Topic: US Constitution, Inspired, Matches 20 quotes.

To summarize, I see divine inspiration in these four great fundamentals of the U.S. Constitution:

•       the separation of powers in the three branches of government;

•       the Bill of Rights;

•       the division of powers between the states and the federal government; and

•       the application of popular sovereignty.

5. The rule of law and not of men. Further, there is divine inspiration in the fundamental underlying premise of this whole constitutional order. All the blessings enjoyed under the United States Constitution are dependent upon the rule of law. That is why President J. Reuben Clark said, “Our allegiance run[s] to the Constitution and to the principles which it embodies and not to individuals.“15 The rule of law is the basis of liberty.

As the Lord declared in modern revelation, constitutional laws are justifiable before him, “and the law also maketh you free.” (D&C 98:5-8.) The self-control by which citizens subject themselves to law strengthens the freedom of all citizens and honors the divinely inspired Constitution.

15. Ibid., p. 43.

Source: Elder Dallin H. Oaks
The Divinely Inspired Constitution
From an address given 5 July 1987, given at the Freedom Festival.

Topics: US Constitution, Inspired

Proclamation Of Christ’s Teachings

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints believes with the Prophet Lehi that America is a “land of promise, a land choice above all other lands”—a land of liberty unto those who keep the commandments of God. But “if the day shall come that they will reject the Holy One of Israel, the true Messiah, their Redeemer and their God, behold, the judgments of him that is just shall rest upon them.” The Church believes, also, that before the end of wickedness shall come, and wars shall be no more, “this gospel of the Kingdom must be preached to all the world.”

The Constitution of this government was written by men who accepted Jesus Christ as the Savior of mankind. Let men and women in these United States then continue to keep their eyes centered upon Him who ever shines as a Light to all the world. Men and women who live in America, “the land of Zion,” have a responsibility greater than that yet borne by any other people. Theirs the duty, the obligation to preserve not only the Constitution of the land but the Christian principles from which sprang that immortal document.

Source: President David O. McKay
General Conference, October 1942

Topics: America, a Choice Land; US Constitution, Inspired

We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law.

We believe that, and this is the relationship that should exist between us and all nations, regardless of where we may live; as the Priesthood and the government of the Lord Jesus Christ we have a definite responsibility in connection with the Constitution of these United States. I am sure if there is a people in all the world that appreciates the Constitution it is this people, for under this divine instrument it was possible for Joseph Smith to bring into existence the Church of Jesus Christ, in a nation where there are equal rights, the right to worship God according to the dictates of one’s conscience.

Source: Elder Joseph L. Wirthlin
General Conference, October 1938

Topics: Freedom, Religious; US Constitution, Inspired

Fundamentals Of Constitution God-given

One of the most important things that we can do for the Church is to stand behind the Constitution of the United States. That does not mean, and no reasoning person would suppose that it meant, that that Constitution may not from time to time be changed as the needs of the people would seem to require. But it does mean that that Constitution should be changed only under the urge of great necessity, and then only in accordance with its great underlying concepts. It does mean that the great fundamental elements of the Constitution are God-given, for he said so. It does mean to me as an individual that the Constitution of the United States and my adherence to it and support of it is a part of my religion.

I have about the Constitution that same sort of conviction that I have about the other doctrines that we are taught, for I believe its precepts are among the doctrines of the Church, and I believe that the Lord will change and modify from time to time those details of its provisions which are ancilliary to its great principles; he will cause us—those who live under it—to modify it in accordance with our needs; but the fundamental principles of it we may not sacrifice.

Source: President J. Reuben Clark, Jr.
General Conference, April 1935

Topics: US Constitution, Amendments; US Constitution, Defend; US Constitution, Inspired

I pray for the people of the world; not only for the Latter-day Saints, but I pray God’s blessings upon every loyal, patriotic man and woman that is endeavoring to do right, and to uphold the laws of the countries where they reside. I pray God’s blessings upon the President of these United States of America. I thank God for the loyalty and the patriotism of the Latter-day Saints. I thank God that we believe that the constitution of our country was given to us under the inspiration of the Living God, and that the Lord supported George Washington and the patriot fathers of this country. I pray that God will inspire us to continue loyal and true to him, to our country, and to its institutions...

Source: President Heber J. Grant
General Conference, October 1924

Topics: Patriotism; US Constitution, Inspired

There are other great Americans who enjoyed inspiration in framing the institutions of this country, and in saying this I am not denying the room for inspiration in the formation and guidance of other countries. We pray for their guidance and the guidance of the officials of not only our own nation here in America but the rulers of other nations. I have thought sometimes we have neglected some of those great characters who were instrumental in shaping the foundations of our country and those who have made comments upon them. I know that we are familiar with the work that Franklin, Jefferson and others did in connection with the framing of the Constitution of our country, but we are less familiar with the work that the great Chief Justice John Marshall did. The formation of the Constitution of the United States is really spoken of as the greatest single achievement of the eighteenth century. There was that about it that inspired Daniel Webster to love it, “to have a profound passion for it,” “to cherish it day and night,” “to live on its healthful saving influence,” and “to trust never to cease to heed it until he should go to the grave of his fathers,” “to earnestly desire not to outlive it.”

Source: Elder Charles H. Hart
General Conference, April 1931

Topics: America, History; US Constitution, Inspired

Our government was founded by inspiration, and the constitution of the United States was written as an expression of the freedom of the ages; a freedom that had been worked out and bled for by a people who looked always to God.

Source: Elder Levi Edgar Young
General Conference, April 1930

Topics: Heavenly Interest in Human Events; US Constitution, Inspired

This Government was founded by the inspiration of God, for the founders prayed for inspiration, and they were inspired. When the members of the First Continental Congress convened at Carpenters Hall in Philadelphia, they turned to God for divine help.

Source: Elder Levi Edgar Young
General Conference, April 1930

Topics: US Constitution, Inspired

A Remarkable Conception of Civil Government

Among the large contributions which Joseph Smith made was that remarkable conception of civil government which he gave to the world, for it was he who emphasized, if he did not first teach, the doctrine that all governments are instituted of God for the benefit of men; and it was he who first plainly declared—assuming that some attention had been given to the same thought before—that the Constitution of the great land in which we live came from the inspiration of God through men who were raised up for the purpose of establishing it as an instrument of government. I have always been grateful for these conceptions of government and I have felt in recent years that until the great ideas of government which he promulgated among this nation find their place more securely and firmly in the minds and hearts of the citizenship of this country, America will never achieve her great destiny and will never be what she was intended to be, the beacon light of liberty and freedom and civil righteousness to all the world.

My attention has recently been directed, by my colleague, Brother Richard R. Lyman, to a book which is off the press but a few months, in which the author, Mr. Clarence True Wilson, sets forth rather more clearly than I have ever seen it stated before, the conception of government which has been taught in this Church for nearly a hundred years. The author points out that for more than thirty years he has studied all the works which have been written upon the Constitution of this country, the influences which brought it about, and the influences exercised upon its framers, which culminated in the form and plan of government which find expression in that great document. He says that never in all his research has he discovered a single author who attributes the Constitution to the influence of the Bible and God. He points out that some contend that influences derived from the Assyrian, the Babylonian, the Greek, and the Roman attempts at Republican government found their expression in this great document.

Influence of the Bible on the Constitution

He says that most commentaries on the Constitution pay homage to the influence of the common law of England and the English experiment in free government, but in no works on this great document does he find a single expression which indicates that it was the Holy Bible, the scriptures of the Lord, which furnished the foundation for this great instrument of government, and yet, says he, the Bible is the only book with which all the framers of the Constitution were intimately familiar. It was the book which they had read from their childhood to their maturity. It was the book from which they learned their spelling; it was the book from which they learned their English, it was their chief literature; and he asks this question: “Is it not reasonable, natural and logical, to draw the inference that it was the influence of the Scriptures of the Lord which permeated the hearts and the minds of those patriotic men in the formulation of the greatest instrument, which Gladstone says, ever fell from the pen of man?” Time will not permit to make anything like an analytical comparison between the fundamental institutions of our government, as they were established in the Constitution, and the Hebrew government which was established under the hand of God, and which prevailed for so many centuries under his divine guidance. It might be said, however, in a moment, that there is not a single fundamental institution of this country, ordained and established under the Constitution, that does not have something like a counterpart in the Israelitish form of government which prevailed prior to the time of the coming of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Source: Elder Stephen L. Richards
General Conference, October 1923

Topics: Heavenly Interest in Human Events; US Constitution, Inspired

•  ⟨⟨ 
•  ⟨ 
•   |  
•  ⟩ 
•  ⟩⟩