How modern evangelicals are ignoring their own history.

The Framers and the Faithful

By Steven Waldman
Contemporary religious conservatives can certainly find quotes from Founding Fathers to support their claims that government should aggressively support religion. They'll have a harder time finding quotes from 18th-century evangelicals. Falwell and company are free to chart a different course from earlier Christians, but they should do so with the knowledge that some very pious evangelical leaders believed this was a dangerous path. When the Rev. Falwell meets his maker, he may well get a pat on the back from Patrick Henry, but he's sure to get a tongue lashing, and a sermon, from the Rev. Leland.

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