How Religious Were the Founding Fathers?

Historian Gordon Wood explains that Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and George Washington were not "emotionally religious." He outlines the development of religion in the early United States, stating that as American society became more democratic, "the evangelicals took over."



Pulitzer Prize for History recipient Gordon Wood traces the history of American efforts to promote democracy around the world from the French Revolution to current involvement in the Middle East.

As far back as the 19th century, the identity of America has been linked to its central role in sparking republican revolutions around the world. - Chautauqua Institution

Gordon S. Wood is Alva O. Way University Professor and Professor of History at Brown University. He received his B.A. degree from Tufts University and his Ph.D. from Harvard University. He taught at Harvard University and the University of Michigan before joining the faculty at Brown in 1969.

He is the author of many works, including The Creation of the American Republic, 1776-1787 (Chapel Hill, 1969), which won the Bancroft Prize and the John H. Dunning Prize in 1970, and The Radicalism of the American Revolution (New York, 1992), which won the Pulitzer Prize for History and the Ralph Waldo Emerson Prize in 1993.

Complete video at: http://fora.tv/2009/08/25/Why_America_Wants_to_Promote_Liberty_and_Democracy