evidence: MDH: Yeah, well, first of all, it’s a factual claim about a historical matter, and I think we should get our historical facts right. So scholar after scholar, popular writer after popular writer has made claims to the effect that many of the founders were deists, most of the founders were deists. And so just simply out of a concern to get our history right, I explore these claims. I look at the evidence that’s presented, and what you find is you have evidence of maybe three or four elite founders that clearly depart from orthodox Christianity, and yet these founders routinely talk about God interfering in the affairs of men and nations. As well, you have claims made about other elite Founders, like an Alexander Hamilton, a George Washington, a James Madison, claims that these Founders are deist as well. And yet, in their cases, there is not even evidence that they depart from orthodox Christianity, and there certainly isn’t any evidence that they embraced deism. And so just as a matter of getting our history correct, I think it is important to recognize that there’s virtually no evidence. I would say probably the only clear deists in the American founding are Ethan Allen and Thomas Paine, and Thomas Paine, as you know, is from England. So you kind of have one homegrown American deist.