I’ve been thinking about the continual claims of the religious right, that America was founded on religion, and is a religious nation, and thus Christianity should be forced upon all Americans whether they like it or not. (There’s a disgusting billboard on University Avenue that claims that those who aren’t Christians are traitor to America, which is what got me fired up on the subject.)

I’ve always thought that the founding fathers were far more tolerant than, but I never had anything to back that up. So I decided to look for a list of the US presidents (especially the early presidents) and see what religious faith they were. Needless to say, I didn’t find everything I wanted in one place, and so compiled the information into a table that suited me.

It seems to me that several of the early presidents were either deists or of a more tolerant faith than most of the religious right. I mean, you don’t see a lot of evangelical Unitarians out there.

So I continue to doubt the claims of the religious right when it comes to the First Amendment.

However, compiling the list again reminded me of how little history I know. I’ve read books on Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, but I know so little about the rest of the founding fathers.

Sometimes I feel like there will never be enough time to learn everything I want to know.