The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If “Thou shalt not covet,” and “Thou shalt not steal,” were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society, before it can be civilized or made free. John Adams 1

 

The law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code…laws essential to the existence of men in society and most of which have been enacted by every nation which ever professed any code of laws. 2 Vain indeed would be the search among the writing of profane antiquity…to find so broad, so complete and so solid a basis for morality as this decalogue lays down. 3 John Quincy Adams

 

Human legislators can undertake only to prescribe the actions of men; they acknowledge their inability to govern and direct the sentiments of the heart….It is one of the greatest marks of Divine favor bestowed upon the children of Israel that the legislator [God} gave them rules not only of action, but for the government of the heart. 4 John Quincy Adams

 

[I]t pleased God to deliver, on Mount Sinai, a compendium of this holy law and to write it with His own hand on durable tables of stone. This law, which is commonly called the Ten Commandment or Decalogue…was incorporated in the judicial law. 5 William Findley, Revolutionary Soldier; U.S. Congressman

 

The opinion that human reason left without the constant control of Divine laws and commands will….give duration to a popular government is as chimerical [unlikely] as the most extravagant ideas that enter the head of a maniac…Where will you find any code of laws among civilized men in which the commands and prohibitions are not founded on Christian principles? I need not specify the prohibition of murder, robbery, theft, [and] trespass. 6 Noah Webster

 

All the miseries and evils which men suffer from vice, crime, ambition, injustice, oppression, slavery and war, proceed from their despising or neglecting the precepts contained in the Bible. 7 Noah Webster

 

The sanctions of the Divine law...cover the whole area of human action… The laws which regulate our conduct are the laws of man and the laws of God. 8 De Witt Clinton, Introduced the Twelfth Amendment; Governor of New York; U.S. Senator

 

[T] he Ten Commandments….are the sum of the moral law. 9 John Witherspoon, Signer of the Declaration of Independence

 

[T]he Holy Scriptures…can alone secure to society, order and peace, and to our courts of justice and constitutions of government, purity, stability, and usefulness. In vain, with the Bible, we increase penal laws and draw entrenchments [protections] around our institutions. 10 James McHenry, Signer of the U.S. Constitution

 

Men, in a word, must necessarily be controlled either by a power within them or aby a power without them; either by the Word of God or by the strong arm of man; either by the Bible or by the bayonet. 11 Robert Winthrop, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives

 

We seek to prevent in some measure the extension of the penal code by inspiring a salutary and conservative principle of virtue and of knowledge in an early age…By general instruction we seek, as far as possible, to purify the whole moral atmosphere…and to turn the strong current of feeling and opinion, as well as the censures of the law and the denunciations of religion, against immorality and crime. 12 Daniel Webster  (Picture above)

 

Had I a voice that could be heard from New Hampshire to Georgia, it should be exerted in urging the necessity of disseminating virtue and knowledge among our citizens. On this subject, the policy of the eastern States is well worthy of imitation. The wise people of that extremity of the union never form a new township without making arrangements that secure to its inhabitants the instruction of youth and the public preaching of the gospel. Hence their children are early taught to know their rights and to respect themselves. They grow up good members of society and staunch defenders of their country’s cause. 13 David Ramsay, Revolutionary Surgeon; Member of the

Continental Congress

 

Let it simply be asked, “Where is the security for property for reputation, for life, is the sense of religious obligation desert…?” 14 George Washington

 

When the minds of the people in general are viciously disposed and unprincipled, and their conduct disorderly, a free government will be attended with greater confusions and evils more horrid than the wild, uncultivated state of nature. It can only be happy when the public principle and opinions are properly directed and their manners regulated. This is an influence beyond the reach of laws and punishments and can be claimed only by religion and education. 15 Abraham Baldwin, Signer of the U.S. Constitution

 

The first point of justice….consists in piety; nothing certainly being so great a debt upon us as to render to the Creator and Preserver those acknowledgments which are due to Him for our being and the hourly protection He affords us. 16 Samuel Adams