[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 12]
[House]
[Page 17666]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                        BIBLE OF THE REVOLUTION

  (Mr. PITTS asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. PITTS. Mr. Speaker, on this day in history, September 12, 1782, 
218 years ago, Congress made a significant decision reported in the 
records of Congress. The American Revolution had just concluded, and 
America was no longer bound by the British law making it illegal to 
print a Bible in the English language.
  A plan was therefore presented for Congress to approve the printing 
of a Bible that would be ``a neat edition of the Holy Scriptures for 
the use of schools.'' Congress approved the plan and on this day in 
1782 our Founding Fathers issued the endorsement printed in the front 
of the ``Bible of the Revolution,'' now considered one of the rarest 
books in the world, and I saw one recently.
  That endorsement declares: ``The United States in Congress assembled 
recommend this edition of the Bible to the inhabitants of the United 
States.'' One historian observed that ``this Congress of the States 
assumed all the rights and performed all the duties of a Bible Society 
long before such an institution existed.''
  This act by Congress on this day in 1782 shows that our Founding 
Fathers believed that it was appropriate for Congress to encourage 
religion and even the use of a Bible, a lesson many today would like us 
to forget.

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