Heritage America

Wise Men Have Left Us an Inheritance

In previous articles I’ve mentioned the notion of “American heritage” or those Americans who can be described as “heritage Americans.” This way of thinking and speaking is foreign to us today, and it also raises suspicions: is this a euphemism for exclusion and discrimination? is this a return to an ugly and terrifying fascist ideology? what must one do to “qualify” as a heritage American? am I included? 

For most nations of the world, to be considered a true German or Italian or Chinese or South African you must be a blood descendent (and thus exhibit common genetic traits), you must live in a geographical location where those people have historically lived, and you must abide by certain customs and ways of life. While America is not a “propositional nation,” neither does she neatly align with how other peoples have historically associated. Heritage America is not reducible to “blood and soil” fearmongering, yet neither are family, kin, and the land unimportant in America’s identity.

What does it mean to be an American? Heritage America is best understood as involving seven inheritances: the English language, Christianity, self-government, Christian government, liberty, equality under the law, and relationship with the physical land.

The English Language

Americans are English-language speakers, descended mainly from the English people. While the settlement of the colonies in the seventeenth-century certainly included peoples of other languages (Dutch, Germans, Spanish, etc.), the majority spoke English. English was the political, religious, and commercial language of the colonies. Those who were not native English speakers quickly realized they had to master the tongue if they wanted to survive and flourish. Even though there was great regional variety among the various colonies as David Hackett Fisher demonstrates, Fisher nonetheless concludes that “nearly all spoke the English language, lived by British laws, and cherished their ancestral liberties.”

A common language is paramount for any kind of national identity, character, government, or collective action. Without the same language, there can be no common history and no share memories. There would be no shared ways of life, general legal norms, widespread business and commerce, prevailing religion, common literature, or seasonal rhythms. In a real sense, a common language is a prerequisite to successful civilization and national self-preservation.

A common language is both a prerequisite and a consequence of a shared life. Language always shapes a people’s character, regionally and nationally. Language is how a people come to conceptualize the world, and a language’s structure determines their habits. For example, it is well known that the German language is able to express, in a single word, complex philosophical concepts that become difficult to translate into other languages. This makes German uniquely suitable as  a philosophical language, which explains the inordinate influence of German philosophy in the modern age. Other languages lend themselves toward beautiful rhetoric and mimetic ease, facilitating public speeches and oral memory.

Noah Webster (author of the famous Webster Dictionary) noted that the English language borrowed heavily from other languages. The origin and groundwork was Saxon, from which came ideas of domestic and agricultural life. In addition, Webster argued that

The French language has furnished us with military terms; the Dutch with sea phrases; the Greek and Roman with words proper to form and polish the poetical, historical and rhetorical stiles, and with terms in mathematics, philosophy and physic; the modern Italian has supplied us with terms in music, painting and sculpture.

Not only did English heavily borrow from Latin, but Greek and Latin were required in schools. Accordingly, all those who received an English education in early America were steeped in Greek and Latin literature—and hence ancient ideas of philosophy, political rule, and moral virtue. It is unsurprising, then, that English-speaking nations have a history of political independence, self-government, and the protection of the peoples’ liberty and morality from demagogues and tyrants.

However, English is now in decline. In the last fifty years, mainly with the influx of millions of Hispanic immigrants (legal and illegal), the United States has become all but officially bilingual. Hospitals, road signs, instruction manuals, and commercial products are now printed in English and Spanish—if not many other languages. Some estimate that by 2050, one in three Americans will speak Spanish (either exclusively or in addition to English). In some regional enclaves, Spanish is the only language spoken; and many bilingual citizens speak their non-English native language exclusively at home.

While none of this is intentionally nefarious, it is a natural consequence of reckless immigration policies. When combined with the loss of civilizational confidence among English speakers and the ideological dominance of “diversity and inclusion,” there is little will among Americans to resist a linguistic revolution. This will, undoubtedly, have long-reaching consequences in law, politics, and social organization. Instead of being proud of our English tongue, we are told we must be accepting and inclusive of non-English speakers. Technology certainly makes intra-cultural exchanges among different languages easier, but it is an artificial band aid; it cannot replace a national language as the source of a common way of life.

Heritage America is an English-speaking America. Non-English speakers who immigrate to America should make it their top priority to learn English and integrate into the common tongue, including reading great American literature. English should formally be declared the official language of the United States, and every effort should be made to preserve and encourage spoken and written English.

The Christian Religion

Christianity has been the dominant religion in America since the colonial era. No other religion has had such a presence or influence—although this might change in the near future. However, some scholars have cleverly convinced themselves that Christianity was stagnant in the seventeenth-century and in decline by the eighteenth century, such that the majority of colonists by the mid-to-late eighteenth-century were not attending church. The “scholarly consensus” by the 1980s was that no more than 10-20% of colonial Americans belonged to a church. In their 1988 article on the topic, Rodney Stark and Roger Finke concluded that “only 10 to 12 percent of the population in 1776 was churched” (this number excluded blacks). In a later book on the same topic, they rounded the number up to 20%. Part of the reason for these low estimates was to support a narrative arch: the Second Great Awakening sparked a massive religious revival in the country over decades of church-planting and conversions, such that by the 1890s 45% of the U.S. population was “churched,” which grew to 62% by 2000.

The problem is that this analysis is wrong. Some historians have exposed the flaws in Stark and Finke’s assumptions and methodology, while others have run their own statistical assessments. From these sources the actual number of “churched,” “church-attending,” or “church adherents” by the time of the American founding (as best as we can gather) was between 56 to 80% of the population, depending upon the region (less churched in the South, more in the North). Thus, American Christianity was neither stagnant nor in decline. In fact, there is even evidence that conversions grew in the eighteenth-century.

Neither was America populated by other world religions. Of the 3,228 known congregations in America by 1776, 98.1% of them were Protestant. There were fifty-six Roman Catholic parishes (1.7%) and five Jewish synagogues (0.2%). There were no significant populations of Muslims or adherents of other world religions. American was overwhelming Christian, and Protestant at that.

There is more than enough evidence that the American people thought of themselves as a Christian people. Consider two briefly. In a 1794 sermon in Hartford, CT entitled “The Necessity of the Belief in Christianity,” Rev. Jonathan Edwards, Jr. commented that “since Christianity appears to be necessary to the public good of the state, it ought to be encouraged by magistrates and rulers of every description,” and that “the citizens in general are obligated to encourage and promote Christianity, by being themselves Christians and that not only in profession, but in heart and life, and by giving their suffrages for those who are of the same character.” In his 1797 Inaugural Address, John Adams remarked that “I feel it to be my duty to add, if a veneration for the religion of a people who profess and call themselves Christians, and a fixed resolution to consider a decent respect for Christianity among the best recommendations for the public service, can enable me in any degree to comply with your wishes, it shall be my strenuous endeavor that this sagacious injunction of the two Houses shall not be without effect.”

Heritage America is Christian America. This is so not only in that the majority of Americans have been Christian throughout our history, but that America has had a Christian origin and télos. America is not merely Christian descriptively, but normatively; thus, if America were to lose her Christian people and character, she would cease being America.

Self-Government

Probably the political characteristic that best describes and distinguishes America was that of local self-government. This was the tradition and way of life that the colonists were attempting to preserve in their conflict with Great Britain that eventually led to independence and war. Although the colonies were technically provinces of the British Empire—chartered by the King, staffed with royal governors, and protected by Red Coats—the British had long adopted the policy of “salutary neglect” toward the colonies, since ruling them across 3,000 miles of ocean was impractical. In this context, even during the colonial era the states experienced a generous amount of freedom to order their own political and social affairs as they saw fit.

The label of “self-government,” however, only tells us so much. What kind of government and in what form? Technically, self-government is compatible with non-representative forms of government if the people acquiesce to being ruled by unelected and unaccountable officials. What matters for self-government is that the government of a certain people or region is theirs, and not forcibly imposed against the will of the political community.

What, then, about republican government, or elements of representation, democracy, and consent of the governed? Some Puritan scholars argue that Massachusetts Bay was not a democracy, but a theocracy or oligarchy. Others point out that our understanding of these terms are anachronistic and one-dimensional. For example, B. Katherine Brown has noted that when John Winthrop and John Cotton spoke of “aristocracy” they actually had in mind more of a mixed government that involved elements of representation and democracy. The people were able to elect their own governors in the expectation that they would be loyal subjects in exchange for protection and government for the common good. The people were bound to submit to the laws if the laws and the governor of the colony ruled according to the law of God.

Regardless of these particular debates, as well as the variety of governments throughout the colonies, the important point is that self-government captured the essence of political or corporate liberty. A people are politically free in so far as they are able to govern themselves as they see fit, not being dictated by an imperial center that would raze their traditions and make them slaves of a government not their own. This requires the virtues of responsibility and restraint by the people. Not all people merely by virtue of being human are capable of self-government. In fact, self-government is rare in human history, as most people are too poor, slavish, stupid, or vicious to establish good government and run it well. They are instead better fit to be ruled without, and even against, their consent. 

The political compromise of 1787 sought to preserve the independent political nature of the several states even while binding them into a national union on matters of foreign policy and intra-state economic relations. The Constitution guaranteed to each state a republican form of government where they would have plenary power to arrange their own domestic affairs for the particular good of the people of that state. Thus, self-government at both the state and national levels was preserved in a unique arrangement of a partially-consolidated confederate republic.

Heritage America is an America of both local and national self-government. It is an inheritance of a people deliberating among themselves via their representatives over laws for the common good. It is a way of life that is demanding and uplifting, that is ordered in opposition to anarchy and that is free in resistance to tyranny.

Christian Government

America of the colonial and founding periods was not just Christian peoples governing themselves, but Christians explicitly seeking to implement Christian government. The Mayflower Compact speaks of the men “covenant[ing] and combin[ing] [them]selves together into a Civil Body Politick,” and doing so “in the presence of God and one another” and “for the glory of God, and advancement of the Christian Faith.”

In Virginia, in the charters issued to the Virginia Company of London in 1606, 1609, and 1612, King James congratulated the investors on their “desires for the furtherance of so noble a work, which may, by the Providence of Almighty God hereafter tend to the glory of His Divine Majesty, in propagating the Christian religion” to the natives, “who yet live in miserable ignorance of the true knowledge and worship of God.” The 1609 charter exhorts all those who “shall inhabit within the said Precincts of Virginia” to “determine to live together in the Fear and true Worship of Almighty God, Christian Peace and Civil Quietness each with [the] other.” In the 1610-1611 Articles, Laws, and Order, Divine Politics, and Martial for the Colony of Virginia, the document opens by speaking of a “most zealous Prince” who, in his own realm, “hath a principall care of true Religion, and reverence for God,” and encourages lower political officials to “let their waies be like his ends for the glorie of God.”

The venerable Justice Joseph Story accurately captured the religious character of the colonial governments when he said in his 1833 Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States:

In fact, every American colony, from its foundation down to the revolution, with the exception of Rhode Island, (if, indeed, that state be an exception,) did openly, by the whole course of its laws and institutions, support and sustain, in some form, the Christian religion; and almost invariably gave a peculiar sanction to some of its fundamental doctrines. And this has continued to be the case in some of the states down to the present period, with- out the slightest suspicion, that it was against the principles of public law, or republican liberty (vol. 3:724).

Even later, in 1846, Rev. William Andrews from Connecticut commented on the original nature of Connecticut’s colonial government:

Connecticut was planted by Christian men, and on Christian principles. The grand aim of the colonists was to build up a Christian state, a system of institutions which should be as a holy temple in honour of Almighty God, founded on the recognition of His authority, reared in accordance with His will, and solemnly devoted to the glory of His name. They looked on civil government as a Divine ordinance, clothed with a majesty descended from above, not derived from beneath, and not as a mere earthly contrivance for the collection of revenue and the maintenance of an efficient police. In fleeing from the oppressions, and striving to be freed from the abuses, of the Old World, they did not cast away the great truth which has been the shaping law of Christendom—Christ’s domain—that the anointed Son of God, from whose birth all Christian nations measure time, is the true centre of the State as of the Church, who should be recognized in every civil and ecclesiastical institution, and to whom every office-bearer owes allegiance (“Eulogy on the Death of the Late Governor John Cotton Smith”)

Was this also true of the American founding, of the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, the U.S. Constitution, and the Northwest Ordinance (the four organic laws of the U.S.)? The short answer is yes, even though tens of thousands of pages have been written debating this and a myriad of related topics. Many scholars are convinced that secular, philosophic, and Enlightenment ideals had significantly diluted the Christian political inheritance by the 1770s and 1780s such that the confederate republican system of the U.S. Constitution and state constitutions by 1790 cannot be said to be Christian forms of government.

This is not the place to debate this in detail, but we will note the overwhelming Protestant character of the state constitutions (rewritten after 1776), as well as the twenty resolutions by the Continental Congress calling for explicitly Christian days thanksgiving, fasting, and prayer between 1774-1784—a tradition that continued during the administrations of Washington, Adams, and Madison. As mentioned above, the American people had not become less Christian in the late eighteenth-century, and there was an expectation that civil law would be Christian in its moral and religious character.

Heritage America is unique in that it is not merely a Christian people seeking to govern themselves well, but to order themselves under intentional Christian government and civil law. To be a Heritage American, then, is to accept this form of religious polity and be willing to submit to laws and institutions that are explicitly Christian in their origin, nature, and purposes.

Liberty

Besides equality, liberty may be the most talked about and cherished American ideal. Yet what do we mean by liberty? In the modern mind, liberty is merely the absence of external constraint or force. To be free, then, is to be able to do as you please for the reasons you want, without either being restrained at the start or punished consequently (all supposedly within reasonable and legal limits).

Yet this is only partly what it means to be free. Modern conservatives like to speak of “ordered liberty,” by which they mean freedom used well, or freedom put to good ends. There is no such thing as “ordered liberty,” however, because all liberty by its nature must be properly ordered. There is liberty, and there is slavery. Slavery comes in two forms: external slavery, in which another forcibly imposes their will and power to take command over your physical body; and internal slavery, in which a person becomes enslaved to their passions, lusts, and desires. (There is also a dimension of internal slavery through external force, as in the case of propaganda, brain-washing, and disordered education.) True liberty requires that one not merely be free from external coercion, but that one also be spiritually free to joyfully choose to do good. Some might even claim that spiritual freedom is the essence of liberty, such that one can be free even if externally oppressed.

Americans have long espoused spiritual liberty as the height of human freedom. To be free is to become truly human—to recognize there is a God and a moral order outside yourself, and that you were created to live in certain ways and not others. This is not primarily an individual effort, but more rightfully is understood in communal contexts since moral obligation and a full life requires relationships with others. Truly, it is better to be in harmony with one’s family and neighbors, to fellowship and cooperate in work and worship, than it is to be pure and unsullied as a hermit. Those whose lives are morally and religious disordered, who reject family and community, and who care nothing for using their freedom to live as they ought, are not Heritage Americans. They have repudiated American freedom and bought the lie that to live as one pleases without any restraint is to be free.

The ideals and practice of religious liberty and toleration are also uniquely American. Historically, this was not the modern practice of religious pluralism, in which the world’s religions can demand toleration in polity and society as their “religious right” or the “right of conscience.” Instead, religious liberty was the freedom to worship the one true God according to one’s conscience, and in a civil and orderly way:

That all person living in this province, who confess and acknowledge the one Almighty and eternal God, to be the Creator, Upholder and Ruler of the world; and that hold themselves obliged in conscience to live peaceably and justly in civil society, shall, in no ways, be molested or prejudiced for their religious persuasion, or practice, in matters of faith and worship, nor shall they be compelled, at any time, to frequent or maintain any religious worship, place or ministry whatever (Frame of Government of Pennsylvania, Laws Agreed Upon in England, Sec. XXXV, 1682)

This meant that the people and their civil rulers were the final arbiters of what religions were true (i.e., worshipped the true God and not false gods) and what religious practices would and would not be tolerated for the sake of civil peace and good order.

As already mentioned, the Americans were overwhelmingly Christian, and so religious liberty and tolerance was more specifically Christian liberty and Christian tolerance. That tolerance was intolerant toward many world religions and religious practices judged to be harmful to soul and body; instead, toleration was primarily extended toward overcoming denominational differences among Protestants.

Heritage Americans must love liberty in its fullest sense—freedom from external tyranny and internal despotism—and seek spiritual freedom in community with family, friends, and neighbors. Heritage America embraces religious liberty and tolerance toward Christian differences, and might even tolerate Christian-adjacent religions if its adherents agree to live according to Christian civil laws, norms, and cultural expectations.

Equality Under the Law

For hundreds of years, Americans have taken it for granted that if they are ever accused of a crime the government will presume they are innocent until proven guilty. And that to be proven guilty they will be tried under a common and uniform standard of guilt: preponderance of the evidence (civil cases) or beyond a reasonable doubt (criminal cases). And that a guilty verdict for severe crimes will be determined by a jury of one’s peers in an adversarial court room setting, in which they as the defendant are allowed to face their accuser(s), bring witnesses and evidence on their own behalf, to cross-examine their accuser(s), and will not be forced to incriminate themselves.

Why do we believe in these ideals and expect our government to respect them and accord them to us? This is our tradition, to be sure, but Americans little realize this tradition is unique. None of these legal and judicial customs are universal to mankind. They are not found in other cultures or judicial systems. These customs are not taught by the natural law or accorded to us as our natural rights. In most nations throughout history, the wealthy and well-connected have been granted special judicial laxity and favor, while the masses are dealt with swiftly and mercilessly as expendable subjects. Yet Americans feel great umbrage if those with the last name of Kennedy, Bush, Clinton, or Obama receive judicial partiality or get off scot free. Neither should minority groups or women or the “gay/queer community” be given a free pass to break the law because of the “legacy” of past evils. “No one is above the law” is a common refrain (even if irresponsibly thrown around in abusive contexts today). Thus, behind the idea of equality of the law lies the belief in some kind of basic human equality. This does not destroy natural inequalities or hierarchy, but merely lays down fundamental principles of justice that should be granted to all.

The belief that justice requires equality under the law and the rejection of a two-tier (or more) justice system is not just a happy accident. It is explicitly a product of America’s Christian, English, and colonial heritage. For example, the Hebrew Old Testament required two or three witnesses before guilt could be decided (Deut. 17:6; 19:15). Magna Carta (1215) declared that “no man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions … except by the lawful judgment of his equals of by the law of the land.” And the Mayflower Compact swore to “enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, Acts, Constitutions and Officers … as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good.”

Therefore, those who have no knowledge of, who care little about, or who have explicitly repudiated the Christian, English, and colonial legal tradition that Americans adopted and incorporated cannot be Heritage Americans. This includes racial activists and pseudo-scholars who have foolishly declared that Western legal norms are an expression of racist White supremacy meant to suppress blacks and minorities.

The Land

Americans have always had a unique relationship to the land of North America for at least three reasons. First, the initial settlements in Virginia, Plymouth, and Massachusetts required that the settlers live off the land. They had to work the land and make it productive and supportive of life, or it would kill them (which it did for hundreds). America was vast, wild, and in many places, uninhabited. (There were Native Indians, to be sure, but they were clustered in certain regions; by the early 1600s there were probably only a few million Indians spread across North America’s 3.1 million square miles.) To survive in such a rugged wilderness, American settlers had to be hardy, resourceful, industrious, and community minded. There were no lone-rangers surviving by their own wit and daring. Americans survived by creating tight-knit communities that were intentionally homogeneous and whose members were mutually dependent upon each other.

Second, unlike in England and Europe where every square inch of land was accounted for (and had been for centuries), America had so much uninhabited (and cheap) land that the lower and middle classes could hope to acquire some for themselves (the end of primogeniture and entail also contributed to this prospect). This led to high rates of property ownership, much higher than in the Old World, and thus to economic and political independence, self-sufficiency, and the belief in basic rights and liberties. In addition, land was a pressure relief-value for solving social conflicts. When communities could not resolve differences and fractured, dissidents could resettle in another locale (i.e., Roger Williams and Anne Hutchinson left for Rhode Island).

Third, America’s Western frontier shaped her spirit, industry, technology, and politics. It drew those looking for adventure and new opportunities; its rich, untapped resources were a promising source of productive wealth; her vastness invited innovations in transportation and communications; and the need to add new states, settle people in an orderly way, provide for internal improvements, deal with the Native Indian populations, and make treaties or fight wars with other nations required constant involvement by state and national political powers. 

Americans have been shaped by the land of North America as much as they have shaped it. By it we were an agricultural people, and by it America became synonymous with property-ownership. Americans were known as rugged, independent, and communal, as well as restless and spirited. An appreciation for the beauty of America’s untamed wilderness led to the creation of the national parks, which still draw millions every year and inspire a reverence for God’s majestic creation. Despite the massive growth in America’s population, most of America is yet uninhabited and undomesticated. Drive through Kansas or Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and you will be awed at the uncultivated vastness. While America’s land has been all but forgotten in the popular imagination, it is still a source of rootedness and hope. While not every Heritage American must own 40 acres and a mule, what is necessary is a particular disposition that loves America as a physical home and that seeks to preserve the people’s connection to the land. 

Conclusion: On Becoming American

These traits are what constitute Heritage America. You might formally be an American citizen by birth or naturalization, but unless you understand these deeply-rooted and traditional aspects of American identity, you cannot be a Heritage American—a true American. Nor is it the case that one can merely pay lip service to these ideals. Instead, what is outlined above is a description of a tangible way of life. Because Heritage America is a habit of living, those outside the tradition can be grafted in. The concept of engrafting—of adopting and integrating into the truck of a tree branches that are foreign to it such that what was once separate becomes one—is the best way to think about becoming a Heritage American if you are not one currently. It is a particular way of life that is proud and exclusive, but it is welcoming to those who want to live in this manner.

In closing, two major questions may arise. First, can black Americans be Heritage Americans? And second, can non-Christians be Heritage Americans? The answer to the first is an unqualifiable yes. The answer to the second is a conditional yes. Black Americans have ancestral roots that go back to the beginning of the American colonies as well as collective memories from every period of American history. Black Americans speak English, even if in distinctive and sub-cultural dialects; they have historically been Christians, and in a tragic way, they have a relationship to America’s land unlike anyone else. Even though blacks were historically denied liberty, equality under the law, and participation in government, they have slowly been accorded these rights and privileges. I consider black Americans to be Heritage Americans.

Can you be a Heritage American if you’re not a Christian? What if you are a Jew, a Muslim, or an atheist? Ideally, of course, all Americans would be Christians, whether sincerely or nominally. However, a polity of pure saints is not practical or likely, and so toleration of those who dissent is necessary. There is a balance that must be struck on this point. Non-Christians can be tolerated, as long as they acquiesce to living in an unashamedly Christian America (i.e., submitting to Christian civil law, government support for Christianity, Christian moral, civil, and religious norms and customs, etc.). At the same time, both public and private citizens should be concerned to help the Christian Church flourish in our nation, since a collapse of Christian conversions, church plants, and influence will mark the end of America. Toleration of non-conformists thus presupposes cultural and religious dominance of some sort. This dominant culture ought to be Christian culture.

Heritage America is neither a myth nor a silly trope. It substantively explains the concrete ways of life, ideals, and principles by which Americans have historically lived. Fluency in the English language and literature, the Christian religion, self-government and specifically Christian government, liberty and equality under the law, and a productive and industrious relationship with the land of North America is our inheritance and so defines the essence of what it means to be an American.

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Image Credit: Speedwell Departing Delftshaven by Adam Wilaerts 1620

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