The Truth About the Tea Party's Constitution Class

The Tea Party likes to bring up the history surrounding the founding fathers. They also claim to be the champions of the Constitution, even though many notable members (even elected officials) have quoted the Constitution wrong and gotten words mixed up with the Declaration of Independence which is not a legal document. Many Tea Party groups hold things called Constitution classes, and even the local Spartanburg Tea Party holds one of their own. 

But what do they teach at these classes. Do they actually get the real text of the entire Constitution plus the many amendments and take them on piece by piece? Probably not, but they do however teach this one book, suggested by Glenn Beck himself. 

Yes Glenn Beck, the crazy commentator from Fox News. A man who compares anything Obama/Democrats/Liberals do to Hitler, even the Peace Corps. A man who's admitted that he's not a journalist, but a commentator. Journalists have to back up what they're saying with facts. He also thinks Woodrow Wilson is somehow the most evil man to ever live, and once pondered about killing filmmaker Micheal Moore live on the air.  

But anyway, Beck found a book just for his Tea Bagger friends. It's called The Five Thousand Year Leap, and it's written by the late Cleon Skousen who was a supporter of the racist John Birch Society. The book tries to twist history into believing that the founding fathers wrote the Constitution with help from the Bible, and that they all believed in limited government. Princeton University Historian Sean Wilentz once wrote about the book regarding the above suggestions as "Either proposition would have astounded James Madison, often described as the guiding spirit behind the Constitution, who rejected state-established religions and, like Alexander Hamilton, proposed a central government so strong that it could veto state laws." Not to mention that many of the founding fathers believed in Deism not traditional Christianity. 

The best quote found by Wilentz was regarding the book's concept that all the founding fathers opposed the re-distribution of wealth. Which simply is not true. 

"He does not mention the Founders’ endorsement of taxing the rich to support the general welfare. Thomas Jefferson, for example, wrote approvingly in 1811 of having federal taxes (then limited to tariffs) fall solely on the wealthy, which meant that “the farmer will see his government supported, his children educated, and the face of his country made a paradise by the contributions of the rich alone, without his being called on to spend a cent from his earnings."

By: Adam Rankin