Less Punishment, More Prevention

“In contemplating the political institutions of the United States, I lament, that we waste so much time and money in punishing crimes, and take so little pains to prevent them. We profess to be republicans, and yet we neglect the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government, that is, the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity, by means of the bible; for this divine book, above all others, favors that equality among mankind, that respect for just laws, and all those sober and frugal virtues, which constitute the soul of republicanism.” – Dr. Benjamin Rush, “A Defense of the use of the Bible as a school book. Addressed to the Rev. Jeremy Belknap of Boston”

Benjamin Rush Cigar Box Label
Benjamin Rush Cigar Box Label

Dr. Benjamin Rush, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, was also a member of the Sons of Liberty, considered by John Adams as top 3 most influential founding fathers, served as Surgeon General for the Continental Army, member of the Pennsylvania Abolition Society, known as the Father of American Psychiatry, Father of American Medicine, Father of Public Schools Under the Constitution, founding member of America’s first Bible Society, and helped begin the American Sunday School movement.

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