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Religious affiliations of presidents of the United States

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This is a list of the religious affiliations of Presidents of the United States. The particular religious affiliations of U.S. Presidents can affect their electability, shape their visions of society and how they want to lead it, and shape their stances on policy matters. For example, a contributing factor to Alfred E. Smith's defeat in the presidential election of 1928 was his Roman Catholic faith. In the 1960 election, John F. Kennedy faced accusations that as a Catholic president he would do as Pope John XXIII would tell him to do. Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and several other presidents were accused of being infidels during election campaigns—and at other times.

Throughout much of American history, the religion of past American presidents has been the subject of contentious debate. Some devout Americans have been disinclined to believe that there may have been agnostic or even non-Christian presidents, especially amongst the Founding Fathers of the United States. As a result, apocryphal stories of a religious nature have appeared over the years about particularly beloved presidents such as Washington and Lincoln. On the other hand, secular-minded Americans have sometimes downplayed the prominence that religion played in the private and political lives of the Founding Fathers.

Episcopalians are extraordinarily well represented among the presidents. This is in part because the Episcopal Church was the state religion in some states (such as Virginia[1]) before their Constitutions were changed. Before the American Revolution, the Episcopal Church was the American branch of the Church of England. The first seven presidents listed below with Episcopalian affiliation were also the first seven from Virginia, and five of those were among the six presidents most closely identified with Deism. Since there have seldom been any churches of Deism, strictly speaking Deist is not an affiliation in the same way Episcopalian is; it is included in the list below, however, to give a more complete view of the religious views of the presidents.

The church closest to the White House is also Episcopal, and has been attended at least once by nearly every president since James Madison. St. John's Episcopal Church, just across Lafayette Square north of the White House, and built after the War of 1812, is one of about five sometimes referred to as "the Church of the Presidents".

Many people are interested not only in the religious affiliations of the presidents, but also in their inner beliefs. Some presidents, such as Madison and Monroe, were extremely reluctant to discuss their own religious views at all. In general, it is difficult to define with any certainty the faiths of presidents, because no one can truly be sure what relationship (if any) exists between another person and his deity, and because presidents, as public officials, have generally tried to remain outwardly within the mainstream of American religious trends.

With regard to Christianity, distinguishing affiliation from belief can be somewhat complicated. At issue, to a certain extent, is "What counts as belonging to a church?" Must one be a communicant to belong, or is baptism or even simple attendance sufficient? Are Unitarians, Jehovah's Witnesses, and independents who generally hold Jesus in high regard, but do not believe that he is or was divine, to be counted as Christians or not? Numerous presidents changed their affiliations and/or their beliefs during their lives. George Washington, for example, gravitated from conventional Christianity as a youth towards deism as he aged. Conversely, it is sometimes claimed that religiously unaffiliated presidents experienced death-bed conversions.

List of Presidential religious affiliations/beliefs (by President)

  1. George Washington – Deist; Episcopalian (VA)
    • The religious views of George Washington are a matter of some controversy. There is considerable evidence that he, like many intellectuals of his time, was a deist — believing in Divine Providence, but not believing in divine intervention in the world after the initial design. Before the American Revolution, when the Church of England was still the state religion in Virginia, he served as a member of the vestry (lay council) for his local congregation. He spoke often of the value of religion in general, and sometimes accompanied his wife Martha Washington (a devout Episcopalian) to Christian church services. However, there is no record of his ever becoming a communicant in any Christian church and he would regularly leave services before communion—with the other non-communicants. When the Rev. Dr. James Abercrombie, rector of St. Peter's Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, mentioned in a weekly sermon (with Washington in attendance) that those in elevated stations set an unhappy example by leaving at communion, Washington reportedly remarked that he had not sufficiently considered the example set by his leaving, and ceased attending at all on communion Sundays. Long after Washington died, when asked about Washington's beliefs, Abercrombie replied: "Sir, Washington was a Deist." An unfinished book of copied prayers attributed to him as a youth by a collector was rejected by the Smithsonian Institution for lack of authenticity [1]. Various prayers said to have been composed by him in his later life are highly edited. He did not ask for any clergyman on his deathbed, although one was available. However, his funeral services were those of the Episcopal Church. See George Washington and religion.
  2. John Adams – Congregationalist; Unitarian (MA)
  3. Thomas Jefferson – Deist; Unitarian (VA)
    • Though a vestryman (lay officer) of the Church of England in Virginia before the revolution, his beliefs were primarily Deist. Unlike its effect on Congregational churches, Deism had little influence on Episcopal churches, which have a more hierarchical structure and are thus slower to modify their teachings. Of only three things Jefferson chose for his epitaph, one was the 1786 Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom. Jefferson's views are considered very close to Unitarian. [3] The Famous UUs website says: [4]
      "Like many others of his time (he died just one year after the founding of institutional Unitarianism in America), Jefferson was a Unitarian in theology, though not in church membership. He never joined a Unitarian congregation: there were none near his home in Virginia during his lifetime. He regularly attended Joseph Priestley's Pennsylvania church when he was nearby, and said that Priestley's theology was his own, and there is no doubt Priestley should be identified as Unitarian. Jefferson remained a member of the Episcopal congregation near his home, but removed himself from those available to become godparents, because he was not sufficiently in agreement with the trinitarian theology. His work, the Jefferson Bible, was Unitarian in theology..."
    • See Wikiquote and Positive Atheism for many relevant quotes.
  4. James Madison – Deist; Episcopalian (VA)
    • In 1779 the Virginia General Assembly deprived Church of England ministers of tax support, but in 1784 Patrick Henry sponsored a bill to again collect taxes to support churches in general. Madison's 1785 Memorial and Remonstrance was written in opposition to another bill to levy a general assessment for the support of religions. The assessment bill was tabled, and instead the legislature in 1786 passed Jefferson's Bill for Religious Freedom, first submitted in 1779. Virginia thereby became the first state to disestablish religion — Rhode Island, Delaware, and Pennsylvania never having had an established religion.
    • In 1813, President Madison signed a bill which cancelled the duty on some printing plates imported by the Philadelphia Bible Society to print copies of the Bible[5]. In 1816, he signed a similar bill exempting the Baltimore Bible Society from paying the same import duty[6]. During the War of 1812, Bible societies had begun donating Bibles to the troops[7]. Congress later discontinued passing such exemptions [8].
    • Madison vetoed two bills passed by Congress on the grounds that they violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution [9].
    • After retiring from public life, Madison composed his "detached memorandum" in which he denounced Congress's appointment of and payment of chaplains, both civilian and military, as inconsistent "with the pure principles of religious freedom." In the same memorandum, he also assailed "religious proclamations by the Executive recommending thanksgivings & fasts." [10]
  5. James Monroe – Episcopalian, theology unknown (VA)
    • Monroe was raised in a family that belonged to the Church of England when it was the state church in Virginia, and as an adult frequently attended Episcopalian churches, though there is no record he ever took communion.
    • "When it comes to Monroe's ...thoughts on religion", Bliss Isely comments in his The Presidents: Men of Faith, "less is known than that of any other President." Monroe burned much of his correspondence with his wife, and no letters survive in which he discusses his religious beliefs; nor did his friends, family or associates write about his beliefs. Letters that do survive, such as ones written on the occasion of the death of his son, contain no discussion of religion.
    • In his two inaugural addresses he mentions "the Supreme Author of All Good", "the Almighty", the "Divine Author", "Providence", and "Almighty God".
    • Some sources classify Monroe as a deist.[2] Franklin Steiner, in his book The Religious Beliefs of Our Presidents, categorized Monroe among "Presidents Whose Religious Views Are Doubtful".
  6. John Quincy Adams – Unitarian (MA) [11]
  7. Andrew Jackson – Presbyterian (NC/SC)
    • He became a member of the Presbyterian Church about a year after retiring the presidency
    • In 1832, with cholera causing great mortality in US cities, both lay officials and clergymen asked President Andrew Jackson to declare a national day of prayer and repentance in hopes of halting the epidemic. He refused on constitutional grounds.
  8. Martin Van Buren – Dutch Reformed or no affiliation (NY)
    • Van Buren did not join any church in Washington, nor in his home town of Kinderhook (village), New York. The sole original source to claim that he did join a church – in Hudson, New York – is Vernon B. Hampton, in Religious Background of the White House (Boston: Christopher Publishing House, 1932). The basis for this claim has not been found.
  9. William Henry Harrison – Episcopalian possibly (VA)
    • Harrison died just one month after his inauguration. After Harrison's funeral, the rector at St. John's Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C. said Harrison had bought a Bible one day after his inauguration and had planned to become a communicant.
  10. John Tyler – Episcopalian, theology unknown (VA)
    • Franklin Steiner, in his book The Religious Beliefs of Our Presidents, categorized Tyler among "Presidents Whose Religious Views Are Doubtful". Although affiliated with the Episcopal church, he did not take "a denominational approach to God," according to his biographer (Robert Seager II, and Tyler too: A Biography of John and Julia Gardiner Tyler, 1963, p. 109). Tyler was a strong supporter of religious tolerance and separation of church and state. Some sources[3] classify him as a deist in belief and practice.
  11. James K. Polk – Presbyterian; later Methodist (NC/TN)
    • Raised Presbyterian, Polk had never been baptized due to an early family argument with the local Presbyterian minister in rural North Carolina. Polk's father and grandfather were Deists, and the minister refused to baptize James unless his father affirmed Christianity, which he would not do. At age 38, Polk had a religious conversion to Methodism at a camp meeting, and thereafter he thought of himself as a Methodist. Out of respect for his mother and wife Sarah Childress Polk, however, he continued to attend Presbyterian services. Whenever his wife was out of town, or too ill to attend church, however, Polk worshipped at the local Methodist chapel. On his deathbed less than 4 months after leaving the Presidency, he summoned the man who had converted him years before, the Rev. John B. McFerrin, who then baptized Polk as a Methodist.
  12. Zachary Taylor – Episcopalian (VA)
  13. Millard Fillmore – Unitarian (NY)
    • In the early 1830s, he worked to overturn the New York test law that required all witnesses in New York courts to swear an oath affirming their belief in God and the hereafter.
  14. Franklin Pierce – Episcopalian (NH)
    • 1850: unsuccessfully worked to abolish that portion of the New Hampshire Constitution which made the Protestant religion the official religion.
    • 1853: Pierce's 12-year-old son died in a tragic train accident, which prompted Franklin into a great bout of depression, during which he questioned God's existence. At his inauguration he became the first, and to date only president to "affirm" rather than swear the oath of office; he also chose not to kiss the Bible.
    • 1861: 4 years after retiring the presidency, he was baptized, confirmed, and became a regular communicant in St. Paul's Episcopal Church, in Concord, NH.
  15. James Buchanan – Presbyterian (PA)
    • raised Presbyterian, he joined its church after he retired the presidency
  16. Abraham Lincoln – Deist; no personal affiliation known (KY/IN/IL)
    • Life before the presidency
      • For much of his life, Lincoln was undoubtedly Deist (see [12], [13]). In his younger days he openly challenged orthodox religions, but as he matured and became a candidate for public office, he kept his Deist views more to himself, and would sometimes attend Presbyterian services with his wife Mary Todd Lincoln. He loved to read the Bible, and even quoted from it, but he almost never made reference to Jesus, and is not known to have ever indicated a belief in the divinity of Jesus.
      • Evidence against Lincoln's ever being Christian includes offerings from two of Lincoln's most intimate friends, Ward Hill Lamon and William H. Herndon. Both Herndon and Lamon published biographies of their former colleague after his assassination relating their personal recollections of him. Each denied Lincoln's adherence to Christianity and characterized his religious beliefs as deist or atheist.
    • Lincoln's religion at the time of his death is a matter about which there is more disagreement. A number of Christian pastors, writing months and even years after Lincoln's assassination, claimed to have witnessed a late-life conversion by Lincoln to protestant Christianity. Some pastors date a conversion following the death of his son Eddie in 1850, and some following the death of his son Willie in 1862, and some later than that. These accounts are hard to substantiate and historians consider most of them to be apocryphal.
      • One such account is an entry in the memory book The Lincoln Memorial Album—Immortelles (edited by Osborn H. Oldroyd, 1882, New York: G.W. Carleton & Co., p. 366) attributed to An Illinois clergyman (unnamed) which reads "When I left Springfield I asked the people to pray for me. I was not a Christian. When I buried my son, the severest trial of my life, I was not a Christian. But when I went to Gettysburg and saw the graves of thousands of our soldiers, I then and there consecrated myself to Christ. Yes, I do love Jesus." Other entries in the memory book are attributed by name. See a discussion of this story in They Never Said It, by Paul F. Boller & John George, (Oxford Univ. Press, 1989, p. 91).
      • Rev. Dr. Phineas D. Gurley, pastor of the New York Avenue Presbyterian church in Washington D.C., which Lincoln attended with his wife when he attended any church, never claimed a conversion. According to D. James Kennedy in his booklet, "What They Believed: The Faith of Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln", "Dr. Gurley said that Lincoln had wanted to make a public profession of his faith on Easter Sunday morning. But then came Ford's Theater." (p. 59, Published by Coral Ridge Ministries, 2003) Though this is possible, we have no way of verifying the truth of the report. The chief evidence against it is that Dr. Gurley, so far as we know, never mentioned it publicly. The determination to join, if accurate, would have been extremely newsworthy. It would have been reasonable for Dr. Gurley to have mentioned it at the funeral in the White House, in which he delivered the sermon which has been preserved[14]. The only evidence we have is an affidavit signed more than sixty years later by Mrs. Sidney I. Lauck, then a very old woman. In her affidavit signed under oath in Essex County, New Jersey, February 15, 1928, she said, "After Mr. Lincoln's death, Dr. Gurley told me that Mr. Lincoln had made all the necessary arrangements with him and the Session of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church to be received into the membership of the said church, by confession of his faith in Christ, on the Easter Sunday following the Friday night when Mr. Lincoln was assassinated." Mrs. Lauck was, she said, about thirty years of age at the time of the assassination.
      • John Remsburg, President of the American Secular Union, argued against claims of Lincoln's conversion in his book Six Historic Americans (1906). He cites several of Lincoln's close associates:
        • The man who stood nearest to President Lincoln at Washington -- nearer than any clergyman or newspaper correspondent -- was his private secretary, Col. John G. Nicolay. In a letter dated May 27, 1865, Colonel Nicolay says: "Mr. Lincoln did not, to my knowledge, in any way change his religious ideas, opinions, or beliefs from the time he left Springfield to the day of his death."
        • In a letter to his old friend, Judge Wakefield, written after Willie's death in 1862, he declared that his earlier views of the unsoundness of the Christian scheme of salvation, and the human origin of the Scriptures, had become clearer and stronger with advancing years, and he did not think he should ever change them. [citation needed]
        • After his assassination Mrs. Lincoln said: "Mr. Lincoln had no hope and no faith in the usual acceptance of these words." His lifelong friend and executor, Judge David Davis, affirmed the same: "He had no faith in the Christian sense of the term." His biographer, Colonel Lamon, intimately acquainted with him in Illinois, and with him during all the years that he lived in Washington, says: "Never in all that time did he let fall from his lips or his pen an expression which remotely implied the slightest faith in Jesus as the son of God and the Savior of men."[15]
  17. Andrew Johnson – no affiliation (NC/TN)
    • Some sources refer to Johnson having Baptist parents. He accompanied his wife Eliza McCardle Johnson to Methodist services sometimes, belonged to no church himself, and sometimes attended Catholic services—remarking favorably there was no reserved seating. Accused of being an infidel, he replied: "As for my religion, it is the doctrine of the Bible, as taught and practiced by Jesus Christ." (See The Age of Hate, 1930, by G.F. Milton, p. 80.)
  18. Ulysses S. Grant – no affiliation known (OH)
    • Grant was never baptized into any church, though he accompanied his wife Julia Grant to Methodist services. Many sources list his religious affiliation as Methodist based on a Methodist minister's account of a deathbed conversion. He did leave a note for his wife in which he hoped to meet her again in a better world.
  19. Rutherford B. Hayes – no affiliation (OH)
    • In his 1890 17 May diary entry, he states: "I am not a subscriber to any creed. I belong to no Church. But in a sense satisfactory to myself, and believed by me to be important, I try to be a Christian and to help do Christian work." (page 435)
  20. James Garfield – Disciples of Christ (OH)
    • In his early adulthood, Garfield sometimes preached and held revival meetings.
  21. Chester A. Arthur – Episcopalian (VT/NY)
  22. Grover Cleveland – Presbyterian (NJ/NY)
  23. Benjamin Harrison – Presbyterian (OH/IN)
    • Harrison became a church elder, and taught Sunday school
    • Franklin Steiner, in his book The Religious Beliefs Of Our Presidents[16], categorized Harrison as the first President who was unquestionably a communicant in an orthodox Church at the time he was elected
  24. Grover Cleveland – Presbyterian (NJ/NY)
    • During his second (non-consecutive) term, Cleveland included mention of Jesus Christ in his Thanksgiving Proclamation, something no other President had ever done.
  25. William McKinley – Methodist (OH)
    • McKinley was a devout Christian and believed the U.S. government had a duty to help spread Christianity and Western civilization to the rest of the world.
  26. Theodore Roosevelt – Dutch Reformed (NY)
  27. William Howard Taft – Unitarian (OH)
    • Before becoming president, Taft was offered the presidency of Yale University, at that time affiliated with the Congregationalist Church; Taft turned the post down, saying that he could not in good conscience accept it because he "did not believe in the divinity of Christ." (See 1912, James Chace, page 24.)
  28. Woodrow Wilson – Presbyterian (VA/GA/NJ)
  29. Warren G. Harding – Baptist (OH)
  30. Calvin Coolidge – Congregationalist (VT/MA)
  31. Herbert Hoover – Quaker (IA/OR/CA)
  32. Franklin D. Roosevelt – Episcopalian (NY)
  33. Harry S. Truman – Baptist (MO)
  34. Dwight D. Eisenhower – Jehovah's Witnesses, later Presbyterian (TX/KS/PA)
    • Eisenhower's pacifist mother, previously a member of the River Brethren, joined the Jehovah's Witnesses (then known as the Watchtower Society) in 1895, when Eisenhower was 5 years old. The Eisenhower home served as the local WatchTower meeting hall from 1896 to 1915. Witnesses are generally opposed to militarism and saluting the flag, and most are pacifists; Eisenhower's ties to the group were weakened when he joined the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York in 1911. By 1915, the home no longer served as the meeting hall. All the men in the household abandoned the Witnesses as adults, and some even hid their previous affiliation.[17] [18].
    • Eisenhower was baptized, confirmed, and became a communicant in the Presbyterian church in a single ceremony February 1, 1953, just 12 days after his first inauguration. He is the only president known to be baptized, or to be confirmed, or to become a communicant while in office. Eisenhower was instrumental in the addition of the words "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954 (an act highly promoted by the Knights of Columbus), and the 1956 adoption of "In God We Trust" as the motto of the USA, and its 1957 introduction on paper currency. The chapel at his presidential library is intentionally inter-denominational.
  35. John F. Kennedy – Roman Catholic (MA)
    • The only Roman Catholic to serve as president, Kennedy's faith was previously seen by some to be a liability that would hurt his chances during his run for the White House. Critics argued that a Kennedy presidency would be subservient to the wishes of the Vatican. He was also a member of the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic men's fraternal organization.
  36. Lyndon Johnson – Disciples of Christ (TX)
  37. Richard Nixon – raised Quaker (CA)
  38. Gerald R. Ford – Episcopalian (NE/MI)
  39. Jimmy Carter – Baptist, born again (GA)
  40. Ronald Reagan – Disciples of Christ, Presbyterian (IL/CA)
    • Reagan, like his father John (Jack) was baptised as an infant in the Roman Catholic Church, but he was raised in his mother's Disciples of Christ denomination. Beginning in 1963 Reagan generally attended Presbyterian church services at Bel-Air Presbyterian Church, Bel-Air, California. During his presidency he rarely attended church services. He became an official member of Bel-Air Presbyterian after leaving the Presidency. Reagan stated that he considered himself a "born-again Christian".
  41. George H. W. Bush – Episcopalian (MA/CT/TX)
  42. Bill Clinton – Baptist (AR)
  43. George W. Bush – raised Episcopalian, at age 40 born again Methodist (CT/TX)

List of Presidential religious affiliations (by religion)

Footnotes

  1. ^ Colonial Williamsburg website has 4 articles on religion in colonial Virginia
  2. ^ The Religion of James Monroe, article by David Holmes at http://www.vqronline.org/articles/2003/autumn/holmes-religion-james-monroe/
  3. ^ http://www.adherents.com/people/pt/John_Tyler.html


Further reading

  • Steiner, Franklin, The Religious Beliefs of Our Presidents: From Washington to F.D.R., Prometheus Books/The Freethought Library, July 1995. ISBN 0-87975-975-5
  • David L. Holmes, The Faiths of the Founding Fathers, Oxford University Press, May 2006. ISBN 0-19-530092-0

Presidential trivia lists

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