JIMMY CARTER is an avowed religious man. What will he say about God and religion in his inaugural address? If he chooses to acknowledge the guidance of God, he will be in good company with all the other presidents. American presidents have expressed their faith in God at the solemn time of their inauguration. With hand on the Bible, they took the simple oath prescribed by the Constitution. Following George Washington's precedent, they delivered inaugural addresses giving their views of the challenges and problems confronting them and the nation. In doing so, they announced publicly to their fellow countrymen their belief in God, feeling that He cared about them and the country. Four presidents did not give an inaugural address, because they succeeded to the office at the death of the incumbent and were not elected in their own right. Gerald R. Ford did not give a formal inaugural address but he did make a public address on the occasion of assuming the presidency.
To define the religious beliefs of the presidents in terms of a system of theology would not be practical, even if possible. Men of religious persuasion differ with one another in their concept of God, even as with themselves at different periods of their lives. Privately, the presidents may have entertained different religious beliefs. A recent book, God in the White House (New York: Crown Publishers, 1968), by Edmund Fuller and David E. Green has assessed the faith of American presidents but makes little reference to inaugural addresses. The expression of their faith on taking up their duties as president gives a unique insight into their religious belief.
The seven presidents from George Washington to Andrew Jackson were men molded by the times of the Revolutionary War and further tested by the trials of the struggling new nation. To this generation of presidents, even though they referred to God in deistic terms, He loomed larger than a Being disinterested in the affairs of men. Nor man Cousins, in his book on the religious faith of the founding fathers, In God We Trust (New York, Harper & Row, 1958), concluded that these men reflected the variety of religious experiences of their day. If they did not some times acknowledge formal church membership, they believed in God and the spiritual nature of man. Indeed, their enlightened concept of the freedom of man rested on a firm religious foundation.
In reality, the religious faith of the presidents represents a unifying theme in their inaugural addresses. As Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., writes in the preface to Fred L. Israel's annotated edition of the inaugural addresses, The Chief Executive (New York, Crown Publishers, 1965), the presidents reminded Americans that the most important task was the preservation of individual freedom and self-government in the great democratic experiment. They believed this freedom originated from the natural rights of man, who was created in the image of God. To them, only God's protection of the American nation perpetuated these freedoms.
President Washington, in his first inaugural, referred more extensively to the "Almighty Being who rules over the universe" than any other president, although Abraham Lincoln devoted a greater proportion of an inaugural ad dress to the intervention of God in the affairs of men. Washington felt that no people could be more grateful to the "Invisible Hand" that guided "every step" by which the United States be came an independent nation. To Washington, this meant not only the Revolutionary War but the adoption of the Constitution and the establishment of the new government.
John Adams viewed God as "an over ruling Providence" who had "protected this country from the first." Thomas Jefferson's brief reference to "an over ruling providence" in the first inaugural gave way in the second to the need for the "favor of that Being in whose hands we are, who led our fathers, as Israel of old, from their native land and planted them in a country flowing with all the necessaries and comforts of life; who has covered our infancy with His providence and our riper years with His wisdom and power. . . ."
James Madison's tribute to the "Al mighty Being whose power regulates the destiny of nations, whose blessings have been so conspicuously dispensed to this rising Republic" was echoed by James Monroe's belief in God's protection of the nation. John Quincy Adams quoted the scripture "Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain" (Ps. 127:1) to make his point concerning the protection of God in the affairs of the nation. Looking back to the national beginnings and the early years of the Republic, Andrew Jackson saw in God a protector of "our national infancy" and an upholder of "our liberties."
The early presidents, uncertain of the outcome of the democratic experiment, expressed their hope of God's protection and blessing for the future. Washington called for the "propitious smiles of Heaven" and the "divine blessings" of the "benign Parent of the Human Race." John Adams entreated "that Being who is supreme over all" to "continue His blessings upon this nation and its Government and to give it all possible success and duration consistent with the ends of His providence." Jefferson asked for God to "lead our councils" in his first inaugural and to "enlighten the minds" of His servants in the second.
Martin Van Buren drew a line be tween his predecessors and himself. Born in 1782, he identified with the generation emerging after the Revolutionary War. In his presidential responsibilities. Van Buren asked for the "strengthening support" of God and His blessing on the nation. William Henry Harrison linked God's creation of man in His image with democratic government, since he believed all men were created equal. Presidents Polk, Taylor, Pierce, and Buchanan looked back to the God of their fathers, imploring His favor for them and the country they governed.
Abraham Lincoln came to the presidency amidst forces threatening to split the Union. He appealed to reason when he declared that if God's "eternal truth and justice" should be only on the side of the North or the South, His will would prevail and settle the issue. Lincoln counseled Americans to hold a "firm reliance on Him who has never yet forsaken this favored land. . . ."
As the war continued and the dead piled high at Shiloh and Antietam, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg, Lincoln's religious convictions deepened. In the majestic second inaugural, Lincoln observed that both North and South read the same Bible and prayed to the same God that their cause would prevail. The prayers of both could not be answered nor had the prayers of either been fully answered, in his view. To Lincoln, this meant "the Almighty has His own purposes."
In calling slavery an offense to God, Lincoln decided that the war brought punishment on North and South alike for the evil of slavery. Moreover, he felt "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether" (Ps. 19:9), even if God willed that the war "continue until all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword. . . ." In conclusion, Lincoln conceived of a peace without malice and with charity.
Here we can only refer to how Ulysses S. Grant expressed his faith in God's watchcare over the American people and, in his second inaugural, expressed his feeling that God would some day unite the people of the world into one nation speaking one language.
Hayes felt that the "destinies of nations and individuals" emerged from the guidance of God. Both Garfield and Harrison refrained from expressing personal religious belief but invoked the blessings of God. Cleveland, in his two addresses, referred to God's intervention in the affairs of the United States.
McKinley expressed his conviction that God would not forsake the United States if Americans obeyed "His commandments" and walked "humbly in His footsteps."
Gratitude to God for Blessings Bestowed
Theodore Roosevelt expressed gratitude to God because He had blessed Americans "with the conditions" that in turn enabled them to achieve well-being and prosperity. William Howard Taft simply asked for God's help to him personally in the presidency. Woodrow Wilson, in his first inaugural, gave assurance of success with God's help. On the brink of World War I, he asked God in his second inaugural to give him wisdom and prudence to face the responsibilities of leading the nation during the time of war crisis.
Warren G. Harding asked for the "favor and guidance of God in His heaven," and Calvin Coolidge attributed to divine origin a belief in the universality of mankind. Herbert Hoover asked God to help him to serve the American people as their president.
Franklin D. Roosevelt came to the presidency at the time of economic crisis. In his first inaugural, he asked for God's blessings, guidance, and protection. In his second, he sought Divine guidance "to give light to them that sit in darkness" (Luke 1:79). With the threat of war hanging heavy over the world at the third inaugural, FDR urged Americans to "go forward, in the service of our country, by the will of God." And then the war came. Burdened by years of leadership, when FDR stood for the fourth time to take the oath of office, he concluded by asking God for the vision to see the way "to peace on earth."
Harry Truman, confronted with a "cold war" that threatened American freedom, voiced a faith in God that would enable all men to secure freedom in a world of justice, harmony, and peace. The only president to pray at his inaugural was Dwight D. Eisenhower, who believed God protected the United States. He decided on the morning of his inauguration to offer the prayer, in which he petitioned God to "give us, we pray, the power to discern clearly right from wrong, and allow our words and actions to be governed thereby, and by the laws of this land."
When John F. Kennedy launched the New Frontier, he spoke of a need for God's blessing and help, although he reminded men that they must be the ones to accomplish "God's work" on earth.
Lyndon B. Johnson found inspiration in King Solomon's prayer, which he quoted "Give me now wisdom and knowledge, that I may go out and come in before this people: for who can judge this thy people, that is so great?" (2 Chron. 1:10). He also reminded Americans that God had not promised that the greatness of the United States would endure.
Natural rights constitute the corner stone of American democracy. The presidents believed that the natural rights of man come not from government but from God. Recent presidents, confronted with great challenges to human freedom, have expressed their faith in the inalienable rights of man.
In his second inaugural, Nixon uttered an almost prophetic statement when he said that "we shall answer to God, to history, and to our conscience for the way we use these years." Gerald Ford, in his public address on assuming the presidency, asked for the prayers of Americans for himself and also for Richard Nixon and his family. Ford asserted that "a higher power . . . ordains not only righteousness but love, not only justice but mercy."
In retrospect, the faith in God's blessings and protection that the American presidents revealed in their inaugural addresses might be rephrased in the nation's motto, "In God We Trust." As the country grew and assumed world responsibilities, the religious faith of the presidents enlarged to include not only Americans but all people in the quest for human dignity and freedom. If this is God's greatest blessing to the American people, what loftier goal can men pursue than to give, as Franklin D. Roosevelt put it, "light to them that sit in darkness"?
