Chris Rodda: A Tale of Two Faith-Based Initiatives

Contrary to the claims of historical revisionists like David Barton, who assert in defense of faith-based initiatives such nonsense as "you'll find early on that we were, in the federal government, funding programs that did mission work" and "you'll find early on that under George Washington -- he funded a number of those programs -- as did John Adams, as did Thomas Jefferson, as did James Madison," there were actually only two federal government programs during the 19th century that can even be remotely compared to today's faith-based initiatives, and neither of these occurred during the administrations of any of the four presidents listed by Barton. The two programs, one begun in 1819 to promote agriculture education among the Indians, and the other a part of Ulysses S. Grant's Indian "Peace Policy," met with less than... [read full story]