I would like to make a point about the quote I have put in bold.
The scholastic influence on our Founders, coming mainly from Thomas Aquinas, paired reason and faith and proved how compatible they actually were. (Subjective moralists, however, separate faith and reason which results in the perversion of both of them.) When our Founders wrote the Constitution they did so together in one philosophy based on objective moral theology where faith and reason were not separated.
In this thread there were some people who maintained quite soundly that there could be no Ten Commandment influence in the Constitution. Quite the contrary, it is so deeply embedded that only people paying attention will notice it.
Yes, to your observations.
On a slightly different point, Jefferson's understanding of "the laws," as articulated below, seems to be consistent with what is known as the "golden rule" as well. Naturally, then, he favored Blackstone's "Commentaries" for the teaching of young students at UVA.
"No man has a natural right to commit aggression on the equal rights of another, and this is all from which the laws ought to restrain him."
" The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."
"Of liberty I would say that, in the whole plenitude of its extent, it is unobstructed action according to our will. But rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law,' because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual."
"It is strangely absurd to suppose that a million of human beings, collected together, are not under the same moral laws which bind each of them separately."
Try reading The Great Heresies (scroll down to or search for the words "THE MODERN PHASE").
In the meantime, while looking for that section, here's a quote I just stumbled over which describes the arguments on this thread:
"There is no essential doctrine such that if we can agree upon it we can differ about the rest: as for instance, to accept immortality but deny the Trinity. A man will call himself a Christian though he denies the unity of the Christian Church; he will call himself a Christian though he denies the presence of Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament; he will cheerfully call himself a Christian though he denies the Incarnation."
And here's another quote which describes the OWS / Dem / Communist camp to a T:
"Meanwhile the third element is appearing quite manifestly: the modern world is getting fuller and fuller of men who so hate industrial capitalism that this hatred is the motive of all they do and think. They would rather destroy society than wait for reform, and they propose methods of reform which are worse than the evils to be remedied-they care far more for the killing of their enemy than they do for the life of the world."
And finally, here is a longer selection of quotes which describes the modern attack on reason, relevant to your post:
" There is here a contradiction in reason, but the modern phase, the anti-Christian advance, has abandoned reason. It is concerned with the destruction of the Catholic Church and the civilization preceding therefrom. It is not troubled by apparent contradictions within its own body so long as the general alliance is one for the ending of all that by which we have hitherto lived. The modern attack is materialistic because in its philosophy it considers only material causes. It is superstitious only as a by-product of this state of mind. It nourishes on its surface the silly vagaries of spiritualism, the vulgar nonsense of "Christian Science," and heaven knows how many other fantasies. But these follies are bred, not from a hunger for religion, but from the same root as that which has made the world materialist-from an inability to understand the prime truth that faith is at the root of knowledge; from thinking that no truth is appreciable save through direct experience."
"Being Atheist, it is characteristic of the advancing wave that it repudiates the human reason. Such an attitude would seem again to be a contradiction in terms; for if you deny the value of human reason, if you say that we cannot through our reason arrive at any truth, then not even the affirmation so made can be true. Nothing can be true, and nothing is worth saying. But that great Modern Attack (which is more than a heresy) is indifferent to self- contradiction. It merely affirms. It advances like an animal, counting on strength alone. Indeed, it may be remarked in passing that this may well be the cause of its final defeat; for hitherto reason has always overcome its opponents; and man is the master of the beast through reason."
"When the Modern Attack was gathering, a couple of lifetimes ago, while it was still confined to a small number of academic men, the first assault upon reason began. It seemed to make but little progress outside a restricted circle. The plain man and his common-sense (which are the strongholds of reason) were not affected. Today they are. But reason today is everywhere decried. The ancient process of conviction by argument and proof is replaced by reiterated affirmation; and almost all the terms which were the glory of reason carry with them now an atmosphere of contempt.
See what has happened for instance to the word "logic," to the word "controversy"; note such popular phrases as "No one yet was ever convinced by argument," or again, "Anything may be proved," or "That may be all right in logic, but in practice it is very different." The speech of men is becoming saturated with expressions which everywhere connote contempt for the use of the intelligence.
But the Faith and the use of the intelligence are inextricably bound up. The use of reason is a main part-or rather the foundation-of all inquiry into the highest things. It was precisely because reason was given this divine authority that the Church proclaimed mystery-that is, admitted reason to have its limits. It had to be so, lest the absolute powers ascribed to reason should lead to the exclusion of truths which the reason might accept but could not demonstrate. Reason was limited by mystery only more to enhance the sovereignty of reason in its own sphere.
When reason is dethroned, not only is Faith dethroned (the two subversions go together) but every moral and legitimate activity of the human soul is dethroned at the same time. There is no God. So the words "God is Truth" which the mind of Christian Europe used as a postulate in all it did, cease to have meaning. None can analyse the rightful authority of government nor set bounds to it. In the absence of reason, political authority reposing on mere force is boundless. And reason is thus made a victim because Humanity itself is what the Modern Attack is destroying in its false religion of humanity. Reason being the crown of man and at the same time his distinguishing mark, the Anarchs march against reason as their principle enemy."
Cheers!