|
Name of Signer |
State | Religious Affiliation |
|---|---|---|
| Charles Carroll | Maryland | Catholic |
| Samuel Huntington | Connecticut | Congregationalist |
| Roger Sherman | Connecticut | Congregationalist |
| William Williams | Connecticut | Congregationalist |
| Oliver Wolcott | Connecticut | Congregationalist |
| Lyman Hall | Georgia | Congregationalist |
| Samuel Adams | Massachusetts | Congregationalist |
| John Hancock | Massachusetts | Congregationalist |
| Josiah Bartlett | New Hampshire | Congregationalist |
| William Whipple | New Hampshire | Congregationalist |
| William Ellery | Rhode Island | Congregationalist |
| John Adams | Massachusetts | Congregationalist; Unitarian |
| Robert Treat Paine | Massachusetts | Congregationalist; Unitarian |
| George Walton | Georgia | Episcopalian |
| John Penn | North Carolina | Episcopalian |
| George Ross | Pennsylvania | Episcopalian |
| Thomas Heyward Jr. | South Carolina | Episcopalian |
| Thomas Lynch Jr. | South Carolina | Episcopalian |
| Arthur Middleton | South Carolina | Episcopalian |
| Edward Rutledge | South Carolina | Episcopalian |
| Francis Lightfoot Lee | Virginia | Episcopalian |
| Richard Henry Lee | Virginia | Episcopalian |
| George Read | Delaware | Episcopalian |
| Caesar Rodney | Delaware | Episcopalian |
| Samuel Chase | Maryland | Episcopalian |
| William Paca | Maryland | Episcopalian |
| Thomas Stone | Maryland | Episcopalian |
| Elbridge Gerry | Massachusetts | Episcopalian |
| Francis Hopkinson | New Jersey | Episcopalian |
| Francis Lewis | New York | Episcopalian |
| Lewis Morris | New York | Episcopalian |
| William Hooper | North Carolina | Episcopalian |
| Robert Morris | Pennsylvania | Episcopalian |
| John Morton | Pennsylvania | Episcopalian |
| Stephen Hopkins | Rhode Island | Episcopalian |
| Carter Braxton | Virginia | Episcopalian |
| Benjamin Harrison | Virginia | Episcopalian |
| Thomas Nelson Jr. | Virginia | Episcopalian |
| George Wythe | Virginia | Episcopalian |
| Thomas Jefferson | Virginia | Episcopalian (Deist) |
| Benjamin Franklin | Pennsylvania | Episcopalian (Deist) |
| Button Gwinnett | Georgia | Episcopalian; Congregationalist |
| James Wilson | Pennsylvania | Episcopalian; Presbyterian |
| Joseph Hewes | North Carolina | Quaker, Episcopalian |
| George Clymer | Pennsylvania | Quaker, Episcopalian |
| Thomas McKean | Delaware | Presbyterian |
| Matthew Thornton | New Hampshire | Presbyterian |
| Abraham Clark | New Jersey | Presbyterian |
| John Hart | New Jersey | Presbyterian |
| Richard Stockton | New Jersey | Presbyterian |
| John Witherspoon | New Jersey | Presbyterian |
| William Floyd | New York | Presbyterian |
| Philip Livingston | New York | Presbyterian |
| James Smith | Pennsylvania | Presbyterian |
| George Taylor | Pennsylvania | Presbyterian |
| Benjamin Rush | Pennsylvania | Presbyterian |
Consider this, to remove any ‘creator’ from our very existence including the beginning of our universe is to remove any ‘thought or intelligence’ from the equation. By definition, you are ultimately left with an existence from stupidity.
…atheism isn't exempt from analysis or critique of its real world consequences. Atheism is a metaphysical stance -- there are no gods and no God, there is no intrinsic purpose to existence, there is no natural moral law, there is no accountability in an afterlife. Those are quite explicit and consequential assertions, just as the negation of those assertions -- that there is a God, that there is a purpose to existence... -- is an explicit and consequential assertion. Atheism lacks liturgy. It does not lack beliefs and consequences. It lacks belief in God; it does not lack belief in the intrinsic consequences of God's non-existence. As Nietzsche emphatically noted, if God is dead, everything changes.
- Michael Egnor
…that if we would maintain the value of our highest beliefs and emotions, we must find for them a congruous origin. Beauty must be more than accident. The source of morality must be moral. The source of knowledge must be rational.Why is this important? The US Constitution assumed all human rights were bestowed to us by our Creator through Natural Law . A Humanistic belief would assume rights and morality are bestowed to us by ‘mankind’ based on circumstance - morality is a man made, relative, and an illusion. A wise man once observed that while belief in God after the Holocaust may be difficult, belief in man after the Holocaust is impossible.
- Sir Arthur Balfour