They Added 'Under God' to the Pledge in 1954 to Own the Soviets
Quick Answer
Was America founded as a Christian nation? No. The Constitution contains no mention of Christianity or Jesus. The First Amendment's first clause prohibits Congress from establishing any religion. The 1797 Treaty of Tripoli, signed by John Adams and ratified unanimously by the Senate, explicitly states that "the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion." The phrases "under God" and "In God We Trust" were both added in 1954 and 1956 respectively, during the Cold War, specifically to distinguish America from the Soviet Union.
In 1797, the United States Senate ratified a treaty with this sentence in it: "the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion." John Adams signed it. The vote was unanimous. This is not obscure. It is a ratified treaty of the United States, publicly available, and it directly answers the question that people argue about on the internet every day as if the answer were unclear.
The treaty nobody mentions
The Treaty of Tripoli was a practical agreement. American merchant ships were being attacked by pirates operating from the Barbary Coast of North Africa. The US needed safe passage in the Mediterranean. The treaty covered navigation rights and protections for American sailors.
Article 11 was included to reassure a Muslim-majority government that the United States was not coming for them on religious grounds. The full clause reads: "As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion — as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility of Mussulmen — and, as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries."
Washington's administration drafted it. The Senate had the full text read aloud, as was standard practice at the time. Every senator in the room heard Article 11. They ratified it 23 to 0.
The First Amendment
Before free speech. Before a free press. Before the right to assemble. The First Amendment's first two clauses are about religion: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."
James Madison wrote it. Madison had spent years watching Virginia churches attempt to get state funding and had fought them every time. He wrote a document called the "Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments" arguing that even three pence of tax money directed toward religion was a violation of conscience. He won. Virginia cut the funding. Then he went to Philadelphia and made it the first line of the Bill of Rights.
Madison later wrote in private letters that he believed even the appointment of congressional chaplains was unconstitutional. He had voted for chaplains during the Constitutional Convention and wrote that he considered it a mistake. He did not publish these views during his lifetime. They came out after his death.
Who actually wrote the founding documents
Thomas Jefferson did not believe Jesus was divine. He cut up the Bible to prove it. With scissors. He removed every miracle, every supernatural event, every resurrection, and pasted what remained into a new book he called "The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth." What was left was practical ethics. No virgin birth. No walking on water. No rising from the dead. He completed it around 1820 and kept it private until after he died.
Benjamin Franklin wrote late in life that he had "some doubts" about the divinity of Jesus and had never resolved them. He believed in a God of some kind, a general Providence, but not in Christianity as a revealed religion. He was 84 and had been one of the most famous men in the world for decades. He still hedged.
Thomas Paine wrote "Common Sense" in 1776, which did as much as anything to generate public support for the Revolution. He followed it in 1794 with "The Age of Reason," a direct attack on organized Christianity and the Bible. He called it "a book of lies" and described the Christian church as "a human invention set up to terrify and enslave mankind." His reputation collapsed. He died in 1809, largely abandoned, and was initially refused burial in a Quaker cemetery. Six people attended his funeral.
George Washington attended church but almost never took communion. His letters use the words Providence and Supreme Being far more often than Jesus or Christ. Several ministers who knew him personally wrote about the omission. Washington never addressed it publicly.
"Under God" is 72 years old
The original Pledge of Allegiance was written in 1892 by Francis Bellamy. Bellamy was a Baptist minister and a socialist. His version read: "I pledge allegiance to my flag and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all." No God. "Indivisible" was the word doing the work — Bellamy wrote it 27 years after the Civil War and meant it.
On June 14, 1954, President Eisenhower signed a bill inserting "under God" between "one nation" and "indivisible." The stated purpose was to distinguish the United States from the Soviet Union during the Cold War. The phrase "godless communism" was in wide use. Congress added two words to a 62-year-old pledge specifically to draw a contrast with the Soviets.
Bellamy's daughter, Frances, objected publicly. Nobody asked her.
"In God We Trust" replaced something else
"In God We Trust" first appeared on coins during the Civil War, in 1864. It did not appear on paper currency until 1956. On July 30, 1956, Congress passed the law making it the official national motto and ordering it printed on all currency. Before that, the de facto motto of the United States had been "E Pluribus Unum" — Latin for "Out of Many, One." That phrase had been in use since 1782. Congress replaced it in 1956 without a public vote, a referendum, or any public process beyond a congressional bill.
Both changes, the Pledge and the motto, happened within two years of each other, in the middle of the Cold War, under Eisenhower. The "Christian nation" framing that people now argue was always true was largely constructed in those 24 months.
If you wear the Not Today Jesus shirt because you've actually read the Treaty of Tripoli, we made it for you. The full t-shirts collection is for everyone who prefers the primary sources. The post on how televangelism works covers what happened after 1956 when the money got involved.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Was America founded as a Christian nation?
No. The Constitution does not mention Christianity, Jesus, or the Bible. The First Amendment explicitly prohibits Congress from establishing any religion. The 1797 Treaty of Tripoli, ratified unanimously by the Senate and signed by John Adams, states directly that "the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion." Most serious historians and constitutional scholars agree that the United States was founded as a secular republic with robust protections for religious freedom, not as a Christian theocracy.
When was "under God" added to the Pledge of Allegiance?
June 14, 1954. The original Pledge, written in 1892 by Francis Bellamy, did not include the phrase. Congress added "under God" during the Eisenhower administration as a Cold War measure to distinguish the United States from the Soviet Union. The two words were inserted between "one nation" and "indivisible," breaking the original rhythm of Bellamy's text. Bellamy's daughter publicly objected to the change.
When was "In God We Trust" added to money?
It appeared on some coins starting in 1864 but was not on paper currency until 1956, when Congress passed a law making it the official national motto and mandating it on all currency. Before that, the de facto motto was "E Pluribus Unum" (Out of Many, One), which dated to 1782. Both the Pledge change and the motto change happened within two years of each other during the Cold War.
Were the Founding Fathers Christians?
Some were, some weren't, and many were deliberately vague. Jefferson and Franklin were deists who doubted the divinity of Jesus and said so in writing. Thomas Paine, whose writing helped start the Revolution, was openly anti-Christian. Madison, the architect of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, opposed any government entanglement with religion on principle. Washington attended church but rarely took communion and almost never mentioned Jesus in his correspondence. The founders were a varied group, and the ones most responsible for the Constitution's structure were specifically opposed to establishing a national religion.
What does "separation of church and state" mean?
The phrase comes from an 1802 letter by Thomas Jefferson to the Danbury Baptist Association, in which he described the First Amendment as building "a wall of separation between church and State." Jefferson was writing to Baptists who had asked for his view on religious freedom. The underlying concept is older: Roger Williams, the Baptist minister who founded Providence, Rhode Island in 1636, wrote about a "wall of separation between the garden of the church and the wilderness of the world" more than 150 years earlier. The legal principle that the government cannot establish, promote, or favor any religion is embedded in the First Amendment's first clause.
What is the Treaty of Tripoli?
The Treaty of Tripoli was a 1796 diplomatic agreement between the United States and the Ottoman province of Tripolitania (in present-day Libya), negotiated to protect American merchant ships from Barbary pirates. Article 11 of the treaty states that "the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion." The treaty was drafted during Washington's administration, signed by John Adams in 1797, and ratified by the Senate 23 to 0 after the full text was read aloud in the chamber.
