America was founded as a kind of experiment, as such it was the most advanced political technology of its time, and it was founded on a vision of grandeur never attempted in HISTORY;

A nation of men who were sovereign kings;

A nation in which all men governed equally a country of law based on no religious doctrine of any kind.

Let that sink in- America was the first society in history to be purposely structured as secularist, insofar as secularism existed in those days. You're asking 'what do you mean "secularism in those days?"...I'll explain.

A common oversight when discussing the construction of the Constitution and the United States Government was the state of science and religion at the time. There was no Darwin, there was no Big Bang, there was no relativity, or quantum mechanics- overall, science in its prematurity was still struggling to distance itself from religious metering and influence/censorship, Thomas Jefferson is among some of the earliest men to approach science without looking at it through the preconception that God were somehow behind the science. The age of Reason, it is commonly referred to, is simply put when reason became the cognitive fuel rather than religion.

However, science was young- and even the strict scientists of the time were born and raised to believe in God, and given there was no true reasonable alternative to God's creation, there was no reasonable grounds of dissent for believing in God aside from the philosophical rhetoric long posited, from the Greeks to Voltaire, many scientists simply separated the two ideas in mind, as opposed to arguing for mutual exclusion. Were it not for this separation, however, science would have denied the precepts of relativity, evolution and the expansion of the universe- to name a few.

But we come back to the founding of our nation- many people cite the multiple references to 'God' or the 'creator' in official documents, and cite that the Constitution, or more loosely (and more often) 'our founding principles' are based on Christian Principles. Many Tea Partiers have shirts reading "One nation Under God;Don't Tread on Me" with the Gadsden flag, or holding signs saying this is a Christian Nation. Recently Tom Tancredo even cited that the US is a Christian Nation, 'real Americans know it' and anyone who doesn't like it should leave or 'go home.'

IN FACT;

The word 'God' -NEVER- appears in the Constitution, the words 'in God we trust' were never added by the 'Founders', and the only reference to a god is in the Declaration of Independence- but it is to 'Nature's God' (Capital 'N') and the phrase 'endowed by their creator' (italics added) skillfully crafted for very obvious reasons to apply to any and every religion (don't forget, this wasn't to exclude agnosticism/atheism as it didn't exist as it does today). The founders were very careful where they put God in..and what were they going to say? All men are endowed by their MOTHERS with inalienable rights? It degrades into a discussion of where rights come from and what they are..real or imagined?

That's another argument though...the idea is there wasn't a strong secularist movement at the time, in the same way slavery still had its advocates- social attitudes change, especially when information increases at the rates of the past two centuries, and especially with the advent of evolution, big bang and advanced physics theories.

WHAT TEA PARTIERS DON'T KNOW ABOUT OUR FOUNDERS;

The Constitution, and/or the Declaration, they say, is based on Christian Principles. Not true, according to any and all scholars with any knowledge of the subject, they, written by Jefferson and Franklin, were based on the principles of John Locke, philosopher of the time. Many of the clauses are ripped straight from the pages of Locke, with few changes- even the famous 'Life Liberty and the pursuit of happiness' was a Locke-inspired clause. As well, Washington commented that the Bill of Rights was based on English Common Law, NOT on the religious laws or morals of the time as people, even then were supposing.

MOREOVER; the wording "all men are endowed by their Creator with.." was proposed to be amended with the words "endowed by their Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.."- the Amendment was voted down with a huge majority, and impassioned speeches were given protesting, relating the proposal to nothing less than one of the reasons America was created to oppose.

Let's beat it to death- the Treaty with Tripoli 1796, amendment 11 reads "since the United States is in no sense  a Christian Nation", voted and signed by George Washington and the Continental Congress.

Jefferson is quoted as saying many things that prove quite easily, being that he wrote the two founding documents in large portion, when he specified the meaning of the separation clause, as an 'ironclad wall between Church and State.' He knew full well the sweeping implications of this, as he said later "history, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest ridden society maintaining a free civil government."

Rounding out the Thomas Jefferson quotes, "There never would have been an infidel if there never was a priest." which seems applicable to the self-assured Christians advocating a fight for Jesus against the Muslims..

In actuality, Jefferson had a quite grim look on religion- in general he credited religion with more innocent deaths, burnings at the stake and horrible religious crimes than any tyrant in history, its hardly reasonable, with any rudimentary understanding of who Jefferson was and what he believed, to think he would have advocated the United States to be a Christian Nation, as Pat Roberts and many of the right-wing tea party protesters advocate.

On top of all of this- if they had an ounce of empathy they could quite easily reverse the situation in their heads and question what they would do if the Jews in America wanted to impose Jewish tradition on our statutory system. Or god forbid a Muslim (no pun intended)....one can imagine they would likely disagree brashly...

The US was founded as the only nation on the PLANET that was NOT subject to the influence of Religion. The Tea Partiers seem to have drawn the opposite conclusion, and seek to overturn the founder's intent.

These people are the American Taliban.

Protect the union- freedom for all and no God in our Government.