David Barton | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Barton in 2016 | |
| Born | (1954-01-28)January 28, 1954 (age 71) Aledo, Texas, U.S. |
| Alma mater | Oral Roberts University (BA) |
| Occupation(s) | Author, political activist |
David Barton (born January 28, 1954) is an Americanevangelical author andpolitical activist forChristian nationalist causes.[1][2] He is the founder of WallBuilders, LLC, aTexas-based organization that promotespseudohistory about thereligious basis of the United States.[3][4]
Barton's work is devoted to advancing the discredited idea that the United States was founded as an explicitly Christian nation and rejecting the notion that theUnited States Constitution calls forseparation of church and state.[5][6][7][8] Scholars of history and law have described his research as highly flawed, "pseudoscholarship" and spreading "outright falsehoods".[9][10][11]
Barton is a former vice chair of theRepublican Party of Texas and served as director of Keep the Promise PAC, a political action committee that supported the unsuccessfulTed Cruz 2016 presidential campaign.[12]
Barton is a lifelong resident ofAledo, Texas, a suburb of theDallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. He graduated fromAledo High School in 1972.[5] He received aBachelor of Artsdegree inreligious education fromOral Roberts University in 1976.[13][14]
After graduating from college, Barton served as a youth pastor at churches in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He was employed as a teacher of math and science and eventually became principal at Aledo Christian School, a ministry of thecharismatic church started by Barton's parents.[5]
In 1987, Barton formed Specialty Research Associates, Inc.,[15] a company which said it focused on historical research "relating to America's constitutional, moral, and religious heritage".[16] Specialty Research Associates submittedamicus curiae briefs in court cases.[17][18][19] In 1988, the company became WallBuilders.[16]
Barton is the founder and president of WallBuilders.[20][21] WallBuilders publishes and sells most of Barton's books and videos, some of which present Barton's position that the modern view of separation of church and state is not consistent with the views of theFounding Fathers.[22] Barton has argued that the religion clauses of the First Amendment were intended only formonotheistic religions, and perhaps solely Christianity.[23] A 2005Time magazine article entitled "The 25 Most Influential Evangelicals" called Barton "a major voice in the debate over church–state separation" who, despite the fact that "many historians dismiss his thinking ... [is] a hero to millions—including some powerful politicians".[24] Barton has appeared on television and radio programs, including those of Republican presidential candidateMike Huckabee andGlenn Beck. Beck has praised Barton as "the Library of Congress in shoes".[25] In September 2013, he returned to the political arena and advised state legislators on how to fight theCommon Core academic standards promoted by theObama administration.[26]
Barton was the vice chairman of theTexas Republican Party from 1997 to 2006[27] under state chairman Susan Weddington. He has also acted as apolitical consultant to theRepublican National Committee on outreach toevangelicals.[24][28][better source needed][29] There was aTea Party movement to get him to run against SenatorJohn Cornyn in the2014 Senate election fromTexas.[30] However, Barton announced on November 6, 2013, that he would not run for the seat.[31] Barton headed the Keep the Promise PAC, a political action committee supportingTed Cruz during hiscampaign for election as U.S. President in 2016.[12] Cruz failed to receive the Republican nomination.[32] Barton has also advisedNewt Gingrich.[27]
Barton's first non-self-published work was a 2003 article in theNotre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy, (Volume XVII Issue No. 2, 2003, p. 399), a survey of Jefferson's writings about the First Amendment.[5]
Barton is the initial funder ofPatriot Academy, a right-wing organization that says it gives participants "the physical training you need to be able to defend your family" and "intellectual ammunition to defend the Constitution".[27]
Barton has served on the board of advisors of the Providence Foundation.[33] In an article discussing Barton,The Nation described the Providence Foundation as "a Christian Reconstructionist group that promotes the idea that biblical law should be instituted in America".[34]
According to Skipp Porteous of the Massachusetts-based Institute for First Amendment Studies, Barton was listed in promotional literature as a "new and special speaker" at a 1991 summer retreat in Colorado sponsored by Scriptures for America, afar-rightChristian Identity ministry headed byPastor Pete Peters, which has been linked to neo-Nazi groups.[35][36] Barton's assistant Kit Marshall said in 1993 that Barton was previously unaware of the anti-Semitic and racist views of these groups.[37] In September 2011, Barton sued two former Texas State Board of Education candidates for posting a video onYouTube that stated that he was "known for speaking at white supremacist rallies".[38]
Barton has been a guest on the television programsThe 700 Club[39] andThe Daily Show.[40] In 2013, Barton appeared onKenneth Copeland'sBeliever's Voice of Victory program where he suggested thatabortion causedclimate change because God no longer protected the environment as punishment for legalized abortion.[41][42]
He has been influential in the faith and intellectual life ofSpeakerMike Johnson.[43][44][45]
Barton has been praised byAmerican conservatives, includingMike Huckabee,Newt Gingrich,Michele Bachmann,[9]Sam Brownback,[46] andTrinity Broadcasting Network presidentMatt Crouch.[47] By contrast,People for the American Way wrote, "This guy is David Barton, a Republican Party activist and a fast-talking, self-promoting, self-taught, self-proclaimed historian who is miseducating millions of Americans about U.S. history and the Constitution."[48]
His work has been criticized by J. Brent Walker of theBaptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty,[49]Rob Boston ofAmericans United for Separation of Church and State,[50]Gordon College history professor Stephen Phillips,[51] SenatorArlen Specter,[10] theAnti-Defamation League,[52] Senior Research Director for theMilitary Religious Freedom FoundationChris Rodda,[53]Messiah College history professor John Fea,[54]Baylor University historian Barry Hankins,[55] andGrove City College professorsWarren Throckmorton and Michael Coulter.[56]
Barton's official biography describes him as "an expert in historical and constitutional issues".[57] Barton holds no formal credentials in history or law, and scholars dispute the accuracy and integrity of his assertions about history, accusing him of practicing misleadinghistorical revisionism, "pseudoscholarship" and spreading "outright falsehoods".[10][58][11] According to theNew York Times, "Many professional historians dismiss Mr. Barton, whose academic degree is in Christian Education from Oral Roberts University, as a biased amateur who cherry-picks quotes from history and the Bible."[9]
Jay W. Richards, senior fellow at the Christian conservativeDiscovery Institute, said in 2012 that Barton's books and videos are full of "embarrassing factual errors, suspiciously selective quotes, and highly misleading claims".[59] TheSouthern Poverty Law Center describes Barton's work as "anti-gay" "historical revisionism", noting that Barton has no formal training in history.[16] A number of credentialed historians have called Barton's work "pseudohistory".[45][60][44][56]
In 1995, in response to criticism by historian Robert Alley, Barton conceded, in an online article titled "Unconfirmed Quotations",[5] that he had not locatedprimary sources for 11 alleged quotes fromJames Madison,Thomas Jefferson,Benjamin Franklin, andU.S. Supreme Court decisions (hence, the title of the article), but maintained that the quotes were "completely consistent" with the views of the Founders. (By 2007, the article listed 14 unconfirmed quotations.)[61] In 1996, Rob Boston ofAmericans United for Separation of Church and State accused Barton of "shoddy workmanship" and said that, despite these and other corrections, Barton's work "remains rife with distortions of history and court rulings".[62] WallBuilders responded to its critics by saying that Barton followed "common practice in the academic community" in citing secondary sources, and that in publishing "Unconfirmed Quotations", Barton's intent was to raise the academic bar in historical debates pertinent to public policy.[61]
In 2006, Barton told theTexas Monthly, with regard to Jefferson's famousletter to the Danbury Baptists, that he had never misquoted the letter in any of his publications. The magazine noted that this denial was contradicted by a 1990 version of Barton's videoAmerica's Godly Heritage, in which Barton said:[5]
On January 1, 1802, Jefferson wrote to that group of Danbury Baptists, and in this letter, he assured them—he said the First Amendment has erected a wall of separation between church and state, he said, but that wall is a one-directional wall. It keeps the government from running the church, but it makes sure that Christian principles will always stay in government.
In 2012, Barton'sNew York Times bestseller[63]The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You've Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson (published April 10, 2012)[64] was voted "the least credible history book in print" by the users of theHistory News Network website.[65] A group of ten conservative Christian professors reviewed the work and reported negatively on its claims, saying that Barton misstated facts about Jefferson.[59][66]
In August 2012, Christian publisherThomas Nelson withdrew the book from publication and stopped production, announcing that they had "lost confidence in the book's details" and "learned that there were some historical details included in the book that were not adequately supported".[67][68] A senior executive said that Thomas Nelson could not stand by the book because "basic truths just were not there."[26]Glenn Beck, who wrote the foreword, announced that hisMercury Ink imprint would issue a new edition of the book[69] once the 17,000 remaining copies that Barton bought of the Thomas Nelson edition had been sold.[70]
A revised edition ofThe Jefferson Lies was published byWND Books in January 2016.[71]
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