Presbyterians in Politics

Proverbs 24:21-22 (ESV)
My son, fear the Lord and the king,
and do not join with those who do otherwise,
for disaster from them will rise suddenly,
and who knows the ruin that will come from them both?

1 Tim. 2:1-2 (ESV)
First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, [2] for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.

For Christians, the Bible is clear that we ought to show respect to those in authority and to pray for our governmental leaders. This is true no matter what country we live in or what kind of leader we have. The advice from Solomon was to “fear the Lord and the king,” because we are called to be a people who live under authority and to recognize authority comes from God. Even in the New Testament, with the church living in a climate of persecution, the Apostle Paul admonishes believers to pray for their political leaders.

We are not given the option from Scriptures to check out of the responsibilities of citizenship, even though we recognize our final loyalty is in another King and another country. Christians in the tradition of the Reformed faith have taken this responsibility with utmost seriousness. John Calvin wrote his magisterially work of theology, the Christian Institutes of Religion as a defense of the movement’s legitimacy under the rule of King Francis I of France. Calvin’s preface is a letter addressed to the king. He wrote this, “The characteristic of a true sovereign is, to acknowledge that, in the administration of his kingdom, he is a minister of God. He who does not make his reign subservient to the divine glory, acts the part not of a king, but a robber.” His concern that the government of Geneva under the leadership of Protestant Reformers was not perceived as a heretical, rag-tag bunch of anarchists or revolutionaries bespeaks his view of government. The Reformers had their problem with a corrupt Church and an errant Pope who had left the true faith of the Bible, not with a legitimate king.

Our nation’s founding bears a direct line to this moral and theological understanding. Samuel Rutherford’s work on the problem of absolute monarchy in his explosive book Lex Rex, influenced the best of the legal minds of our early founders from the English jurist William Blackstone to John Witherspoon: the only clergyman to sign the Declaration of Independence, and a Presbyterian. Samuel Rutherford was one of the commissioners of the Westminster Assembly in England. James Madison studied under Witherspoon at Princeton and with his Calvinist imprint was a principal author of the Constitution.

This tradition of the Reformed faith continued through our nation’s history. Consider that 10 of our Presidents have been Presbyterian or members of the Reformed Church. Some were:

John Q. Adams – a trustee at New York Ave. Presbyterian Church.
Martin Van Buren – from the Dutch Reformed Church and antislavery campaigner.
James Buchanan- eventually joined New York Avenue Presbyterian, after an initial probation, since he had moderate views on slavery.
Benjamin Harrison – A Presbyterian deacon, elder and S.S. teacher.
Theodore Roosevelt – Dutch Reformed Church.
Woodrow Wilson - One historian noted, “No one in the history of the White House could equal his master of the Bible, nor could anyone surpass his knowledge of theology.” His father and grandfather were Presbyterian ministers, and he left the presidency of Princeton University to lead our nation during the tumultuous times of the First World War. Notwithstanding all this, he was a progressive in his ideology.
Dwight Eisenhower – baptized into a Presbyterian church after being sworn into office. Attended National Presbyterian Church – got serious about faith in public life and during his time the motto “In God we trust” was imprinted on our currency.
Ronald Reagan – a member of Bel Air Presbyterian Church in California and the last U.S. president to be a Presbyterian (although not a regular attendee).

We also cannot forget Abraham Lincoln, who never officially joined any church and disavowed himself of organized religion did attend services at the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in D.C. His wife, Mary Todd appeared to be a faithful Presbyterian.

So, if you add up the numbers of both Presbyterian and Reformed Presidents they outnumber any other denomination, with the Episcopalians coming in second at nine. A recent poll (now a year old) showed that our Congress had 9.7 Presbyterians compared to the national average of 1.7 who claim some type of Presbyterian membership. This is not to say these numbers show a large percentage of faithful believers at work in our government, but merely points out that our heritage has had a lasting influence in the way we think about our civil responsibilities. We ought to be about fearing God and honoring our leaders.