Conservative Party (Virginia)

The post below is in response to a colleague’s FaceBook page praising historian David Barton’s June 25, 2010 appearance on the Glenn Beck program.  The subject was the second installment of Black Founders on Founder’s Friday. Some of the concepts in quotes are others claims in addition to works of others.

Response By Kevin M. Samartin, Chairman,  Conservative Party (Virginia)

Great program. David Barton is an excellent historian. I have a bunch of his work including a DVD where he goes through the faith of our Founders. It is an incredible ‘sermon’ that he gave as a guest of the great Pastor Charles Stanley. He explained the faith of many of the 56 signers, and pointed out an interesting fact that the two who were the least religious, are the two that we have been taught the most about in our public education system. Those 2 being Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin. Though they do deserve a great place in our country’s history, there is a reason why the others are discounted and that is to attempt to claim that our country was not founded upon Judeo-Christian principles and that our Founders were not religious.

The “slavery thing” [another FB responder's claim in his string in opposition to the Founder's]was mainly a southern issue. Particularly three states – North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. There were a majority of colonial inhabitants that were vehemently opposed to slavery. I am proud to say that my Baptist brothers and sisters were staunchly opposed to slavery. The Constitution itself did spell out the abolition of slavery in Article 5. This was a compromise to ensure the inclusion of the southern states as a mean of providing security for the new nation as a whole. Additionally, the 3/5 clause counted non-free blacks as 3/5 of a person as a protection to ensure that the southern states could not count their slaves in a census on a 1:1 as opposed to a free person. This was extremely important in that if the slave states were allowed to count their slaves in a census, the south’s representation in the House of Representatives would far exceed that the free states and in turn slavery would not be abolished. The 3/5 was achieved when the northern states explained that if the southern states were going to count what they deemed their “property” the northern states were going to include in the census their property as well, which included many more cattle, horses, and other livestock than their southern counterparts. The south agreed to the 3/5 number.

The Founder’s wanted to end slavery, but were having a difficult time with the logistics of it all. Upon George Washington’s death, his slaves were given large parcels of his estate. The US was clearly on a course to the abolition of slavery until the Missouri Compromise of 1820.

The history that David Barton has been able to find in the archives of many institutions and private collections is astounding. He has shown time and time again that there was not a “racist” thing going on between blacks and whites in the days of our Founders. The documents and data do not lie. We all need to search out our history because much of what has been provided over the past 40 years or more has had a skew which is detrimental to the health of our nation. Thomas Sowell, the great economist and Hoover Fellow, explained with incredible amounts of data showing that black people had begun a rise in personal income, education, and other factors that show an increase in what can best be described as their class in this country. Business ownership by blacks increased in the years leading up to the 60s. Once the 60s came around with “The Great Society” there was a systematic breakdown of family, an increase of out of wedlock births, and an increase in single parent homes among blacks. The government and other entities that made up this “Great Society” fed a notion that the government would provide for black families living at or below poverty and the need for a father in the home was not necessary. It is a sad commentary that so many had to suffer needlessly, families were broken apart orthey became non-existent in an attempt to improve their condition in America in what has been classified as “white guilt”.