Did America Have a Christian Founding?: Separating Modern Myth from Historical Truth

by Mark David Hall

the object of the Declaration was not to “find out new principles, or new arguments . . . it was intended to be an expression of the American mind, and to give that expression the proper tone and spirit called for by the occasion.

Authors who contend that the founders were deists routinely highlight the views of some combination of eight men: Franklin, Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Hamilton, Allen, and Paine.