American Religious History Week

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Aderholt) is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. ADERHOLT. Mr. Speaker, I do want to thank my colleagues for taking time to call attention to this topic that we have been discussing tonight. And certainly from the very beginning of our history in this Nation, religious expression and faith was the norm amongst conversations that our Founding Fathers had.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Forbes) along with several of my colleagues tonight pointed out that as we stand here tonight in this Chamber that as we look around the room and we see the reliefs under the ceiling of the Chamber, and we see the 23 different lawgivers that are depicted above the gallery doorways, the most prominent relief, of course, has been noted is that of Moses who handed down the Ten Commandments. And of course those Ten Commandments were handed down to the children of Israel from God Himself.

Furthermore, it has been noted here tonight that ``In God We Trust'' is above the Speaker's chair, as it is our national motto. And of course let's not forget that as we started the legislative day today, before we voted on the legislation just a couple of hours ago, a chaplain said a prayer that began the legislative day. And of course that has been the custom dating back to the days of our Founding Fathers.

The Founding Fathers no doubt believed that God had His Almighty hand in the founding and the building of this Nation. George Washington himself believed that America's independence from Britain ultimately depended on God and not man. I find it interesting that it is not unusual for the Founding Fathers when they dated documents at that time they would use the phrase ``in the year of our Lord Jesus Christ 1776'' of what the date may have been.

A few months ago, I was walking down the stairways just outside of the House Chamber, and one of the paintings that is above the stairways is the ``Signing of the Constitution.'' And I have passed by that painting hundreds of times. Of course, most Americans are very familiar with that famous painting. But for some reason, one thing caught my eye that was not usually the case, and I noticed there was an open book there near where the presiding officer was over the signers of the Constitution. And I took a closer look and noticed that it was an open book. And at the top it said ``Saint Matthew.'' And certainly I don't think it is any coincidence that that book was open on that particular day.

One may ask why our Founding Fathers were so concerned about this issue. And one reason I believe that they were so focused on this issue and thought it was so important is because they had this radical belief that we are all endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights. And this was indeed a radical concept in the time, because in England your rights were granted to you by the king. Therefore, if the king or the queen granted your rights, or if man granted your rights, then the king or the queen or the man could take those rights away. However, if God granted those rights, no person, be he king or queen, could take them away. They were a gift of God.

So when one asks the importance of religious history and faith in America, one can point to many reasons. And one reason that we can point back to is that in the United States of America, rights are granted by God and not by man.

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