Ben Carson Botches Ben Franklin Prayer Story (UPDATED)

The Constitution Wasn't Rescued with Delegates Kneeling in Prayer

My contention is that Christian nationalism requires distorted history in order to survive. Today’s illustration of this comes from physician and former HUD Secretary under Donald Trump, Ben Carson. Apparently promoting his new book Perilous Fight, Carson tells a whopper about Benjamin Franklin (Graham’s tweet has now been removed). Watch:

Transcript: “There are forces that have always wanted to fundamentally change us. You know the founders of this country were really some terrific people. And they were studious. And they studied every government system that ever existed in the history of the world because they wanted to take the good things and leave the bad things out and give us the kind of country that would last and would have freedoms for our people.

But it was a rough go. And in that last Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, the whole thing almost broke apart because there were so many disagreements about how it should be done. And then the elder statesman, 81-year-old Benjamin Franklin, came up and he said, ‘Gentlemen, stop. Let's get down on our knees and let's seek wisdom from God.’ And they knelt and prayed. And they got up and they put together the Constitution of the United States, which I think is a God-inspired document if we will follow it.”

There is only one thing true about the Franklin part of this clip. On June 28 1787, Benjamin Franklin rose to speak to his fellow delegates at the Constitutional Convention and suggested that they pray for God’s help in resolving their differences over the Constitution. However, according to Carson, Franklin and the delegates then knelt and prayed. Then, Carson claimed, “they got up and they put together the Constitution of the United States, which I think is a God-inspired document if we will follow it.”

The part that is true is that Franklin proposed prayers. The rest is not true. The Convention delegates didn’t kneel in prayer, nor did they even vote on his motion. Instead, they adjourned and didn’t come back to the matter. They continued to debate and disagree all the way until the end of the Convention in September. About his motion, Franklin later wrote, “The convention, except three or four persons, thought prayer unnecessary.”

Here’s what happened.

Franklin offered the following speech:

Doctor FRANKLIN. Mr. President, The small progress we have made after four or five weeks close attendance and continual reasonings with each other — our different sentiments on almost every question, several of the last producing as many noes as ayes — is, methinks, a melancholy proof of the imperfection of the human understanding. We indeed seem to feel our own want of political wisdom, since we have been running about in search of it. We have gone back to ancient history for models of government, and examined the different forms of those republics which, having been formed with the seeds of their own dissolution, now no longer exist. And we have viewed modern states all round Europe, but find none of their constitutions suitable to our circumstances.

As an aside, Franklin says the delegates appealed to history and modern states but nothing fit their needs. He didn’t say a thing about the Bible or Christianity being an inspiration for the Constitution as many Christian nationalists assert. Even if he meant Israel when he referred to “ancient history,” Franklin said none of those forms were suitable to their circumstances.

In this situation of this Assembly, groping as it were in the dark to find political truth, and scarce able to distinguish it when presented to us, how has it happened, Sir, that we have not hitherto once thought of humbly applying to the Father of lights, to illuminate our understandings?

Franklin then made a case for the following motion which was seconded by Roger Sherman. With the exception of getting on his knees, Carson is correct to this point. Franklin moved that the Convention begin with daily prayers.

I therefore beg leave to move — that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one or more of the clergy of this city be requested to officiate in that service.

DELEGATES DECLINED TO PRAY FOR HEAVEN’S ASSISTANCE

Madison recorded the reaction of the delegates:

Mr. SHERMAN seconded the motion.
Mr. HAMILTON and several others expressed their apprehensions, that, however proper such a resolution might have been at the beginning of the Convention, it might at this late day, in the first place, bring on it some disagreeable animadversions; and in the second, lead the public to believe that the embarrassments and dissensions within the Convention had suggested this measure. It was answered, by Doctor FRANKLIN, Mr. SHERMAN, and others, that the past omission of a duty could not justify a further omission; that the rejection of such a proposition would expose the Convention to more unpleasant animadversions than the adoption of it; and that the alarm out of doors that might be excited for the state of things within would at least be as likely to do good as ill.
Mr. WILLIAMSON observed, that the true cause of the omission could not be mistaken. The Convention had no funds.
Mr. RANDOLPH proposed, in order to give a favorable aspect to the measure, that a sermon be preached at the request of the Convention on the Fourth of July, the anniversary of Independence; and thenceforward prayers, &c. to be read in the Convention every morning. Doctor FRANKLIN seconded this motion. After several unsuccessful attempts for silently postponing this matter by adjourning, the adjournment was at length carried, without any vote on the motion. (emphasis added)

As noted above, Franklin later wrote that the reason for the lack of interest in his motion was that the delegates, “except three or four persons, thought prayer unnecessary.”

DON’T EXPECT INTERFERENCE OF HEAVEN

As we shall see, the delegates continued their debates using “ancient history,” Britain, and the rest of Europe for their models and authorities. Rarely did anyone reference religion in the formation of the Constitution. In fact, just days later on July 2, delegate Gouverneur Morris, as if to answer Franklin’s motion for assistance from heaven, said to the Convention:

Reason tells us we are but men; and we are not to expect any particular interference of Heaven in our favor.

I have written in more detail about Franklin’s call to prayer in the past (here, here, and here). Eric Metaxas made the call to prayer a main focus of his recent book If You Can Keep It (see my review of that book here). Metaxas uses the story to imply that the call somehow set the Convention on the path toward solution and compromise. However, a daily reading of Madison’s notes paints a different picture. Instead of supporting the Christian nationalist notion of a Christian republic, I think the reaction to Franklin’s call to prayer undermines the claim that the delegates sought to create a Constitution based on biblical principles.

1787 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION SERIES

To read my series examining the proceedings of the Constitution Convention, click here.  In this 2017 series, I wrote about any obvious influences on the development of the Constitution which were mentioned by the delegates to the Convention. Specifically, I tested David Barton’s claim that “every clause” of the Constitution is based on biblical principles. In that series, I found nothing supporting the claim.

Constitutional Convention Series (click the link). Madison’s notes edited by Max Farrand.

As I noted above Franklin Graham and the Billy Graham Center removed the tweet and video. However, they did not post an admission of the false story or a correction. This is sadly typical. Tell a pious but false story and then hope nobody notices when they back out of it.