Buffman

It never occurs to Buffman that some of the Christians at the time were interested in various events and made notes about them.

Buffman knows who made notes. Does Radorth?

Is Farrand interested in whether "the entire Convention" assembled in church together (per Randolph's suggestion) on July 4th and heard a sermon by William Rogers?

Buffman could certainly care less who attended church on the 4th of July 1787. I wonder why Radorth cares?

Exactly which Convention delegates attended the Rogers sermon on the 4th? I bet Radorth has no idea. I bet that Radorth thinks that the Convention officially asked for such a sermon. If he does, then I'm sure he will be glad to provide us with the evidence that it did.

[ December 21, 2002: Message edited by: Buffman ]</p>

Radorth

Buffman dosesn't have time to speak to the lowly Radorth, except indirectly.

No, I don't. That's why I put "entire convention" in quotation marks.

So do you want the non-Barton source or not? I thought you said you did not care? And if it turns out they did, you will do what? Lower yourself to speak to me again?

Oh wait, if Farrand or Madison isn't sourced, it never happened. I forget the rules.

Maybe you should get out of the skeptics.org library Buffman. Is it possible the delegates followed Randolph's lead even though in a "legal" sense they did not?

According to Federer, it was quite the appropriate sermon BTW. He gives an excerpt. Interested?

Rad

Toto

Here is a shortened link to the full text of Steel's letter as printed in 1850, which Buffman is researching:

<a href="http://snurl.com/Steel1850" target="_blank">http://snurl.com/Steel1850</a>

Buffman

Radorth

I don't see where you refute my quote about Washingtons's visage, Buffman.

Ah, so even Madison admits that the record is real, but that Dayton could have been looking through rose colored glasses at Washington and Franklin. Is that a fair assessment or not?

All you've shown is that Dayton may have misread Washington's face after Franklin's prayer, or that he saw friendlier feelings when there were not. Right?!

[b]I still see no reason to doubt the quotes I gave, particilarly since Madison is not referring to them, and Madison tells us almost nothing about the visages of the delegates at various points.

The quotes I used still seems rather innocent to me. Not sure why you are making a crusade out of turning a misdemeanor into a felony, and claiming this huge underground plot against the truth.

The reason that I elected to research your post (quote) about this William Steele letter is because you failed to post the background references concerning it or where you got the information. The Federer book apparently failed to report the whole background. Evidently, at some point, David Barton has provided a far more complete and accurate analysis of the lack of credibility of the William Steele letter and of the events described within it. My personal research does confirm Barton's current explanation of the Wm. Steele letter controversy. It appears that the John Bigelow book helped to provided confirmation of the James Madison contention that the Wm Steele letter was filled with erroneous information.

<a href="http://www.wallbuilders.com/resources/search/detail.php?ResourceID=19" target="_blank">http://www.wallbuilders.com/resources/search/detail.php?ResourceID=19</a>

This following information does place William Steele in New Jersey during the period he reports as having received the Dayton anecdote. However, it does not explain why there are so many errors of fact contained in his account of what Dayton supposedly said. The errors are easily exposed and in such profusion as to completely destroy any credibility for the rest of the letter. That's what caused me to question your use and defense of it. (See your above statements.) Just read the alleged Dayton contention that he met with delegates from Conneticut, Delaware and Rhode Island. Rhode Island never sent any delegates to the Convention. Then there is the claim that Alexander Hamilton was alone in his protest against Franklin's motion. Another prevarication...including the italicized expression supposedly voiced by Hamilton. There are claims about the approval of adjournments that did not happen as described. Claims about what Dayton said that he did not say. And even the claim that Jonathan Dayton was a General when the highest military rank I can find for him is Captain. (His father was the General.) Dayton was the junior delegate from New Jersey and didn't even arrive at the Convention until June 21, 1787. A Convention that had sat in session since May 25th. At almost every paragraph of the Wm. Steele letter, words that are claimed to be the "authentic" words of Dayton are in error. Yet you elected to defend them rather than investigate their authenticity. That is why I have treated you as little more than a typical apologist for Christianity...rather than a sincere defender of supernatural spiritual/ religious faith ...of which there are many more than just Christianity. (Read the John Bigelow analysis of morality at the end of this post.)

<a href="http://www.rootsweb.com/~nysteube/guy/pg4.html" target="_blank">http://www.rootsweb.com/~nysteube/guy/pg4.html</a>

(Extract)
Hon. William Steele, a well known and highly respected citizen of Painted Post, removed from New Jersey in 1819. He served in the war of the Revolution, and was severely wounded and made prisoner at sea in 1780. In 1785 he was appointed clerk in the old Board of Treasury, and in 1794, he commanded a troop of horse and aided in suppressing the insurrection near Pittsburgh. He died in 1851. (Obituary notice in Corning Journal.)
(End extract)

David Barton concludes, "But the final word in this discussion comes from Franklin's own pen. In John Bigelow's, The Works of Benjamin Franklin, a footnote (pg. 378) referring to Franklin's speech states:

To the original draft of this speech there is the following note appended in the handwriting of Dr. Franklin: "The convention, except three or four persons, thought prayer unnecessary." [This same notation is given as a footnote on page 452 of Max Farrand's Records of the Federal Convention."

Who was John Bigelow?

<a href="http://newearth.org/frontier/grintro.html" target="_blank">http://newearth.org/frontier/grintro.html</a>

John Bigelow's view on morality.

<a href="http://newearth.org/frontier/gr1.html" target="_blank">http://newearth.org/frontier/gr1.html</a>

Radorth

That's great research Buffman, but of course you used up a huge amount of bandwidth to prove an old man can't remember well. If I use the quote again, I shall qualify it.

I particularly thank you for the "Wallbuilders" site, that horrid place I never went because I heard huge monsters lived and worked there, removing the brains of Christians and turning them into little Bartonbots. Now we find out the horrid monster Barton says everything you and Toto said, and accurately summarizes the issues you raised here. Right?

You know, one should be careful not to swat a gnat while swallowing a camel. Do you agree with the following or no?:

And the horrid Barton monster goes on to say:

I figured out the same thing myself reading sites like this. I know you disagree, but that is an excellent summary IMO.

And thanks to Barton, we have something more meaningful to contemplate- how the chaplaincy got started.

Rad

[ December 23, 2002: Message edited by: Radorth ]

[ December 24, 2002: Message edited by: Radorth ]</p>

Radorth

You end your long post with a cite containing this glittering diatribe:

What's that doing here, other than to appease the choir? And do we get to respond?

I will anyway.

Yes we do have an inate sense of right and wrong, just as Paul says in Romans 2.

The problem is that very few seem to be able to obey their own consciences, even when they are left with the freedom to do so. So even if true, what good is this knowledge? History tells us that true or not, it makes little difference. I think even the recent history of this site tells us this info is pretty academic. How ironic that virtually everyone here argues this, but it's effect on behavior is virtually nil.

More to the subject, Jefferson obviously disagrees with Bigelow and would say Jesus tells us what it means to treat one another rightly and set the prime example for us Right? And more helpfully, IMO tells us what will happen if we don't, and offers us the help of God himself, knowing mere "moral teaching" has little use except to show us where we have missed the mark.

Rad

Buffman

(New information update taken from Richard Rosenfeld's "American Aurora.")

The following Message was received from the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES:

Gentlemen of the Senate:

I nominate Alexander Hamilton, of New York, to be Inspector General of the Army, with the rank of Major General. Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, of South Carolina, to be a Major General...
Jonathan Dayton, of New Jersey, to be a Brigadier General...William Stevens Smith, of New York, to be adjutant General . . . [&c.]
JOHN ADAMS 548*


John Adams is nominating leading Federalists to command the new federal army. Alexander Hamilton, founder of the Federalist party, will be second
in command (behind Washington). C. C. Pinckney is the Federalist whom Washington appointed and France rejected as James Monroe's successor as
minister to France. Jonathan Dayton is the Federalist Speaker of the House, who expelled Benny Bache and me from the House floor. William Smith is John Adams' son-in-law.

[Note: Benny Bache is Ben Franklin's grandson.]

*548. ANC, 5C, 2S, 621-523 [ ANC = The Debates and proceedings in the Congress of the United States... March 3, 1789 to May 27, 1824.
(Washington: Gales and Seaton, 1834-56), 42 Vols.]

(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: American Aurora, A Democratic-Republican Returns, The Surpressed History of Our Nation's Beginnings and the Heroic Newspapers That Tried to Report it. Richard N. Rosenfeld, St. Martin's Press, N Y (1997) pp. 194-95


ONLINE VERIFICATION AND SOURCE:
A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774 -1875
Annals of Congress, Senate, 5th Congress, 2nd Session

<a href="http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llac&fileName=007/llac007.db&recNum=307" target="_blank">http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage....db&recNum=307</a>

Thus the previous Captain became a General. Of course this occurred just days after the passage of the "Sedition Act of 1798."

[ December 25, 2002: Message edited by: Buffman ]</p>

Radorth

So Dayton was a general. You might want to e-mail that link to Barton, although he seems to have known everything else you and Toto dredged up.

And what the hell does the FACT that he was a general have to do with how he became one? It's a marvel how the motives of the founders turn to $*&# when it suits the atheist's case or he runs out of actual facts and quotes.

Criminy.

Rad

Daggah

See guys, Radorth doesn't lie ALL the time.

Just most of it.

"Criminy."

Dag

Buffman

Rad

So Dayton was a general. You might want to e-mail that link to Barton, although he seems to have known everything else you and Toto dredged up.

Still supporting Barton's lies, are you? How many must be exposed to you before you wake up and smell the foul odor? Or is it that his lies smell sweeter simply because he claims to be a Christian? You don't seem to know what you really think about Barton. ..or anything else that isn't spoon fed to you by someone else. (BTW, Dayton was also indicted for treason, right along with his schoolmate Aaron Burr, but not brought to trial.)

And what the hell does the FACT that he was a general have to do with how he became one?

I know a Post Office box number that you can send your money to in order to purchase a certificate that awards you a Clerical or military rank. Dayton earned the rank of Captain. His support for President Adams bought him the rank of General. Any other absurd questions?

It's a marvel how the motives of the founders turn to $*&# when it suits the atheist's case or he runs out of actual facts and quotes.

The only reason that I resort to finding accurate facts and quotes is in order to counter all the inaccurate facts and quotes coming from a dark corner of the Christian world. It never ceases to amaze me what a blind eye some Christians will turn towards anything that could possibly besmirch one of their so-called Christian icon's propagandized reputation or personal moral values. I bet you are one of those types that "honestly" believes that George Washington never told a lie. However, I guess that you best exemplify what it really means to be a blind faith believer in the supernatural.

If you ever wish to learn some interesting accurate historical facts about America, you might enjoy reading both "Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong" and "Lies Across America; What Our Historic Sites Get Wrong" by James W. Loewen, A Touchstone Book, published by Simon and Schuster.

http://www.uvm.edu/~jloewen/

http://www.uvm.edu/~jloewen/slideshow/8washington.htm