that so menacing a document, full of hitherto misunderstood
detail, can have application only to the unprecedented world-historical crisis of
their own time.48
44 Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 15.
45 Smith’s Thoughts on Daniel and the Revelation states instead: “And the conviction has fastened itself
upon many minds that the hand of Providence has been conspicuously manifest in the rise and progress of
this nation.” 541
46 The United States in the Light of Prophecy covers the providential rise of the United States on pages 214, before turning to the subject of prophecy; The Marvel of Nations Battle Creek, Mich.: Review and
Herald, 1885) covers America’s strength and progress for 3 chapters before turning to prophecy in chapter
4.
47 Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 14.
48 See Boyer, When Time Shall Be No More, and sources cited there, 42-3.
133
Thus, Smith imposed definite meanings on the vague texts of Revelation that seemed to
have direct application to modern events, and particularly the history of America.
Noting that one “beast,” or great nation, was still unidentified – the two-horned
beast in Revelation – Smith extracted six characteristics that he believed signified
America.49 Following its description of the leopard beast, Revelation describes a twohorned beast by stating, “I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth” (Rev. 13:11).
Smith explained in detail his interpretation of the leopard beast as the Catholic church.
The leopard beast had received a “deadly wound,” (Revelation 13:3), which Smith
interpreted as France’s conquest of Italy and the exile of the Pope in 1798. Thus, the
time of the two-horned beast “coming up,” should be roughly the same time as the time
the previous beast received its deadly wound, or 1798. Smith determined that 1798 was
soon enough after 1789 for the United States to be considered still “coming up.” The
leopard-beast arose from the ocean, which Smith explained as a symbol of peoples: the
papacy rose among the peoples of Europe. However, the two-horned beast arose out of
land, which Smith interpreted as meaning that the kingdom developed in a “previouslyunoccupied territory,” or somewhere in the Western hemisphere. Smith’s interpretive
scheme ignored the existence of Native Americans and dismissed Canada as mere
“frozen fragments of humanity” and central and south American countries as “semibarbarous, revolutionary, and uninfluential.”50 After determining an approximate time
and place for the new kingdom, Smith turned to some of its governmental characteristics.
In the description of the beast as two-horned Smith saw a two-fold power, which
he identified as religious and civil liberty. Smith suggested that in the series of beasts in
Daniel and Revelation, horns symbolize a nation’s uniqueness: strength, power, or
49 Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 31-32.
50 Ibid., 38-9.
134
honor.
51
Smith then quoted the Hon. J. A. Bingham, a well-known contemporary
politician,52 as saying that the purpose of those who came to America “was to found
‘what the world had not seen for ages; viz., - a church without a pope, and a State without
a king.’”
53
Quoting liberally from the Constitution and Bill of Rights, he further sought
to impress American values of freedom onto the minds of his readers. For Smith, the
uniqueness of the United States was found in its civil and religious forms that promoted
freedom.
Here, then, are two great principles standing prominently before the people:
Republicanism and Protestantism. And what can be more just, and innocent, and
lamb-like, than these? And here, also, is the secret of our strength and power . . . .
One of these horns may therefore represent the civil republican
power of the
54
government, and the other, the Protestant ecclesiastical.
Although Smith’s interpretation of America was positive up to this point, Smith finished
this section on a somber note: “But, alas for our country! its acts are to give the lie to its
profession. The lamb-like features are first developed; but the dragon voice is developed
hereafter.”
55
Before Smith addressed the “dragon voice,” he reviewed the points made so far as
to ensure that the reader would be ready for the next step in interpretation. The
symbolism of the two-horned beast required specific characteristics of the nation it
represented: separate from the Old World nations, arising in new territory by the year
51
Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 71.
52 Bingham, a moderate Republican, served as a U.S. Representative from Ohio from 1855 to 1863 and
from 1865 to 1873. During the Civil War, he was an early advocate of emancipation. During
Reconstruction, he was responsible for drafting the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment, which
extended the constitutional protections of due process and privileges and immunities against state
government interference. “John Armor Bingham,” Dictionary of American Biography (New York: C.
Scribner’s Sons, 1943).
53
54
55
Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 72.
Ibid., 77.
Ibid., 78.
135
1798, Protestant, and a republic.
56
Smith associated the “dragon voice” with the ten-
headed dragon-beast, a previous beast in the apocalyptic chronology interpreted by
Adventists and many other Protestants as the secular Roman state. As for its “voice,”
Smith proposed that the “‘speaking’ of any government must be the public promulgation
of its will on the part of its law-making and executive powers.”
57
Since the distinctive
characteristic of the “dragon” in the apocalyptic description was as a persecuting power
of the church, Smith thus proposed that America’s primary function in end-time events
was as a religious persecuting power.58
Smith softened the effect of his designation of the United States’ role in the
apocalypse by pointing to matters of concern for many in later nineteenth century
American society. He noted that, despite America’s glorious past, evil threatened liberty
on several fronts. Some of the nation’s shortcomings were evident in the inequality and
violence facing freed slaves in the South, and in political corruption. Smith also
expressed concern over increasing “Popery” in society, appealing to nativist fears of
religious and ethnic differences among his audience. Then there were other societal
evils: “In addition we have spiritualism, infidelity, socialism, and free-love, the tradeunions, or labor against capital, and communism, all assiduously spreading their principle
among the masses.”
59
Even as his image of America turned dark, Smith had not ventured
too far from American Protestant traditions. His message sounded as a warning to toocomfortable Christians, a classic jeremiad. The evils in society that he enumerated were
matters of concern to most conservative Protestants in the nineteenth century.
56
57
Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 79.
Ibid., 81.
58 The United States in the Light of Prophecy and Marvel of Nations focus only on America as a
persecuting power. In contrast, Smith’s Daniel and the Revelations and White’s The Great Controversy
portray the conflict as global; America leads the way in establishing a national Sunday law, and other
nations follow suit.
59
Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 87.
136
Finally, Smith presented his apocalyptic interpolation of America as a religious
persecuting power. Revelation 13:14-16 states that the two-horned beast “causes men to
make for themselves an image,” which Smith saw as reinforcing his republican
interpretation of the beast – the people in the democracy are responsible for the creation
of this idol. Since the image was of the leopard-beast, one “must first form a definite
idea of what constitutes the papacy itself.”
60
Smith asserted that the defining
characteristic of the papacy was an ecclesiastical system with the power to enforce its
religious doctrines by law. The conclusion was evident: “Let the Protestant churches in
our land be clothed with power to define and punish heresy, to enforce their dogmas
under the pains and penalties of the civil law, and should we not have an exact
representation of the papacy during the days of its supremacy?”
61
Those that refused to
worship the image of the beast would be put to death, pitting divine obedience against
state obedience.
For America to become a religious persecuting power, the various denominations
must be united in some way, to enforce their will through the state. While Smith
acknowledged that Protestant churches in America were far from being united, he noted
widespread agreement among both Catholics and Protestants on doctrines of immortality
of the soul and Sunday worship.62 Neither of these doctrines were endorsed by Seventhday Adventists. Moreover, he proposed that ecumenical efforts were a first step toward a
state religion, citing “recent efforts to unite all the churches in the land into co-operation
on the common points of their faith.”
60
61
Citing the development of an “Independent
Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 103.
Ibid., 104.
62 Ibid.
63
63
Ibid., 110.
137
64
American Catholic Church,” an outgrowth of the Catholic Americanist Controversy, he
suggested that it signaled a movement toward unification between Catholics and
Protestants in America. Any sort of ecumenical effort, in Smith’s configuration, was a
sign of the end and a precursor to religious persecution in America.
Smith presented the Saturday Sabbath as central to this end-time conflict between
false religious powers and true believers by identifying Sunday worship as the “mark of
the beast.” The final actions of the two-horned beast were to enforce the death penalty on
those that do not worship its image, and prevent those with the “mark of the beast” from
buying or selling. Smith interpreted the mark as a sign of ownership. Looking back at
the description of the ten-headed beast in Daniel, another beast thought to represent the
papacy, he noted that the beast would “think to change times and laws” (Daniel 7:25). It
followed that the mark of the beast represents changes that the Pope, or the Catholic
Church, had made to God’s law. One had only to compare the Biblical Ten
Commandments to Catholic catechetical formulations which clearly departed from them.
Current catechisms specifically violated the Decalogue’s prohibition of graven images
and its depiction of Sunday as the Sabbath. One catechism explained that, “During the
old law, Saturday was the day sanctified; but the church, instructed by Jesus Christ, and
directed by the Spirit of God, has substituted Sunday for Saturday; so now we sanctify
the first, not the seventh. Sunday means, and now is, the day of the Lord.”
65
Another
endorsed the Church’s authority to change the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday.
Ques. Have you any other way of proving that the church has power to institute
festivals of precept?
Ans. Had she not such power she could not have done that in which all modern
religionists agree with her - she could not have substituted the observance of
64
Smith cited the Church Advocate, March 1870 as the source for this info. The magazine was published by
the General Eldership of the Churches of God, a Baptist and evangelical offshoot of the German Reformed
Church. The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 111.
65
Ibid., 123.
138
Sunday, the first day of the week, for the observance
of Saturday, the seventh day,
66
a change for which there is no scriptural authority.
Thus, for Smith, worship on Sunday represented loyalty to false religious powers. The
papacy had abrogated divine authority by changing the Biblical Saturday Sabbath to
Sunday. Protestant churches that embraced traditional Sunday worship tacitly
acknowledged papal authority.
Smith’s use of Catholic sources capitalized on Protestant fears of Catholicism by
pointing out a discrepancy in the Protestant anti-Catholic stance. Protestants in America
viewed themselves as different from Catholics primarily because of the issue of the
authority of the church. Smith’s strategy was to frighten Protestants, who denied the
Pope’s authority as non-scriptural and “foreign,” by suggesting that observation of the
Sunday Sabbath acknowledged the Pope’s absolute authority over scripture.
Smith elucidated a link between the Saturday Sabbath and the Biblical account of
creation in an effort to appeal to the concerns of many mainstream Protestants about
evolutionary theories. Noting that the fourth commandment is the only one that “makes
67
known who the Lawgiver is and contains his signature of loyalty,” he reinforced the
importance of the correct Sabbath day. The phrase “Signature of loyalty” references
Ezekiel 20:12 which states, “Also I gave them my Sabbaths as a sign between us, so that
they would know that I the LORD made them holy.” That commandment states: “For in
six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the
seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and hallowed it” (Exodus
20:11). Smith further noted that the Saturday sabbath was a “memorial” of creation and a
68
“barrier against atheism;” notions that would ring soundly in the ears of Protestants who
feared implications of recent geological theories of the earth’s age and chronology.
66
67
68
Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 124-125.
Ibid., 128.
Ibid.
139
Many American Christians in the late-nineteenth century were concerned by how these
ideas might affect the Christian cosmology in Genesis, and Biblical historicity in general.
Smith concluded each of his apocalyptic works by suggesting that a necessary
precursor to religious persecution in America would be the unification of Christians Catholics and Protestants - on some points, even if they retained their individual creeds.
He listed a series of reports by ministers promoting an evangelical alliance, and of reports
of Sunday-keeping laws in certain places. He also associated the then-popular beliefs in
spiritualism with belief in the immortality of the soul. Thus, spiritualists could not be
communing with the dead, but rather with devils.69 He closed with an appeal to the final
image from the apocalyptic symbol that signified Seventh-Day Adventist identity: the
third angel. “If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his
forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God . . . . Here
is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the
faith of Jesus” (Revelation 14:9-11). This final image indicated the beleaguered and
commandment-keeping status of the elect, and a warning of the mark of the beast. The
third angel’s message became the sign by which Adventists identified themselves, their
theology, and their converting and proselytizing message to the world.70 Smith
highlighted the gravity of the Sunday issue and its cosmic scale by weighing the death
penalty, the ultimate punishment by the state, against “divine wrath.”
71
As evidence of the unification of Protestants and Catholics, Smith an 1889
meeting of the Church Union Society in which Philip Schaff, whom he identified as “the
ecclesiastical historian,” spoke. Smith summarized his speech as predicting that a
69 With the exception of Universalists and Unitarians, clergy from most denominations warned against the
evils of spiritualism, see R. Lawrence Moore, “Spiritualism,” in Edwin S. Gaustad, ed., The Rise of
Adventism (New York: Harper and Row, 1974), 93-96.
70 Malcom and Bull, Seeking a Sanctuary, 44-45, 53-54.
71
Smith, The United States in the Light of Prophecy, 114.
140
Christian Union would occur within the next generation, and that he thought the Catholic
Church “magnificent,” and that he neither believed that the Pope was the antichrist nor
that Roman Catholics were idolaters. According to Smith, “Such sentiments from such a
source are simply unaccountable, or would be, did not prophecy affirm that apostate
Protestantism will turn around and pay deference to the beast, and make an image to it.”72
He suggested that every Protestant “knows the unchanging policy and principles by
which it [the Catholic church] is governed, knows the terrible oaths by which its evilscheming hierarchy are bound, and knows how quickly it would quench every ray of
Bible light, and strangle every impulse of religious liberty in our land, if it had the power;
- that such an one should call the Romish Church a ‘magnificent church,’ and profess
great ‘respect’ for it, is nothing less than most surprising.”73 Smith reminded his readers
though that such a union must occur for the “image to the beast” to be formed, Protestant
acceptance of Catholicism could only be explained through prophecy. In this and other
editorials, Smith monitored any hint of confederation among denominations in the United
States as fulfillment of prophecy and a necessary condition for the end to occur.74
By affirming the providential origin of the United States, and its commitment to
civil and religious freedom, Smith identified Adventists with core American values. In
his view of the future, the United States would betray its own source of value and
strength by becoming a religious persecuting power. Thus, although the apocalyptic
scheme projected a negative view of America’s future, the conceptualization was not
anti-American but opposed to the arbitrary power of religion over the state: a distinctly
72 Uriah Smith, “The Preliminary Steps,” Review and Herald, 66:42 (October 22, 1889), 664
73 Ibid.
74 See also, for example, Uriah Smith, “The Coming Ecclesiastical Union,” Review and Herald 63:11
(March 16, 1886), 168; “The Spirit of Romanism,” Review and Herald, 63:12, (Mar. 23, 1886), 182; “A
New Name for the Image: Christian Syndicate” Review and Herald 66:48 (Dec. 3, 1889), 760; “The Drift
of Protestantism,” Review and Herald 67:2 (January 14, 1890), 24.
141
American value. Moreover, Smith emphasized factors in the downfall of America that
many conservative Protestants were concerned about in the late-nineteenth century,
including Catholicism, Biblical criticism, spiritualism, Darwinism, atheism, and
ecumenism. Finally, the apocalyptic plan affirmed the unique experience and identity of
Adventists by making the seventh-day Sabbath central to religious persecution.
Adventists and Politics
The earliest report on a local Sunday law Smith published in the Review and
Herald was in 1862,75 and he continued to include such reports through the 1880s. Some
of the articles simply quoted Christian magazines in support of Sunday laws, and some
reported on legal developments.76 One reason for his increased interest in Sunday laws
was the expansion of Adventism into new regions of the United States and encounters
there with new state sabbatarian laws. While Adventism began as a small movement in
New England, evangelistic efforts spurred its expansion to other regions of the United
States. In the 1870s, membership nearly tripled, with new congregations in Southern,
Midwestern, and Western states. In 1882, an Adventist editor was arrested in California
for opening the Adventist press office on Sunday. In 1884, some Adventist church
members were arrested in Arkansas and Tennessee for working on Sunday. In 1893, the
Illinois legislature introduced a bill to close the Chicago World’s Fair on Sunday.
While Adventist leaders had from the 1850s eschewed politics as an unwise
alliance with earthly powers, debates over Sunday laws in the 1880s elicited Adventist
political responses. Butler explains this shift as follows: before the 1880s, Adventists
viewed their primary responsibility as spreading the word about their distinctive beliefs
75 Editorial, Review and Herald, 19:15, (March 11, 1862), 116.
76 Uriah Smith, “The Sunday Question Again,” Review and Herald, 53:10, (March 6 1879), 79; “The
Sabbath Conflict, “Review and Herald, 53:20, (May 15, 1879), 160
142
and gaining converts.77 He argues that Ellen G. White’s changed understanding of
political prophetic in the 1880s made Adventists politically responsible for delaying the
time of trouble through political lobbying for freedoms. The evidence for increased
Adventist political activity beginning in the 1880s is abundant. Adventist leaders
established the first magazine devoted to religious liberty issues in 1884, entitled the
Sabbath Sentinel, which was renamed American Sentinel in 1886, and Liberty in 1906;
Liberty was established for the express purpose of heightening consciousness of the
Sunday issue among legislators. In addition, the church sponsored organizations such as
the National Religious Liberty Association (1889) and the International Religious Liberty
Association (1893) to promote freedom of religion.78 In 1888 and 1889, Adventists
lobbied to defeat Senator H. W. Blair’s Sunday Rest bill. And, in 1892 their participation
in the debate over the Sunday closing of the Chicago World Exposition included petitions
to both Houses, the reading of papers before congressional committees, and the
presentation of legal briefs in court.79 These activities support Butler’s assertion that
Seventh-day Adventists warrant scholarly interest because of their unique status as
“catastrophic” millennialists who, rather than waiting for a calamitous end, actively
sought to prevent it. Moreover, being a fundamentalist group that advocated separation
of church and state further distinguishes them from fundamentalists who actively tried to
promote their religion in the public sphere in the twentieth century.
While it is clear that political activity increased among Adventists beginning in
the 1880s, I argue that an important component of this shift was the desire to raise the
national profile of Adventism. Smith’s writings during this time period demonstrate that
77 See Lawson, “Church and State at Home and Abroad,” 286; Butler, “Adventism and the American
Experience,” 196-8; Morgan, Adventism and the American Republic, 241-242.
78 Bull and Lockhart, Seeking a Sanctuary, 183.
79 Lawson, “Church and State at Home and Abroad,” 286; Butler, “Adventism and the American
Experience,” 196-8; Morgan, Adventism and the American Republic, 241-2
143
he saw Sunday law debates as confirming the Adventist scheme of the end. These
debates raised the national profile of Adventists, offering them the opportunity to present
their views to a broader audience, and to increase subscriptions for the Review and
Herald. It validated Adventist apocalyptic views to its adherents and encouraged
evangelistic efforts. Like Ellen White, Smith did not believe that the 1880s Sunday laws
indicated the “close of probation,” a time in which each person’s salvation was already
decided and one that immediately preceded the “time of trouble” and the second coming
of Christ. Instead, they were precursors that validated their apocalyptic scenario and
demonstrated the need for increased evangelistic efforts. Smith’s interpretation is further
clarified by his overall assessment of First Amendment rights. He seems unconcerned
about church establishment in general unless it restricted Seventh-day Adventists from
their free exercise of religion.
In 1882, a series of events took place which Adventists referred to as the
California Dilemma – a term Smith characterized as “the mildest that can be applied.”80
The Republican-dominated congress in California passed a new penal law targeting work
on Sunday. Between March and June of that year, over 1600 people were arrested for
violating the statute, including Adventists, Jews, and Chinese. Had the law simply
targeted saloons and businesses rather than differing religious groups, few may have
protested.81 One of those arrested was W. C. White, son of Ellen and James White and
the editor of the Adventist Signs of the Times magazine, for violating the law in Oakland
by opening the Pacific Press publishing office on a Sunday. In response to a comment in
a newspaper that Adventists supported enforcing a Saturday Sabbath, Smith called it “the
wildest thrust of all,” asserting that Adventists repudiated “the idea of enforcing the
80 Uriah Smith, “The California Dilemma,” Review and Herald, (March 21, 1882), 184.
81 Sandra Sizer Frankiel, California’s Spiritual Frontiers: Religious Alternatives to Anglo-Protestantism,
1850-1910 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), 53.
144
Sabbath on anybody.”82 He set to work publishing 2,500 tracts and a special edition of
the Signs of the Times to clarify the Adventist position on the Sunday law. He also
traveled from Michigan to California to take over White’s responsibilities until the matter
was resolved. Continuing to write editorials for the Review and Herald in the meantime,
he engaged in a public relations campaign to inform Californians about Adventist views
on the Saturday Sabbath.83
Smith found certain elements of the Sunday debate in California encouraging,
and stressed them as most significant. The debate indicated, on a smaller scale, the
coming of a national Sunday law that in Adventist eschatology immediately preceded the
apocalypse and second coming of Christ. It also provided a new platform from which
Adventists could speak about their religious beliefs. According to Smith, “The
excitement on the Sunday question is not only giving us an opportunity to get our views
before the people, but is awakening a new interest among our people themselves in the
cause in which we are engaged. Confirmations of the sure word of prophecy are grand
incentives to zeal and activity.”84 Moreover, the controversy might generate good
business for the Review and Herald. Smith took the occasion to exhort his readers to
subscribe to his magazine now to help their cause.85 When the issue ended favorably for
Adventists with the law’s repeal, Smith defensively argued in the Review that the repeal
of the Sunday law did not negate the Adventist prophetic interpretation of the end. 86
82 Smith, “The California Dilemma,” 184.
83 Durand, Yours in the Blessed Hope, 179.
84 “Editorial Correspondence: the CA camp-meeting,” Review and Herald, 59:41, (Oct. 17 1882), 648
85 “Editorial Correspondence: Good for the East,” Review and Herald , 59:38, (Sept. 19 1882), 600,
86 “Election results in CA: The Result Reached,” Review and Herald, 59:46, 728
145
Smith’s aims in the California dilemma were centered on Adventist freedom of
religion, rather than separation of church and state in general. He asserted that Adventists
only sought an exemption to the Sunday law, not its repeal. “Had the Republicans done
this, as they were requested to do, it would have prevented the effort made on behalf of
our rights under the principles of American freedom, in the publication of the Special
Edition of the Signs.”87 Although he saw the California Sunday law as an infringement
on First Amendment rights, he cared little for the rights of those who might choose not to
observe any day of rest. According to Smith’s assessment of the issue “In these
movements as merely political questions and issues we have no interest whatever. Only
as in connection therewith questions affecting our religious rights are brought into the
arena, in fulfillment of prophecy, have we given, or do we or shall we give, any attention
to them.”88 By emphasizing his interest only in Adventists’ religious rights, and only
those in connection with the Adventist apocalyptic scenario, Smith presented a restricted
interest in first amendment issues.
Smith advocated separation of church and state in the abstract, just not in specific
instances. In 1885, in the context of the National Reform Association’s lobbying, Smith
published a reader’s letter inquiring whether he would endorse a national Christian
amendment if Adventists were the majority in the United States. Smith responded firmly:
If the observers of the true Sabbath were in the majority, we would oppose all
attempts on the part of the government to force the minority by civil enactments
to keep that Sabbath, just as we would oppose all civil laws enjoining upon man
that he shall not covet, or that he shall love God with all his heart. Into that field,
of which God and a person’s conscience can by the only occupants, human laws
may not intrude.89
87 “Election results in CA: The Result Reached,” 728.
88 Ibid.
89 Uriah Smith, “Let Us Understand Each Other,” Review and Herald, 63:3, (January 20, 1885), 40.
146
Although Smith argued for absolute separation of church and state in the abstract, in
specific instances, such as the California dilemma, he demonstrated that he cared only
that Adventists were free to worship and spread their message as they pleased.
In 1886, Smith reported that the supreme courts of Arkansas and Tennessee had
upheld lower court decisions that Adventists arrested in those states for working on
Sunday were guilty. Smith identified Adventists not as general rights-bearing citizens,
but as those truly obeying God: “Such is the price Christians are beginning to have to pay
in this land of boasted liberty, for the privilege of being true to their own consciences and
obeying the just and holy law of God.”90 Smith phrased his defense of Adventist rights in
religious, rather than secular, terms. Smith was only interested in issues of church and
state in so far as they impacted Adventists. Moreover, his appeals targeted Christian
audiences, rather than proponents of secular liberties.
Smith’s position on church and state in the abstract is also clarified by his position
on Mormonism. The subject of Mormon polygamy posed a problem for Adventists, as
arguments against Mormonism were frequently associated with Protestant claims that
America was a Christian nation. Smith asserted that polygamy was “not a religion but a
crime. It outrages personal and social rights which human governments are ordained of
God to protect.”91 It bore no comparison with Sabbath observance, for “observance of
the seventh day infringes upon no man’s rights; his legitimate labor on the first day,
cheerfully restrained from going beyond bounds which would disturb any other person’s
rest or worship, presents no just grounds of complaint from any one; no immorality is
involved in it; for it is in strict conformity to God’s revealed law.”92 Smith’s assertion
that Saturday observance did not impinge upon other’s rights was a rights-based
90 Uriah Smith, “The Sunday Prosecutions,” Review and Herald, 63:25, (June 22, 1886), 392.
91 Uriah Smith, “Human Laws vs. Divine,” Review and Herald, 63:9, (Mar. 2, 1886), 136.
92 Ibid.
147
argument; suggesting that Saturday observance was a Christian duty reached into the
ambiguous realm of Christian interpretation. The latter argument glossed over differences
between religious practices of Mormons and Adventists, both of whom sought religious
freedom, by assuming that Adventist observance of Saturday was objectively in
conformance with the Bible and polygamy was not.
In 1893, the Illinois legislature introduced a bill to close the Chicago World’s Fair
on Sunday. Smith responded that Adventists had “long looked forward to oppressive
religious legislation in this country.”93 In August of 1893, Ellen White wrote to Smith
regarding the Fair, enthused that resisting the law would create opportunities for
Adventists to present the “truth” about the Sabbath to broader audiences (something that
must happen for the end to occur): “I can see in the Chicago exhibition the great act that
is to bring the Sabbath of the fourth commandment before all nations, tongues and
people. The day of God’s preparation is near[,] very near.”94 Smith also viewed the
Sunday closing of the Fair as providing a unique opportunity for Adventists: it would
allow them to highlight their position on Sunday laws while not actually impinging on
their religious rights. He cared little if Adventists could not attend the Fair on Sunday,
but embraced the symbolic import of the law.95 Echoing his previous claims regarding
state Sunday laws, Smith exhorted his readers to carry on the work of proselytizing.
According to Smith, the Illinois bill “proclaims to us that now is our opportunity. We
have a basis on which to work such as never before, and our complete freedom as yet to
carry forward our message.”96 The issue of closing the Fair on Sunday, for Smith,
provided a logical opportunity to redouble efforts in stirring up public interest in Sunday
93 Uriah Smith, “Our Opportunity,” Review and Herald, 70:1, (Jan. 3., 1893), 8.
94 Personal correspondence, Ellen G. White to Uriah and Harriet Smith, August 10, 1893.
95 Uriah Smith, “Our Opportunity,” Review and Herald, 70:1, (Jan. 3., 1893), 8
96 Ibid., 8.
148
versus Saturday observance. The Review and Herald included updates and information
on the Fair debate over the next several months. Ultimately, the US Congress held a
hearing to decide whether or not the Fair should be closed, at which Samuel Gompers,
representing working classes, and the Adventist editor of the American Sentinel A. T.
Jones testified. Unions opposed the Sunday closing on the grounds that it prevented
workers from attending on their only day off during the week, and the Adventist
representative objected on grounds of separation of church and state. Ultimately, the
measure was repealed, and although it was reported in the Review and Herald, Smith did
not elaborate on its significance. Smith’s silence on the issue echoes his defensiveness at
the close of the California Dilemma; favorable resolutions removed opportunities that
crisis points presented regarding Sunday legislation.
In the next section, I analyze Smith’s rhetoric regarding Sunday laws from 1881
to 1890. These arguments were in response to the California Dilemma of 1882, lobbying
by the National Reform Association during the 1880s, and to the proposed Constitutional
Christian amendment in 1890. Of particular interest to Smith was following the activities
of the National Reform Association (NRA). An interdenominational group formed in
1863, the NRA lobbied for a Constitutional amendment that acknowledged and honored
God. The NRA saw its first signs of success in 1888, when Senator Blair of New
Hampshire first introduced a bill for a constitutional amendment that included a national
Sunday rest law. The bill was defeated but introduced again in 1890. Smith wished to
demonstrate that the arguments of Sunday law reformers were thinly veiled attempts to
promote (apostate) Protestantism in America in fulfillment of prophecy. His arguments
about the Sunday laws attempted to “unmask” the real motive behind them, which he saw
as blatant state imposition of a religious practice.
During the California Dilemma in 1882 Smith responded to claims that the law
was in the best interest of the working man, and only sought to prevent overwork.
According to Smith, White had not violated the spirit of the human law and was actually
149
upholding God’s law in this regard, rendering the law unjust.97 White was not a working
class man who needed protection by the state against overwork. He rested, as he saw fit,
on the Saturday Sabbath. Smith asserted that, rather than being protective of working
classes, Sunday laws were a bogus authority to support Sunday worship, invented to
replace the Bible’s authority: “And this is only history repeating itself; for it has ever
been that when divine sanction to sustain the inventions of men has been found wanting,
appeal to the civil arm is the next resort.”98 This argument suggested that when religious
authority, which for Smith meant the Bible, was lacking, religious powers must use the
power of the state to uphold their authority.
Smith sought to undermine rational arguments for a Sunday rest law by stressing
the emotional connection that members of the Republican Party appeared to have with
the Sunday plank during the California Dilemma. His characterization of the California
Republican Convention, which he attended, warned that a kind of madness had overtaken
its constituents on the Sunday question. The Sunday law plank was only one of 18, yet
was the only plank to elicit any response. According to Smith,
Clapping of hands, stamping of feet, vociferous shouting, throwing up of hats,
hugging one another in the delirium of excitement, transformed the hall of
Representatives of the Capitol, with its four hundred and fifty delegates, for the
time being thrown into the wildest pandemonium. Nor were they content with
one outburst of this kind continuing many minutes; but when the chairman of the
committee undertook to read the next proposition, they broke forth afresh,
effectually drowning all attempts at the introduction of further business. At
length three cheers were proposed for the Sunday plank, which were given with a
will and a roar.99
For Smith, this emotional response proved that solid reasoning would fail to have an
effect on the Sunday debate. He likened this enthusiasm to drunkenness (surely an
97 Uriah Smith, “Editorial Correspondence” Review and Herald, 59:36, (September 5, 1882), 568.
98 Smith, “The California Dilemma,” 184. See also “The Last Resort” Review and Herald , 59:38, (Sept.
19 1882), 600.
99 Uriah Smith, “Editorial Correspondence: The Sunday Plank of the California Republican State
Convention,” Review and Herald , 59:37, (Sept. 12 1882), 584
150
unwelcome comparison considering the Party’s many pro-temperance advocates), and
suggested that a national Sunday law would ultimately be passed on such a tide of
irrational fervor.
In 1881, Smith commented on a letter to the Philadelphia Gazette by leaders of
the National Reform Association (NRA) opposing an exemption bill in Pennsylvania for
Saturday worshipers. The NRA was formed in 1863 for the express purpose of gaining a
constitutional amendment acknowledging Christianity in the United States. Smith
wished to demonstrate that its real aim was to enforce Sunday laws. He saw, in its
opposition to an exception clause in Pennsylvania, the exposure of its genuine goals:
“Nothing could more clearly show the spirit of the Constitutional-Amendment
movement, and the determination of these men to maintain the [Pennsylvania] Sunday
law, however much it may violate the spirit of the Constitution of the United States, and
whatever hardships it may impose upon dissenters.”100 Moreover, the Gazette
commented that it hardly seemed practical to acknowledge two Sabbaths. In response to
a pragmatic appeal for rest on Sunday, Smith asserted
We care nothing for the spirit of intolerance, nor the probable practical results
involved in this movement; but we do object to the hypocritical pretension that
this movement is born of lamb-like innocence, and is not intended to abridge the
liberty or interfere with the conscientious scruples of any class of people. We
have been forewarned in prophecy of the nature and results of this movement, and
it might as well throw off its lamb-like clothing, and appear in its true colors.101
His lack of objection to religiously intolerant laws suggested his resignation to and even
anticipation of religious persecution. Rather, he objected to the “hypocrisy” of Sunday
law reformers’ assertions that their aims were only practical in defining the Sabbath as
Sunday.
100 Uriah Smith, “The Voice of Oppression,” Review and Herald, 57:12, (March 22, 1881), 184.
101 Ibid., 184.
151
Smith’s The Marvel of Nations (1885) was published with a current events section
informing Seventh-day Adventist readers of events regarding church and state, urging
that they signaled the imminent end. Among such events activities of the NRA loomed
large. Although protecting Sunday laws was only one aspect its objectives, Smith felt
that the proposed Christian Amendment masked the real objective: a national Sunday law
in fulfillment of prophecy. Smith quoted a lengthy section of an editorial in which the
author characterized “Sabbath-breaking” as a “national sin.” The author further
suggested that those who would break the Sabbath would not hesitate to break laws
against men if they had the chance. Commenting on this article in his book The Marvel
of Nations, Smith wrote,
Let the full import of these words be carefully considered. The writer by some
unaccountable impulse betrayed into a revelation of the real policy and aim of this
movement. He holds up to the public view those Congressmen who traveled on
Sunday, as men who would rob and steal if they saw an opportunity to do so
without danger of detection! Not one of them, he says, is fit to hold any office in
the government. He would make this religious test a qualification for office,
contrary to the Constitution. Every corporation that infringes upon Sunday should
be immediately destroyed by a forfeiture of its charter. And what then of the
individual, in this respect, who does not observe, the Sunday?102
The “real policy” Smith identified in the article was that of promoting cooperation
between church and state. For Smith’s purposes, it was necessary to uncover the “real”
aims of the NRA to demonstrate the fulfillment of prophecy in this movement. Whether
or not God was in the Constitution mattered little to Smith, who characterized the
movement as merely “a banner under which to sail,” while the real motive was to enforce
Sunday observance.103 Yet, Smith appealed to Constitutional prohibition against
religious tests, and the impact on the liberty of businesses and individuals who had
differing beliefs, to demonstrate the far-reaching and “anti-American” consequences of
such a national policy.
102 Smith, Marvel of Nations, 211.
103 Syme, A History of SDA Church-State Relations, 22.
152
In 1888 and 1890 a Constitutional amendment acknowledging God, including a
Sunday rest clause, was introduced in Congress by Senator Blair of New Hampshire with
the backing of the National Reform Association. Smith responded to appeals to protect
the “American Sabbath,” as distinct from the “continental Sabbath,” by vehemently
denying that America had the authority to institute a day of rest for God. “So America
has a ‘sacred rest-day,’ has it? …please tell us when American ‘rested,’ so as to be said
to have a ‘rest-day.’”104 In contrast, Smith asserted that the alleged authority and
tradition for Sunday as a day of rest came from the Catholic Church, and no amount of
patriotic rhetoric could change that fact. Unless America had “usurped the prerogative so
presumptuously claimed by the Catholic Church, that is, to assume to command, under
sin, the observance of holy days,” then such assertions were pure “folly.”105
Smith countered arguments which appealed to tradition as a reason to support
Sunday laws by asserting that reliance on the role of tradition in faith was a Catholic
innovation which Protestants had sought to expunge during the Reformation.
It is perhaps appropriate enough that Catholic arguments should be used in behalf
of a Catholic institution. What a humiliating position for a Protestant who has
inscribed upon his banner, ‘The Bible and the Bible alone as the rule of faith and
practice,’ to be engaged in defending a practice for which he is obliged to confess
that no scrap of authority has come down to us from either Christ or his apostles
in the form of legal enactment or apostolic injunction?106
Given the anti-Catholic sentiment among American Protestants during the nineteenth
century, lumping all Sunday-keeping Protestants with Catholics was a shocking charge.
Moreover, Smith’s claim that acceptance of the Sunday rest was not based on the Bible
struck at one of the root claims of Protestantism’s articulation of authority.
104 Uriah Smith, “Strange Fire,” Review and Herald, 67:42 (Oct. 28, 1890), 664.
105 Ibid.
106 Uriah Smith, “The Close of the Volume,” Review and Herald, 67:50 (Dec. 23, 1890), 792.
153
Smith responded to arguments that the Decalogue’s command to rest on the
seventh day was part of Jewish ceremonial law, like required temple sacrifices, and were
no longer binding on Christians. He claimed that it was just as logical to say that the
injunction against worship of images was “ceremonial” and no longer binding as well.107
This assertion again equated Protestants and Catholics by comparing worship and rest on
Sunday to the use of images in worship, a Catholic practice frequently condemned by
Protestants as idolatry.108 He also addressed the presumption of Protestants that the
Seventh-day Sabbath was part of Judaic law, and thus a “thing of the past.”109 If it were
Judaism that Seventh-day Adventists was promoting by asserting the Saturday Sabbath,
then indeed Judaism was part of the present. The argument implied the continued
presence of Judaism in the United States, yet Smith was careful to distinguish Adventist
beliefs from Judaism by further reiterating that Sunday was a creation of the Catholic
Church, and thus the Saturday Sabbath was Protestant as well as Jewish.110
Smith similarly dismissed arguments for Sunday laws based on appeals which
characterized the day as a “civil Sabbath,” or those which asserted the needs of the
working classes for a day of rest. While acknowledging that some asserted the need for a
day of rest on Sunday as purely a civil or secular holiday, he suggested that their real
intentions were too frequently exposed by others promoting a religious day of rest.
According to Smith, “It would be far better for our friends to frankly acknowledge the
real status of the question, than to try to carry through their enterprise under a false
issue.”111 Avoiding the appearance of being opposed to working men’s rights, he
107 Uriah Smith, “Another Attempt,” Review and Herald, 67:42 (Oct. 28, 1890), 664.
108 Uriah Smith, “The close of the Volume,” Review and Herald 67:50 (Dec. 23, 1890), 792.
109 Uriah Smith, “Another Attempt,” Review and Herald 67:42 (Oct. 28, 1890), 664.
110 Ibid.
111 Uriah Smith, “The Truth of It,” Review and Herald, 67:37 (Sept. 23, 1890). 584.
154
asserted that they had the right to a day of rest; yet being compelled to rest on a particular
day was an infringement, not enforcement of their rights. For Smith, Sunday was a de
facto religious institution, and therefore claims to its secular authority had no standing.
In what seems an unequivocal statement for total separation of church and state, he
declared “any government goes beyond its legitimate province when it legislates in
regard to institutions or questions which are of a purely religious nature.”112
Smith’s articulation of Adventist apocalyptic doctrine and advocacy positioned
Adventists within a comprehensive world view, past, present, and future, in which they
were the true Americans. He stressed the unique history of the US in providentially
creating a “state without a king, and religion without a Pope.” Yet these fine promises
only served as a precursor to America’s reneging on its promises of liberty and leading
the world in the persecution of Seventh-day Adventists everywhere. Although Smith
boldly declared a doctrine of strict separation of church and state, his interest in debates
over church and state was limited to Adventist conflicts over Sunday observance laws,
using public debates over the Sunday question to motivate buyers of his books and
magazines and to urge the spread of the Adventist message. Associating Protestants with
Catholics, he suggested that an alliance between the two and with the American
government was imminent and signaled the end. In this way, Adventists emerged as true
Protestants and true Americans. This configuration of religious and national identity
affirmed a distinctive Adventist identity and promoted Adventist evangelistic growth.
112 Uriah Smith, “Sunday and the Workingmen,” Review and Herald, 65:50 (December 18, 1888), 792.
155
CHAPTER IV
“A BETTER AND MORE PATRIOTIC CITIZENSHIP”: SIMON WOLF AND
REFORMED JUDAISM IN AMERICA
While the Jewish population in America was only about 4,000 in 1825,
immigration increased those numbers dramatically over the next 100 years. By 1880
American Jews numbered 250,000, and between 1880 and 1920, more than 2.1 million
Jews immigrated to America.1 In response, anti-Semitism increased and intensified
during the Gilded Age. Jewish author and activist Simon Wolf fought against that trend,
arguing that “our religion, instead of being a hindrance, is an aid and stimulus leading to
a better and more patriotic citizenship.”2 Wolf’s historical works identified Jews as true
American patriots and citizens, utilizing a traditional definition of citizenship – military
service – to defend Jews from accusations of being anti-American. Moreover, in the
words of one scholar, Wolf was “the semi-official Jewish lobbyist in Washington at the
turn of the century.”3 Taking on political issues as varied as Indian policy, Sunday laws,
religion in public schools, and immigration, he argued vehemently for the equal rights of
Jews based on religious freedom. Wolf insisted on a religious, rather than racial,
definition of Jewishness. Yet an emphasis on Jewish culture, broader than religious
beliefs and rituals, lay shallowly beneath the surface of his rhetoric. Nineteenth century
understandings of culture and race made it difficult for Wolf to embrace the one without
the other, and to craft a consistent and persuasive message of Jewish religious
exceptionalism.
1 Benny Kraut, “Jewish Survival in Protestant America,” in Jonathan D. Sarna, ed., Minority Faiths and the
American Protestant Mainstream, (Urbana and Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1998), 19.
2 Simon Wolf, Selected Addresses and Papers of Simon Wolf, (Cincinnati, Union of American Hebrew
Congregations, 1926), 258.
3 Arthur Hertzberg, The Jews in America: Four Centuries of an Uneasy Encounter: A History, (New York:
Simon and Schuster, 1989), 178.
156
Wolf’s position reflected the standard Reformed stance that Jewishness was a
religion and not a race. Emphasizing the role of education to preserve Jewish cultural
features, he sought to inspire Jews to live up their heritage through stories from the past.
His emphasis on transmitting cultural values through education indicates that he viewed
cultural characteristics as acquired rather than inherited (or “racial”) tendencies.
However, while he claimed that Jewish cultural characteristics were rooted in Judaism,
religious education – surprisingly, perhaps – was not the focus of his energies. Rather, in
his writings and speeches he sought to promote increased awareness of Jews from the
past who had influenced western culture, particularly American culture and history.
Moreover, he explicitly attributed his tireless efforts on behalf of B’nai B’rith to
counteracting prejudice through inspiring and educating Jews regarding their rights and
duties as American citizens.4
Born in Bavaria in 1836, Wolf immigrated with his grandparents to the United
States at the age of 12. While working as a merchant in Ulrichsville, Ohio, he
campaigned for the Democratic Party in the 1850s. He switched his allegiance to the
Republican Party over the issue of slavery and remained an ardent Republican for the rest
of his life. After studying law and being admitted to the bar in 1861, he practiced law for
a year in Ohio. However, when his practice floundered due to the chaos of the Civil War,
he moved to Washington, DC in hopes of getting a government job. After being denied a
job as a clerk in the War Department, he began a private law practice in Washington, DC.
He obtained an appointment from Grant’s administration as recorder of deeds for
Washington, DC, which he retained from 1869-1877. After Hayes was elected, he served
as a magistrate for the District for three years, then as a US diplomat to Egypt for a year.
4 According to a report of a speech given by Wolf, “B’nai B’rith, Jewish Chautauqua Society,” The
Menorah, 22 (January 1897-June 1897), 37.
157
In 1881, he resigned and returned to Washington, where he resumed his private legal
practice.5
Wolf rose to prominence as a leader in the American Jewish community through
two organizations. The first was the fraternal organization B’nai B’rith.6 In addition to
gaining much of his authority to speak for American Jews through B’nai B’rith, and later
its subsidiary organization the Anti-Defamation League (formed in 1913), it provided
financial support for his lobbying activities. Wolf became acquainted with several people
who belonged to the lodge while he lived in Ohio, including Benjamin Peixotto, who
formed the first lodge in Cleveland in 1860 and served as the national president of the
organization 1863-4. As soon as Wolf began to practice law in Washington in 1862, he
took on cases of southern Jews tried for treason, and wrote letters to newspapers who
labeled traffickers as “Hebrews” or “Israelites.” He objected to such characterizations as
religious discrimination. These activities attracted the attention of B’nai B’rith, which
offered Wolf its support, granted him “unanimous admission” in 1868, and made him the
Washington, D.C. lodge president in 1869.7 Wolf was charged with “traitorous”
activities himself because of his connections with B’nai B’rith and legal defense of
southern Jews, though the charges were dropped.8 Wolf chaired the national convention
of B’nai B’rith in 1874 and served as president of the national organization (1904-5).
5 Esther L. Panitz, Simon Wolf: Private Conscience and Public Image, (Rutherford: Fairleigh Dickenson
University Press, 1987), 22-29. For reasons unknown, the US State Department wished to recall Wolf from
his position in Egypt, but offered him the option of resigning instead, which he took. Panitz, Simon Wolf,
78
6 The Independent Order of B’nai B’rith was a social and mutual aid association formed in 1843 in New
York by a small group of German-Jewish émigrés. Its purposes were primarily charitable and
philanthropic, but individuals and individual lodges took on political roles as well. While the preamble to
the organizations constitution initially described its purpose as promoting Judaism and humanity, in 1863 it
was changed to simply “the highest interest of humanity.” Deborah Dash Moore, B’nai B’rith and the
Challenge of Ethnic Leadership, (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1981), 28.
7 Panitz, Simon Wolf, 24.
8 Edward E. Grusd, B'nai B'Rith: The Story of a Covenant, (New York: Appleton-Century/Affiliate of
Meredith Press, 1966), 35.
158
Wolf’s other primary leadership position in the Jewish community came with his
appointment to the executive committee of the Board of Delegates of American Israelites
in 1870. The Board of Delegates had been formed in 1859 in New York as an
organization to lobby for Jewish civil rights. It was dominated by Conservative Jews
from the east coast. Wolf’s appointment came about merely because of his prominence
in defending southern Jews, but he quickly took over the Board and turned it into an
instrument of Reform Judaism.9 In just seven years he merged it with the (Reformed)
Union of American Hebrew Congregations, and it was renamed the Board of Delegates
of Religious and Civil Rights.10 Wolf chaired the Board of Delegates from 1877 until
1906.
Wolf had no formal training in religion, nor did he address theological issues in
his writings. His purposes were whole-heartedly in the Reform movement, and he had no
deep appreciation for Conservative, Orthodox, or what he termed “ritual” Judaism.11 His
aim was for Jews to put aside “hair-splitting differences” and unite in service.12 He also
opposed Zionism, an international political movement to restore a Jewish homeland in
Palestine that originated in the 1890s, because he saw it as detrimental to Jewish and
gentile relations.13 While Orthodox and Zionist Jews may have appreciated Wolf’s
lobbying in some cases, Orthodox Jews found his attitude toward East European Jewry
“patronizing,” and his strident anti-Zionism alienated him from Zionist Jews. But while
9 Panitz, Simon Wolf, 61.
10 Proceedings of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, vI (1873-1879) (Cincinnati: Block and
Co., 1880), 364.
11 Panitz, Simon Wolf, 62.
12 Ibid., 64.
13 Moore, B’nai B’rith and the Challenge of Ethnic Leadership, 83.
159
some sneeringly referred to his Washington connections as “palavering,” Jews of every
ideological stripe were willing and grateful recipients of Wolf’s help when needed.14
The arguments between Reform and “traditionalist” Jews in Germany of the early
nineteenth century, began also in America in the 1820s. Reform emphasized rationalism
and ethics in religion rather than the Mosaic code and Jewish separatism.15 Historians of
American Judaism tend to emphasize the nineteenth century as the century of Reform.
Although the Reformed Jews in America experienced a great deal of institutional success,
including the establishment of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations in 1873,
and the Hebrew Union College in 1875, Orthodoxy and Conservative-Orthodox
congregations persisted and ultimately expanded with the influx of immigrants between
1880 and 1900.16 Wolf hoped the work of the Board of Delegates on behalf of
immigrants belonging to Orthodox synagogues would lead to Orthodox membership in
the Union of American Hebrew Congregations. But although he claimed that
Conservative Jewish publications overwhelmingly praised the work of the Board of
Delegates, it did not induce greater cooperation or unity of Jewish synagogues through
the UAHC.17
The main challenge facing American Jews in the late-nineteenth century was how
to embrace America yet retain their group distinctiveness. American Jews defended their
group identity and status in America through a number of tactics: Jewish community
14 Panitz, Simon Wolf, 97, 229.
15 Gerald Sorin, A Time for Building: The Third Migration, 1880-1920, (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
University Press, 1992), 170.
16 Ibid., 171.
17 25th Annual Report (1898), Annual Report of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, Report of
the Board of Delegates on Civil and Religious Rights, Simon Wolf, Chairman. 3949-3950.
160
institutions, education, political and legislative lobbying, and public propaganda. 18 Other
notable efforts include the establishment of the American Jewish Historical Society in
1892 (of which Wolf was a founding member), and the Jewish Publication Society in
1888.19 Reformed Jews embraced America’s history, enshrined the founding fathers as
heroes, and interpreted America’s vision in Jewish terms and Jewish aims in American
terms. Conversely, they resisted elements of the exclusivist vision of American identity:
Sunday laws, Protestant religious instruction in public schools, judicial affirmations of
the Christian basis of American law, and efforts to add a religious amendment to the
Constitution.20
Increased social discrimination in America against Jews in the 1890s coincided
with popular movements to “Christianize” America through government policy and
evangelists’ anti-Semitism in sermons.21 According to Wolf, American revivalist Dwight
Moody, while “claiming to be a spiritual guide, wantonly attacks his Jewish fellowcitizens in a set harangue of over an hour.”22 American Jews blamed Christian hostility
for the discrimination they faced, ignoring socioeconomic or racial factors even after
increased Jewish immigration after 1880 elicited class and racial rhetoric on the side of
18 Benny Kraut, “Jewish Survival in Protestant America,” in Jonathan D. Sarna, ed. Minority Faiths and
the American Protestant Mainstream, (Urbana and Chicago, Ill: University of Illinois Press, 1998), 45; for
Jewish religious and secular organizations see Naomi Cohen, Encounter with emancipation : the German
Jews in the United States, 1830-1914, (Philadelphia, Pa. : Jewish Publication Society, 1984), 39-55; on
community, see Hasia Diner, A Time for Gathering: The Second Migration, 1820-1880, (Baltimore: Johns
Hopkins University Press, 1992), ch. 4.
19 Kraut, “Jewish Survival in Protestant America,” 45; Cohen, Encounter with Emancipation, 206, 282-3.
20 Ibid., 40.
21 Usually by attributing deicide to Jews, and disparaging Jewish banking power in America. See Naomi
W. Cohen, “Antisemitism in the Gilded Age: The Jewish View,” Jewish Social Studies 41:3/4
(Summer/fall 1979), 193-4.
22 Wolf, “Influence on Jews on the Progress of the World,” [1888] in Selected Addresses, 61.
161
policymakers regarding the “Jewish Question.” 23 Reformed Jewish leaders had
proclaimed religion and not race the source of Jewish identity as early as 1869, possibly
as a strategic move to avoid racial issues. However, Reformed Jewish leaders as well as
lay people continued to use religious and racial language interchangeably, indicating
some ambivalence in the official position.24 American Reform Jews had imperative
reasons for separating race from religion. Religions were constitutionally required to be
on equal footing in America, while racial inequality was legally enforced in many
different ways.
One reason why American Jews may have vacillated on the religion or race
question was that nineteenth-century understandings of culture and race made a binary
use of the terms practically impossible. Ethnology began as a “scientific” endeavor in the
nineteenth century; as a branch of anthropology, its explicit aims were to study the
origins of human society, developmentally and comparatively. Ethnologists assumed that
races and peoples could by defined by their language, physical, and cultural
characteristics. They assumed that some races were more “developed” than others, and
elaborated on those differences. Most assumed a link between physical and cultural
evolution. While some spoke of “evolution” and others of “progress,” both terms
encapsulated a teleological understanding of race culminating with Anglo-Saxon
achievements.25 From the study of biology in the nineteenth century, as more biologists
began to accept evolution, many adopted what is known today as a “soft” view of genetic
inheritance: the idea that humans reproduce acquired characteristics in their children,
23 Cohen, “Antisemitism in the Gilded Age,” 203.
24 Eric L. Goldstein, “‘Different Blood Flows in our Veins’: Race and Jewish Self-Definition in Late
Nineteenth Century America,” American Jewish History, 85:1 (March 1997), 30, 38. Cohen,
“Antisemitism in the Gilded Age,” 188.
25 See John S. Haller, Jr., “Race and the Concept of Progress in Nineteenth Century American Ethnology,”
American Anthropologist 73:3 (June 1971), 710-724.
162
sometimes called Lamarckism after the evolutionist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744-1829).
The “classic” example is that of the giraffe which was thought to have developed a long
neck from stretching to reach leaves to eat. Neo-Lamarckism flourished at the close of
the nineteenth century, including “Darwin’s Bulldog” biologist Thomas Huxley (18251895) and British philosopher Herbert Spencer (1820-1903), the “social Darwinist.”
Both embraced a view of heredity that included parents’ acquired characteristics.26
Wolf explicitly credited Judaism for positive Jewish cultural traits, though he
relied on cultural history and education to inspire Jews rather than religious examples or
instruction. His exhortations to Jews to live as good patriots and citizens indicate that he
viewed these values as acquired traits, yet his overgeneralizations about Jewish attributes
and innate qualities suggest that he may have viewed these characteristics as
transmissible. Wolf’s vision of Jewish cultural identity provided a strong sense of
peoplehood that was compatible with American nationalism – not only compatible, but
one that portrayed Jews as the best possible American citizens.
Wolf’s Historical Vision
Wolf’s historical writings demonstrate what he wanted to present as essential
Jewish qualities: patriotism, loyalty, duty, and advocacy for freedom. He argued that
Judaism inspired and increased national loyalty in its adherents. Moreover, because of
their history of persecution, American Jews uniquely appreciated and advocated for
religious liberty in America. His histories portrayed Jews as playing an important role in
American history; Jews had made outstanding contributions to and sacrifices for the
nation. Religious liberty was essential to America’s history and character, and to the
preservation of liberty in its future. The greatest challenge that America faced was from
26 See Peter J. Bowler, “Evolution and Heredity” chapter 3, The Mendelian Revolution: The Emergence of
Hereditarian Concepts in Modern Science and Society, (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1989), 46-73
163
religious intolerance; American Jews had a particular responsibility to preserve freedom
in America. Although he overgeneralized Jewish cultural traits of loyalty and duty, his
exhortations to American Jews indicate that he viewed those characteristics as matters of
personal choice, not inherited traits. He wanted Jews to be inspired from stories of the
past to advocate for freedom and assert their rights; while he located his historical
subjects’ patriotism in their religion he did not rely on religious teachings to inspire such
patriotism and activism in the present.
To assess Wolf’s view of the past, this section looks at a memorial Statue to
Religious Liberty that Wolf commissioned through B’nai B’rith in 1874. Then, it
examines a popular speech he delivered in the 1870s called “The Influence of the Jews on
the Progress of the World,” which outlines important historical contributions of Jews to
Western and American government and culture. Next, we examine The American Jew as
Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen (1895), his portrayal of Jews as exemplary citizens through
detailing participation in American Wars. Finally, a biography, “Mordecai Manuel
Noah” (1897) details the life of a prominent Jewish-American during the first half of the
nineteenth century as an outstanding patriot and contributor to American history.
Wolf’s first public action demonstrating his keen interest in the role of history and
memory in solidifying the Jewish position in America was in his proposal for a
monument to religious liberty in 1874. At the 1874 convention of the Independent Order
of B’nai B’rith in Chicago, at which he presided, he “suggested that a statue to Religious
Liberty should be given by the Order to the United States.”27 The statue was completed
two years later. In a letter Wolf wrote a letter to President Grant inviting him to attend
the unveiling of the statue, he stressed that the statue demonstrated the patriotism of Jews,
as well as their unique appreciation for religious freedom: “This evidence of patriotism
27 Simon Wolf, “The B’nai B’rith and the Philadelphia Statue of Religious Liberty” [1921], in Selected
Addresses, 277.
164
and of love of liberty on the part of American citizens of Jewish faith is in keeping with
their history and their lofty ideals and conception of duty. No class of citizenship has
been made happier by religious liberty than the Jew, for the denial of that liberty in their
land has been the cause of endless persecution and misery.”28 He pointedly referred to
Jews as “Americans of the Jewish faith” in this letter to emphasize the primacy of Jewish
religious and national identity, rather than racial. The statue was placed in Centennial
Park in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and was unveiled on Thanksgiving Day 1876, the
year of the Centennial Exposition there.
The centrality of liberty in this monument, overshadowing “faith” and “America,”
aptly reified Wolf’s emphasis on freedom. As described by a New York Times article at
the time of the its dedication, the marble statue presents an imposing 11-foot female,
representing a “Goddess of Liberty,” wearing a liberty cap with thirteen stars as the 13
original states. Her left hand holds the Constitution and a laurel wreath. Her right hand
is extended defensively, shielding a smaller male figure beside her, the “Genius of Faith.”
At the feet of the female is an eagle, representing America, with its talons buried in a
snake signifying “Religious Intolerance.”29 The base of the monument declares:
Religious Freedom. Dedicated to the People of the United States by the Order B’nai
B’rith and Israelites of America. Wolf later extolled B’nai B’rith as the only organization
in the US to erect a statue to religious liberty.30
Wolf gave a lecture several times in cities across the nation in the 1870s entitled
“The Influence of the Jews on the Progress of the World” that he revised for publication
28 Simon Wolf, The Presidents I Have Known, from 1860 to 1918 (Washington, DC: Press of Byron S.
Adams, 1918), 89.
29 “Statue to Religious Liberty; The Unveiling of the Monument at Philadelphia Presented by Hebrews,
Description of the Work of Art,” New York Times (December 1, 1876), 4.
30 Simon Wolf, “The B’nai B’rith and the Philadelphia Statue of Religious Liberty” (1921), in Selected
Addresses, 279.
165
in 1888. According to a Chicago Daily Tribune article from 1875, Wolf’s lecture, which
was delivered at a Methodist church, had a large audience of both Jews and Christians;
moreover, “the flattering reports in regards to this lecture from other cities where it had
been delivered were not in the least exaggerated.”31 Wolf used non-Jewish sources to
demonstrate the contributions of Jews to Western culture in literature, medicine, science
and business.
In this speech, Wolf claimed several historical figures as Jews who had converted
to Christianity, thus privileging a cultural or racial definition of Jewishness. He noted
three nineteenth-century Jews who converted to Christianity: German Romantic poet
Heinrich Heine (1797-1856) and political writer Ludwig Borne (1786-1837), and British
Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881). Wolf downplayed their conversion by
asserting that the “times” in which they lived “forced the ambitious, the intellectual Jews”
to be baptized “hypocrites.”32 He claimed that, despite their apparent conversion, “in all
their writings and acts they were like the painted leopard – the spots could not be washed
away.”33 Because Heine and Borne were known for promoting liberalism and freedom,
and Disraeli for his reforms for the working classes, including extending the vote, they fit
nicely with Wolf’s overriding contention that Judaism inspired love of and advocacy for
freedom. The polemical advantage of claiming these persons as Jews led Wolf to
discount their conversions to Christianity, but Jewish hypocrites could hardly be viewed
as those in whom Judaism was the primary influence. After the turn of the century, when
racial definitions of Jewishness assumed a greater importance due to immigration
31 “Jewish Influence,” Chicago Daily Tribune (January 10, 1975), p 11.
32 Wolf, “The Influence of the Jews on the Progress of the World,” [1888] in Selected Addresses, 68.
33 Ibid. Indeed, Heine famously wrote that “The baptismal certificate is the ticket of admission to
European culture,” qtd. In The Jew in the Modern World: a Documentary History, Paul R. Mendes-Flohr
and Jehuda Reinharz, eds., (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980),
166
policies, Wolf argued that Heine, Borne, and Disraeli ceased to be Jews when they
converted.
In terms of America, Wolf stressed the role of European Jews in discovering the
New World. Spanish Jews made the discovery of the “new world” possible, for “The
voyages of Columbus could never have been made, had it not been for Jewish counsel,
[and] Jewish ducats.” Moreover, he claimed the first European to set foot in the New
World was Jewish: “[Washington] Irving, in his History of Columbus, states, as a curious
coincidence, that the first Spanish soldier that stepped on American soil was Luis De
Torres, a Jew.”34 Wolf did not mention that Irving described Torres as a Jew who had
converted to Christianity.35 Ignoring Torres’ conversion, in tandem with discounting the
conversions of Heine, Boerne, and Disraeli, Wolf contradicted his usually careful
definition of Jews as adherents to Judaism.
While American historians and much of the American public took for granted that
democracy originated in Protestant religion and traditions,36 Wolf located the foundation
for republicanism in Mosaic law. “On Sinai’s mount was first proclaimed equality and
freedom. To Moses we owe the Republican form of government, the forming of a Senate
composed of select men; the election of tried and trusted elders to advise and counsel,
had their beginning with him. The appointing of judges also, to whom he gave the allimportant advice to be ever just, not only to the Israelite, but to the stranger.”37 Locating
democracy in Mosaic Law certainly predated the Protestant Reformation chronologically,
giving Wolf’s argument of democratic origins a certain advantage in asserting
34 Wolf, “The Influence of the Jews on the Progress of the World,” [1888] in Selected Addresses, 44.
35 Washington Irving, A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus, volume I (New York:
G. and C. Carvill, 1838), 176.
36 See Winthrop S. Hudson, “Democratic Freedom and Religious Faith in the Reformed Tradition,”
Church History 15:3 (Sept 1946), 177.
37 Wolf, “The Influence of the Jews on the Progress of the World,” [1888] in Selected Addresses, 36.
167
precedence. Establishing equality before the law as a principle of Judaism, “not only to
the Israelite, but to the stranger” might resonate with some Americans, particularly
Republicans, who hailed the Fourteenth Amendment as instituting equal protection.
In this lecture, Wolf also addressed some of the most frequent stereotypes of Jews
in America. One was the term “Shylock,” taken from the Jewish usurer in Shakespeare’s
The Merchant of Venice. Slurs against Jewish bankers and the influence of Jews on the
Republican Party gained in prominence after the demonetization of silver in 1873, and
were frequently used by writers in the nascent movements (Grangers, Greenbackers,
Farmer’s Alliances) of Populism.38 Wolf countered these stereotypes with a positive
portrayal of Jewish wealth that proceeded from their religious values: “They [Jews] are
prosperous because they are thrifty; they economize because waste is sinful.” 39 Another
common stereotype of Jews was that they were not assimilated or loyal citizens because
they were “clannish.”40 According to Wolf, Jews “cling together because in unity lies
strength.” 41 The phrase “in unity is strength” is generally attributed to Aesop, but the
phrase became a kind of slogan for populist movements in late-nineteenth century
America.42
Wolf gained prominence as an amateur historian in 1891, when a moderately
well-known journalist published a letter in The North American Review asserting that
38 See Cohen, “Antisemitism in the Gilded Age: the Jewish View,” 198-200.
39 Wolf, “The Influence of the Jews on the Progress of the World,” [1888] in Selected Addresses, 72.
40 Eric L. Goldstein, “Different Blood Flows in our Veins,” 33.
41 Wolf, “The Influence of the Jews on the Progress of the World,” [1888] in Selected Addresses, 72.
42 “In Unity is Strength” was a 1880 campaign song for Greenbacks, see William Miles, Songs, Odes,
Glees and Ballads: A Bibliography of American Presidential Campaign Songsters, (New York: Greenwood
Press, 1990), xxxviii. Nelson A. Dunning, The Farmers' Alliance History and Agricultural Digest,
(Washington D.C.: The Alliance Publishing Company, 1891), 255. Regarding farmers’ cooperatives, see
Letter to the Editor, The Nation, 58 (November 1, 1894), 325.
168
Jews had not participated in military service during the American Civil War. Wolf
immediately responded with a letter to the editor detailing the names and ranks of men
“of Jewish faith who battled for the Union.”43 Wolf claimed that the ridiculous
accusation in the article would ordinarily have not warranted any notice, but for the
political realities of the time.44 Anti-Semitism was strong in Europe. In America, fears
of Jewish immigrants flooding in from Eastern Europe and Russia ignited public fears.
Thus, he felt that the article gained more attention that it should have under other
circumstances, and required a reply.45
Due to public interest in his response letter, Wolf spent the next four years writing
a book of Jewish demonstrating American Jewish support for the nation through military
service. The American Jew as Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen was published in 1895.
Beginning with the American Revolution, and proceeding through each subsequent
American war, he detailed both Jewish military involvement and civilian support. In
conducting his research, he published ads soliciting information on Jewish participants as
well as pursuing documentary research. 46
The book served a larger purpose than to demonstrate Jewish military service.
According to his editor’s remarks, Wolf’s “impelling motive has been to enforce a
recognition of the Jewish people as a militant factor in the upbuilding of the State, and of
Judaism as a primal force in the furtherance of civilization, and he has chosen as his
43 Simon Wolf, The American Jew as Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen, (Philadelphia: The Levytype Company,
1895), 7.
44 Ibid., 1-2.
45 Wolf, The American Jew as Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen, 1-2
46 One study suggests that although Wolf’s book served an important purpose in correcting views about
Jews, the book was lacking in documentary evidence for the numbers he showed. Sylvan Morris Dubow,
“Identifying the Jewish Servicemen in the Civil War: A Reappraisal of Simon Wolf’s The American Jew as
Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen,” American Jewish Historical Quarterly 59:3 (Mar 1970), 357-369.
169
weapons the simple truth of history and the testimony of leaders among men.”47
Moreover, the title page of the book included a picture of the Religious Liberty statue in
Philadelphia. Wolf included an excerpt from a review of his book from the New York
Sun in his book The Presidents I Have Known (1918). According to the reviewer, the
purpose of the book was “To combat one of the most obstinate of prejudices and to
promote enlightenment on a subject concerning which ignorance has become
unpardonable.”48 Thus, the book was not only about Jewish contributions to American
wars, but about Judaism as a positive factor in civilization, the importance of religious
liberty, and to combat prejudice against Jews.
Wolf attributed the patriotism of American Jews, when it came to serving in war,
to their religion. “The keen and responsive sense of duty which, through Torah and
Talmud, the Jewish character is so deeply imbued, has never failed to become manifest
when occasion has called it forth.”49 Furthermore, national loyalty, associated with the
Jewish faith, was universal and not just specific to American Jews. “The Jew, while
retaining his racial and religious distinctiveness, identifies himself with the people among
whom he dwells.”50 As support for this claim, Wolf offered the fact that Jews fought on
both sides of the Civil War. “Where home, or liberty or law is at stake the Jewish people
have never been chary of the uttermost sacrifice, and the muster rolls of the armies in the
great war between the States afford the fullest evidence of their ample share in its
burdens and its sufferings.”51 In contrast, the War of 1812 and the Mexican-American
47 Louis Edward Levy, Editor’s Preface, in Simon Wolf, The American Jew as Patriot, Soldier, and
Citizen, vii.
48 Wolf, The Presidents I Have Known, 146.
49 Wolf, The American Jew as Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen, 12.
50 Ibid., 104.
51 Ibid., 105.
170
War were more partisan wars, the first being opposed by the Federalists and the second
by the anti-slavery Whigs. Consequently, fewer Jews rallied to fight in those wars than
in the Revolutionary and Civil Wars.52
Wolf’s phrasing of Jews’ “racial and religious distinctiveness” raises a certain
dissonance with his otherwise careful and consistent labeling of Jews in the book as
“American citizens of the Jewish [or “Hebrew”] faith” (a deliberate Reformed expression
used to denote “denominational” status of American Jews). This example is similar to
that of the writings of many Reformed Jews for whom the language of race sometimes
slipped into their usage, despite explicit rejections of racial identity. Although Wolf’s
reference to race in The American Jew as Patriot, Soldier and Citizen suggested that
Jews’ race and religion made set them apart in America, he argued that it was religion,
and not race, that inspired the loyalty of Jews.
The historical data that Wolf presented was primarily in the form of lists of names
of participants. Despite a dearth of documentation from the Revolutionary period, he
found that a large proportion of the small population of American Jews at the time (which
he estimated at about 3,000) fought for the Patriots. Documentation of early Jewish
resistance to British imperial power was evident in the Non-Importation Resolution of
1765; nine Jews were among the signors.53 American Jews also contributed financially to
the Patriot cause.54 He also cited correspondence between George Washington and
Jewish citizens, demonstrating the commitment of a “founding father” to Jewish civil
liberties.55 When George Washington visited Newport, Rhode Island in 1790, synagogue
52 Wolf, The American Jew as Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen, 105.
53 Wolf, The American Jew as Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen, 13.
54 For a scholarly appraisal of Jewish participation in the American Revolution, see Howard M. Sachar, A
History of the Jews in America (New York: Knopf, 1992), 23-6.
55 Wolf, The American Jew as Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen, 53-61.
171
warden Moses Seixas read a welcome address to the new President on behalf of the
congregation there. Afterwards, Washington wrote a letter of thanks to the congregation
affirming his commitment not just to “toleration” but to equal protection of all natural
rights.56
Wolf’s 1897 biography of Mordecai Manuel Noah (1785-1851) reiterates themes
outlined in his previous works: it stressed the historical contributions of Jews, or as he
phrased it “the good work done by American citizens of Jewish faith.”57 While his
previous works had stressed the loyalty of Jews and their contributions to civilization,
this particular work emphasized religious liberty to a greater extent. This was a direct
response to challenges to religious liberty in the United States in the 1890s. He wrote
that the current temper of the nation included elements which promoted intolerance in
opposition to the “spirit and genius of our institutions,” requiring a corrective.58 He
referenced judicial decisions as part of this intolerant spirit by which presumably he
meant the Supreme Court discussion of America as a Christian nation in Holy Trinity
Church v United States (1892). Wolf emphasized Noah’s love of country and patriotism,
and his own desire to counteract prejudice. These were characteristics he wished to
inculcate in his Jewish audience.59
Wolf presented Noah as an exemplary model of Jewish patriotism, patriotism that
was fostered through a profound appreciation for religious liberty. Noah’s patriotism,
according to Wolf, was instilled in him from an early age. Both his father and maternal
grandfather, Robert Phillips, fought in the Revolutionary War; Noah was raised by
56 The Papers of George Washington, Presidential Series, W. W. Abbot et al., eds., vol. 6, 284-86 (Mark
A. Mastromarino, volume editor), (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1996). Simon Wolf, The
American Jew as Patriot, Soldier, and Citizen, 53-61.
57 Wolf, “Mordecai Manuel Noah: a Biographical Sketch,” [1897] in Selected Addresses, 108.
58 Ibid.
59 Ibid., 112
172
Phillips from the age of 10. Noah’s grandfather taught him that in America “was found
that refuge which the Jews, persecuted throughout ages, had so long hoped and prayed
for.”60 In return for this freedom, he learned that his duty was “to support the constitution
and laws of his country, which guaranteed civil and religious liberty.”61
Wolf described Noah’s patriotic advocacy as a “critical factor” in gaining South
Carolina’s support for the War of 1812. 62 While living in Charleston, SC, a few years
prior to the War of 1812, Noah noticed that the mercantile community opposed the war
because of the fear of an embargo.
He at once entered the political arena as an advocate of war and the maintenance,
at all hazards, of American rights on the high seas, and his vigorous and patriotic
communications to the Charleston press over the signature of ‘Muley Malack,’63
in which he denounced the craven spirit of those who would sacrifice the honor of
their country and the liberty of its citizens to the mere greed of money, and
advocated war in maintenance of American liberty and independence among the
nations of the earth.64
This example addressed a stereotype that Jews valued profit above all else. Wolf had
fought against such stereotypes by providing legal defense to Jews accused of
profiteering during the Civil War, and through his book The American Jew as Patriot,
Soldier and Citizen. In his example of Noah during the War of 1812, the stereotype is
reversed. The merchant community in South Carolina valued profit over loyalty, and an
American of Jewish faith persuaded them to support freedom. Noah’s defense of
60 Wolf, “Mordecai Manuel Noah,” [1897] in Selected Addresses, 112.
61 Ibid., 111.
62 Ibid.
63 Muley Malack is a variation of many spellings of Mulai (prince) Abd el-Malik, a Moroccan king who
fought with Elizabethan England against Spanish and Roman control of Morocco; he became a popular
character in British drama beginning in the 1580s, and new versions of the character appeared in English
and later American literature through the nineteenth century. See Jeffrey H. Richards, Drama, Theatre,
and Identity in the American New Republic, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 155.
64 Wolf, “Mordecai Manuel Noah,” [1897] Selected Addresses, 112.
173
America did not go unchallenged. His patriotism landed him in duels three times, but
after killing one of his opponents, no more confronted him directly.65
Having established Noah’s patriotism and loyalty, Wolf recounted an episode that
indicated Noah’s influence on American “civilization” – the interpretation of the
Constitution. Noah was appointed as a consul to Tunisia and Algeria in 1812 by
President Madison. During the War of 1812, an American privateer entered Tunis with
three English boats from the East Indies. The British minister at Tunis objected due to
Britain’s treaty with Algeria, which stipulated that “no Christian power should sell a
British prize or its cargo in an Algerian port.”66 Noah responded that the United States
was not a Christian nation. As evidence, he referred to Article VI (the “no religious test”
clause) and the First Amendment of the Constitution, as well as the United States’ Treaty
of Tripoli (1797), “which declared that the United States made no objection to
Musselmans [Muslims] because of their religion and that they were entitled to and should
receive all the privileges of citizens of the most favored nations.”67 The Tunisian head of
state upheld Noah’s interpretation and the goods were subsequently auctioned.
According to Wolf,
the proposition was never thereafter questioned by England, nor, indeed, by any
other nation. Therefore, the United States, in which no union of church and state
exists, and no religious tests of any kind are recognized, is not a Christian nation
within the meaning of the Constitution, and the framers of that great bill of rights,
declaring civil and religious liberty, built even better than they knew. Mordecai
Manuel Noah, an American Jew, was the first to carry these provisions of the
constitution of his country into practical effect from the standpoint of
international law.68
65 Wolf, “Mordecai Manuel Noah,” [1897] in Selected Addresses, 112.
66 Ibid., 118.
67 Ibid.
68Ibid., 119.
174
Wolf noted that Noah’s interpretation of the Constitution was an important episode in
Constitutional history, as well as the development of American institutions.
Wolf portrayed Noah as an ideal American citizen, influential in promoting
freedom during war and peace and promoting religious liberty in his diplomatic role.
Yet, he still faced discrimination from other Americans because of his faith. Noah was
recalled from his position of consul by President James Monroe in 1816 “upon the
miserable pretext that, being a Jew, his religion was regarded as incompatible with his
consular position.”69 Noah obtained letters of support from James Madison, Thomas
Jefferson and John Adams, but was unable to retain his position. This example reiterated
for Wolf’s readers the importance of Jews in America’s history, the favor shown them by
the founding fathers, but also the religious discrimination that they nevertheless
experienced.
Wolf’s soaring rhetoric in describing Noah’s patriotism demonstrated the primacy
he accorded to notions of freedom. The fact that Noah, in Wolf’s estimation, upheld
American above all else even though he experienced discrimination served to inspire
Jewish readers to do the same.
He was a man among men, a Jew among Jews, an honor to his country and his
race, but, above all, he was an American, proud of his nativity and attached to the
free institutions of his country. The Constitution was his shibboleth – the very
breath of his nostrils. What was nearest his heart was that every Jew, nay, indeed,
every Christian in the land, should appreciate the great value of a government, the
keystone of whose arch is civil and religious liberty. 70
American patriotism transcended all other loyalties and identities. “Shibboleth” refers
explicitly to primary identity – as when, in the Biblical story, the Gileadites used it as a
linguistic password to identify Ephraimites by their pronunciation of the word (Judges
69 Wolf, “Mordecai Manuel Noah,” [1897] in Selected Addresses, 115.
70 Ibid, 129-130.
175
12:1-15). Moreover, Wolf raised the idea of American institutions and law above actual
experiences of discrimination.
In 1906, Wolf gave a speech in Philadelphia entitled “The Jew as a Factor in the
Development of the United States.” In this lecture, he stressed the qualities of Jews that
made them good American citizens. These qualities were shaped by Jewish history,
tradition, education and religion. He began by arguing that persecution of Jews in other
lands had strengthened the Jewish “intellect” and “ardor”: “therefore the Jewish
immigrants of the past as well as those of the present, come to our country thoroughly
equipped for the battle that confronts them, and ready to assimilate with the best in their
new environments.”71 So, in this example, Wolf attributed the high quality of Jewish
citizenship to their intellectual abilities and love of country, a result of persecution in
other countries and the opportunity for freedom in America. Civic participation that grew
out of these superior traits – intelligence and patriotism - included Jewish support of and
success in public schools, colleges, and universities.72 He briefly mentioned American
Jewish military service, and referenced his book on the topic, asserting that Jews
contributed a higher rate of combatants than any other faith. However, he stressed that
duty and citizenship were not limited to military service, instead, the “basic principle of
government lies in the home.”73 Citing an Episcopal Bishop who applauded the lack of
divorces among Jews, he suggested that even those of other faiths acknowledged the
superior emphasis on home and family among Jews. In addition, he asserted that Jews
were far removed from all the political scandals and corruption that were of such concern
to many reformers of the time. He also used the example of Jewish charitable institutions
71 Wolf, “Mordecai Manuel Noah,” [1897] in Selected Addresses, 193.
72 Ibid.
73 Wolf, “The Jew as a Factor in the Development of the United States,” [1906] in Selected Addresses,
195.
176
to demonstrate the social responsibilities of his co-religionists. Jews did not allow those
of their faith to become public charges, and “are ever ready to assist and aid the
unfortunate, of every creed and every nationality. It is part of the curriculum of our faith
and of our traditions, and this tends to a higher development of the nation in which the
Jew resides.”74 In this lecture, Wolf emphasized broad cultural traits of Jews that made
them outstanding contributors to America, though religion was only one of several
operative factors in his formulation.
Despite various descriptions of the outstanding qualities of American Jews,
Wolf’s charge to his Jewish audience at the close of the speech indicates that it is their
responsibility to maintain these traits in themselves and to inspire future generations to do
the same. Jews should be careful not to force themselves on others, but to “make them
seek you by virtue of your intelligence, your sobriety, your good conduct and your
patriotism. The Jews should be like Caesar’s wife, ‘above suspicion.’ For we stand all
for one, and one for all.”75 This places responsibility on individual Jews to avoid even
the suspicion of anything inappropriate. Wolf suggests to his older listeners that they can
face death with the consolation that they have inspired another generation of Jews with
their fortitude, nobility, determination, modesty and virility – but he does not mention
their religiosity.76 His charge to individual American Jews emphasized personal
responsibility in representing their people. It argued against an inherited sense of positive
characteristics and asserted that individual Jews must strive to be worthy members of the
religion or race they represent in America. Here, Wolf did not address the importance or
role of religion in inculcating the kinds of traits that set Jews apart as a people.
74 Wolf, “The Jew as a Factor in the Development of the United States,” [1906] in Selected Addresses, 196
75 Ibid., 198-199.
76 Ibid., 199.
177
Wolf’s historical vision was one in which American Jews were central actors.
They had served the country loyally and endeavored to preserve its heritage of religious
liberty. The Statue to Religious History represented Wolf’s claim that, because of their
historical experience of persecution, Jews were uniquely grateful for America’s religious
liberty and devoted its preservation. Wolf’s lectures regarding the contributions of Jews
to Western culture, particularly in the discovery of America and the ideas that influenced
its laws and institutions, stressed how the Jewish loyalty translated into action.
Presenting accounts of Jewish participation in American wars, and instances of “founding
fathers” supporting Jewish equality, Wolf hoped to inspire patriotism in his readers. His
biography of Noah portrayed a man whose loyalty to America and the Constitution
transcended all other loyalties. Discrimination against Noah, or anti-Semitism in general,
appeared as senseless bigotry. Finally, while he asserted that Jews were of the highest
quality of citizens, he charged Jews with the responsibility to be good patriots and
citizens, remembering that the actions of the few reflected on all Jews. Although Wolf
defined Jews as “Americans of Jewish faith,” Judaism was only one of several cultural
factors to which he attributed their past success and through which he sought to inspire
future action.
Wolf and the Present
Beginning in the 1860s, Wolf lobbied against anti-Semitism as religious
discrimination, following the Reformed stance of Jewishness as a religion. In the 1890s,
in the midst of controversies over Christianity and the Constitution, Sunday laws, and
religion in public education, he argued for strict separation of church and state while
promoting a civil religion: a spiritualized elevation of the ideas of America and its
institutions. For Wolf, the providential greatness of America was based on religious
liberty, and true patriotism required defending freedom. He used Biblical rhetoric to
emphasize the spiritual importance of America and American patriotism. Also in the
178
1890s, Wolf used his contacts in Washington, D.C. to lobby for government recognition
and support for Jews facing persecution in Eastern Europe and Russia. As Jewish
immigration from those countries to America accelerated, the Immigration Department
developed a “List of Races and Peoples” in 1898. Always starting with the contention
that Jews belonged to a religion and not a race, his position unraveled into inconsistencies
in these debates. Wolf’s aim was clearly to prevent Jews from being counted by
immigration officials. However, his vacillating arguments demonstrate that removing
Jews from the “List” was more important than the principles he promoted as a means to
that end.
Wolf’s Early Lobbying
Wolf’s lobbying activities began during the Civil War, when he provided legal
defense to Southern Jews (who had moved north) charged with disloyalty and blockaderunning.77 He also was instrumental in organizing Jewish protest against General Grant’s
Order no. 11 (1862), which expelled Jews (thought to be active in the cotton black
market) from his military district including parts of Tennessee, Mississippi and
Kentucky. Due to pressure from Jewish leaders, President Lincoln revoked the order and
Grant later claimed the order had been drafted by one of his subordinates and he had
signed it without knowledge of its full content.78 Wolf also obtained a promise from
President Grant that a Jewish woman that he knew seeking a job in government would
not be required to work on Saturdays.79 His close relationships in Washington with
officials and interactions with presidents are detailed in his book The Presidents I Have
Known (1918).
77 Panitz, Simon Wolf, 24-9. Wolf, “The Life and Service of the Rev. Isaac Leeser,” [1868] in Selected
Addresses, 103-4; Presidents I have Known, 8-9.
78 Panitz, Simon Wolf, 27-9.
79 Wolf, Presidents I Have Known, 105.
179
While defending Jews during the Civil War, Wolf took the stance of that
Jewishness was a religion, not a race. These arguments placed him in a better position to
defend those singled out as Jews, as freedom of religion had a strong Constitutional
backing. Popular association of Jews with blockade-running during the Civil War
prompted Wolf to write a letter to the New York Evening Post in 1864. In his letter, he
assailed the press for its labeling of arrested Jews. “Why, when the authorities arrest a
criminal, telegraph immediately throughout the Union that a Jew, or another Jew
blockader has been caught? Do they, when they catch a James Maloney, say a Methodist
or a Presbyterian has been caught? Is it, then, a crime to be born a Jew?”80 Despite the
primary argument, he referred to one being “born” a Jew, and not one who espoused the
Jewish religion. The overlap of Jewish religion and peoplehood made consistent
language difficult even for the most ardent of Reformed Jews.
Grant’s Indian Peace Policy attracted Wolf’s attention as a way of advocating
Jewish equality with mainstream Protestants. According to Wolf, when he heard of the
policy, he thought that the “Jewish faith should have a representative” among the Indian
agents, “as we were not a proselyting people, and that whoever was appointed would see
to the physical, mental and moral welfare of the Indians.”81 Wolf spoke with President
Grant, who asked for a name, and Wolf suggested Dr. Herman Bendel, who Grant
subsequently appointed as a Federal Indian superintendent for the state of Arizona in
1870. The appointment itself was contested by Senator Roscoe Conkling (AZ), who
claimed the privilege of appointments. Wolf testified before the Committee on Indian
Affairs in the Senate and secured Bendel’s appointment. Bendel worked for a year in this
position when, once again, his appointment was questioned. The Board of Missions,
which was composed of Christians of many faiths and oversaw the Peace Policy,
80 Wolf, Presidents I Have Known, 38.
81 Ibid., 82.
180
convened a meeting a year later to review the superintendents and their work. The
review of Bendel stated reservations regarding his religion. It stated that he was “a most
excellent official, a man of splendid judgment, strict integrity, who has managed the
affairs of the office to entire satisfaction, but unfortunately he is not a Christian.”82 The
Senate Committee invited Wolf to attend the review meeting, where in his words he gave
“an exposition on American citizenship which I am sure they never forgot.”83 Although
Wolf secured his position once again, Bendel resigned a few years later, disillusioned by
the controversy surrounding his appointment and position.84
Church and State
Wolf’s views on church and state were unabashedly separationist. Religion made
Jews better citizens, but its place was in the home and not in government. In a lecture in
1893 entitled “Church and State” Wolf warned of threats to America’s religious liberty,
and charged his Jewish listeners with the responsibility of preserving America’s future
freedom. He condemned the Supreme Court “decision” that the United States was a
Christian nation and contemporary agitation for Sunday laws. To inspire his Jewish
listeners he stressed both their American and Jewish heritage. In 1905 Wolf appeared
before a committee of the Washington, D.C. Board of Education regarding the issue of
reading the Bible in public schools, while he was Chairman of the Committee on Civil
Rights of the UAHC. In his statement, he advocated for a purely patriotic rather than
religious curriculum to promote citizenship. In both of these speeches, Wolf warned that
any compromise on the issue of church and state jeopardized America’s future, by
undermining the foundation on which it had been built. Freedom of religion was no mere
82 Wolf, Presidents I Have Known, 82.
83 Ibid., 82-3.
84 Panitz, Simon Wolf, 58.
181
matter of practical expediency in America, but was a universal necessity. Wolf’s
spiritualized rhetoric of American patriotism indicated a civil religion in both the current
use of the term to indicate beliefs in transcendent values of a nation represented by
symbols and reinforced by rituals, and in the eighteenth-century Rousseauian sense of
requiring adherence to the social contract and ideas of tolerance.
In “Church and State” (1893), Wolf argued that threats to religious liberty in
America in the 1890s jeopardized the nation’s future. America’s providential past had
made it “the favored nation of God” and a “beacon-light” to other nations. 85 However,
America’s privileged status was endangered by movements to Christianize the nation, “in
direct violation to the principles that animated the founders.”86 According to Wolf, the
“misfortunes of every country have had their origin, continuance and culmination in the
form of religious differences arising from the doctrine that Church and State are one.”87
He exhorted Jews to not let any threat to religious liberty go without “a protest, in the
name of the founders, a protest in the name of the American people, a protest in the name
of the future American whose birthright is in danger and whose liberties are invaded.”88
All Americans must realize the dangers that accompanied, for example, a proposed
“Christian nation” amendment to the Constitution, “if the American republic is to live
and be perpetuated.”89 If religious liberty were to be lost in America, then the “entire
fiber of the Constitution” was in danger of unraveling, and “bloody conflicts” would
ensue.90
85 Wolf, “Church and State,” [1893] in Selected Addresses, 173.
86 Ibid., 157.
87 Ibid., 155.
88 Ibid., 173.
89 Ibid.
90 Ibid., 157.
182
Wolf’s appeal to religious liberty as the foundation of civil freedoms had
considerable promotion during the nineteenth century in America. According to the
liberal narrative of religious liberty the Protestant Reformation had shattered a religious
monopoly by the Catholic Church. The Church controlled people by educating only the
clergy; religious services were in Latin to further distance ordinary people from gaining
any autonomy. Then the Protestant Reformation occurred, and the power of the Church
was broken. Education improved, Bibles were written in the vernacular, and worship
services became more accessible to ordinary people. People started to think for
themselves, to question the authority of institutions, and this led to a movement for
political liberty.91
Wolf urged American Jews to protect religious liberty by appealing to their
historical experience and legacy – not their religious values – and underscoring the role
of education in fostering patriotism. Jews had a responsibility “not as Jews,” but as those
who had experienced discrimination, to remind Christians of the dangers of Sunday
legislation or religious instruction in public schools. Furthermore, they must impress this
duty upon their children.92 The obligation to perform this duty derived from the debt
owed to their Jewish ancestors and America’s founders:
It is our bounden duty to care for the future, just as much as our ancestors cared
for us. We are here to create anew, to infuse into the fires that are still burning
glowingly, as much patriotism, as much love of country as ever our founders did.
It is our bounden duty as citizens of Jewish faith to pay our tribute and devotion to
this country in which we are so happy.93
For Wolf, patriotism required advocacy for liberty. His emphasis on personal action also
indicates that he viewed the patriotism as a cultural value – one that was inculcated, not
91 Richard Helmstadter, Freedom and Religion in the Nineteenth Century, (Stanford: Stanford University
Press, 1997) 2-3 .
92 Wolf, “Church and State,” [1893] in Selected Addresses, 172.
93 Ibid., 174.
183
inherited from birth. In addition, American Jews were obligated to continue the legacy of
Jewish contributions to western culture: “And let us Jews remember that as Moses was
the law-giver of the world, and as we gave to the world religion and philosophy, so let us
continue to show to the nation the sublime example of courage, patience and yet of
manliness, the example of love of justice, of truth and of undying devotion to liberty as
exemplified in the American republic.”94 The universalism in Wolf’s rhetoric is
unmistakable: the purpose of promoting liberty was not to make America a better place
for Jews but for everyone.
In 1892, the Supreme Court case Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States
included discussion that characterized the United States as a “Christian nation.” While
this statement was only tangentially related to the decision of the court, the evangelical
press and the National Reform Association exulted in what they characterized as a
Supreme Court “affirmation” of a Christian America.95 Wolf argued that the “Christian
nation” statement was in opposition to America’s history and common law, and in direct
opposition to the idea of government and law proposed by the founding fathers of the
United States,
Jefferson, Madison, Washington, Franklin, Paine and other leaders and lights of
the glorious past certainly knew what they were doing when they were founding
this government. They did not call it a Christian government. They called it an
American government, for all the people in the world to worship their God as they
pleased, that no legislature should interfere, and nothing should prevent them
from worshipping in a republic what they believed to be right, proper and just.96
Wolf carefully explained Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States (1892) to diminish
the importance of its discussion of America was a Christian nation. The case concerned a
church that hired a minister from another country in perceived violation of US
94 Wolf, “Church and State,” [1893] in Selected Addresses, 176.
95 Linda Przybyszewski, “Judicial Conservatism and Protestant Faith: The Case of Justice David J.
Brewer,” Journal of American History, 91:2 (Sept 2004), 474.
96 Wolf, “Church and State,” [1893] in Selected Addresses, 171.
184
immigration laws, which prohibited importing contract labor. Overruling the decision of
the lower courts, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the church, stating that the law was
aimed at manual labor. In Justice Brewer’s written opinion, he diverted to the topic of
the religious nature of the United States to prove a particular point: “no purpose of action
against religion can be imputed against any religion, because this [the United States] is a
religious people.”97 Citing support for religion in the founding of the American colonies,
and in the constitutions and laws of its states, the opinion also mentioned the findings of
the Pennsylvania supreme court in Updegraph v Commonwealth (1824) which stated
"Christianity, general Christianity, is, and always has been, a part of the common law of
Pennsylvania; . . . not Christianity with an established church and tithes and spiritual
courts, but Christianity with liberty of conscience to all men."98 While Justice Brewer
was making an argument for religious freedom based on the religious nature of the
United States, he did assert that freedom of religion applied equally to Roman Catholic
churches and Jewish synagogues, a point duly noted by Wolf.99 However, Wolf
dismissed the significance of the discussion, which was “no part of what was actually
adjudged by the Court, and was an inferential remark, his own individual opinion and in
no way governed the decision of the case.”100
Regarding agitation for Sunday laws in the 1890s, Wolf argued that this question
had already been resolved, historically and legally, in favor of religious freedom. In
1810, Congress passed a law which required all post offices to be open on Sunday long
enough to deliver the mail. The law sparked protest from evangelicals, but resistance to
the law took on a national character in 1825, when Congress re-enacted the law. From
97 Church of the Holy Trinity v United States, 143 US 457, 465 (1892).
98 Ibid. Cited in Wolf, “The Bible in Public Schools,” (1905), in Selected Addresses, 187-8.
99 Wolf, “The Bible in Public Schools,” [1905] in Selected Addresses, 188.
100 Ibid.
185
1828 through the early 1830s, Congress was flooded with petitions to repeal the law,
provoking a debate on the relationship of church and state in America.101 Wolf reprinted
arguments against national Sunday protection that Senator Richard M. Johnson of
Kentucky presented in Congress in the 1830s in response to the mail issue. The speech
argued for the role of government to protect citizens’ civil rights, not dictate religious
views, and warned that “if a solemn act of legislation shall, in one point, define the law of
God or point out to the citizen one religious duty, it may, with equal propriety proceed to
define every part of divine revelation and enforce every religious obligation.”102 Relying
on an appeal to universal and unchanging values of separation of church and state, Wolf
claimed that these arguments were as “right” and “just” as when they were written.103
Wolf argued that the proposed legislation to close the 1893 World’s Fair in
Chicago on Sunday illustrated the true religious aims of its proponents. Many Sunday
laws had been passed for the purported protection of workers’ rights, ensuring they had
one day off per week. However, if the Fair was closed on Sundays, the only day
“workers” were free, the law would effectually bar workers from attending. Moreover,
they would probably entertain themselves in some other way, such as drinking.104 (Most
blue law advocates were proponents of temperance too.) Wolf portrayed the law as
hypocritical: its backers were willing to sacrifice educational opportunities for workers
and provide opportunities for drinking in exchange for one religious law.
101 See James R. Rohrer, “Sunday Mails and the Church-State Theme in Jacksonian America,” The Early
Republic, 7:1 (Spring 1987): 53-74.
102 "21st Congress, 1st Session, House Report on Sunday Mails, Communicated to the House of
Representatives, March 4-5, 1830," American State Papers, Class VII, pp 229. American State Papers
Bearing On Sunday Legislation, Revised and Enlarged Edition, Compiled and Annotated by William
Addison Blakely, Revised Edition Edited by Willard Allen Colcord, (Washington D.C.: The Religious
Liberty Association, 1911), pp 244-268. Wolf, “The Bible in Public Schools,” [1905] in Selected
Addresses, 180-4. See also, “Church and State,” [1893] in Selected Addresses, 169-170; Presidents I have
Known, 277.
103 Wolf, “Church and State,” [1893], in Selected Addresses, 170.
104 Ibid., 170-171.
186
In 1905, Wolf presented a case against religious education to the Washington
D.C. Board of Education. Most proponents of Bible reading in schools suggested that
religion was the foundation of patriotism and citizenship, and claimed no desire to unite
church and state. Yet, according to Wolf, “that would naturally come later, if they are
successful in the innovation now proposed,” which he found “self-evident” in its attempt
to align church and state.105 Paralleling his previous arguments for religious liberty, he
appealed to the issue of church and state as one “which for centuries has produced the
greatest prejudice and caused needless wars with all their attendant miseries.”106
Invoking “slippery slope” logic, he argued that religious instruction in public schools was
tantamount to opening “Pandora’s Box” when it came to church and state separation:
“Absolute freedom of religious exercise cannot be maintained, if any religious teaching is
permitted in the public schools by the state.”107
Rather than teaching religion to promote good citizenship, Wolf suggested that
teaching civics lessons were sufficient. “It has become general in the public schools to
teach certain subjects under the combined name of civics, which are intended to instruct
the future citizen in his duty to the State, and this form of study ought to be allsufficient.”108 (“Civics” in the 1890s included such varied approaches as pledging
allegiance to the American flag, singing of the national anthem, memorization of the US
Constitution, observation of holidays such as Presidents’ Day, or receiving small
American flags as rewards for good behavior.)109 Wolf cited the 1890s “School City”
105 Wolf, “The Bible in Public Schools,” [1893] in Selected Addresses, 177
106 Wolf, “The Bible in Public Schools,” [1893] in Selected Addresses, 178.
107 Ibid., 185.
108 Ibid., 186.
109 The National Educators Association (NEA) first proposed civics courses be offered in public schools in
1888 to promote patriotism and citizenship. See Mary Ruth, “The Specific Means of Training for
187
project in some urban school systems, which sought to promote citizenship skills among
students by developing student government organizations.110 Patriotism, not religion,
was the common ground that all American citizens could agree on, making it appropriate
for public school curriculum.111 Wolf’s valorization of secular patriotism, and the kind of
pseudo-religious civics rituals that public schools practiced in the 1890s, fits the pattern
of Robert Bellah’s definition of a civil religion: it is a “religion” that exists outside of
church religion, one that grew out American historical experience, and includes sacred
texts (like the Constitution), places (battlefields), and rituals (national holidays). It is not
the worship of America, but “an understanding of the American experience in the light of
ultimate and universal reality.”112
The civil religion Wolf promoted as a matter of practical expediency in public
schools in 1905 was one that had been evident in his “Influence of Jews on the Progress
of the World” (1888) and “Day of Atonement” (1897) lectures, the first delivered to Jews
and non-Jews and the latter delivered exclusively to Jews in a synagogue address. In
these speeches, his soaring rhetoric indicates the transcendent values he ascribed to
American symbols, rather than the reality of the American society and government.
Discrimination against Jews and immigrants, which Wolf had fought against for decades
in Washington, were notably absent from his descriptions of American symbols. The
Statue of Liberty “welcoming the immigrant at the gate of the noble Bay in the city of
New York is typical and emblematic of the spirit that prevails throughout our land.”113
Citizenship in the Secularized Schools of the United States,” Catholic Educational Review 14 (November
1917): 304-326.
110 Wolf, “The Bible in Public Schools,” [1905] in Selected Addresses,189. Mary Ruth, “The Specific
Means of Training for Citizenship in the Secularized Schools of the United States,” 314-5.
111 Wolf, The Bible in Public Schools, [1905] in Selected Addresses,189.
112 Robert N. Bellah, “Civil Religion in America,” Daedalus, Journal of the American Academy of Arts
and Sciences, 96:1 (Winter 1967), 19.
113 Wolf, “Day of Atonement Address,” [1897] in Selected Addresses, 250.
188
The Jew who became indifferent toward his country was “a renegade to the flag, whose
broad folds shelter and protect him in the freedom of his conscience.”114 He included in
the speech a descriptive report of English-language schools for Jewish immigrants in
several cities along the eastern seaboard:
The primary intention in establishing the school was the Americanize these
foreign Jews. American flags are to be found upon the walls of every class room.
The Constitution of the United States and the Declaration of Independence have
been translated in parallel columns in Hebrew, Jargon [Yiddish], and German, in
order that they may fully understand every word, and it is used as a daily textbook in the schools. Patriotic songs are sung for the children, and on the 4th of
July, the children recite the following pledge, entitled ‘Allegiance to the Flag:’ I
pledge allegiance to my flag, to the Republic for which it stands, one nation
indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. We give our heads and hearts for our
country, one country, one language, one flag.115
His emphasis on civil religion in educating immigrants was reiterated in his testimony to
the industrial commission on immigration in 1901, when he noted that in Jewish
charitable schools for Russian-Jewish immigrants “on every desk of the children there is
a tiny United States flag”116 He also cited the school’s attention to singing patriotic songs
and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance on the Fourth of July.117
Moreover, Wolf’s writings to his fellow religionists frequently imbued patriotic
symbols with Jewish religious meaning. He referred to America as “our Palestine,”118 and
the “Jerusalem of the Prophets.”119 Teaching America’s history of religious liberty to the
“younger generation” was of utmost importance: “Let us never forget, but rather, as our
114 Wolf, “Day of Atonement Address,” [1897] in Selected Addresses, 257. See also, for example, Wolf,
The Presidents I Have Known, 35.
115 Wolf, “Day of Atonement Address,” [1897] in Selected Addresses, 251-2.
116 “Testimony of Simon Wolf Before the United States Industrial Commission,” [1901] in Selected
Addresses, 247.
117 Wolf, “Day of Atonement Address,” [1893] in Selected Addresses, 250..
118 Wolf, “The Influence of the Jews on the Progress of the World,” [1888] in Selected Addresses, 74.
119 Ibid., 44.
189
ancestors taught us to do, impress it upon our wrists, foreheads, and inscribe it upon the
doorposts of our houses, what this government of the people, by the people, and for the
people, has done in the cause of progress and tolerance.”120 Thus, he Americanized the
imagery of tefillin or phylactaries, boxes containing verses from the Torah121 which
orthodox Jews bound to their heads or arms to remind them of their primary spiritual
purpose in life, and to remember to exodus from Egypt (Exodus 13:9, 16; Deuteronomy
6:8, 11:18). He related American history to central aspects of Jewish experience
contained in the Torah.
Wolf also used Biblical rhetoric to heighten the spiritual importance of the
separation of church and state. He referred to it as the “principle upon which the temple
of American liberty has been built.”122 He suggested that those who advocated Sunday
laws were “throwing a firebrand into the holy of holies of American institutions” evoking
images of the burning of the Jewish temple by Rome in 70 CE. He also referred to
America as God’s “favored nation.”123 He asserted that the “spirit of enlightenment”
began when “the tablets of law were given at Sinai, and found its truest political
interpretation and greatest promise of perpetuity on the 4th of July, 1776.”124 He even
spoke of America as the Messiah.
Indeed, from my standpoint, the Messiah has come: the Messiah of good
fellowship, of kindness, of equality, of kinship among nations, and soul-life
among individuals, the Messiah of affinities and human achievements, so that
what happens in one country, reproduces itself in others. The spirit of liberty has
120 Wolf, “Patriotism and Religion,” [1897] in Selected Addresses, 240.
121 The first five books of the Bible – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy – detailing the
origin of the world, the origin of Israelites, the Mosaic law, and the exodus from slavery in Egypt into the
“promised land” of Palestine.
122 Wolf, “Church and State,” [1893] in Selected Addresses, 156.
123 Ibid., 173
124 Wolf, “Patriotism and Religion,” [1897] in Selected Addresses 243.
190
been wafted from this country into other lands and the political recognition and
equality of the Jew in this country has had an important influence, and has
operated as a factor throughout the world.125
The universalism of Wolf’s Judaism is evident in this passage also, as he noted the
spreading of the doctrines of religious liberty throughout the world.
One of the terms Wolf frequently used in Presidents I Have Known to describe
presidents, various officials, or writers was “Americanism,” or conversely, “unAmericanism.” His articulation of Americanism bore a striking resemblance to the civil
religion Rousseau promoted in The Social Contract (1762). It required devotion to the
social contract, the idea that government exists to protect the rights of its people in
exchange for citizenship duties, and the practice of tolerance towards others. Wolf
described Americanism variously as a liberal and broadminded love of country –
overlooking differences in politics, avoiding sectarianism – in essence, that one who was
truly loyal to America protected freedom of expression and religion.126 For Jews to
which he applied the term, he meant those who had served their country loyally in times
of war.127 In the one case in which he used the term “un-Americanism” it was in regard
to a writer who saw no need for the United States to be concerned with the pogroms in
Russia.128 For Wolf, one test of “true” Americanism was how people treated Jews.
Wolf appealed to both the historical experience of Jews and general American
history in advocating for religious liberty. The dangers that he saw were not so much for
the present, but for America’s future. Since religious liberty had led to political liberty,
in the liberal narrative, an extrapolation of this principle posited that that restricting
religious liberty would lead to political repression. American Jews had a particular
125 Wolf, “Patriotism and Religion,” [1897] in Selected Addresses 245-6
126 Wolf, Presidents I have Known, 133, 137, 222, 233, 229, 273.
127 Ibid., 35, 169.
128 Ibid., 87.
191
responsibility, given their persecuted past, to ensure that this did not occur. Wolf’s
separation of political and social threats to liberty in America from his unflagging
devotion to transcendent American ideals and institutions, made advocacy appear
worthwhile. Wolf did not just fight against discrimination; he hoped to inspire other
Jews to do the same.
Jews in Eastern Europe and Russia
From 1870 through the early 20th century, Wolf’s political advocacy focused
primarily on four concurrent and interrelated international issues. First, Jews in Eastern
European countries and Russia were experiencing persecution. Second, Russia refused to
recognize the passports of American Jews. Third, Jewish and other immigrants from
Eastern European countries and Russia flooded into the United States, which raised
concerns in the public sphere about “undesirable” immigrants. Fourth, the US
Immigration Bureau created a “List of Races and Peoples” in 1898 by which to classify
races entering America. In addition to his meetings and correspondence with Presidents
and other elected officials over these issues, Wolf communicated frequently with the
State Department and the Bureau of Immigration.129 He urged US officials to pressure
other countries to respect the rights of their citizens, and to defend the rights of American
citizens when they faced religious discrimination abroad. Religious exceptionalism was
central to his advocacy for Jewish immigration: American Jews ensured that Jewish
immigrants would not be a burden on the state, and Jewish immigrants were of a better
sort than others. He was also adamantly opposed to racial categorization of incoming
Jews. Although he acknowledged some acceptance of a Jewish race in a “scientific”
sense in two instances, Wolf held the line that Jews were a religious not a racial group,
yet inconsistencies crept into his arguments. In most of Wolf’s writings and speeches,
129 Panitz, Simon Wolf, 79.
192
though he explicitly defined Jews by religion, he implicitly defined them by culture. But
arguing that Jewish people constituted a “culture” was simply not an option in the first
decade of the twentieth century. Culture was considered part of race. The explicitly
racialist approach by social scientists and government officials to immigration compelled
Wolf to resist Jewish racial classification at all costs.
At the beginning of Grant’s presidency, Romania had the worst anti-Semitic laws
in Europe.130 In 1870, at Wolf’s request, President Grant appointed an American-Jewish
ambassador to Romania named Benjamin Peixotto.131 Although there was little that
Peixotto could do to counteract the policies of Romania, as the US was had no treaty or
trade agreement leverage, his appointment was an important symbolic victory for
American Jews.132
Ten years after Peixotto’s appointment, Russia eclipsed Romania’s maltreatment
of Jews by a series of unofficial and official acts of violence. After Tsar Alexander II’s
assassination in 1881 was rumored to be the result of a Jewish plot, pogroms erupted in
hundreds of villages and towns in Russia, and Jews who could began to leave in large
numbers. In 1882, popular violence turned into institutional repression as Russia enacted
new laws restricting Jews from living in the countryside. Russian Jews began to flee the
country in unprecedented numbers. The United States received the majority of these
immigrants; almost 200,000 Russian Jews arrived in America during the 1880s.133
American Jewish leaders followed the situation in Russia closely, and those with political
130 Harry Simonhoff, Saga of American Jewry, 1865-1914: Link of an Endless Chain (New York: Arco
Publishing, 1959), 44.
131 Barbara Fink, Defending the Rights of Others: The Great Powers, the Jews, and International Minority
Protection, 1878-1938 (Cambridge: Oxford University Press, 2004), 16.
132 Wolf, “The Influence of Jews on the Progress of the World,” [1888] in Selected Addresses, 41-5;
Presidents I have Known, 184.
133 Bernard D. Weinryb, “East European Immigration to the United States,” The Jewish Quarterly Review
(1955) 45:4, 518-519.
193
ties, such as Wolf, endeavored to influence the US to pressure Russia to change its
policies.
Additionally, Russia started refusing to recognize the passports of JewishAmericans. While some, including James G. Blaine while secretary of state in 1892,
alleged that these acts violated the Russian-American Treaty of 1832, the State
Department refused to pressure Russia on this issue for fear of jeopardizing trade
relations.134 Wolf asked President McKinley on several occasions (1897-1901) to press
the passport issue further. However, nothing was done.135 When Theodore Roosevelt
took office, Wolf continued his efforts to address the Russian passport issue.
In April of 1903 a brutal pogrom occurred in Kishinev, a Ukrainian city with a
large Jewish population. According to some figures, 45 were killed, about 600 injured,
and 10,000 Jews left homeless. Officials in Russia only responded after two days of
rioting, leading many in other countries to think that the Russian government implicitly
supported the pogroms.136 Although pogroms were nothing new, Kishinev galvanized
American public opinion against the Russian government. The incident became
engrained in the popular imagination through newspaper and magazine reports, a play
based on the events, and organized efforts to provide aid to the victims.137
In June of 1903, Wolf urged the President of B’Nai B’Rith, Leo N. Levi, to
convene a meeting of the Executive Committee in Washington, while he arranged for
them to meet with the President and the Secretary of State to petition for intervention in
Russia. President Roosevelt and Secretary John Hay subsequently met with them, and
134 “American Jews in Russia,” New York Times, (May 19, 1882), 4.
135 Wolf, Presidents I Have Known, 174.
136 Taylor Stultz, “Roosevelt, Russian Persecution of Jews, and American Public Opinion.” Jewish Social
Studies, 33:1 (Jan 1971), 14-15.
137 Ibid., 15-16.
194
expressed their concern over the issue.138 Wolf and Levi drafted a petition to send to the
Tsar requesting an official response to the tragedy. They asked that he declare “that none
shall suffer in person, property, liberty, honor or life, because of his religious belief; that
the humblest subject or citizen may worship according to the dictates of his own
conscience, and that Government, whatever its form or agencies, must safeguard these
rights and immunities by the exercise of all its powers.”139 The petition included several
thousand signatories. The Russian government, however, refused to receive the petition.
Wolf and Levi then set out to obtain more petitions to present to Washington in hopes of
an official diplomatic response to the issue. They gathered almost 13,000 signatures and
petitions from various groups in the US, which they sent to Secretary Hay, with hopes
that it would either be forwarded to Russia or placed in the archives of the State
department. The latter was its destination. A New York Times article explained that the
petition would remain in the State Department as “documentary” evidence of the outrage
felt by the American public over the incident; “the President and Secretary Hay agree that
the better course” was to have the American diplomat convey such concerns to the
Russian Foreign Office rather than to directly address the Tsar by petition.140
In the fall of 1903, Wolf returned to the Russian passport issue. In July of 1903,
Russia had limited the passports of all Americans, allowing visas to be obtained only in
the cities of Washington, New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, excluding about half a
dozen other American cities. The New York Times suggested that Russia’s policy was in
response to “expressions of disapproval by the American people of the treatment of the
138 Alan J. Ward has assessed the pressure that Jewish organized placed on President Roosevelt in his
dealings with Russia as considerable: “Immigrant Minority ‘Diplomacy’: American Jews and Russia, 19011912,” Bulletin. British Association for American Studies 9 (Dec. 1964), 9.
139 Wolf, Presidents I Have Known, 206.
140 “Kishineff Petition May Never Be Sent,” New York Times (July 13, 1903).
195
Jews at Kishineff.”141 Perhaps Wolf saw this as an opportunity to gain additional state
support for the passport issue. In November of 1903, the Board of Delegates on Civil and
Religious Rights (of which Wolf was Chairman) met to draw up an official request, and
Wolf subsequently arranged a meeting for himself and several other Jewish leaders with
President Roosevelt. They expressed their view that American citizens’ passports should
be recognized regardless of religious affiliation and both the President and Secretary of
State Hay expressed their sympathy and support.142
Over the next year, the Russian passport issue became a national issue. In
December of 1904, President Roosevelt publicly denounced Russia’s refusal to grant
passports to Jewish-Americans, shocking foreign diplomats by his audacity, according to
the New York Times.143 In 1904 and 1908 both Republican and Democratic Parties
denounced the Russian passport issue in their platforms. In 1909 Congress proposed a
resolution to renegotiate the Treaty of 1832 that did not pass. In February of 1911 Wolf
and other Jewish leaders, including Louis Marshall and Jacob Schiff from the American
Jewish Committee,144 met with President Taft who unswervingly declared his intention to
avoid further confrontation with Russia. The American Jewish Committee turned their
attention toward Congress, and gained the additional support of the American Federation
of Churches and the American Federation of Labor on the issue by the fall of 1911.145 A
proposed abrogation resolution passed Congress in 1911 and the treaty was abrogated in
141 “Russian Step Directed Against American Jews,” Special to the New York Times (July 30, 1903), 1.
142 Wolf, Presidents I Have Known, 264-5.
143 “President’s Criticism May Offend Russia: His Comments on Jewish Passport Issue Amaze
Diplomats,” Special to the New York Times (Dec. 7 1904), 1.
144 An organization formed under the leadership of Jacob H. Schiff and Louis Marshall in the US in 1906
in response to Russian pogroms to advocate for the international welfare of Jews
145 Ann E. Healy, “Tsarist Anti-Semitism and Russian-American Relations,” Slavic Review 42:3 (Autumn
1983), 421.
196
1912.146 The resolution, as originally written by Representative William Sulzer (New
York), read (in part):
That the people of the United States assert as a fundamental principle that the
rights of its citizens shall not be impaired at home or abroad because of race or
religion; that the government of the United States concludes its treaties for the
equal protection of all classes of its citizens, without regard to race or religion;
that the Government of the United States will not be a party to any treaty which
discriminates, or which by one of the parties thereto is so construed as to
discriminate between American citizens on the ground of race or religion.147
The House passed this strident affirmation of religious and racial equality by a vote of
300 to 1, yet was opposed by the President and the majority of the Senate. Senator Henry
Cabot Lodge drafted a substitute which stated vaguely that constructions of the treaty
were impossible to uphold, given that the two countries “differed upon matters of
fundamental importance and interest to each.”148 While the President and Senate claimed
that the more delicately worded resolution would “avoid more disagreeable action,” and
American Jews celebrated a victory, one New York journalist cried foul. To George W.
Blake, the evident purpose of the amendment was to “avoid much trouble in the future for
gentlemen of Senatorial and Presidential size who never cross race lines except when
angling for race votes.”149 Wolf simply welcomed Taft’s begrudging assent to
abrogation, and B’nai B’rith presented the President with a gold medal for his support.
Wolf characterized the Russian treatment of Jews as an object lesson regarding
separation of church and state. Previously he had designated religious liberty and
separation of church of state as the foundation of freedom; in the case of Russia he
predicted that their violations of Jewish rights spelled their doom as a free society.
146 Although a new treaty was never agreed upon, the United States resumed trade during World War I
until the Bolshevik Revolution began in 1916. See Healy, “Tsarist Anti-Semitism and Russian-American
Relations,” 408-425.
147 George W. Blake, ed., Sulzer’s Short Speeches (New York: J. S. Ogilvie Publishing Co., 1912), 202.
148 Congressional Record, 62nd Congress, 2nd Session, (December 20, 1912), 559.
149 Black, Sulzer’s Short Speeches, 204.
197
Writing in 1918, he suggested that “The present condition in Russia proves conclusively
that church and government cannot be combined.” In light of the Russian Revolution,
Wolf claimed that Kishinev “marked an epoch… Since then the country has known
nothing save misfortune.”150
American outcry against the Russian Passport issue coincided paradoxically with
increased racial discrimination within its borders, evident in the Chinese Exclusion Acts
and Jim Crow laws. Moreover, a new racial critique of immigration began in the 1890s.
In 1894, secretary of state Walter Quinton Greshem decried Russia’s policy toward Jews
as “forcing upon us large numbers of degraded and undesirable persons.”151 Beneath the
veneer of United States officials’ concern for Russian Jews were also fears about the
impact of Jewish immigrants on American society. Additionally, labor leaders like
Samuel Gompers and Terence Powderly argued that the flood of immigrants depressed
wages. Finally, even American Jews worried that the language, culture, and poverty of
Russian Jews would damage Americans’ perceptions of all Jews; Wolf suggested that
American Jews were more subject to anti-Semitism in this regard than Christians.152
Restricted civil rights, pogroms, expulsions, economic downturns, as well as
exaggerated rumors of Jewish organizational support for immigration and opportunities
abroad led to vast migrations of Jews out of Russia, Romania, and Austria-Hungary from
1870 to the First World War.153 While approximately 40,000 Jews immigrated to the
United States in the 1870s, that number rose to 186,589 in the 1880s; 279,811 in the
1890s; and 467,266 in the 1900s. The peak year was 1906 in which 152,491 Jews
150 Black, Sulzer’s Short Speeches, 204.
151 US Department of State, Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, 1894, 535;
Healy, “Tsarist Anti-Semitism and Russian-American Relations,” 409.
152 Wolf, “The Jew as a Factor in the Development of the United States,” [1906] in Selected Addresses,
198.
153 Weinryb, “Eastern European Immigration to the United States,”517.
198
entered the US. A demographic shift in immigration from northern and western Europe to
southern and eastern regions included unprecedented numbers of Italians, Slavs,
Hungarians, and Greeks, as well as Jews. Ethnically and religiously different (Catholic
and Jewish), and tending to stay in cities on the Eastern seaboard, the new immigrants
were viewed by many Americans as an economic and social threat. Social scientists
frequently distinguished the newcomers racially in biological or evolutionary terms from
America’s previous immigrants. Ideas of social Darwinism and eugenics legitimized
popular racism and discrimination in America, and seemed to explain the vexing
problems of urbanization that the nation faced.154
Wolf maintained a high profile in Washington regarding immigration issues
beginning in the 1890s. Charles Nagle, Secretary of Commerce and Labor (which
oversaw immigration), stated “Mr. Simon Wolf is in Washington and keeps a pretty close
watch on us. If we ever miss him, we think the world is going to stop. I frequently
inquire about eleven o’clock, ‘Has Wolf been here?’”155 Wolf’s involvement was not
limited to Jewish immigrant issues. He offered testimony to a board of inquiry appointed
by President Roosevelt in 1902 to investigate conditions and policies at Ellis Island.156
He also opposed the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the first immigration law in the
United States that barred a specific race or nationality. 157 Both the Republican and
Democratic parties supported restrictions on Chinese immigration; although there was
154 Daniel J. Tichenor, Dividing Lines: the Politics of Immigration Control in America, (Princeton
University Press, 2002), 78-80.
155 Otto Heller, ed., Charles Nagle: Speeches and Writings, 1900-1928, (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons,
1931), 151.
156 Wolf, Presidents I Have Known, 267.
157 Henry S. Cohn and Harvey Gee, “NO, NO, NO, NO!”: Three Sons of Connecticut Who Opposed the
Chinese Exclusion Acts,” Connecticut Public Interest Law Journal 3 (2003), 2.
199
some national opposition to the legislation, it was a very small minority.158 In 1902, when
the law was up for renewal Wolf appeared before the Senate Committee, and in his
words, “made a lengthy argument against such drastic and unjust legislation.”159 Mary
Roberts Coolidge, a sociologist at Stanford, wrote a book called Chinese Immigration
(1909) in which she summarized Wolf’s testimony: the immigration law was
discriminative, offensive, and unnecessary; moreover, the law was “contrary to the spirit
of American institutions and to the spirit of the age, for the period of exclusiveness was
past.”160
Because of the condition of Jews in countries in Europe and the issue of
immigration in the US, Wolf spoke with President Harrison in 1892, “outlining his
views” and the President suggested he draft his concerns in a letter to Secretary of the
Treasury Charles Foster.161 The gist of Wolf’s letter was that, while many of the Jewish
immigrants were in desperate situations, the support of private charities was sufficient to
provide for them. In 10 years of immigration, he claimed that not one had become a
“public burden.”162 Thus, he maintained that Jewish immigrants were protected from
exclusion by the 1882 Immigration law barring immigrants who were paupers, or likely
to become public charges.163
In addition to barring immigrants who were poor or unable to support themselves,
immigration laws attempted to prevent persons who were ill, disabled, criminals, or
158 Cohn and Gee, “NO, NO, NO, NO!”: Three Sons of Connecticut Who Opposed the Chinese Exclusion
Acts,” 4.
159 Wolf, Presidents I Have Known, 285.
160 Mary Roberts Coolidge, Chinese Immigration (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1909), 247.
161 The Treasury Department oversaw immigration.
162 Wolf, Presidents I Have Known, 159.
163 Ibid.
200
contract laborers from entering the country. In the 1890s, race became an additional and
prominent mode for discussing and justifying immigration restriction. However, race
was a term that eluded strict definitions, and laws that referenced race were no exception.
The Naturalization Act of 1790 which restricted naturalization to “free white persons”
was revised in 1870 to include “those of African origins,” by which was meant “blacks,”
but the law was phrased in geographical terms. Congress banned the naturalization of
Chinese in 1882, but did not explain whether “Chinese” meant race or nationality.
Because naturalization was a judicial function, the courts decided who was a white
person, an alien of African descent, or Chinese. The Basic Naturalization Act of 1906
created the U.S. Naturalization Service to promote uniform standards. While
naturalization officials tried to determine whether race meant color or nationality, they
encountered an additional use of the term in immigration records. In 1898, Ellis Island
officials created a “List of Races or Peoples” to classify arrivals. The policy explicitly
denied that it designated race in an “ethnological”164 sense – it was simply supposed to be
a way of grouping “people who maintain recognized communities.” They used the term
“race” as we might use the term “ethnicity” today. In practice, immigration officials
varied widely in their application of racial categories as well.165
The list proved popular with government officials. In 1901 the Industrial
Commission on Immigration and Education reported “The most important improvement
since 1893 in the method of compiling statistics of immigration was introduced in 1899,
when instead of the preceding classification of immigrants according to the countries or
political divisions from which they came, they were classified according to the races to
which they belonged…For example it appeared that, in 1898, 40,000 Russians came to
164 The nineteenth century term for the “scientific” study of race.
165 Marian L. Smith, “Race, Nationality, and Reality: IND Administration of Racial Provision in U. S.
Immigration and nationality Law Since 1898, Part 1” Prologue (34:2 (Summer 2002).
201
the United States, whereas the great majority of these were Poles or Jews, probably not
over 200 being actually Russians.”166 As the value of the findings was expressed in terms
of accurately counting Jews specifically, and paired them with Polish immigrants –
popularly viewed as “undesirables” – some American Jews, with Wolf leading the way,
resisted the classification system.
In 1901, Wolf testified before the US Industrial Commission on Immigration. He
asserted that America was built upon immigration, that Jewish immigrants were not a
burden due to private charities, and that Jewish immigrants were being properly
assimilated, or Americanized, by these institutions. As an example, he appealed to the
experience of German-Jewish immigrants, who immigrated to America in large numbers
during and after the revolution of 1848. They considered themselves “assimilated,” and
as the largest portion of Reformed Jews claimed their only difference from other
Americans was “denominational.” He noted that, far from being “dependent,” these
immigrants “have since become some of the foremost citizens of our country, active in
war as well as peace.”167 Wolf himself immigrated to the United States during 1848,
with his grandparents, and though they brought “scarcely $5” with them, they were taken
in by a relative who had immigrated some years before.168 He modestly commented that
he did not mean to suggest that the US had benefited in any great way by his arrival, “but
I am sure it has not lost anything.”169
When asked whether the 1900 Census indicated the current number of Jews living
in America, Wolf took the opportunity to assert that Jews were a religious rather than a
166 Patrick Weil, “Races at the Gate,” Georgetown Immigration Law Journal 15 (2001-2), 631-2.
Industrial Commission Report XV, ix.
167 “Testimony of Simon Wolf Before the United States Industrial Commission,” [1901] in Selected
Addresses, 248; regarding his own immigration, see 229-230
168 Ibid.
169 Ibid.
202
racial group. He noted that their numbers were recorded by congregations, but not the
Census. He did offer that, according to congregational records, there were about 800,000
Jews currently living in the United States. The 1900 Census, in fact, only distinguished
between white, black, mixed-race blacks, Chinese, Japanese, and Indian, leaving
American Jews with the happy result of being counted as white.170 Wolf also mentioned
a previous meeting with Terrance Powderly, US Commissioner General of Immigration
(1897-1902), over the issue of race and immigration, and stated, regarding immigrants:
“People come in as Austrians, Italians, Germans, Greeks, and not as Catholics or
Protestants. The religious proclivities of the individual is no concern of the United
States.”171 Noting the national origins of immigrants in this case, he either ignored or
was unaware of the fact that the immigration office was classifying immigrants by race.
Despite Wolf’s apparent rejection of religious and racial categories of immigrants,
he described Jewish immigrants as “desirable,” clearly distinguishing them from “other”
immigrants at the time. He cited a New York Sun editorial that compared Jewish laborers
during a labor dispute favorably to other immigrant workers, because Jews “withdraw
from all the deliberations and from the vicinity of their shops to their places of worship
[when the Sabbath begins Friday evening], and are always law-abiding and orderly,
showing a high degree of moral and religious instinct which the others never do.”172
When asked how Jewish people compared to Italians and other immigrants in a particular
part of New York City, Wolf declared that they were superior: “the Jews of that section
170 The 1900 Census question on race directed respondents to the following options: “White,” “Black,”
“Mulatto,” “Quadroon,” “Octoroon,” “Chinese,” “Japanese,” or “Indian.” See “Index of Questions,”
History, U.S. Census Bureau,
http://www.census.gov/history/www/through_the_decades/index_of_questions/1890_1.html
171 “Testimony of Simon Wolf Before the United States Industrial Commission,” [1901] in Selected
Addresses, 249.
172 Ibid., 251.
203
are of a far higher grade of manhood and intelligence.”173 Thus, Wolf’s defense of
Jewish immigrants described qualities that were related to their religion, but also
mentioned cultural and even possibly “racial” traits.
Wolf also asserted the superiority of Jewish immigrants to those of the “white”
races. The commission asked Wolf whether Jewish people were “as competitive among
themselves as the Aryan race?”174 To this, he responded that among the Russian-Jewish
immigrants “there is far more mutual help and charity… than among those of other faiths,
but there is also a keener and more searching competition. The Jew is innately
individualistic, optimistic, and ambitious.” Not only did Wolf claim that Jews were more
competitive than “Whites,” but they were also more community-oriented. They appear as
ideal citizens who will be both productive and virtuous. Moreover, Wolf’s
characterization of “innate” – as opposed to acquired – qualities of Jews imply a racial
understanding of Jewishness.
As part of the Immigration Act of 1903, Congress approved the Immigration
Bureau’s racial classification system. Wolf had thought that the racial classification
system had been abandoned after his conversation with Powderly fours year prior. When
he learned of its continued use and institutionalization, he spoke first with Frank P.
Sargent, the Commissioner-General of Immigration, who referred him to George B.
Cortelyou, Secretary of the Department of Commerce and Labor. In his letter to the
Secretary, Wolf objected to the policy on several grounds. First, he claimed that Jewish
immigrants had no nationality other than that of the nation they were born in.
Furthermore, he claimed to have no problem with designating Jews as a race if the same
“ethnological” criteria and statistics were gathered on all entering peoples equally.
173 “Testimony of Simon Wolf Before the United States Industrial Commission,” [1901] in Selected
Addresses, 251.
174 Ibid.
204
However, he did object to labeling the religion of entering immigrants “as it is contrary to
the spirit and genius of our institutions, and the Government is assuming functions that
were never contemplated in the Constitution of the United States; the administrative
functions are political and not religious.”175
Wolf included with his letter to Secretary Cortelyou a collection of letters from
Jewish leaders who he had written to on the subject of a Jewish race. As Wolf tried to
rally Jewish opposition to the list he inadvertently unearthed the wide variety of views
and significance of the issue of race among Jewish leaders. The letters responded in a
variety of ways, but only a few answered the question of Jewish racial identity directly.
One of the respondents suggested that Wolf warn the Immigration office that in
addressing Jewish race it had undertaken “one of the most vexing questions of
controversy among Jews.”176 Another suggested the policy was simply impractical
because classifying immigrants by their “ethnology would entail upon itself a pretty long
genealogy of every immigrant.”177 Some of those he canvassed saw Jews as
“caucasian,”178 others as a “mixed” race. Two saw no harm in counting Jews as a “race,”
though Wolf noted that these two were Zionists – a movement founded in the latenineteenth century by secular Jews who responded to anti-Semitism in Europe and Russia
with a call for Jews to return to political independence in Palestine.179 On the issue of
Jewish nationalism, two others claimed that Jews had no separate national identity than
country of origin. 180 Others expressed their concern that Jews not be singled out for
175 Wolf, Presidents I have Known, 240-241.
176 Ibid., 244
177 Ibid., 247
178 Ibid., 242
179 Ibid., 241
180 Ibid., 248, 250-251
205
designation, whether it be religious or ethnological, and asked whether Jews who had
converted to Christianity would be counted as Jews.181 If Wolf had hoped that Jewish
leaders would unite in denouncing Jewish racial identity, he was disappointed.
In 1909, Wolf returned to the issue of racial classification with renewed vigor.
The Union of American Hebrew Congregations, B’nai B’rith, and the American Jewish
Committee joined the cause and a number of rabbis and prominent Jews across the nation
held rallies to protest the issue of racial classification. These activities gained the
attention of the U.S. Immigration Commission, which invited Wolf, Max Kohler, and
Julian Mack to testify on the matter in a special session.182 The United State Immigration
Commission, known as the Dillingham Commission, met between 1907 and 1911, to
determine any negative effects of immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe on the
United States. The Commission was chaired by Senator William Paul Dillingham of
Vermont, and included Senator Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts, along with other
members of Congress, the US Commissioner of Labor, and the Commissioner of
Immigration for California. In 1911, when the commission published their findings, they
concluded that immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe was a significant threat to
American society and recommended restrictions on immigration based on race.183
Senator Lodge, who questioned Wolf, was a strong proponent of immigration
restrictions based on “race.” Having received Harvard’s first doctorate in political
science, and having writing a thesis on Anglo-Saxon law and heritage, he considered
himself a social scientist. His published study of “distribution of ability” of races in
America in the 1890s claimed that Americans of English descent far outpaced other
181 Wolf, Presidents I have Known, 245-7, 249, 250-1.
182 Eric L. Goldstein, The Price of Whiteness: Jews, Race, and American Identity, (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 2006), 105. Max Kohler was a young lawyer who became one of Wolf’s strongest allies,
and Julian Mack was a representative of the American Jewish Committee.
183 Immigration restrictions were ultimately implemented in the 1920s.
206
groups in terms of their positive impact on the nation.184 In the study he stressed the
significance of immigrants who assimilated quickly.
What I think is the most important result of the whole inquiry [is] that the people
who have succeeded in the United States and have produced the ability of the
country are those who became most quickly and most thoroughly Americans.
This is a moral of wide application, and carries a lesson which should never be
forgotten, and which, whenever we meet it, should be laid to heart.185
Immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe were not viewed as those who
“Americanized” quickly. They were not English-speaking, not “white” (in the northern
and Western European sense), and not Protestant (Jewish or Catholic).
Wolf made the case to the Commission that his position, and that of the
organizations he represented, was that Jewishness was a religion and not a race.
Furthermore, he argued that immigrants should be classified by the nation they entered
from – nationality. A central assertion of Jewish “racial” composition had to do with
their tendency to intermarry. Wolf addressed this directly by referring to a recent
rabbinical council in New York186 which declared intermarriage to be an issue of religion
and not race, because “different faiths create domestic disturbance and lead to
acrimonious results.”187 Furthermore, Wolf referenced the fact that Russia classified
Jews by their religion, and that if they converted to Christianity they could be recognized
as citizens “thus confirming all our contention that it is not racial, but religious.”188
Senator Lodge’s response was to inquire whether Benjamin Disraeli was a Jew. Wolf
replied that his conversion did not change the fact that he was “born a Jew; not at all; and
184 Tichenor, Dividing Lines, 80.
185 Henry Cabot Lodge, “The Distribution of Ability in the United States,” The Century Magazine
(September 1891), 694.
186 Goldstein, The Price of Whiteness, 101-2
187 “There is No Jewish Race!” Maccabaean 18:1 (1910), 20.
188 Ibid., 21.
207
I know the Jewish people throughout the world have claimed him [Heinrich] Heine,
[Ludwig] Borne, and others, who were born of their blood as being Jews, when they
speak of persons who have accomplished something wonderful in the world. But they
ceased to be Jews from the standpoint of religion.”189 Wolf’s dismissal of Disraeli,
Heine, and Borne, is strange given that he himself claimed these men as Jews in his
lecture “The Influence of the Jews on the Progress of the World” (1888).
A startling reversal of Wolf’s position on religious labeling of Jews from 1903
was that he claimed to accept religious labeling. Previously, he objected to religious
labeling as being outside of the legitimate sphere of the state, and did not object to racial
classification so long as the criteria were the same for all races. Here he now claimed
that religious labeling was acceptable so long as it applied to everyone: “If you make no
discrimination, we have no objection at all but if you are going to discriminate and mark
the Jew distinctively, we do object.”190 Wolf’s shifting arguments in opposition to the list
from 1903 to 1909 suggest that it was the separate numbering of Jews that he found
objectionable.
Senator Lodge held firmly to the position that the classification system was about
acquiring knowledge of races entering the United States, and that the classification had
nothing to do with religion. Lodge distinguished the racial classification that the
Immigration Bureau used as “historical” rather than “scientific” race categories. The
“scientific” races he listed were five divisions: “the Mongol, the Negro, the North
American Indian, the Aryan, the Semitic.” These divisions, he claimed were not practical
in terms of immigration and “would be of no value whatever;” what he viewed as critical
was to distinguish between “race mixtures” in Europe which had “historically,” if not
“scientifically,” become separate races He similarly proclaimed the fact that the Census
189 “There is No Jewish Race!” 21.
190 Ibid., 23.
208
did not count races made the data “almost valueless.” And, classifying immigrants by
their country of origin would be “useless.”191 The use of the racial classification system
was to track who was entering the country, and how well they assimilated. Such data
could be used to develop a racial quota system to block “undesirable” races from entering
America.
In the aftermath of Wolf’s testimony, he was denounced by Zionists; the
transcript was reprinted in the Zionist magazine the Maccabaean as an example of a wellintentioned but absurd repudiation of race. The article stated it would “welcome a
classification which will enable the Jewish people to prove that they [are] physically,
morally, and spiritually good material for the United States.”192 Many prominent Reform
Jews expressed shock over his complete denial of Jewish race, and Wolf privately
admitted in a letter that he went further than he meant to in denying Jewish race.193 The
American Jewish Committee subsequently withdrew its opposition to the racial
classification system in response to pressure from its members. The Commission failed
to obtain Congressional support for racial restrictions on immigration. Dillingham,
Lodge, and others turned instead to proposing “national” quotas and literacy tests as a
way to limit the entrance of “undesirable” races from Southern and Eastern Europe.
Wolf’s erratic arguments notwithstanding, his opposition to the Commission’s numbering
of Jews was probably warranted, given their racial attitudes and agenda.
Conclusion
Religious liberty was central to Wolf’s writings; he presented Jews as proponents
of religious liberty, and framed anti-Semitic policies as religious persecution. This
191 “There is No Jewish Race!” 26.
192 Ibid., 17.
193 Goldstein, The Price of Whiteness, 107-8.
209
approach portrayed Jews as more “American” than those who discriminated against them.
He was fully aware of forms of discrimination other than religious – racial, cultural,
class, and nativist – as his rhetoric in opposition to slavery and Chinese immigration
restriction, and advocacy for immigrant rights attests. He even accused Americanized
Jews of cultural and class prejudice against immigrant Jews from Eastern Europe and
Russia. His articulation of Jewishness in many instances was broader than religion – it
encompassed cultural elements beyond religious identity. Yet, it was American Jews’
religious identity that provided solid footing for critique and change in American culture
and public policy. While he occasionally acknowledged cultural, class, racial, and
nativist obstacles to Jewish acceptance in America, he doggedly maintained that
discrimination against Jews was due to the fact that they were not Christians, and that
Jewish patriotism and advocacy for religious liberty were essential to effect change.
210
CHAPTER V
“FRIENDLY IDEAS, AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS”: ISAAC SHARPLESS’S
HISTORIES OF AND ADVOCACY FOR PEACE IN AMERICAN POLITICS
In a lecture delivered in 1909, Quaker historian Isaac Sharpless asserted the
lasting importance of the colonial Pennsylvania government for America: “The influence
of Friendly ideas upon American institutions, and especially the experiment of William
Penn, has been great. …of all the colonial founders, William Penn saw more truly than
any other, the line on which the future would develop… when [he] reared a state devoted
to democracy, liberty and peace.”1 In this chapter, I assert that Sharpless’s alternative
narrative of nationalism was primarily constructed around his advocacy for pacifism.
From a historical standpoint, he wished to redirect attention away from Puritan New
England to Quaker Pennsylvania as the cradle of American freedom and democracy,
while asserting that peace politics were inextricably linked to these ideals. In political
terms, he wished to present a model of Quaker involvement in politics that need not entail
compromise on the issues of pacifism. While the colonial Pennsylvania government had
been successful in a number of ways, he challenged his Quaker audience to further
advance the holy experiment in America through the peace testimony.
Sharpless drew upon a number of sources in constructing a Quaker Americanism:
the historical experience of American Quakers, Quaker theology, and widely accepted
American beliefs about democracy and liberty. Weaving these ideas into a progressive
narrative of America, he asserted that Quakers contributed to America’s success in the
past and were essential to its future progress and success. This chapter, then, highlights
how Sharpless’s historical writings placed Quakerism at the center of Americanism. Yet,
it also demonstrates how his historical and political views represented distinctively
Quaker perspectives and needs. For example, current scholars of Quakerism assert that
1 Isaac Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” Lecture delivered at Berkeley, California, 1909, Isaac
Sharpless Papers, Quaker and Special Collections, Haverford College, 8-9.
211
Moderate Quakers plunged into the flood of mainstream evangelicalism during the late
nineteenth century. Indeed, Quaker involvement in popular evangelical and progressive
movements such as temperance, religious education, and First-Day (Sunday) schools
hardly appear unique. Yet, this interpretation overlooks historically distinctive aspects
that the Quaker peace testimony added to Americanism. The issue of pacifism infused
Sharpless’s work and writings. Criticizing the nation at large, and by extension a
significant portion of evangelical religion, he challenged his fellow Quakers to transform
mainstream American national and religious culture.
Sharpless (1848-1920) was born to Quaker parents in Chester County,
Pennsylvania, graduated from Westtown Boarding School in 1867, and then taught there
for four years. Afterwards, he received a degree from the Scientific School of Harvard
University. He taught mathematics and astronomy at Haverford College from 1875-84.
In 1884 he was named Dean of the faculty, and President of the College in 1887, a
position he retained until his retirement in 1917. Sharpless began researching and writing
about Pennsylvania history during his tenure as President at Haverford.2 He wrote The
Quakers in the Revolution (1899), Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History (1900), A
Quaker Experiment in Government: History of Quaker Government in Pennsylvania,
1862-1783 (1902), Quakerism and Government: Essays (1905), coauthored Quakers in
the American Colonies (1911), and also wrote Political Leaders of Provincial
Pennsylvania (1919). His books were hailed by reviewers in historical journals as
“carefully executed,” “fair-minded and straightforward,” “sound, [and] substantial.” One
reviewer warned that “the student of Pennsylvania history cannot safely overlook”
Sharpless’s contributions.3
Sharpless asserted that the history of Pennsylvania Quakers
2 For biographical information, see “Educational Notes,” Friends’ Intelligencer, (April 23, 1887), 17.
3 Howard M. Jenkins, review of A Quaker Experiment in Government, by Isaac Sharpless, American
Historical Review 4:1 (October, 1898), 168; review of A History of Quaker Government in Pennsylvania,
by Isaac Sharpless, in The American Historical Review 5:4 (July, 1900), 769; Reginald C. McGrane, review
of Political Leaders of Provincial Pennsylvania, by Isaac Sharpless, in The Mississippi Valley Historical
212
demonstrated that their “ideas of civil and religious liberty, their treatment of the Indians,
their penal and hospital systems, the large material growth which accompanied their
management, and the general tone of their public life afford a basis of a favorable
judgment upon their experiment.”4 A review in the American Historical Review of
Sharpless’s Quakerism and Government noted that the book urged Quakers to become
more involved in politics, and that “since the publication of this volume, the author has
put his precepts into practice by responding to the call of his fellow citizens to stand for
political office.”5 In addition, Sharpless wrote on topics of education and peace policy,
and contributed many articles to journals such as The Friend and The Friends’
Intelligencer.
The Quaker history of dissent within Protestantism predated their presence in
American colonies. Quakers differed from most Christian traditions in rejecting creeds,
sacraments, and ministers (though in the nineteenth century the more evangelical
branches began to retain pastoral staff).6 Even more striking than these differences in
doctrine and polity was the Quaker belief in the “inner light.” As Hugh and Barbour
state, “For 300 years Friends have sat in outward silence as each person would pray,
meditate, or ‘listen to the Light of God’ within himself or herself and within the group.
Until recently, their only ‘ministry’ rose out of such ‘listening,’ when any member of the
group felt led inwardly to offer a specific message, prayer, or song.”7 According to
Review 7:1 (June, 1920), 81; W. T. Root, review of Political Leaders of Provincial Pennsylvania, by Isaac
Sharpless, in AHR 25:3 (April, 1920), 512.
4 Isaac Sharpless, Political Leaders of Provincial Pennsylvania, (New York: The Macmillan Company,
1919), vii.
5 Herman V. Ames, review of Isaac Sharpless, Quakerism and Government: Essays (1905), American
Historical Review v12 n1 (October 1906), 148-9.
6 Hugh Barbour and J. William Frost, The Quakers: Denominations In America, n3 (New York:
Greenwood Press, 1988), 4.
7 Ibid., 4.
213
Hamm, the most distinctive ideological aspect of Quakerism that set it apart from
evangelicalism in the early nineteenth century is what scholars term “quietism,” “a life of
meditation and reflection, focusing on the experience of the immediate working of the
Holy Spirit on the soul.”8 For Friends, the critical religious experience was growth in
faith, while evangelicals placed much more emphasis on the “new birth” conversion
experience. Moreover, in contrast to many denominations’ exclusivity, they believed that
the “church” was a universal body of believers, referring to themselves simply as the
Society of Friends.
Despite the many differences that Quakers perceived between themselves and the
larger cultural mainstream of America, Sharpless belonged to a faction of Quakers that
were becoming more similar to evangelical Protestants in the late-nineteenth century. In
the 1820s, American Quaker minister Elias Hicks had initiated a schism by questioning
the historical authenticity of the Bible and of Christ. Many Friends followed his
teachings and became known as Hicksites. Other conservative Friends called Wilburites,
after their leader John Wilbur, developed as a new sect that emphasized strict historical
Quakerism in the 1830s. Some Orthodox Friends, however, began to move in a more
evangelical direction. Within the Orthodox Friends movement, the emphasis on
evangelicalism culminated in additional discord in 1870 resulting in three factions: those
involved in a Wesleyan-style holiness movement, those who were moderate, and those
who were conservative.9 Isaac Sharpless was associated with this moderate group.10 One
of the important differences between Quakers involved in the holiness movement and
those who were moderate lay in their views of the millennium. Moderates rejected
8 Thomas D. Hamm, The Transformation of American Quakerism: Orthodox Friends, 1800-1907
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988), 2.
9 Hamm, The Transformation of American Quakerism, xiv-xv.
10 Ibid., 112.
214
“catastrophic” millennialist teachings, and engaged in reform efforts similar to many
other evangelical “progressivist” millennialists, such as Prohibition.11 Within debates
among other Protestants regarding issues of modernism and fundamentalism, moderates
sided with liberal modernist evangelicals as well, and Sharpless oversaw the
incorporation of topics such as Biblical criticism into courses at Haverford College.12
Like most moderates, Sharpless identified doctrinally with the Philadelphia
Yearly Meeting, even if he had liberal leanings.
I have always thought that the doctrinal expressions of Philadelphia Y-M [Yearly
Meeting] came nearer to expressing abstract truth than any other body of
expressions I know of, and still think so. But I have felt with an unceasing
intensity for I suppose 20 years past, that these expressions are so perverted in
their application that this perversion is dragging the body down to extinction.13
Despite these criticisms of how the Yearly Meeting applied doctrine, Sharpless was
careful to point out that he did not support initiating a pastoral system or planned
meetings, distinguishing himself from evangelical factions of Quakerism.14 He also
stated that he was not opposed to the Yearly Meeting and was “continually explaining
and defending Phila. [sic] to our students [at Haverford] from elsewhere.”15
Sharpless demonstrated a strong attachment to historical Quakerism. In addition
to asserting the need for expansion in the Philadelphia Society (of Quaker History) by
adding to their archival collection, producing a journal, and holding annual meetings, he
11 Hamm, The Transformation of American Quakerism, 119-120.
12 Ibid., 154.
13 Letter written by Isaac Sharpless to Henry Tatnall Brown, 12-31-1894, Isaac Sharpless Papers, Quaker
and Special Collections, Haverford College. Brown was a Quaker businessman involved in various
philanthropy and reform efforts; later served on the Board of the American Friends’ Service Committee,
see Lester M. Jones, Quakers in Action: Recent Humanitarian and Reform Activities of American Quakers,
(New York: McMillan, 1929), 176-180.
14 Letter written by Sharpless to Henry T. Brown, 5-4-1914, Isaac Sharpless Papers, Quaker and Special
Collections, Haverford College.
15 Ibid.
215
suggested that the importance of these efforts lay in grounding present-day Friends in
historical Quaker principles. He distinguished between Quaker principles, which he saw
as permanent, and methods and applications of those principles which changed with
historical context and understanding. He asserted that the progress of Quakerism
depended on essential historical principles: “If we are to grow in the future as I think we
shall it is well for us to know just what Quakerism stands for. The failure in this respect
and the lack of regard for Historical Quakerism has largely caused the divergences which
we now have in the West.”16 His view of the importance of Quaker history addresses his
emphasis on progressive reform and also current concerns over schisms within
Quakerism.
Thomas Hamm’s influential study of nineteenth century Quakers argues that the
period demonstrates a “movement from a peculiar orthodoxy to a peculiar
evangelicalism.”17 The introduction, written by Catherine L. Albanese and Stephen J.
Stein,18 characterizes Hamm’s study as illuminating “the process of acculturation,” “the
challenge and opportunity of the religious center, about how people religiously ‘other’
come to identify with the mainstream.”19 According to Hamm, one of the ways in which
Moderates like Sharpless and the Orthodox differed from the holiness strands of
Quakerism was in their articulation of these moves towards evangelicalism. Quaker
efforts at reform, benevolence and politics were based on their “own belief that they were
thus defending primitive Quakerism.”20 Yet, these efforts brought them into closer
16 Letter written by Sharpless to Henry T. Brown, 5-4-1914.
17 Hamm, The Transformation of American Quakerism, 23.
18 Editors of the Religion in America series in which Hamm’s book was published.
19 Hamm, , The Transformation of American Quakerism, x.
20 Ibid., 27.
216
proximity with other evangelicals and highlighted common goals and interests.
According to Hamm, once these links were made, it was impossible for Quakers not to be
influenced by the larger evangelical culture.
This chapter argues, in contrast, that the Quaker position on pacifism,
exhaustively promoted by Sharpless in his historical and political writings, distinguished
Quakers significantly from other evangelical reformers. Peace advocates were outsiders
in late-nineteenth century evangelical culture. Moreover, even within the peace
movement of the late-nineteenth century, the Quaker perspective was distinct. Advocates
of international peace and arbitration frequently exhibited biases of Anglo-Saxon
superiority through “civilization” rhetoric. Moreover, many saw the elimination of war
as a distant goal, not a present imperative.21 In contrast, Sharpless stridently advocated
that war was immoral in all cases, and cited Anglo-Saxon racism and failure to take other
perspectives on justice into account as a major historical cause of injustice and war.
This first section of this chapter examines the major themes that Sharpless
emphasized in his historical writings. It begins by looking at the links he suggested
between Quaker theology and the Pennsylvania government, and the nation at large.
Next, it looks at his assessment of colonial Quaker-Indian relations as an example of the
effectiveness of an absolute policy of peace. In discussing Quaker abolition movements
during the late eighteenth century, he stressed the forward-thinking position of Quakers
on the absolute equality of races at a time when the rest of the nation was embroiled in
the violence of the Revolution. Finally, we look specifically at his assessment of Quaker
peace policies during the Revolution, as a pivotal point in Quaker and American history.
These themes demonstrate that in addition to asserting the centrality of Quakerism to
21 See Cecelie Reid, “Peace and Law: Peace Activism and International arbitration, 1895-1907,” Peace
and Change, 29:4 (July 2004), 527-548.
217
Americanism, Sharpless advocated increased political, historical and religious awareness
of the Quaker idea of peace.
The second section of this chapter focuses on Sharpless’s political views. He
asserted that Quaker withdrawal from politics during the American Revolution
represented a historical aberration that had unfortunately become habit among Quakers.
He asserted that Quakers had never been “non-resistant” and modeled Quaker resistance
through his own involvement in various reform groups. Moral and religious education
were key elements that Sharpless found lacking in public education, creating a serious
problem for the future of America. For one thing, pacifism as a policy could never be
widely embraced as a value until underlying values of critical rather than unthinking
loyalty, service rather than business, and principles rather than practicality were
engrained in citizens’ education. Sharpless appealed to international peace movements as
indicating a progressive future, but maintained firmly convinced that war under any
circumstances was wrong. He also criticized the Anglo-Saxon legacy as one of perceived
superiority that had led to many wars.
Histories of Penn’s Holy Experiment
In his historical narratives regarding Penn’s “holy experiment” in Pennsylvania,
Sharpless highlighted a number of features to assert that the colony was a distinctively
Quaker enterprise with a significant impact in shaping the nation. First, he sought to
demonstrate that Penn’s constitution and political principles were, quite simply,
Quakerism applied to government. Liberty, equality, and democracy were logical public
policy expressions of Quaker doctrine and practice. Moreover, he presented Penn not
only as the founder of the Pennsylvania colony, but of the nation at large. Taking
historiographical exception with accepted narratives of New England as the cradle of
American civilization, he employed comparisons loaded with commentary that New
England’s legacy was one of religious intolerance, unification of church and state, and
218
lagging ideals of democracy. Quoting the eminent contemporary historian George
Bancroft, he appealed to a non-Quaker source to convince his readers of the objective and
historical authenticity of his assertions that the Quaker government in Pennsylvania held
a lasting impact on the form of the United States’ government. These arguments
provided that historical basis for his assertions about the centrality of Quaker values to
American society, the progressiveness of Quaker ideals, and their particular relevance to
turn of the twentieth century political concerns.
For Sharpless, Pennsylvania’s government was a direct result of “the application
of Quakerism to politics and the problems of the state.”22 He explicitly connected
Quaker ideas of religion and polity with civil ideals. The doctrine of the inner light
“reduced to a spiritual level all ranks of birth, sex, fortune or education.”23 Theoretically,
no Quaker held a position of spiritual power, leading to perfect equality and democracy
in spiritual matters. While no ordination separated clergy from laity, there was
recognition that some held spiritual gifts that benefitted others. This system he
characterized as “a spiritual democracy.”24 He contrasted Quaker views of democracy
with the views of authority of other Protestants. “The Quaker called for simplicity and
spirituality of worship, and the breaking down of the distinctions which exalted the clergy
above the laity, and absolute free will in the matter of individual salvation. It taught the
worth of the man.”25 The implication was that Quaker doctrinal views on spiritual
equality differed as much from the Anglican emphasis on clergy and ritual and
Calvinistic predestinarian views, as Penn’s constitution and framework for democratic
government differed from that of England. By appealing to concepts of democracy and
22 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 6-7.
23 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, (Philadelphia: Alfred J. Ferris, 1898), 10
24 Ibid., 10; “Quakerism and Government,” 30-31
25 Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1900), 33.
219
free will in Quakerism, Sharpless argued that Penn provided the model for American
government. “Yet through it all, the basis laid down by Penn stood, and when in 1780 to
1790, this band of scattered states was gathering itself into a nation and painfully picking
up the threads of principles, political and social, with which it would weave its permanent
fabric, it found them not in the dogmatism of Massachusetts, or the aristocracy of
Virginia, but in the civil and religious liberty of Pennsylvania.”26 For Sharpless,
America’s political forms were inherited from Quakers.
One of the aspects of Penn’s government that Sharpless particularly stressed was
its emphasis on religious liberty. According to him, the doctrine of the inner light led to
more tolerance of other beliefs than other religions of the time: “While they [Quakers]
contended that this light would in essential particulars lead all obedient children in
closeness of sympathy and substantial similarity of belief, they recognized the varying
degree of its acceptance by different people, and were willing to leave the uninstructed to
its further operations and the inspired teaching of those who were more fully confirmed
in its counsels.”27 Moreover, the Quaker belief that “Grace was universal” distinguished
them from Calvinists who viewed the “elect” as separate from many erroneous believers
and unbelievers. These beliefs culminated in a “doctrine of human equality [that] was to
them more than a theory; it was a principle to be incorporated with their social and
political institutions, to go to jail for, if need be to die for.”28 According to Sharpless, the
natural result of such principles was democracy, equality and liberty in civil governance.
Crediting the success of the colony in its democratic experiment to William Penn,
Sharpless characterized him as “the noblest character in Pennsylvania’s history.”29
26 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 10.
27 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 116.
28 Ibid., 12.
29 Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, V.
220
Sharpless’s portrayal of William Penn made him a “founding father” not just of
Pennsylvania, but of the nation. Pennsylvania’s religious diversity was an aspect of its
history that Sharpless sought to underline as critical to its successful development of
democracy. Composed of English Quakers, Presbyterians, and simple religions such as
Amish, Mennonite, and Moravian, with a variety of industrial and rural interests, the
colony’s government posed a challenge in uniting these interests.30 Such diversity was
important to Sharpless’s broader argument that this history was not provincial but
national; Penn’s ideas were not Pennsylvanian but American: “The ideal democracy of
Penn is no more the property of his State than of others. When she entered the Union she
threw all her cherished theories, civil and religious liberty, peace, kindness to natives,
penal enlightenment, into the common treasure, and drew therefrom such as she needed
of the contributions of others. We are no longer Pennsylvanians in ideas of government,
but Americans.”31 While Penn’s views of civil and religious liberty were adopted by
America “to a success that seems unlimited,” his ideas of peace had yet to be fully
realized.32 Moreover, regarding racial progress, Penn’s policy of “absolute equity to
Indian and African and Asiatic has gone to the wall, and the nation has lost honor and
advantage.” The inequalities of the reservation system for Indians, and the lack of civil
rights for African-Americans, Asian immigrants and Asian-Americans were matters of
concern to many reformers during this time. Sharpless asserted that the nation must show
positive development toward Quaker ideals in these areas as it had in democracy and
religious freedom.
Sharpless’s comparisons of Quaker and Puritan colonies in America stressed the
more liberal Quaker reaction to religious persecution. Both Quakers and Puritans
30 Ibid.; Sharpless, The Quakers in the Revolution, (Philadelphia: Ferris and Leach, 1902), 2.
31 Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, 371; see also “Quakerism and Government,” 26.
32 Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, 371.
221
experienced persecution in England and sought to obtain freedom of conscience for
themselves in the New World. Quakers “however, unlike the Puritans, generalized from
their own case and arrived at the conclusion that they were working for a common
liberty, not the establishment of their own ideas of truth.”33 This characterization
contrasted sharply with the narrative of Puritan New England, in which only members of
the church could vote or hold office, taxes paid for the upkeep of the church, and
religious and civil law were identical. Sharpless also cited William Penn’s 1670 treatise
“The Great Case of Liberty of Conscience” to indicate the broad principles of religious
toleration that informed Pennsylvania’s founding: “His [Penn’s] main statement is ‘That
imposition, restraint and persecution for conscience’ sake highly invade the Divine
prerogative.’”34
Sharpless explicitly contrasted much of his history of Pennsylvania with New
England, viewing the two regions with their religious affiliations as representing
diametrically opposed models of religion and government in America. “About the year
1700 two antagonistic conceptions of Christian life and duty were in conflict in the
northern colonies of America. One which we may call the Calvinistic conception rigidly
demanded literal orthodoxy as applied to all the relations of life. Its test was the Bible,
both the Old Testament and the New.”35 The most striking difference for Sharpless was
that Puritans believed the Bible was literal, and applied its lessons literally to their social
system. Quakers’ beliefs in individual spirituality, on the other hand, had allowed for
more progressive thought.
33 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 118.
34 William Penn, The Great Principle of Liberty of Conscience Once More Briefly Debated and Defended,
([1670] rep. Kessinger Publishing, 2003), 12. Cited in Sharpless, Ibid., 117.
35“The Friends’ Theory of Worship and Guidance,” Address by Isaac Sharpless, 1888, Writings of Isaac
Sharpless, Quaker and Special Collections, Haverford College.
222
Sharpless contrasted Quaker Pennsylvania and Calvinist New England by
asserting that New England government drew on a religion characterized by hierarchy
and religious intolerance. Quakers did not use political stations to enforce or support
their religious beliefs, but to promote ideals of freedom and democracy. Quaker leaders
“could not fail to demand individual rights to the full, for they had ever claimed for
themselves the largest individual freedom.”36 One of the examples he used to
demonstrate Pennsylvania’s superior religious tolerance is in the area of witchcraft trials.
This choice of examples was particularly important in that Quaker women were
sometimes specifically targeted as witches in New England colonies.37 Regarding
persecution, Pennsylvania had one case of witchcraft which made it into the courts in
1683, which was decided as follows: “She was tried by jury, the evidence soberly sifted,
its absurdity proven, and the jury brought in the verdict, ‘Guilty of having the common
fame of a witch, but not guilty in manner and forme as she stands indicted.’ No other
witch got so far as to court. Nine years later they were hanging them in
Massachusetts.”38 Moreover, Pennsylvania’s experience with witchcraft trials was in
direct contrast to the infamous Salem Witch trials of 1692 in Massachusetts, in which 150
persons were arrested and imprisoned on charges of witchcraft, of which 29 were
convicted of the capital felony of witchcraft and 19 were executed. After juxtaposing
these two contemporaneous witch trials Sharpless commented that Pennsylvania “had no
witchcraft crazes,” indicating that religious intolerance leads to irrational paranoia.
Sharpless did not see Pennsylvania’s history as a perfect model. One of the
shortcomings he pointed out was in subsequent limitations to Penn’s doctrine of religious
liberty. Penn extended freedoms only to those professing the Christian faith. “That it did
36 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 47
37 Carol F. Karlson, The Devil in the Shape of a Woman, (W. W. Norton and Co., 1998), 19.
38 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 39-40.
223
not extend to non-Christians is a matter of regret. It is probable that a charter could not
have been obtained on this basis. It was expected that Penn would found a Christian
colony. At this time there were practically no professing non-Christians, except perhaps
a very few Jews.”39 In 1705 additional measures were taken to exclude Catholics from
the religious liberties in Pennsylvania:
Catholics… were also, by the imposition of the same test, denied the legal right to
hold church property, or in other words, while freedom of worship was permitted
to all, it was intended to make Pennsylvania’s government one of and for
Orthodox Protestant Christians only. This was in advance of other colonies
(except Rhode Island and Maryland), where the Catholic worship was prohibited,
but behind Penn’s enlightened conceptions of religious liberty and equality under
the law.40
Sharpless’s approach to the colony’s treatment of Catholics was apologetic. While he
asserted that the policy did not live up to Penn’s standards of religious liberty, he
suggested that the colony was still far in advance of other colonies by allowing freedom
of worship to Catholics.
Penn’s constitution, first presented in 1682, outlined the essential frame of
government that would exist in Pennsylvania. Sharpless raised Penn’s constitution as a
model for “other States and of the Federal Union,”41 as pointing the way toward the
future and ensuring the colony’s success. The document provided for religious freedom,
freedom of the press, an elected assembly, measures against saloons, the initiative and
referendum,42 and limited capital punishment (only for murder and treason) in
comparison to other constitutions of the time.43 Freedom of religion and the press and
39 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 121.
40 Ibid., 126; see also Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, 197.
41 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 63.
42 The “initiative” allowed reformers to bypass legislatures by petitioning to submit legislation directly to
the voters, who could then vote directly on the proposed legislation in a referendum.
43 Cited in Sharpless, Ibid., 58; “The Fundamental Constitutions of Pennsylvania,” The Pennsylvania
Magazine of History and Biography 20:3 (1896) 283-301.
224
measures for electing officials were implemented early in the US Constitution, providing
a uncontroversial foundation for the foresight of Penn’s framework. However, the
references to saloons would resonate with nineteenth century temperance advocates. In
addition, Sharpless’s reference to direct democracy provisions would similarly appeal to
late-nineteenth century advocates for constitutional reforms in response to urban political
machines and corruption in the late nineteenth century. He closed his summary of the
Pennsylvania Frames of Government by quoting George Bancroft’s famous History of
the United States (1860):
Thus did Penn perfect his government. An executive dependent for its support on
the people; all subordinate elective officers elected by the people; the judiciary
dependent for its existence on the people; all legislation originating exclusively
with the people; no forts, no armed force, no militia; no established church; no
difference of rank; and a harbor open for the reception of all mankind of every
nation, of children of every language and every creed; - could it be that the
invisible power of reason would be able to order and restrain, to punish crime and
to protect property?44
Sharpless used the quote from a revered and popular historian to emphasize the apparent
novelty and equality in Penn’s formation of government.
Sharpless’s writings on the colonial Pennsylvania government stressed that its
ideals of civil and religious freedom were progressive, if not always perfect. He implied
that Penn’s views had a stronger influence on the shape of American government than
other colonies, and that Pennsylvania included measures in its governance that would
later be taken up by nineteenth century “reformers.” For Sharpless, this progressivism in
colonial Pennsylvania was due to the application of spiritual ideals of equality and
democracy to government. His narrative of early Pennsylvania suggested that
mainstream progressive reforms in the late nineteenth century were aligning with Quaker
ideals, rather than implying that Quakers were adapting and entering mainstream reform
culture.
44 George Bancroft, History of the United States, (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1874), 46. Cited in
Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 66-7.
225
Quakers, Indians and Peace
Sharpless’s treatment of the Quakers and Indians in colonial Pennsylvania served
two purposes. One was to affirm the effectiveness of Quaker peace policies with the
Indians. Francis Parkman and John Fiske had written well-known and received historical
works in which they characterized the success of the early Quakers with the Indians as
being due to the Indians’ character rather than the Quaker policies.45 Sharpless
acknowledged the generous and fair nature of the Indians in his narrative, but warned that
Indians would quickly turn “savage” if treated unfairly. Another reason for highlighting
Quaker peace policies with Indians was President Grant’s Quaker-inspired and
administrated Indian peace policy (1870-1899). As Sharpless commented,
When, later, the nation recovered from its debauch of Indian atrocities and
encroachment upon weaker nations, it saw the way in the success of the policy
of justice practiced for three score years in the eastern end of this province –
making it a little oasis in the dreary history of blood and aggression which told
the story in New England, New York and the South, and accompanied the
frontiers as they were pushed forward to the Mississippi and beyond.46
Sharpless sought to demonstrate that Indians responded kindly to fair treatment, and that
military responses only heightened tensions in Indian-American relations. Nineteenthcentury peace arbitrationists frequently cited justice as a necessary precondition for
peace; thus Penn’s “just” dealings with the Indians provided a similar model for peace
policy. Demonstrating the effectiveness of Quaker Indian policy was important in
making a case for peace policy in any sphere. According to Sharpless, the idea of peace
45 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 178; also, as noted by a reviewer of one of Sharpless’s
books, Herman V. Ames, review of Quakerism and Politics: Essays by Isaac Sharpless, by Isaac Sharpless,
American Historical Review 12:1 (October, 1906), 149. See Francis Parkman, The Conspiracy of Pontiac:
and the Indian War after the Conquest of Canada, (London : J.M. Dent ; New York : E.P. Dutton, [1927]
1908), 69. John Fiske, The Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America, (Boston, New York: Houghton,
Mifflin and Co., 1899), 165.
46 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 10-11.
226
was as unlikely as liberty at the time, again showing Penn’s progressive principles.47 In a
rhetorical move that replicated his presentation of Penn’s government, he sought to
demonstrate Quaker Indian successes in contrast with Anglican and Puritan failures. He
blamed Presbyterians in Pennsylvania for general deteriorating Indian relations leading
up to the French and Indian War; subsequently, Quakers resigned from political duties as
they opposed war. Yet, he also attempted to show how the Quakers were able to
negotiate peacefully with Indians through an extragovernmental organization called the
“Friendly Association” when war made their government office-holding impossible.
Sharpless emphasized to his readers that even after Quakers withdrew from politics they
maintained a political interest and voice, particularly in the matter of peace.
Despite historical critiques of Penn’s dealings with the Indians, popular images of
Quaker benevolence had been ingrained in American memory by the mid-nineteenth
century. Sharpless appealed to the popular axiom that colonial Quaker interactions with
Indians were fair and peaceful to add weight to his assertions about the effectiveness of
peace policies in general. Sharpless noted that Penn’s treaty with the Indians at
Shackamaxon (1682) had been “immortalized” by Benjamin West’s painting (1771-2)
and Voltaire’s comments.48 West’s painting was popular at the time and wood engraved
replicas abounded; the painting also served as the inspiration for two famous nineteenth
century paintings by Edward Hicks: Peaceable Kingdom (1826) and Penn’s Treaty with
the Indians (1830-5).49 Penn initially paid the Indians for the land in Pennsylvania he
settled, and while this was somewhat common practice among the colonists, according to
47 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 19-20.
48 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government,152. Voltaire wrote in 1760 that Penn’s treaty was the
only one between Christians and Indians in America that was “never infring’d,” Letters Concerning the
English Nation: By Mr. de Voltaire (L. Davis and C. Reymers; R. Baldwin, and S. Crowder and Co., 1760),
23.
49 Michael G. Kammen, Meadows of Memory: Images of Time and Tradition in American Art and Culture,
(Austin: University of Texas Press, 1992), 134-138.
227
Sharpless he appeared to be “unusually fair” about it: “The treaties were open and
honorable contracts, and not characterized by sharpness and chicanery.”50 Moreover,
Penn set up laws to ensure that friendly relations would continue. For example, “All
transactions with them [Indians] were to be in the open market, so that frauds might be
detected; injuries to Indians were to be punished as if committed on whites, and joint
juries were to pass on disputed questions involving both races.”51 Sharpless portrayed
Quaker Indian policies as progressive and sought to demonstrate that they were effective
as well.
To demonstrate the success of Penn’s peace policy toward the Indians, Sharpless
cited as evidence that skirmishes between Indians and settlers were on an individual basis
and settled justly until Penn’s death (1718).52 According to Sharpless, many critics of the
peace policy claimed that later problems with the Indians were caused by the lack of a
military presence in Pennsylvania. However, he asserted that deteriorating relations with
the Indians had been triggered by a lack of justice rather than force that later provoked
Indian hostilities. “A policy of peace and one of justice combined may be successful; it
is hardly fair, however, to provoke attack by iniquity and then saddle the inevitable
consequences upon the lack of preparation for military resistance.”53 After Penn’s death,
his heirs (who were Anglican) failed to provide proper justice to the Indians. Sharpless
suggested that there was a general failure to provide Indians with just protection and
recompense for increasing settler demand for their lands, but noted several instances in
particular that aggravated Indian relations in Pennsylvania.
50 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 157.
51 Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, 52.
52 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 167.
53 Ibid., 168.
228
The first of these instances of injustice against the Indians was the so-called
“Walking Purchase” of 1737. Thomas Penn, the Anglican son of William Penn, claimed
to produce a document from the 1680s ceding land from the Indians for as far as a man
could walk in a day and a half. The Delaware Indians, assuming the document was
authentic and that a man could walk about 40 miles during this time, agreed to the test.
Penn and the colonial administrators cleared a path for the “walk” and hired a series of
runners who made it about 70 miles in the allotted time.54
Along with the Anglican son of William Penn, Sharpless assigned blame for
deteriorating relations with the Indians on Presbyterian settlers in the Pennsylvania
colony. The Presbyterian settlers lived primarily in the western frontier of the colony,
and as such, had direct skirmishes with the Indians over land. Sharpless suggested that
Presbyterian ministers goaded these conflicts by asserting “the command given to the
Israelites ‘to utterly destroy’ the races inhabiting the land.”55 Such a formulation further
implied how religion could be twisted to wrongdoing without the guidance of the inner
light.
Sharpless claimed that the combined effect of the proprietors and the frontiersmen
in aggravating the Indians effectively ended the Quaker policy of peace with the Indians
in Pennsylvania. Their unfair and even cruel treatment of the Indians was repaid with an
Indian alliance with the French during the French and Indian War (1754-1763).
[The Indians] felt excused from fulfilling the obligations they had assumed to
William Penn and the Quakers, who, they rightfully conjectured, had nothing to
do with these iniquities; they joined heartily with the French in their hostilities,
and shot down Braddock’s army in the summer of 1755 with a right good will.
The terrors of Indian warfare to which the other colonies had been subjected were
now for the first time reproduced in Pennsylvania, and the effects of the ‘Holy
Experiment’ were ended.56
54 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government,168.
55 Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, 153.
56 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 177.
229
It was important to Sharpless to contradict those who had stated that the Quaker peace
policy was too weak in dealing with Indians. He emphasized that the policy of peace
worked, and only when Indians were betrayed and attacked themselves did they retaliate.
The French and Indian War ended Quaker control of the Pennsylvania Assembly.
In light of their pacifist principles, they could not in good conscience retain their
positions in a time of war without compromising their beliefs. The Book of Discipline
raised an injunction against serving in politics due to war, and thus the peaceful results of
Quaker government ceased.57 However, Sharpless asserted that Quakers continued to
exert governmental authority and promote policies of peace through an independent
organization called the “Friendly Association.” This organization, formed in 1756, took
on the role of diplomacy between the colonial government and the Indians in hopes of
ending warfare. The members of the group “refused to pay war taxes, but pledged
themselves to contribute in the interests of peace ‘more than the heaviest taxes of a war
can be expected to require.’”58 According to Sharpless, the Association negotiated a
series of treaties “which finally resulted in the termination of the war and the payment to
the Indians of an amount which satisfied them for the land taken by the Walking
Purchase and other dubious processes.”59 For Sharpless, the Quaker Indian policy
demonstrated the importance of fairly adjudicating disputes, and the idea that fraud and
war went hand in hand.60 This example of extra-governmental political involvement in
promotion of political ideals served to promote Sharpless’s aim of encouraging Quakers
in the late nineteenth century to engage more fully in politics. It provided an example of
57 Philip S. Benjamin, The Philadelphia Quakers in the Industrial Age, 1865-1920 (Philadelphia: Temple
University Press, 1976), 74-5.
58 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 179.
59 Ibid., 180.
60 Sharpless, “The Friendly Association,” The Friend, 72 (March 2, 1899), 262.
230
extending the holy experiment without sullying oneself in questionable moral situations.
Moreover, he attributed credit to the Association for ending the war, demonstrating again
the effectiveness of Quaker peace policies in resolving disputes, and making war
unnecessary.
Abolition: Equality, Peace and Citizenship
In Sharpless’ narratives of abolition movements among American Quakers, his
assertions mirrored the purposes of his writings on Quaker government and Indian
relations. First, he wished to show that Quaker progressivism on the issues of slavery
was a direct result of their spiritual beliefs and practices. By contrasting Pennsylvania’s
history of abolition with New England he reinforced his recurring assertion that Quaker
Pennsylvania was the source of America’s strength and honor rather than New England.
He drew parallels between the slavery question and the history of the nation by
highlighting slavery reforms in Pennsylvania during and immediately after the
Revolutionary period, and in the events leading up to the Civil War. Similar to SeventhDay Adventists, in the wake of the Civil War, Quaker views of pacifism required
definitions of citizenship and ways of demonstrating loyalty to the Union other than
military service. For Sharpless, the proof of Quaker loyalty and good citizenship lay in
rejecting slavery as a violation of the principle of equality, rather than fighting in wars.
According to Sharpless, the advanced position of Quakers on the issues of Indian
policy, war, slavery and intemperance were direct results of the use of discipline in
Quaker meetings to clear themselves of evil and accomplish moral reform.
The history of the growth of the anti-slavery sentiment has often been told, but so
far as it concerns our Pennsylvania Friends, it may be repeated as an illustration
of the effective way in which they cleared themselves by their admirable
discipline of the evil before they launched their corporate testimony against a
hostile nation.61
61 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 31; see also “Friends as Moral Reformers,” The
Westonian, (1909), 97-8.
231
Sharpless began his narrative of Friends and slaves with the 1688 Germantown (a
neighborhood in Philadelphia) Meeting’s protest against the slave trade. In 1696 the
Yearly Meeting advised against the importation of slaves. In 1758, the Yearly Meeting
proceeded to condemn the owning of slaves and appointed a committee to visit
slaveholders and ensure compliance. When this failed to eradicate slaveholding among
some Quakers, the Yearly Meeting declared in 1776 that slaveholding Quakers would
from then on be excluded from membership.62 Sharpless noted “How faithfully yet how
tenderly the work [of emancipating slaves] was done, while the Revolutionary War raged
around them, the records of 1776 and 1777 in nearly every meeting testify.”63 In other
words, while the nation was embroiled in the violence of the Revolutionary War, Quakers
were peacefully and progressively settling the question of slavery. Had the rest of the
nation attended to this issue rather than being caught up in the whirlwind of Revolution,
the Civil War might have been prevented as well.
Comparing Pennsylvania’s abolition laws during the Revolution to “Calvinist”
New England, Sharpless pointed out that “The same year Massachusetts enacted a Bill of
Rights declaring freedom and ‘inalienable right.’ But it was several years later that by
judicial decision it was decided that this applied to blacks.”64 This formulation implied
that Quakers saw the far-reaching effects of equality first, and that Massachusetts had to
be forced into such a position by their judges rather than the people or legislature
realizing the implications of their principles of freedom and equality.
62 For original documentation of these events see Gerret Hendericks, Derick up de Graeff, Francix Daniell
Pastorious, Abraham up de Graef, “Germantown Quaker protest against slavery,” 1688 (Haverford Special
Collections Manuscripts); for a secondary overview of colonial Quakers and slavery see Thomas E. Drake,
Quakers and Slavery in America, (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1950), 1-99.
63 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 33.
64 Sharpless, “Friends and Slavery,” undated writings, 28, Isaac Sharpless Papers, Quaker and Special
Collections, Haverford College. Published in The Quakers in the American Colonies, by Rufus M. Jones,
and Isaac Sharpless. London: Macmillan and Co., 1911.
232
Sharpless continued his critique of New England colonies on the subject of
slavery. Slavery might not be practiced nor encouraged in New England, yet its
merchants took part in the slave trade. “While their [Puritans’] consciences rebelled
somewhat against slavery within their own limits, for where there was but little need, it
did not prevent their active engagement in the business of supplying.”65 In contrast, in
Pennsylvania, not only did Quakers eliminate slavery from among their own members,
but they took steps toward legal restrictions as well. “Pennsylvania, which seems to have
been the only colony where moral consideration had real chance of corporallizing [sic]
into legislation repeatedly enacted laws placing taxes, which were intended to be
prohibitive, on the trade, the most severe of which were vetoed in England. The result
however was almost to stifle importations before the Revolution.”66 His characterization
of Pennsylvania’s government as “moral” provided another contrast to “religious”
governments in New England.
After the Revolution, Sharpless’s narrative of anti-slavery views stressed
Pennsylvanians’ (not just Quakers’) loyalty to the free soil cause. He cited the opposition
of Pennsylvania leaders to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1783, and subsequent efforts to
protect freed slaves wrongfully accused of being fugitives from being returned to their
masters. Moreover, he discussed Pennsylvania senators’ opposition to the expansion of
slavery to Missouri in 1819, and their political aim to contain slavery in the Southern
states.67 Pennsylvanian senator David Wilmot sponsored the Wilmot Proviso of 1846,
which prohibited slavery in the newly acquired Western territories, rather than extending
the Missouri Compromise line.68 The Mexican-American War of 1848 Sharpless
65 Sharpless, “Friends and Slavery,” 6.
66 Sharpless, “Friends as Moral Reformers,” undated writings, 7, Isaac Sharpless Papers, Quaker and
Special Collections, Haverford College.
67 Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, 313-314.
68 Ibid., 333-334.
233
described as inextricably linked to desires to extend slavery in the nation, and a move
Pennsylvanians and Quakers alike found “distasteful.” “Yet still she [Pennsylvania] was
loyal to the nation.”69 The sentiment echoes Shea’s of long-suffering loyalty to the
nation even when it goes astray.
Sharpless also credited the influence of Quakers as a factor in the victory of the
North in the Civil War. According to him, the role that English Quakers had played in
abolishing slavery in England meant that the North had a secure ally in England, and that
the South did not. In assigning responsibility for the “Union victory something must be
credited to the outspoken pioneers of anti-slavery whose sympathies kept the English
government from recognizing and aiding the independence of the Southern states.”70
Sharpless’s narrative of anti-slavery views among Quakers and Pennsylvanians
insinuated at the least that issues of warfare and expansion had distracted the nation from
dealing properly with the issue of abolition. At the most, it suggested that the Civil War
might have been prevented. Finally, Sharpless also suggested that Quakers had indirectly
contributed to the Union victory in the Civil War by accomplishing abolition in Britain
and preventing their alliance with the South.
American Revolution and Peace
The American Revolution, as it represented the birth of the nation in most
histories, posed a particular problem for Quakers. While it was an apex in the height of
the Quaker abolition movement, Quaker pacifism meant opposition to the war for
independence, withdrawal of the few Quakers who were left in political office after the
French and Indian War, and expulsion of Quaker members who supported the war. Thus,
it marked a critical turning point in Quaker history, one that removed them far from the
69 Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, 333.
70 Sharpless, “Friends and Slavery,” 135.
234
center of American life and institutions. For Sharpless, too, the war’s result in Quaker
quietism and withdrawal from public life posed a particular challenge. His narrative of
the Revolution, therefore, displayed two aims. The first was to demonstrate that Quakers
did not oppose unification and independence of the American states, only war for
independence. The second was to demonstrate that Quaker withdrawal from public life
had been in response to historically contingent circumstances that no longer existed in the
late nineteenth century.
The narrative stance from which Sharpless approached the Revolution was that it
was a story of unification of the colonies. He began this section by asserting that Penn
had first proposed a union of the colonies in 1696 through a kind of parliament, with a
capital in New York, but the idea of unifying the colonies was one “of slow
development.”71 The structure of his narrative suggests that because the colonies were not
amenable to Penn’s idea, the first actions toward unification came in response to a stamp
tax imposed by Britain in 1765: “The first step towards this end was the imposition of a
tax to help defray the expenses of the French wars in America.”72 While the colonists
had not realized their joint interests previously, opposition against England clarified their
mutual interests and needs. “During this time the lesson was being learned that each
colony could not be as it had been since the settlement, a separate government, working
out its own internal problems. Community of interests was fused by English attacks upon
all alike, and the necessity for union against a common enemy.”73 Sharpless contrasted
Pennsylvania’s response with that of the other colonies. In Pennsylvania, legal
transactions which required the tax were simply suspended for six months, and stamp tax
71 Sharpless, Two Centuries of Pennsylvania History, 164.
72 Ibid.
73 Ibid., 163.
235
agents were unmolested.74 The Quakers’ belief in submitting to government tempered
their response.75 The idea to simply agree to non-importation of taxed items was also
“quite a Quaker method of resistance.”76 Sharpless even went so far as to speculate that
Quaker methods of resistance and reason may have worked to resolve the Stamp Tax
issue, had the other colonists responded similarly instead of with “hot words and armed
resistance.”77
In lieu of Benjamin Franklin, the best-known founding father of Pennsylvania
(and not a Quaker), Sharpless emphasized the role of John Dickenson, a former Quaker.
Although he was raised a Quaker and married the daughter of a well-known Quaker
family, he left the Society as over the issue of pacifism during the French and Indian
War. Sharpless cited Paul Leicester Ford as describing Dickenson as follows: “‘in the
literature of that struggle his position is as prominent as Washington in war, Franklin in
diplomacy, and Morris in finance.’”78 He was called the “penman of the Revolution” for
his “Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania,” which argued the legal case for American
liberty.79
When the attempt was made to impose the Stamp act upon America, John
Dickinson found himself in close accord with popular sentiment. He framed the
plan of protest which was adopted by the Stamp act Congress in 1765, appears to
have been the authors of its “Declaration of Rights’ and ‘Petition to the Kind,’
and also a draft from which the resolutions adopted by the Assembly of
Pennsylvania were largely taken. …He wrote the Liberty Song, which went over
the country like fire, and which contains at least one line that will never be
74 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 80.
75 Ibid., 75.
76 Ibid., 80.
77 Ibid., 80-81.
78 Paul Leicester Ford was the great-grandson of Noah Webster and a popular novelist and biographer of
the founding fathers. Qtd. In Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 100.
79 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 95.
236
forgotten, the watchword of the Revolution – ‘By uniting we stand, by dividing
we fall.’80
Dickenson represented an exemplary statesman to Sharpless in that he resisted the Stamp
Act through legal and intellectual debate, coined the phrase ‘united we stand, divided we
fall,’ and yet did not support armed resistance to Great Britain. He also neatly
symbolized what happened to Quakers in politics after the Revolution: “While not much
of a Quaker he undoubtedly represented and dignified the Quaker idea of the preservation
of liberty. He represented also their absolute loss of influence and power which
coincided with the Declaration.”81
For Sharpless, the Revolutionary War marked a turning point in American Quaker
history. He interpreted the subsequent shift toward inwardness or quietism that occurred
as detrimental politically, but beneficial spiritually:
The Revolutionary war was an epoch in Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, the
beginning, in a sense, of the type of Friends which we have since known.
Something of the public spirit and broader outlook of earlier days was lost; but an
intense denominationalism, a separation from alien influences, a devotion to high
moral standards, an endeavor after internal righteousness, were gained.82
Sharpless was less optimistic regarding the intellectual losses incurred by the Society due
to the Revolution. Many of the intellectuals of the time joined with the Revolutionary
cause and were disfellowshipped.83 Consequently, an anti-intellectual bent developed
among Quakers: “[Intellectual] mediocrity is written on the history of the following
decades – a mediocrity, however, most respectable in its sincerity, and groping towards
something better.”84
80 Sharpless, A Quaker Experiment in Government, 98-99
81 Ibid., 102.
82 Ibid., 46.
83 Editorial, “The Effect of the Revolutionary War upon the Education of Friends,” The Westonian, XVI:2
(Feb. 1910), 45.
84 Ibid., 46.
237
Political Ideals
Quaker withdrawal from political life lasted from the Revolution until the second
half of the nineteenth century, when Quakers became increasingly “critical of the major
tenets of the growing national culture.”85 Today’s scholarship explains this shift as a
result of the schisms that the Society of Friends endured in which some branches
embraced evangelical culture, and in which all divisions of Quakerism subsequently
became drawn in to the larger mainstream of society. This section on Sharpless’ political
views argues that his political message was uniquely shaped by his Quaker identity and
theology. First, he was advocating and modeling political activities to Quakers based on
an appeal to primitivism. Sharpless dealt with one hundred years of Quaker political
withdrawal by asserting that political involvement was a vital activity of primitive
Quakerism in America and one to which present-day Friends must return. He continually
appealed to early Quaker experiences in politics to affirm his position. Furthermore, his
progressivism, unlike that of many reform-minded evangelicals, did not include any
efforts to hasten a “second coming” or to establish God’s kingdom on earth. In an
inversion of the usual kinds of progressive reform narrative, his arguments relied heavily
on returning to the model presented by early American Quakers, particularly William
Penn, in order to progress in the nation. Moreover, his views and activities regarding
peace issues diverged from more popular views in the arbitrationist peace movement that
saw arbitration as a means to eliminate war in the future, and as evidence of Anglo-Saxon
superiority and part of their civilizing mission to the world. Sharpless saw war as wrong
in and of itself, condemned the Spanish-American and Philippine-American wars as a
result of Anglo-Saxon “superiority,” and promoted arbitration as a moral means to peace,
a moral end.
85 Philip S. Benjamin, The Philadelphia Quakers in the Industrial Age, 1865-1920 (Philadelphia: Temple
University Press, 1976), xi.
238
Sharpless explained the Quakers’ nineteenth century shift in becoming more
involved in the world as a simple change in circumstances. The issues of war and oaths
drove Quakers from politics, yet their high principles and involvement in areas of reform
drew them back again. Under the circumstances surrounding the American Revolution,
the Quaker move to leave political life behind was appropriate. It was impossible to
participate politically without being involved in the war or without taking an oath of
loyalty. Yet, Sharpless was adamant in his stance that the conditions that drove Quakers
out of politics in the late eighteenth century no longer existed at the end of the nineteenth.
It must be noted that the causes that first led Friends out of politics no longer
exist. We do not have to do violence to our principles in ordinary public life. If
this involved participation in warlike measures, the Friends might well hesitate. If
it necessitated taking or administering oaths, the Friend faithful to the history of
the Society would decline such an office. These were the essential issues that
drove Friends out on the past and the vitality of our testimonies in these respects
was worth the abrogation.86
His defense of Quaker withdrawal from politics is apologetic. He presented it as a way
of preserving the principles of Quakerism without compromise. However, his defense of
the quietism that prevailed during the second half of the eighteenth century was strictly
limited to that era. “The days of withdrawal from such things into the shell of selfdefense followed with the Indian and Revolutionary wars. At first intended to be
temporary it became habit.”87 This defense of eighteenth century Quaker quietism
notwithstanding, Sharpless promoted political action in the late nineteenth century as
necessary to achieve progress and moral reform.
Moreover, for Sharpless, unthinking mimicry of Quaker preoccupations that were
historically rooted in the colonial time period violated the larger principles of Quakerism.
Basing his advocacy for Quaker political activity on a broad definition of primitivism, he
suggested that contemporary Quakers must adhere to the historical principle but not
86 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 35-36.
87 Sharpless, “Intelligent Loyalty,” The Westonian 15:10 (Dec 1909), 226.
239
necessarily historical practices of early Quakers. “For it is not faithfulness to the past to
adhere to old customs, if the spirit which dictated those customs, is forgotten. They are
not true successors of the early Friends who do as they did in every particular, but such as
do as they would have done had they been living now.”88 Sharpless’s progressivism is
evident in this logic and elaborated further with an example:
We may not find a vital cause of protest in the obsequiousness on the one hand,
and the pride on the other, which distracted England in the 17th. Century, but
surely in the abuse of wealth and the denial of rights to the poor of America, there
is a vital protests needed of the 20th. Century; and he is not willing at all expense
of suffering to make this protest. A general revision of testimonies as years go
by, which would keep alive the vitality of early [American struck through]
Quaker morality, is needed of every generation.89
While he viewed the historically contingent responses to conspicuous consumption and
elitism (plain dressing, language) as appropriate in former eras, the relevant aspects of
wealth to be opposed now were “denial of rights to the poor.” Sharpless asserted that
while the customs of time change, the principles do not. However, the application of
Quaker values must necessarily change for progress to occur.
Sharpless was himself involved in many political and reform activities. He was a
member of the state Republican Committee for many years, focusing his priorities
principally on municipal reform.90 Under the leadership of Sharpless and others,
Philadelphia Quakers responded to the “notoriously corrupt Republican political
machine” by voting a reform party, the City party, into office in 1905. Sharpless referred
to this election as “the most significant municipal revolution in the history of America.”91
He was also active in typical evangelical reform activities such as temperance and
88 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Moral Reform,” Lecture delivered at Berkeley, California, 1909, Isaac
Sharpless Papers, Quaker and Special Collections, Haverford College 2-3.
89 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Moral Reform,” 2-3.
90 Ibid., 75.
91 Sharpless, qtd. in Benjamin, "Gentlemen Reformers,” 75.
240
Sunday school societies, and was a vice-president of the Evangelical Alliance in 1894.92
News reports on the Temperance Association of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting in the
Friends’ Review during the 1880s and 1890s cite Sharpless’s involvement in giving
public lectures on temperance, advocating temperance textbooks for schools, and serving
as president of the association in 1890.93 He was also elected president of the Yearly
Meeting’s First-Day School Association in 1894.94 In the 1890s he became involved in
peace organizations. Later, he was influential in forming and lobbying for the American
Friends Service Committee in 1917, which offered alternatives for pacifists to military
service.95
For Sharpless, success in reform and progress required a multi-faceted approach.
As might be expected from the President of Haverford, he saw education, particularly a
moral education, as one necessary element. Morals were an undeniable aspect of
political participation. And, while it was impossible for a Christian’s politics not to be
influenced by his or her morals, legislation was necessary for reforming the larger
society: “most men unthinkingly adopt the civil and criminal law as their standard.
…legislators and judges are therefore not only providing for the machinery of
government but they are also creating moral standards for the individual. They modify
the thinking of men.”96 Reform legislation required moral political officials, thus,
92 “Evangelical Alliance Congress,” Friends’ Review, (July 27 1893), 47, 1.
93 Regarding his temperance activities, see “Temperance Association of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting,”
Friends’ Review, (April 29 1882), 38, 38; “Temperance Notes,” Friends’ Review, 36 (October 28 1882),
12; “Temperance Association of Friends’ of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting,” Friends’ Review, 43 (May 15
1890), 42; “Friends’ Temperance Association of Philadelphia.” Friends’ Review, 42 (April 11 1889), 37;
“Temperance association of friends of Philad’a Yearly Meeting,: Friends’ Review, 42 (May 2 1889), 40;
“Society Intelligence,” Friends’ Review, 42 (May 23 1889), 43;
94 “Orthodox Friends’ Yearly Meeting,” Friends’ Intelligencer, 51 (April 28 1894) 17.
95 Howell John Harris, “War in the Social Order: The Great War and the Liberalization of American
Quakerism,” ed. D. K. Adams and Cornelius van Minnen, Religious and Secular Reform in America: Ideas,
Beliefs, and Social Change (Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh, 1999), 183.
96 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 45.
241
sometimes eliminating corruption was necessary before enacting appropriate reform
legislation would be possible.
Education was vital to inculcating the proper morals in citizens of the nation so
that they would become the right kinds of political participants. The values that a
Christian should hold as a citizen were most notably those learned in education. For
Sharpless, education provided an “indirect” attack against evil that would prove to be
more lasting in its effects that direct attacks.97 One might easily observe the effects of an
education on the individual, and thus “even the national character may be modified by the
education ideals and spirit of the youth.”98 Education values and national values were
reciprocal, but “the strongest influence is from the schools to the nation, rather than from
the nation to the schools.”99 The reason for this is that the political principles that people
stand for mean nothing without the inculcation of values as a foundation for applying
particular principles in politics. For example,
the argument that war is an economic waste assumes that people value being
frugal. How shall we counter unthinking “pseudo patriotism” when we encourage
emotional involvement in competitive school sports? And, if we wish to curb the
demand for unreasoning increase of our territory, then we must revise our
standards of greatness. As long as we teach students that their aim should be
business rather than service, such claims about war and foreign policy make no
sense.100
97 Sharpless, “The Importance of the Atmosphere of a College,” undated address, Writings of Isaac
Sharpless, Quaker and Special Collections, Haverford College, 4
98 Ibid., 5.
99 Sharpless, “Education of Peace Men,” undated address, Writings of Isaac Sharpless, Quaker and Special
Collections, Haverford College, 8-9.
100 Ibid., 5-6.
242
Sharpless viewed utilitarian philosophy as the most damaging to American values.
Students must be taught to do what is right rather than what is expedient for reform and
progress to occur in America.101
Sharpless saw religious education as inseparable from moral education because he
viewed religion as the foundation of character: “the most profound, character forming
factor in life is the religious sentiment, and the most potent influences come from the man
with a spiritual mind.”102 Thus, it is important for educators to be religious and to pass
on their religious education to their students. Sharpless named as a “defect” the
elimination of the Bible from public school curriculum.103 The middle ground position
that many public schools and churches had taken on the issue of religious education in
schools was to provide reading of the Bible “without comment.” Like Shea, he viewed
this compromise measure as resulting in completely inadequate spiritual training. “How
inefficient this is from the point of view of education every teacher will know.”104 He
saw Sunday schools as equally inefficient as attendance was voluntary, and no serious
study or tests were involved. He also characterized the information conveyed as “usually
a mixed up and deceptive array of facts.”105 Apart from causing ignorance, “a failure to
understand the religious history of the past and the significance of religious movements
of the present time,” Sharpless saw the lack of serious Bible study in schools as causing
101 Sharpless, “Education of Peace Men,” 5-6, 8-9. Sharpless’ inaugural speech when he became president
of Haverford stressed the evils of utilitarian education, as related in excerpts in “Haverford College,”
Friends’ Review, (June 2 1887), 40, 44.
102 Ibid., 21.
103 Sharpless, “Another Mission of the Friends’ School,” The Westonian, 16:5 (May 1910), 167.
104 Ibid..
105 Ibid.
243
additional “intellectual, political and social lapses to give us all pause as to the conditions
into which we are drifting.”106
Accepting separation of church and state might inevitably mean that there was no
place for religious education in public schools. According to Sharpless, this was a less
than ideal conclusion. Christianity was indelibly etched into the nation’s character and
institutions, yet reconciling America’s Christian foundation with absolute liberty of
conscience for all raised complexities.
The problems of the relation of church to state are not yet all worked out. How to
give the children of the country the religious education they should have without
violating the conscience of any, how to secure the Biblical knowledge in our
country necessary to appreciate our standard literature and maintain our
institutions, permeated, often insensibly, by Christian ideas and standards; how, in
short, to prevent a break with the past which will destroy the fruits of our old
endeavors, and the continuity of history, this is still our problem.107
He saw the problem of church and state as unsettled, although he suggested that “no sane
man thinks it [the solution] lies in a state religion or sectarian test.”108
Sharpless proposed optional religious instruction as a hypothetical solution to the
“problem” of the elimination of religious education from public schools. He
acknowledged that all religious and non-religious groups had equal rights as pertaining to
public education. “We must apply the same principles to Catholics, Jews, and
unbelievers we do to the Protestant sects, of in any locality they demand it. …And yet
this is to my mind not a satisfactory result to come to.”109 One option was to make the
application of religious education democratic and optional in public schools. “If in a
district of 100 families, ninety-five desire and would be greatly profited by the infusion
106 Sharpless, “Another Mission of the Friends’ School,” 167.
107 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 15.
108 Ibid., 15.
109 Sharpless, “The Relation of the State to Education in England and America,” Annals of the American
Academy of Political and Social Science, 3 (May 1893), 8.
244
of general religious truth, and cannot get it except through the schools, why not excuse
the five from attendance and give it[?]”110
A practical solution that Sharpless offered regarding religious education was to
leave it to private schools. While he did not approve of excluding religious education
from public schools, he saw in this move an unprecedented opportunity for private
education. “Do not these conditions suggest the possibility of great usefulness for
schools not hampered by the reception of public money?”111 Sharpless reminded his
readers that Friends’ schools need not be proselytizing agencies, yet could provide “A
guarded religious education to boys and girls who are able to pay for tuition, in the place
of the lower influences and teaching to which they may be subjected in some public
schools.”112 Moreover, Sharpless decried a public sentiment regarding
“undenominationalism” that made denominational colleges almost apologetic regarding
their religion. Religious schools should realize that the religious education they offered
was their great strength.
One point that Sharpless wished to demonstrate was that Quaker quietism did not
equal passivity. He made the assertion several times that Quakers were not “nonresistants.”113 According to him, “Acquiescence in evil, when the means were at hand to
strike it down morally, never was a part of their principles or practice.”114 However,
Quakers limited their resistance to moral means; the means could never justify the end.
“To do evil to correct evil, was never a part of their theory of government, or public
110 Sharpless, “The Relation of the State to Education in England and America,” 689.
111 Sharpless, “Another Mission of the Friends’ School,” 167.
112 Ibid.
113 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 8, 23; “The Redemption of Philadelphia,” The American
Friend, (Dec. 21 1905), 848.
114 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 7.
245
action, and this hesitation sometimes has made them seem less vigorous than others.”115
War was an example of an action that Quakers saw as evil in itself and would not
undertake for any justification, such as self-defense.116 For Sharpless, opposition to
utilitarian philosophy was “the point of the Quaker testimony against war.”117
Sharpless was very active in Quaker peace meetings, and although he kept abreast
of international peace movements, his activities were within Quaker peace organizations.
He belonged to and spoke regularly for the Quaker Peace Association that was part of the
Philadelphia Yearly Meeting and was part of the organizing committee for the Quaker
Peace Congress in 1901.118 In particular, he added his historical perspective on the issue
by asserting that Penn’s experiment with the Peace Policy had had favorable results and
provided historical precedent of the success of peace. When the issue of signing a Treaty
of Arbitration was raised in 1897, Sharpless was part of a meeting of Friends that drafted
the minutes of the meeting approving the measure in the form of a “memorial” and
forwarded it to the US Senate.119
Cecilie Reid argues that the aims of American international arbitrationists around
the turn of the twentieth century were “based on a firm belief in Christian, Anglo-Saxon
racial superiority and jurisprudence.”120 The group included members who were both pro
and anti-force. Yet, she claims that the ideas that they emphasized and that bound them
115 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 8.
116 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Moral Reform,” 7-8.
117 Ibid., 8.
118 “Orthodox Friends’ Yearly Meeting,” 17; “The Friends’ Peace Congress,” Friends’ Intelligencer, 58
(November 9 1901), 45.
119 “Peace and Arbitration, Meeting at Twelfth Street Meeting-House,” Friends’ Intelligencer, 54 (Feb 27
1897), 9.
120 Reid, “Peace and Law,” 527.
246
together was a fear of “uncivilized nations” and a belief in the peaceful results of their
civilizing mission to spread impose law and order globally. She focuses her discussion
on the Lake Mohonk Conference on International Arbitration, convened annually
between 1895 and 1916. The meetings first began when Alfred K. Smiley, a Quaker who
had served on the Board of Indian Commissioners overseeing the Peace Policy, called
together a conference at a resort he owned on Lake Mohonk to discuss the “Indian
Question,” later including the “Negro Question,” in the United States. Smiley’s opening
remarks at the 1890 conference explicitly named the aim of the conference as “aiding the
weaker race.”121 According to Smiley, this could be accomplished through education.
Reid argues that this idea of racial uplift was transferred to ideas of international
arbitration in that Anglo-Saxon civilization was assumed to be superior and that other
nations could be educated into the rule of law and justice. Reid cites Edwin D. Mead, a
prominent New England peace activist, as exhibiting this sense of international uplift
after international arbitration became a focus of the Mohonk Conferences: “The
organization of the world will come. It shall be Anglo-Saxondom; it shall be
Teutondome; it shall be Christendom; it shall be mankind.”122 Moreover, the aims of the
conference were a system of justice that could lead to peace, not “peace at any cost.”123
While Reid’s interpretation of the imperial and ethnocentric views of international
arbitrationists appears persuasive, Sharpless’s views on peace included some important
distinctions. First, Sharpless’s historical discussions of peace in relation to Indians had
nothing to do with racial uplift or particular definitions of justice. He assumed that
Indians had their own sense of justice which must be respected. Although education was
clearly a matter of highest importance for Sharpless, it must be noted that he viewed it as
121 Reid, “Peace and Law,” 529.
122 Quoted in Reid, “Peace and Law,” 533.
123 Ibid., 542.
247
much a matter of uplift for whites as for any other race. Like the arbitrationists,
Sharpless emphasized the role of justice in accomplishing peace, yet held firmly to the
peace at all costs position. For Sharpless, as for Orthodox Quakers, war could never be
right or justified by any conditions.
During a discussion of papers at the Friends’ Peace Conference in Philadelphia,
1901, Sharpless remarked, “It is impossible for the highest ideal of civilization to exist,
and at the same time for war to exist.”124 This statement indicates Sharpless’ distinct
view of the barbarism of war. Unlike many of the arbitrationists, who worked for a
future alternative to war, Sharpless roundly condemned the actions of the United States in
the Spanish-American War (1898) and the subsequent Philippine-American War (18991913). In a letter to an evangelical magazine, The Outlook, Sharpless sharply criticized
its support of the Spanish-American War as supporting both unlawful means and ends
and “hurting the cause of peace and arbitration.”125 In 1904, Sharpless’ activities
regarding the Philippine-American War included forming and serving on a Philippine
Independence Committee that drafted an address to be read at both Republican and
Democratic national conventions demanding Philippine independence and requesting that
such a position be adopted into their respective platforms.126 The address to the national
political parties included a denunciation of Anglo-Saxon superiority: “many AngloSaxons are but too much inclined to assert their superiority in a manner little mindful of
the rights, interests, and self-respect of those whom they consider their inferiors.”127
124 Sharpless, “Twentieth Century Good Words.” Friends’ Intelligencer, 59 (May 24, 1902), 21.
125 Isaac Sharpless, “The War as Viewed by The Outlook’s Correspondents,” The Outlook, 59 (May 21,
1898), 3.
126 “Philippine Independence Committee,” Advocate of Peace, (April 1904), 66, 4; “The Philippines for
the Filipinos,” New York Times, (March 10 1904), 8.
127 Copy of the address printed in “Philippine Independence,” The Outlook, (June 11, 1904), 135.
248
Sharpless wrote an article in 1910 in response to two developments: the proposal
for establishment of an arbitral organization at the Hague to arbitrate legal disputes
between countries, and the former President Theodore Roosevelt’s promotion of the
militarism and imperialism as necessary for developing “virile virtues” in civilization.128
The very important announcement made at the last Mohonk Conference that a
permanent ‘Court of Arbitral Justice’ would in the immediate future be
established at The Hague by some seven or eight great powers points directly to
the time when armaments will be limited to police duties, and when wars will be
no more. From most points of view this seems to be a most desirable
achievement. Our distinguished ex-President, however, warned us against the
loss of the ‘virile virtues,’ the ‘keen fighting edge,’ the tendency to
commercialism, which may follow the departure of a strenuous occupation like
war.129
Sharpless’s definition of the “virile virtues” of citizenship argued that those who did their
duty daily and persistently without notice, fully showed the kinds of qualities necessary
to our civilization. Moreover, he included women’s domestic roles in this definition.
The civil officer who gives his valuable time to the service of the state, the citizen
who takes a perennial interest in his local surroundings, the doctor who faces a
dread disease, and the thousand sacrifices of family life, which wives and mothers
exemplify daily, count for more and are worth more than the heroism of deadly
conflict.130
Sharpless ended with an exhortation to Friends to step up to the political responsibilities
bravely and teach their children well the vigorous responsibilities of citizenship. “If we
do not find in the public advocacy of good morals, of good government, of good
principles, a means of sacrificing ourselves for others, then surely the taunt of martial
men, that peace makes weaklings, may properly be applied to us. The schools of all
128 Regarding Roosevelt, see “Roosevelt Pleads for a Virile World,” New York Times (May 13 1910); Gail
Bederman, Manliness and Civilization: A Cultural History of Gender and Race in the United States, 18801917, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), 185-186; Thomas G. Dyer, Theodore Roosevelt and
the Idea of Race (Louisiana State University Press, 1992), 42.
129 Sharpless,, “The Virile Virtues,” The Westonian, 16:7 (July 1910), 254
130 Ibid., 254-255.
249
grades have the problem on their hands.”131 Thus, he redefined strength as “selfsacrifice,” a value that transferred from military service to everyday life.
Sharpless utilized progressivist rhetoric to claim that pacifism was becoming a
political reality. If liberty had seemed an unlikely promise when Penn implemented it in
the seventeenth century, the policy of peace was even more so. While Penn could ensure
that justice, a necessary precondition of peace, was upheld in Pennsylvania, there was
little he could do regarding other colonies’ or counties’ injustices.132 The lesson of
Penn’s government was that “it pointed the way to the future. It gave the most potential
lesson in the world’s history of the possibilities of applied Christianity as shown in a
policy of justice and moral resistance.”133 Sharpless saw in the international arbitration
movement and the Congresses an indication that “our forefathers had a glimpse of a
principles in which they had sufficient faith to abide, for a long time deemed Utopian, but
now within sight of adoption.”134
Conclusion
This chapter demonstrates that Sharpless’s historical and political writings offered
a distinct vision of American religious identity for Quakers. As in the other chapters,
historical preoccupations with the origins of American values of freedom and equality,
and the place of the war and military service figured prominently in his narratives.
Political interests involving intersections of church and state such as Indian policy and
public schooling also figured similarly to other chapters. However, Sharpless’s emphasis
and perspective on peace indicate a distinctive contribution and critique of American
131 Sharpless,, “The Virile Virtues,” 255.
132 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 19-20.
133 Sharpless, “Quakerism and Government,” 22.
134 Ibid., 11.
250
institutions. Moreover, the ambiguous place of Quakers in the usual insider/outsider
binary scholarly formulation demonstrates the impracticality of such classifications.
Suggesting that Quakers were either “in” or “out” of mainstream evangelicalism at the
end of the nineteenth century ignores the ways in which they understood their
relationship to other religious groups. Sharpless felt Quakers had an important and
unique message to offer the nation and other religions, as well as stressing their
commonalities with the larger society.
251
CONCLUSION
Each of the intellectuals in this work asserted the reality and significance of
America’s past, present, and future in religious terms, and used that understanding to
inform their positions on religion in public policy. Articulations of religious
Americanisms demonstrate negotiation and engagement. Comparing the ideas of these
intellectuals contributes to historical narratives of nationalism and religion in the period
by demonstrating the similarities in efforts of “insider” and “outsider” productions of
nationalism, and limits to the power of “dominant” ideas of religion in the nation.
Focusing on this theme offers a framework for constructing a coherent narrative of the
period. Various intellectuals actively produced new understandings of America that
demonstrate the dynamic nature of religious and national ideologies in response to a
changing society. Moreover, the ideas that these intellectuals produced, which emerged
from common understandings of identity and action among these religious groups, have
persisted in the form of meaningful and relevant institutions.
While scholars have long been interested in detailing how Philip Schaff came to
embrace and promote ideas of religious liberty, they have overlooked the way in which
his historical and denominational views accordingly altered. He attributed the origin of
religious liberty in America to Quakers until he embraced religious liberty, after which he
shifted his historical focus toward Reformed communities in early America and
marginalized other religious groups’ contributions. Quakers and Baptists had only
embraced religious liberty because they had no power to persecute others – thus their
endorsements of religious liberty were purely tactical and pragmatic, not a matter of
principle. Though he complained that denominational histories failed to show the
comprehensive nature of religion in America, his own view showed a similar parochial
bias.
252
Similarly, Schaff’s views on public policy issues regarding religious liberty were
inconsistent after he embraced religious liberty as a value. He firmly asserted the need
for state regulation of monogamous marriage, Sunday legislation, and religious
instruction in public schools. Yet, to some extent, he bowed to the opposition by
promoting Sunday legislation as “protective” rather than “coercive” regulation. He
vacillated on the rights of religious groups who worshipped on another day. In one
instance, he suggested that they submit to the majority and observe two days of rest per
week, and in another, he offered that they should be allowed “exemptions.” And, finally,
regarding religious instruction in public schools, his views on that issue varied from
arguing that religious instruction should be required of all, to offering choices or
exemptions. Schaff’s ideal of religious unity and religious liberty remained unfulfilled in
his conception as it was in reality. His shifting views over time represented adaptation to
other forces and arguments that demonstrate the malleability of the mainstream view. Its
defensiveness, its inability to articulate a coherent counterpoint to opposing views
demonstrates the limitations of a worldview considered “dominant” at the time.
Schaff’s ecumenical vision was most clearly realized through the
interdenominational efforts of organizations such as the Evangelical Alliance. The Social
Gospel movement, emphasizing action by religious groups to deal with the problems of
industrialization, gained momentum after the turn of the century. The Alliance helped
convince American Protestants that cooperation among denominations was necessary to
deal with current social problems. Thus, it contributed to a movement which led to the
creation of the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America in 1908, renamed
the National Council of Churches (NCC) in 1950. The NCC exists today and
representatives of its 37 member denominations updated its Social Creed of 1908 in 2007
to include current and international concerns.
From the perspective of current historical scholars, John Shea’s unmasking of
myths of religious liberty in America, as well as Protestants’ failure in creating a
253
Christian America, appear more persuasive. His task was to set the record straight
between Protestants and Catholics in America. Catholics had pioneered true religious
liberty in America, not New England Protestants. American Protestants had persecuted
Catholics and destroyed their property in wars, despite the loyal service of Catholic
soldiers. Protestants claimed that Catholic immigrants were destroying the sanctity of
Sunday, while Shea noted Sunday was a Catholic institution that Protestants were
destroying because they did not have the authority to enforce it. Protestants claimed to
base their authority on scripture, but there was no scriptural authority for Sunday as a day
of worship. He criticized the celebrated Indian peace policy as destroying religious
liberty of Catholic Indians. Shea found common ground with Protestants in asserting the
need for religious education in public schools, and the central importance of Christianity
to virtuous and responsible citizenship. However, he pointed out that Catholic students
were routinely forced to endure dogmatic, Protestant religious instruction in public
schools. While he felt a reasonable solution was to divide tax funds among
denominations for public education, he realized the futility of persuading Protestants to
do so. Protestant lack of consensus on the meaning of religious rights and freedom in
public institutions led him to conclude that the result would be secular institutions and
that Protestantism in America would fail when it no longer had the support of the state.
Of the authors in this dissertation, Shea was the most reserved about flag-waving
patriotism. Religious liberty in America was a matter of practicality, the common good
for a diverse society, one that would no longer be necessary after Protestantism collapsed
and Catholicism prevailed. He did promote patriotism, but one that promoted critical
assessments of political principles and freedom, and the study of history. His was not a
conservative retreat into a “ghetto” of American Catholicism, but promotion of
Catholicism that had loyally served America in the past and offered it the best future.
Shea’s ideals live on in vast networks of Catholic social institutions, and debates
over abortion and school vouchers. Some scholars characterize the abortion debates of
254
the 1980s as the origin of American Catholic political engagement. Rather than viewing
this fusion of religion and politics as an anomalous emergence, this paper suggests that
such advocacy is a logical outgrowth of nineteenth-century Catholic Americanism.
Despite Protestant discrimination against Catholics, American Catholics embraced their
history and engaged with political ideas, rather than withdrawing into isolationism. More
recent advocacy signifies continuity rather than disjunction with the historical and
political consciousness that Shea’s writings promoted.
Uriah Smith uncritically incorporated the myth of a providential and triumphant
America into his Seventh-day Adventist worldview as a foundation from which to
critique contemporary American policies regarding religious liberty and to issue warnings
about America’s future. Connecting Protestants to Catholics on issues of Sunday
worship and laws, he conflated mainstream Protestantism with Catholicism. He even
cited Schaff’s ecumenical efforts as a sign of the end. In his formulation, Adventists
were true Americans by resisting Sunday laws. While scholars have suggested that
Adventists engaged in activism to “delay the end,” Smith’s activities seemed determined
to raise consciousness, gain converts, and engage Adventists in their beliefs through
activism.
In 2000, The General Conference of Seventh-Day Adventists issued a statement
affirming their dedication to religious liberty and evangelism. The North American
Religious Liberty Association (NARLA) and the International Religious Liberty
Association (IRLA), as well as Liberty magazine, persist as Adventist institutions
dedicated to the separation of church and state. NARLA works as a consciousnessraising institution, promoting religious liberty through public education and media
campaigns, legal services, and legislative advocacy.
Simon Wolf valorized religious liberty in his rhetoric above all else. In his
historical writings he asserted the prominence of Jews in promoting freedom through
military service, patriotism, and dedication to religious freedom. He claimed that Jews
255
had a unique devotion to religious freedom based on their history of persecution. He
promoted the study of history as essential to preserving a political consciousness among
Jews of their loyalty to America and their duty to continue to work toward greater
freedoms in the present. While scholars of Reformed Jews during this time period focus
on the relationship between ideas of race, religion, and culture, Wolf’s assertions about
the Jewishness – except for using the word “race” – parallel the efforts of the other
authors in this dissertation. He was asserting that their religion made them better
Americans, appealed to historical examples to validate his point, focused this historical
understanding on political action in the present, and worked toward greater cooperation
among Jews, and between Jews and Christians. If Shea lies on the critical end of the
spectrum of American patriotism, Wolf represents an extreme in the promotion of an
uncritical American patriotism. He accepted the total separation of church and state, a
view of religion as private, and did not fear greater separation of church and state as a
dangerous secularization trend.
Despite the advent of the term “ethnicity” in the interwar period, questions about
Jewish identity –whether racial or cultural or national – remain unresolved today.
Immigration remained one of the main points of lobbying for the Board of Delegates on
Religious and Civil Liberty through the immigration quotas, which did not specifically
name Jews, in 1920s legislation (although Jews were limited specifically in 1940s
immigration laws). In 1925, the organization dissolved in light of the overlapping work
being done by the American Jewish Committee and the Anti-Defamation League. These
two organizations still promote understanding of Jewish issues and civil liberties and
human rights for all. Both organizations came to support the state of Israel, although that
position although that position continues to be controversial among American Jews.
For Isaac Sharpless, his emphasis on religious liberty in colonial Pennsylvania
was the basis for motivating Friends to engage in politics. He also made a link between
religious liberty and pacifism. In his interpretation of history, Friends had been ahead of
256
the curve on the issue of freedom and democracy, and also pacifism. His universal and
progressive narrative of American history presented political advocacy for peace policies
as the next step in America’s development as a nation and their place in the world.
Although the US had embraced Pennsylvania’s ideals of freedom and democracy, the
ideal of peace was one that had yet to be realized. Friends must work to make this ideal
as much a part of their contribution to America’s legacy as that of religious liberty and
democracy.
Sharpless’s message of religious liberty and peace found a significant legacy in
the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), formed in 1917 to provide alternative
service for conscientious objectors, founded in part by Rufus M. Jones, a professor of
Philosophy at Haverford who collaborated with Sharpless in writing The Quakers in the
American Colonies in 1911. The AFSC was committed to protecting first amendment
conscientious objection, also a variety of other human rights causes in the twentieth
century. The organization still promotes, in addition to peace, humane immigration and
justice system reforms, economic help in impoverished communities, and assistance in
humanitarian crises around the world.
Master narratives in history tend to center on those in power. Thus, we tend to
think of flag-waving patriotism and nationalism in conservative and “hegemonic” terms.
The result is histories that focus on how power is exercised and resisted. For example,
the studies on Theodore Roosevelt persuasively note the nativist, masculinist, and
imperialist functions of his vision of Americanism. Similarly, studies of Josiah Strong
identify similar themes promoted and combined powerfully with religion and the nation.
However, this assumes that everyone was either duped by these ideologies or that they
were forced into a defensive position. Focusing on peripheral subjects can cause
difficulties as well, as sometimes the master narrative is lost in the details. Or, new
narratives may depend on master narratives of power as a foil, elevating those in power to
an unintended centrality by reducing the intellectual production of those without power to
257
a knee-jerk reaction. This dissertation demonstrates that intellectual production of
religious national ideologies is also about world-building. Creating coherent narratives of
the past, present, and future provided people with security in their religious identities as
well as pointing towards work for the future. In other words, the end result was to
promote meaningful engagement in society.
258
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