Tag: david Barton

David Barton’s 700 Club Interview: The Things We Didn’t Say

Guest post by Michael Coulter

David Barton was interviewed for the July 4, 2012 edition of the 700 Club.  It is 9 minutes of remarkably misleading television.   There are many false claims about Jefferson, but I want to focus on Barton’s reference to our book Getting Jefferson Right in this post.

Without being asked about the book, Barton says:

 A lot of that goes back to a whole academic viewpoint of  Deconstructionism. . . there’s a couple of professors who hate this book and they’ve got a book written to rebut it and they start up right up front saying “hey you think American exceptionalism is a good thing.  It’s not.  American exceptionalism is terrible.”  That tells you the philosophy.  They don’t like America as that position.   And Jefferson six of the ideas he put in the Declaration are the basis of every idea in the Constitution. That produces American exceptionalism . . so if you’re going to tear apart American exceptionalism, you’ve got to tear  the guy who founded it.  And so you go after Jefferson and other founders . . .  If you don’t like American exceptionalism, you’ve got to take him out.  That’s really the target of academics. (2:49-3:50)

Here’s what we wrote in the introduction of GJR about American exceptionalism:

Barton then argues that the “joint influence of Deconstructionism and Postructuralism” has undermined “American exceptionalism.”  The problem with this brief reference to the phrase, “American exceptionalism,” is that Barton uses the phrase as if it has a single and agreed upon meaning, and that meaning is that “America is blessed and enjoys unprecedented stability, prosperity and liberty.” The problem with this characterization is that the phrase, “American exceptionalism,” lacks a single, canonical definition. There is no one author that can be said to have indisputably originated the idea.  Raymond Smith says that it is a “school of thought that views U.S. politics and society as a distinctive product of unique circumstances.”  The components of American exceptionalism, according to Smith, include social mobility, a distinctive national creed, and unique institutional development.  Smith also asserts that “American exceptionalism” also sometimes “carries a connotation of superiority” with respect to democratic practices.  Smith further argues that the xceptionalist perspective has been used to justify expansionist or aggressive military policies undertaken by the US government.   Some, like Smith, see the term used in a variety of ways; others, such as Michael Ignatieff, a public intellectual and scholar of human rights (and currently the leader of the Liberal Party in Canada), sees the term as mostly negative asserting that it refers to “human rights narcissism,” which refers to the embrace of negative rights at exclusion of positive rights; “judicial exceptionalism,” which refers to the position that foreign court practices and rulings are irrelevant in the United States; and to “American exemptionalism,” which is the view that the United States can and should be exempt from some multilateral treaties and institutions (such as the International Criminal Court).  Harold Koh, a Yale professor of international law, argues that American exceptionalism includes a favorable element such as “a distinctive rights culture” but also a “problematic face  . . . when the United States actually uses its exceptional power and wealth to create a double standard.”

For deconstruction, post-structuralism, and American exceptionalism, Barton takes complex terms and uses them in a way that nearly all scholars would not recognize.  (Note: footnotes that accompany this portion of text in book are here removed.)

Our point is rather straight forward: Barton uses a term whose meaning is contested, but he uses it as if it has a single, uncontested meaning.  We do not say that “American exceptionalism is terrible,” but we acknowledge that some writers use the term in a negative way.

In social life, there are many terms whose meaning is contested.  Take a commonly used term, such as conservative.  There is no single agreed upon definition for that term.  Rush Limbaugh, David Brooks, Russell Kirk, William Buckley – all significant American conservatives – would all have different definitions of what is a conservative.  No one can reasonably claim that there is a single definition of a conservative.  In the same way, there is no single definition of American exceptionalism.

Moreover, Barton says, “They don’t like America as that position,” even though we say nothing remotely like that.  And further our aim is not to “tear apart American exceptionalism.”

As a biographical note,  I presented a paper at a 2011 conference hosted by Grove City College’s Center for Vision and Values on Alexis de Tocqueville and American Exceptionalism (the presentation can be viewed or heard by clicking the link, wherein I argue that Tocqueville could be understood as promoting a modest version of American exceptionalism – by which I meant that Tocqueville saw the United States as having a distinct political culture and circumstances which enabled the growth and operation democratic political institutions (but not the immodest version of American exceptionalism which sees the US as some kind of chosen nation).  You can’t listen to that talk and call me someone who hates the concept of American exceptionalism.  Moreover, if one looked at my course syllabi with their plentiful selections of Federalist Papers and other documents from the founding era as well as lengthy passages from Tocqueville’s Democracy in America, one could not conclude that I am trying to “tear apart American exceptionalism.”

It seems that Barton cannot confront our criticism of his claims with discussions of texts and facts, but must go to a classic type of bad argument – the ad hominem criticism.  Warren and I are certainly not bothered by ad hominem criticisms, but we do wish the Barton would respond to what we actually wrote, rather than what he imagines we wrote.

And one more thing.  Perhaps Barton would find this distinction unintelligible, but we don’t hate his book (or him).  We find many of his claims to be erroneous and his arguments to be specious, but that’s not the same as hating something (or someone).   Hate derives from fear or in response to real or perceived threat or injury. Our criticism arises from dispassionate analysis of his claims.

David Barton on CBN today; Confuses Everson v. Board of Education with Something Else

David Barton will be on the 700 Club today and although the video is not yet available, a summary of his appearance is on the 700 Club website. He is supposed to talk about Jefferson and says falsely that Jefferson was an active member of the Virginia Bible Society, that he financed a Bible edition in 1798, and that he demonstrated interest in bringing Christianity to Indians. He will apparently also discuss the Jefferson Bible.

Under the church and state section, the narrative refers to the 1947 Emerson v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision that applied the Establishment Clause to the states. Barton has an interesting reading of the case:

In 1947 in Emerson v Board of Education (sic), the Supreme Court announced it would reverse this historic meaning and ruled that a school in Illinois had made the mistake of allowing voluntary religious activities by students, a practice that had characterized American education for the previous three centuries.

In fairness, perhaps the narrative was written by someone else who got the name of the case and the state wrong.  Everson actually upheld a New Jersey public school board’s policy of providing transportation to Catholic schools for children in their district. You can read that decision here.

Probably Illinois came  into the picture due to Barton’s criticism of McCollum vs. Board of Education decided in 1948. That case was in Illinois and related to religious instruction being offered in the public school. You can read that case here.

A prime finding of that decision was:

This utilization of the State’s tax supported public school system and its machinery for compulsory public school attendance to enable sectarian groups to give religious instruction to public school pupils in public school buildings violates the First Amendment of the Constitution, made applicable to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment.

Even though the classes were voluntary, the school organized the religion classes to the degree that the court believed religion was being established. Barton says that these decisions reversed all prior practice. Not quite. See this case for a much earlier state case where the schools were not permitted to include mandatory Bible readings.

The Founders’ Bible – Really?

Rolling over in their grave, they are…

I wonder if Thomas Jefferson provides commentary on some of the books. Prior to the book of Revelation, Jefferson could enlighten readers with this little gem:

It is between fifty and sixty years since I read it [the book of Revelation] and I then considered it as merely the ravings of a maniac no more worthy nor capable of explanation than the incoherences of our own nightly dreams. I was therefore well pleased to see in your first proof sheet that it was said to be not the production of St John but of Cerinthus a century after the death of that apostle. Yet the change of the author’s name does not lessen the extravagances of the composition and come they from whomsoever they may I cannot so far respect them as to consider them as an allegorical narrative of events past or subsequent. There is not coherence enough in them to countenance any suite of rational ideas. You will judge therefore from this how impossible I think it that either your explanation or that of any man in the heavens above or on the earth beneath can be a correct one. What has no meaning admits no explanation and pardon me if I say with the candor of friendship that I think your time too valuable and your understanding of too high an order to be wasted on these paralogisms. You will perceive I hope also that I do not consider them as revelations of the Supreme Being whom I would not so far blaspheme as to impute to Him a pretension of revelation couched at the same time in terms which He would know were never to be understood by those to whom they were addressed. In the candor of these observations I hope you will see proofs of the confidence esteem and which I entertain for you.

 

More Evidence David Barton is Wrong About Jefferson and Slavery: Robert Carter’s Emancipation Deed

I talked about Robert Carter in a prior post. Carter set in motion a plan to free his slaves beginning on August 1, 1791. Fresh from the Northumberland District Court in Heathsville, Virginia, I have copies of the Deed of Gift which Carter filed on August 1, 1791. I will pull out a couple of pieces of it and then provide links to all the pages which you can click through to review.

David Barton wrote in The Jefferson Lies that Thomas Jefferson was unable to free his slaves due to Virginia law. However, in Getting Jefferson Right, we demonstrate that Virginia law changed in 1782 to allow emancipation both during an owner’s life and at his death. The law was in effect for 24 years until it was modified in 1806 to make manumission more complicated for the slaves.

It is one thing to examine the law, but it is another thing to see the law in application. Robert Carter, a wealthy plantation owner who also sat on the Governor’s Council, submitted a deed, in accord with the law, on September 5, 1791. The process would take years and involve other people Carter appointed when he left Virginia.

Carter wrote the Deed of Gift on August 1, 1791 and included a list of 452 of his slaves covering all or part of five pages. Slaves over age 45 would be handled in another manner. Page one is here so you can see the format of the deed:

First, Carter introduced the list, then provided a listing of his plantations and finally a list of his slaves by name, age and location.

The next three pages contained an inventory of human beings and then on the fifth page of the deed, Carter provided his rationale and legal basis for the emancipation.

This section is quite important so I type it out here for easier reading (start at the red slash at the end of the first line):

And whereas I have for some time past been convinced that to retain them [slaves] in slavery is contrary to the true principles of Religion & Justice, that therefore it was my Duty to manumit them, if it could be accomplished without infringing the laws of my Country, without being of disadvantage to my neighbors & the Community at large: And whereas the General Assembly for the Commonwealth of Virginia did in the year seventeen hundred eighty two enact a Law entitled “an Act to authorize the manumission of slaves” now be it remembered that the said Robert do under the said Act for myself my heirs my Executors & administrators emancipate from slavery all such my slaves in the aforesaid Schedule (as are under the age of forty-six years) but in a manner & form as hereafter particularly mentioned & set forth.

Virginia law set age restrictions on manumissions and the older slaves would be handled differently. However, this document provides clear reference to the Virginia law passed in 1782 which allowed Carter to do what he listed here.

As recently as last week, David Barton told a radio audience that Jefferson could not free his slaves due to Virginia law. I don’t know how long it will take for someone in the Christian community to hold him accountable for this but the evidence is here that he is wrong.

Some have asked me why this matters. First of all, I would like to think that Christian leaders would not want to put out falsehoods. Second, I recently spoke to an African American pastor who told me that Barton’s whitewash of Jefferson’s record is offensive to him and his colleagues. According to this pastor, lifting up Jefferson as an abolitionist and civil rights champion hinders racial reconciliation within the greater Christian community.

Robert Carter’s entire Deed of Gift (click the links)

Page one, two, three, four, five, & six.

 

For more on Jefferson and slavery as well as other matters covered in David Barton’s recent book, see Getting Jefferson Right.