A model for political self-government

When speaking of "In God We Trust" and the belief that the United States is a Christian nation, proponents like to refer back to documents (or events) they believe support their view while discounting others.  One is the "Mayflower Compact" signed in 1620:

In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the Loyal Subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, defender of the Faith, etc.:

Having undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith, and the honor of our King and Country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the Northern parts of Virginia; do by these presents, solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one another; covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic; for our better ordering, and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.

In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the 11th of November, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, 1620.

While the proponents of a "Christian Nation" focus on the opening lines of the second paragraph, "Having undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith,,," they ignore the remainder of the document and the history surrounding it. An excellent example of this can be seen in the video below at 32:22.  The sentiment being expressed is by Dr. Ron Baity of Return America.   In other words they revise history to suit their needs and advance their agenda.



The Mayflower Compact is often cited as one of the foundations of the Constitution. The story of its creation begins with the Separatists Pilgrims in England (also called Saints); Protestants who did not recognize the authority of the Anglican Church and formed their own Puritan church. To escape persecution and possible imprisonment, they fled England for Holland eventually deciding to create their own colony in the New World.  What many are not aware of (myself included), the Mayflower passengers were not all Separatists.  Of the 102 passengers, 61 were common people (merchants, craftsmen, skilled workers,  indentured servants and several young orphans); as the Pilgrim called them "strangers."

Arriving in the New World, the Mayflower didn't quite make it to Virginia and ended up off the shores of Cape Cod, an area outside the jurisdiction of the Virginia Company (the "landowners" the Pilgrims  were beholden to); therefore, its rules and regulations no longer applied. Dissent arose between the Pilgrims and the other settlers and out of that dissent came the Mayflower Compact, a social contract whereby the forty-one men who signed it agreed to abide by the new government's laws in exchange for shared protection.  William Bradford describes the growing discontent in Mourt's Relation:   A Journal of the Pilgrims at Plymouth (1622) as follows:

This day before we came to harbor, observing some not well affected to unity and concord, but gave some appearance of faction, it was thought good there should be an association and agreement that we should combine together in one body, and to submit to such government and governors as we should by common consent agree to make and choose, and set our hands to this that follows word for word

The Compact by design, and by inspiration of pastor John Robinson head of the church in Leiden, created a separation of Church from state and equality.  What is interesting to note, these concepts where penned by Robinson in 1620, prior to the departure of the Pilgrims.  On August 5 of that year, John Carver read these word: 

Lastly, whereas you are become a body politic, using amongst yourselves civil government, and are not furnished with any persons of special eminency above the rest, to be chosen by you into office of government; let your wisdom and godliness appear, not only in choosing such persons as do entirely love and will promote the common good, but also in yielding unto them all due honor and obedience in their lawful administrations, not beholding in them the ordinariness of their persons, but God's ordinance for your good; not being like the foolish multitude who more honor the gay coat than either the virtuous mind of the man, or glorious ordinance of the Lord. But you know better things, and that the image of the Lord's power and authority which the magistrate beareth, is honorable, in how means persons soever. And this duty you both may the more willingly and ought the more conscionably to perform, because you are at least for the present to have only them for your ordinary governors, which yourselves shall make choice of for that work.

Every adult male, Pilgrim and "stranger" had to sign the agreement before stepping foot on land.  The Mayflower Compact was an attempt to establish a temporary, legally-binding form of self-government and remained in effect until the 1621 Peirce Patent; Plymouth was eventually incorporated then absorbed into the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1691.

It is my opinion, that Christian Nation proponents fail to recognize when citing the Mayflower Compact, the men of the Mayflower were undereducated in the sense that they were not lawyers, politicians or trained clergy; these were lay people, simple folk with a common goal.  William Brewster, oft cited as the only passenger with advanced education, is believed to be the primary writer of the document along with William Bradford.  The dire straights forced these men to use their wits to prevent an all out mutiny, all they had as a model were the written agreements used by the Pilgrims to establish their Separatist churches in England and Holland.

The pattern of church self-government served as a model for political self-government in the Mayflower Compact; it is an adaptation of a Puritan church covenant to a civil situation .  Instead of focusing on the inactive clauses of the document, all one needs to do is look at the active part of the agreement:

,,,covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic; for our better ordering, and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.

Think of a modern day business letter. Your first paragraph introduces who you are and why you're writing, the body of letter is the meat of the matter.  It tells us what is important, a covenant whereby the settlers would subordinate their rights to follow laws passed by the government to ensure protection and survival is what made it a unique document.  Not, "[h]aving undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith,,,a voyage to plant the first colony in the Northern parts of Virginia."

To deny the importance of the Mayflower Compact would be foolhardy, it was the foundational document for the Plymouth Colony. The compact, with its fundamental principles of self-government and common consent, has been interpreted as an important step in the evolution of democratic government in America.  But it ends there!  It was not the establishment of a Christian nation, it was not the establishment of a theocratic government.  It was the recognition that people of different religious beliefs could live in tolerance side by side while working for the good of the whole. It was recognition of the concept of a government of the people and by the people with the individuals within the group being treated as equals.