THE SOCIETY OF CATHOLIC SOCIAL SCIENTISTS
Friday and Saturday, October 26-27, 2007
The St. John’s University School of Law
Kevin Schmiesing
Acton Institute and CatholicHistory.net
17666 Sharp Rd. Sidney, OH 45365
937-492-5584
Paper 3
“The Founding in Twentieth-Century Catholic Historiography”
Kevin Schmiesing, Acton Institute and CatholicHistory.net
In the first half of the twentieth century, American Catholic historians such as Gaillard Hunt and John Rager emphasized the influence of Catholic ideas and participants on the Revolution and Constitution. By the 1980s, historians such as William Halsey had dismissed the earlier views as naïve and tendentious. This paper will analyze how changes in the perspectives of Catholic historians led to changing perceptions of the relationship between Catholicism and the Founding.