Customer Reviews

The American Creed: A Biography of the Declaration of Independence

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FORREST CHURCH's BOOK : AMERICAN PRIMER

Forrest Church has done it again.

In this time of world chaos and national confusion,he provides not only food for thought and understanding about ourselves and others around the world, but helps us tap into our own courage and re-dedication to our principals as we make choices about actions.

He doesn't tell us how to think and act, but instead provides us information and perspectives. Good for any age.

Interesting discussions could be activated by this book in families, among friends or students as well as among our leaders.
B.O'Reilly, Idaho

In just a few pages (about 160), Church explains what the United States is all about. He doesn't gloss over the low points or over glamorize the highs. Instead, he just looks at when do we live up to the ideals expressed in the Declaration of Independence (the American Creed) and we do we trample on those ideals? American history is an up and down cycle of following that creed. Read this and then get the much heavier A People's History of the United States, and then you will be well versed on the real meaning behind American history.

Church doesn't resort to flag waving. Nor does he engage in self-loathing or America bashing. He takes an even-handed approach, describing what makes the country great, and why we have to eternally be considering and reconsidering our actions as a nation. He reminds us of the great basic premises of the country, citing history and philosophy. A true handbook of reflection for the patriot or student of American history.

I picked up the The American Creed in the bargain bin at Barnes and Noble. It appeared to be a patriot pro-faith book, so I thought I'd give it a shot. I enjoyed the book, as it laid out the message of the Declaration of Independence and the importance of faith in our culture. Forrest Church is a gifted writer. His style and prose is elegant and poetic. He started with our nation's founding and then began jumping through history with an underlying theme that our country and experiment in democracy has not been perfect, but that great leaders have drawn from the strength of our "American Creed" to continue to push forward democracy. However, the book fell short in a few areas and left me a little disappointed.

My biggest problem with it were his choices of the events where the american creed was used. He tended to focus mostly on Democrat presidents and their speeches, but not the actual consequences of their policies. He spent an entire chapter on FDR and JFK each analyzing their most famous speaches (the Four Freedoms and the Ask not what your country can do for you, respectively.) Presidential speeches are hollow, meaningless, and often inconsequential. But after reading these chapters, I thought, okay, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt, because surely, I'm about to read about Reagan and his tireless lifelong war against communism. But then I got to the one paragraph on Ronald Reagan and here is what is said.

"However one may view his policies, President Ronald Reagan owed much of his electoral success and his persuasiveness as a leader to the eloquence with which he reclaimed American symbols such as the flag. The country remained divided. For those to whom the American dream was a nightmare and the American Creed itself therefore abrogated, the president's flag waving was nothing more than camouflage for a bankrupt national ethicc."

That's when his bias really became exposed. You can't write a book that discusses individual liberty and faith have full chapters on FDR and JFK speeches and nothing on Ronald Reagan.

I enjoy reading about America's flaws and strengths and know that the history of the the struggles in this country has many dimensions and angles. This book had promise but could have been much better. It was more like a fluffy poetic essay than a rich historical book. For a better book with a similar theme, I'd recommend "10 Days that Unexpectedly Changed America".