Donald Trump claims Thomas Jefferson was the principle author of the Constitution - Thoughts

@dontbekoi And while Jefferson frequently is credited with being a major influence on the Bill of Rights first 10 Amendments, particularly the one on Religious freedom which he already had pushed through in Virginia, those also were written by Madison. Although Madison acknowledges that he listened more to Jefferson on those, and not to Hamilton who wanted a stronger Federal government without as many restrictions.

@dancingtongue I had no idea. Thanks for sharing 😊

@dancingtongue Sorry, Jefferson authored the Statute for Religious Freedom, though Madison ended up getting it through the Virginia legislature:

[quote]Written in 1777 and first introduced in 1779, Jefferson's statute was repeatedly overlooked in the Virginia Assembly[6]untilPatrick Henryintroduced legislation titled "A Bill Establishing a Provision for Teachers of the Christian Religion" in 1784.[7]James Madisonand others led the opposition to Henry's bill[8]which culminated in Madison'sMemorial and Remonstrance against Religious Assessments, published on June 20, 1785.[9]As noted by theLibrary of Congress, "Madison revived [Jefferson's statute] as an alternative to Henry's general assessment bill and guided it to passage in the Virginia Assembly in January 1786."[10][/quote]

(See [i]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Statute_for_Religious_Freedom[/i])

@SomeMichGuy Ah, that old dangling unconnected pronoun. That is what I meant but should have said "which Jefferson already had pushed through in Virginia". But the dangling he could be read as Madison. Thank you for clarifying.

Actually, the Virginia Religious Freedom statute was kind of a farce. You needed to get a license to preach and only Anglican/Episcopalians and Lutherans in the German communities could get licenses. It is why one of my ancestors, a Primitive Baptist Abolitionist, left for the Northwest.

@dancingtongue ...but it was Madison who shepherded Jefferson's resurrected bill through the Virginia legislature.

The timing of your ancestor's leaving would be crucial, because it sounds as though it was before the statute was effective, since it disestablished the Church of England...?

@SomeMichGuy It disestablished the Church of England but set up the licensing process. The devil always is in the details, and licensing authorities continued to be restrictive in who they licensed to preach. And there is historical evidence of more than one unlicensed preacher -- most frequently Primitive Baptist "Messengers" as they were called, since they were abolitionists -- being arrested and jailed. And at least one incident in which a lynch mob set fire to the jail while the unlicensed preacher was still incarcerated. Although I will acknowledge it is not the only reason he left. As a Revolutionary War veteran who survived that winter at Valley Forge, he was entitled to land grants in what became southwestern Pennsylvania.

@dancingtongue Hmmm...the statute does not set up licensing, but terms of licenses and jailing of Baptists for either not having valid licenses or for violating the terms of them is mentioned in the pre-Statute period at

[i]https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/baptists-in-colonial-virginia/[/i]

In fact, Baptists and Presbyterians were part of why the Statute passed.

I'll dig more to see if, at that time, there is a parallel regulatory code in Virginia, etc.

@SomeMichGuy Would appreciate hearing anything you discover.