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Over the past fifty years or so, there has been an active discussion about the origin of the United States of America. Often conversations, which sometime slip into debates, revolve around the question, “Was the United States founded as a consciously Christian nation?”
Of course, the topic quickly becomes mixed with the question of church-state relations. Establishmentarianism versus voluntarism may even surface. The proponents for a stout, dark line of separation between church and state would have us believe a purely secular environment is best and what the founders of our nation intended. In today’s ecclesiastical clime, we have the unsettling presence of those who tend to an extreme reaction to the secularist posture. You might call that position a “Christian nationalist” position, but that is a fluid movement and hard to define with its quite broad spectrum of voices. Within that broad movement however are some who sound quite like proponents of a theocracy of some sort. All of this makes for a confused and conflicted public and church.
It seems that much of the conflict and confusion centers on the history of the Revolutionary period and its antecedent history. D. G. Hart’s new book, Protestants and Patriots, carefully and lucidly sets forth a history that can sort through the confusion. “This book,” writes Hart, “is about Presbyterian protest, what made Anglophone Reformed Protestants particularly combative and activist, and how political circumstances in England and Scotland colored efforts for ecclesiastical reform” (2). But there is more as the book “completes the story by showing how these committed Protestants became defenders of liberal democracy” (2).
These days most people who grope for a Christian nation and wish to restore it on historical grounds, miss the historical transition that took place among the Protestants and
especially the Presbyterians. That transition was from “theocratic expectations for a godly society” to a representative governance, civil and religious liberties, and the shift from established churches to voluntary churches (2). Granted there are ironies to be faced as one considers the whole matter of the founding of the colonies, the Revolution, and the constitutional United States. Hart’s argument is that once the dust of the Presbyterian revolution of the 1640s in Scotland, England, and Ireland settled, “Presbyterians became champions of free markets, representative government, personal responsibility, national improvement, and religious liberty” (16). The outliers were those who sought to make transitional figures like Calvin, Knox, and Rutherford isolated models for explaining “the church’s place in modern society” (16). The truth is that Presbyterians’ political ideals were tempered by the reality that was their experience from James I (1604) to William of Orange (1700). This is where part one of the book ends.
Part two sets forth “Presbyterian Modern, 1700–1875.” Here Hart takes the most space and “traces adjustments that these Protestants made to constitutional monarchy and its administration in Britain and North America” (17). The chapters consider the Presbyterians’ compromises and moderate postures necessitated by political victory. These, the author argues, were not considered by the earlier and most zealous Presbyterians. Additionally, Hart shows that Presbyterian involvement in both the American battle for independence and the Irish Rising of the same period was more civil than ecclesiastical in substance. Efforts to avoid or escape civil intermeddling in church affairs became the focus of Protestants in general, but Presbyterians specifically. This did not, however, mean that Presbyterians had no view toward a blessed modern society:
But after the Glorious Revolution, Presbyterians learned by experience and reflection that the same political arrangements that lightened the church’s burden from an overreaching magistrate were also among the tools by which modern nations could fashion a generically Christian society. (272)
That generically Christian society on the horizon of Presbyterians is defined by Hart as the blessings of a “good” government. Those blessings included “increase in suffrage, more extensive representation in government, free trade and better distribution of goods for more affordable prices, higher rates of literacy, . . . [and] the separation of church and state” (272).
In the end Hart admits how difficult “reconciling old and modern Presbyterian politics is” (302). He illustrates this from Arthur Herman’s How the Scots Invented the Modern World. Traces of democratic republicanism could be found in Knox and the Scots’ National Covenant (1638) where government of the people could be identified. However, according to Herman, “Presbyterians such as the Covenanters were ‘inspired less by their love of democracy than by their hatred of Satan’ ” (303).
From this admitted historical tension, Hart, trying to properly nuance the “Presbyterian Rebellion” mindset, turns to John Witherspoon. Witherspoon came over from Scotland in 1768 to take up the leadership of the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University). Ten years prior to his coming to the colonies, “he could highlight the British government’s treatment of the Covenanters to argue for the importance of protecting constitutional liberties” (303). Once in the midst of the colonies and the Revolution, he “did not rely on language of resisting tyranny or restoring the ‘crown rights’ of Jesus. Instead, Witherspoon argued from the emerging liberal political and economic world” (303). Even though Witherspoon would engage as a citizen and serve the nascent nation in civic roles, he did so as a citizen who was a Christian. He did not represent the church per se. To put it another way, he didn’t legislate for the “crown rights of Jesus,” but for rights of the citizenry and for the establishment and maintenance of a representative republic.
The Presbyterian role in the American Revolution is one that is beyond doubt. But how did its role manifest? That is the abiding question. Some want the religious views of Presbyterians to be the justification for the American Revolution and therefore the basis for pursuing a “Christian nation” revival. “This book,” argues Hart, “shows the weakness of that interpretation” (306). This reviewer agrees with the historical case Hart presents and hopes all the readers will agree with the author when he says, “The Presbyterian assertion of the church’s spiritual independence and its elaborate and sometimes baffling explanation of the spiritual and temporal spheres of Christ’s rule were necessary features in building liberal politics” (306).
For those familiar with Professor Hart’s previous writings, you will not be surprised to know this book is well researched, carefully crafted, and pointed in analysis. It is good for the church while at the same time appealing to and useful for the general reader who may have no connection to the church. College classrooms, pastor’s studies, and Christians who want to rightly consider the church-state issue need this book. Protestants and Patriots cannot be commended too highly.
The author is a PCA pastor and professor.
The Trinity Psalter Hymnal Joint Venture Board (a collaboration of the OPC and URCNA) is pleased to announce the release of its second album, completing a two-album collection of choral recordings from the Trinity Psalter Hymnal. Together, the albums present forty psalm settings, beautifully performed by The Genevans of Geneva College under the direction of Dr. David Smith.
Album 1, released in 2024, brought some of these psalm settings to churches and families around the world. Album 2 completes the set. Both are available for streaming on major platforms and may be purchased at minimal cost, keeping this collection widely accessible to God’s people.
These choral recordings are offered as a ministry to the church, not a commercial venture. They are intended to encourage the singing of God’s Word, to help congregations and families learn the psalms, and to provide music suited to worship preparation, family devotions, and personal enjoyment.
© 2026 The Orthodox Presbyterian Church
