While scholars increasingly recognize the importance of religion throughout American history, The Bible in American Law and Politics is the first reference book to focus on the key role that the Bible has played in American public life. In considering revolting from Great Britain, Americans contemplated whether this was consistent with scripture. Americans subsequently sought to apply Biblical passages to such issues as slavery, women's rights, national alcoholic prohibition, issues of war and peace, and the like. American presidents continue to take their oath on the Bible. Some of America's greatest speeches, for example, Lincoln's Second Inaugural and William Jennings Bryan's Cross of Gold speech, have been grounded on Biblical texts or analogies. Today, Americans continue to cite the Bible for positions as diverse as LGBTQ rights, abortion, immigration, welfare, health care, and other contemporary issues. By providing essays on key speeches, books, documents, legal decisions, and other writings throughout American history that have sought to buttress arguments through citations to Scriptures or to Biblical figures, John Vile provides an indispensable guide for scholars and students in religion, American history, law, and political science to understand how Americans throughout its history have interpreted and applied the Bible to legal and political issues.
One of six titles in The Bible in American Culture series published to celebrate the Society of Biblical Literature's centennial, this volume explores the intersection of politics and religion from colonial era through the 1950s.
The Bible in American Law, Politics, and Political Rhetoric
This collection brings together legal professionals and theologians to assess the significance and function of civil law in the Bible.
This Handbook brings together a number of established scholars, as well as younger scholars on the rise, to provide a scholarly overview--rich with bibliographic resources--to those interested in the Bible's role in American cultural ...
This volume profiles nineteen of America's most influential Christian jurists from the early colonial era to the present day.
In brief, this is an analysis of conservative and liberal plans to do good for the nation, evaluated in light of the Bible and common sense.
Contending for the Constitution is a companion volume to the popular work Defending the Declaration.
A Study in History William J. Federer ... II , p . 664 . Anson Phelps Stokes and Leo Pfeffer , Church and State in the United States ( NY : Harper and Row , Publishers , 1950 , revised one - volume edition , 1964 ) , p . 156 .
And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubilee unto you. Leviticus 25:10 Among the best-known symbols of liberty in American history is a ...
God’s Law and Order shows that we cannot understand the criminal justice system without accounting for evangelicalism’s impact on its historical development.