The Founding Myth: Why Christian Nationalism Is Un-American

by Andrew L. Seidel

“Sir,” John Quincy shot back, “what is high treason? The Constitution of the United States says what high treason is…. It is not for the gentleman from Kentucky, or his puny mind, to define what high treason is and confound it with what I have done.” John Quincy then ordered the clerk to read the first paragraph of the Declaration of Independence…. “When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation–” “Proceed!” John Quincy thundered. “Proceed! Down to ‘right’ and ‘duty’!” The clerk continued: “It is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government.” “Now, sir, if there is a principle sacred on earth and established by the instrument just read, it is the right of the people to alter, change, to destroy, the government if it becomes oppressive to them. There would be no such right existing if the people had not the power in pursuance of it to petition for it…. “I rest that petition on the Declaration of Independence!” John Quincy boomed.