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The hristian Foundationso Work in merica
1988
Columbus was the frrst to see in theNew World, finally giving up
his hopesfor passage to the Indies, a land representing the gates
of Eden itself. Hisreport was but the first of the images ofa land
of all but workless plenty. Exploring the Carolina coast a century
after Columbus, Captain Arthur Barlowefound himself in the midst of
suchincredible fruitfulness that he was cer
tain it was the golden age intact-- aland where the earth
bringeth forth allthings in abundance, as in the :first creation,
without toil or labor. Later whenCaptain John Smith undertook a
arefulmapping of the New England coast hewas convinced that three
days work aweek would satisfy any settler in thatfruitful land,
much of that time spent inthe pretty sport of fishing. I
The English crown, claiming the entire American continent north
of Mexico had neither the money nor the aptitude to found colonies
after the warwith Spain which lasted until 1604. Soit gave
concessions to individuals andcompanies to do so. Most of the
English colonies of the early seventeenthcentury, such as Jamestown
(1607),Plymouth (1620) and MassachusettsBay (1628), started as
trading postsowned by English merchants and settledby their
employees. The original settlers were hired men working under aboss
called a governor, who wasresponsible to owners living in
England.
The sixteenth century closed just as
Robert Smith aPrcsb;yterlan layman JS directorof the
ChristianFood Mission nLaurel, MS.
The Counsel of Chalcedon, October, 1988
byRobert Smith
the fifteenth without England havingplanted a colony or even a
trading postin the New World, but on December20 1606 a group of 120
enterprisingcolonists left England for America tochange that.
Backed by a joint stockcompany of many small investors, theyleft
under the direction of CaptainChristopher Newport to found
thesettlement of Jamestown (after the Kingof England, James I),
Virginia. They
wasted no time in building a fortifiedtrading post, thatched
houses, a churchand a storehouse. Within six monthsafter Captain
Newport had sailed backto England in June, 51 of the men andboys
had died of disease and starvation.The friendship of Captain John
Smithwith Powhatan, through his daughter,Pocahontas, and the return
of CaptainNewport with supplies and between 7and 100 new settlers
on New Year's daywas all that saved the rest.
The new settlers proceeded to sickenon the local food they
bought from theIndians, caught malaria from the hordesof mosquitoes
and died like flies inAutumn. By May of 1610 the colonistswere
reduced to the last stages ofwretchedness through disease, s t r v
~tion, and discouragement. In June,1610, a gig bearing Lord de la
Warr(from whom Delaware was named) with300 men and ample supplies
came upthe river to once again save the colonyfrom collapse or
extinction. The onlything that kept the Virginia colonyalive in the
early difficult years was the
patriotism and deep Christian religiousfaith of the leaders.
This is well expressed in the writings of the governor,Sir Thomas
Dale, through 1610 and1611.
Between 1616-1624 the colony wastransformed from a desperately
maintained trading post ruled by iron discipline to a prosperous,
established
settlement. Three key factors whichbrought about this
transformation werethe cultivation of tobacco, the institution of
private property, and political realignment. John Rolfe, who
marriedPocahontas, imported seed from theWest Indies, crossed it
with the localIndian tobacco, and produced a smoothsmoke which
captured the Englishmarket. As early as 1618 Virginia exported
50,000 pounds of tobacco toEngland. This development, coupledwith
the opportunity for property, savedVirginia. After seven years the
terms ofthe Company's hired men expired withthose who chose to stay
becomingtenant farmers and later being giventheir land outright
This made a tremendous difference as Captain JohnSmith wrote, When
our people were
fed out of the common store, andlaboured jointly together, glad
was hewho could slip from his labour, orslumber over his taske, he
cared nothow; nay, the most honest among themwould hardly take so
much true painesin a week, as now for themselves theywill doe in a
day. A third factor,political, ensured the success of Virginia. The
Company ordered GovernorGeorge Yeardley to abolish arbitraryrule
and introduce English common lawand due process and summon a
repre
sentative assembly. In the English c o n ~ception of freedom the
first and mostimportant was a government of laws,not of men.
Governor Yeardley summoned a legislative assembly, the veryfirst in
America, in 1619.
Plymouth Colony was founded in1620 by the Mayflower Pilgrims
whobrought Puritanism in one of its purestfonns to America. But New
Plymouthwould long have remained a poor andisolated colony, and New
England amere string of trading post s and fishingstations, but for
the great Puritan migrations of the 1600's. Puritanism, withits
emphasis on Bible study, extemporaneous prayer and long, meaty
sermonson duty and doctrine, appealed to m r ~chants because it
taught that a mancould serve God as well in business orin a
profession as by taking ho ly ordersand that all callings were
equallyhonorable in His sight. James I disliked
Pagc7
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the Puritans; he boasted that he wouldhave them conform. Charles
I, hissuccessor, looked on Puritan practicesas blasphemous. The
governmentpurged the universities of Puritans andput pressure on
the Puritan clergy toconform or get out. By 1634 some10,000 of them
had settled in NewEngland over religious grievancesmainly. The
Puritans had a definitemission to establish a communityrather than
a mere colony, where theycould put their Christian ideas
intopractice . They were out to prove it waspossible to live the
New Testamentlife, yet make a living .2 .
Unlike the fust New World adventurers, the settlers of Puritan
NewEngland came with no hopes of prelapsarian ease. They were
laborers fortheir Lord, straighteners of crookedplaces, engaged in
a task filled withhardships, deprivation and toil . They didnot
expect to pluck treasures from theland but planned to civilize and
tame it,even as they expected to struggle tocivilize and take the
wild places int ~ m s l v s Puritan men carne ready , ifnot eager ,
to work in the sweat of theirfaces and to see, as William
Pennwrote, what sobriety and industry cando in a wilderness against
heat, cold,Willlts, and dangers. 3
The fur trade along the ConnecticutRiver became important with
the Rev .Hugh Peter organizing fisheries atMarblehead. For several
years the mainbusiness of the Massachusetts BayColony was raising
cattle, com, andotber foodstuffs to sell to newcomers.The Puritans
later turned to shipbuilding and to the West Indies trade .where
there was a demand for dried fishsalt beef and pork, ground
vegetables,poultry, even horses. The great mass ofimmigrants to New
England . weremiddle-class farmers , tradesmen andartisans.
Puritailism put no stigma onmanual labor. In New England youcould
always f md a blacksmitl;l, wheelwright, carpenter, joiner,
cordwainer,taqner , ironwodrer:, , spinner , weaver , orwhatnot --
to . make things which theSout:Qern colonies at that era had
toimport from England.
Th e . transfer o f the Massachusetts
Bay charter from London to Boston hadan important influence on
future meri-can institutions. It made the colonyvirtually
independent of England in the1640 's. s a business chaner,
thecorporation consisted of stockholders,who met in an assembly
called thegeneral court where were annuallyelected, on a stated
date, the governor,deputy governor, and assistants. Transfer of the
charter to America turned thecompany into a colonial government.The
stockholders were now the voters,the governor and deputy governor,
thetwo chief magistrates, and the assistants, the governor's
cOuncil and supreme court. The franchise was confinedto church
members in good standin;;but this excluded very few adult men.
t must be noted how important animpact education did play in
this wholemovement of the early Puritan occupation of America. New
Englanders excelled over their old country in theiremphasis on
education and literacy.Education was necessary to fulf lll aman's
calling. Literacy came into education as a necessity for mastery of
theBible 3 d the fulfilment of Christianvocation .S
During the first ha lf of the nineteenthcentury, when Europeans
began tocome in numbers to inspect the new
American nation, they marvelled at theextent of the
transformation. Mter tenyears as a resident of Boston, theViennese
immigrant Francis Grundcame . o the conclusion: There is,probably,
no people on earth with whom business constitutes pleasure,and
industry amusement, in an equaldegree with the inhabitants of
theUnited States of America . Active oecu- pation is not only the
principal sourceof their happiness, and the foundationof their
national greatness, but they are
absolutely wretched without it. . . . itis as i all America were
but onegigantic worlcshop, over the entrance ofwhich there is the
blazing inscription,'No admission here, except on business. '
Where Puritans had been called totheir vocations, nineteenth
centuryAmericans began to be told it was one 'ssocial duty to
produce. The ideat of
Pa2es----------------------------------------------------
public usefulness all but nudged outGod through such writers .
as HenryWard Beecher and William ElleryChanning in the mid-1800's.
Carlylelooked upon labor as a means ofreforming man nd society.
Workcleared away any doubts and vanquisheddespair; it curbed the
animal instincts ofviolence; it distracted the laborer fromthe
siren call of radicalism; it redeemedthe convict prisoner. Emerson
secondedCarlyle's ideas with, Labor: a mancoins himself into his
labor; turns hisday, his strength, his thoughts, hisaffection into
some product whichremains a visible sign of his power. 6
Thus a shift was underway to nolonger view labor from the
perspectiveof the Puritan (Protestant) work ethic asa calling from
God but it becamemore of a necessity for the beuennentof societY
and man. Deep elaborationssaw worlc not as a Biblical
responsibility to fulfill man's purpose underGod but as an end
itself, as a way forman to fmd identity within himselfapait from
God.
In our present society work seems tohave lost most of its
meaniitg and truevalue under God. Work, in our trui.ncentered
society, as with all areas oflife, has been reduced .to something
forstudy and analysis. A case in point:
Worldng by Studs Terkel caused quiteil stir in Girard,
Pennsylvania in 1982.The book is a series of sketches aboutpeople
who work at different obs , fromaccountant to garbage collector
toprostitute. The workers do the talkingwith many of the sketches
both warmand very human. Many are also lacedwith obscenities and
profanity. Somehigh school students and parents feltboth the
]anguage and what one mothercalled the distorted view of theworking
world' . offended their values. n
anapparently emotional session before
the student body Terkel received severalovations, and one
student publiclyprofessed . o have changed his mindabout the book.
The New York Timesreported on the incident: Challenged byMr .
Richardson (one of the protestingstudents) tO read aloud one of
thepassages upon which the dispute wasfocussed, Mr. Terkel opened a
paper-
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back volume and began, leaving blanksfor obscenities that were
obvious to hisaudience . Terkel seemed to be acknowledging a sense
of decorum; it wouldhave been inappropriate to read theobscenities
aloud, in that setting (aschool) . Perhaps he was aware that
themedia covering the event would havebeen in the awkward position
of beingunable to quote him i he had read theobjectionable
language. Terkel was virtually canonized in the press, and
thestudents who still refused to readWorking were made to look
stupid. Notonly that, the boys were threatened withnot being
allowed to graduate . They hadto get a lawyer to negotiate with
theschool for their diplomas, because theyfelt the assigned reading
offended theirvalues and beliefs. They fmally did
graduate but were assigned F's in thecourse.7
America has seen reported some ofthe most perplexing labor
problems,worker shortages and employee demographics in the 1980's.
One industry,whose workers fought long and hard forreduced hours
and won, had to implement rules regulating the resultantproblems of
loitering off-duty workers .Another report, which is all too
common, told of a tough city policemanwho became a Quistian . His
new-found
faith compelled him to resign from hisdirty job to seek a
different vocation.It was reported in 1980 that 23,500employees of
General Motors, Ameri-ca's largest coi}>Oration, did nothing
besides ill out government forms .
In June of 1987 more than on-thirdof Oregon 's $30 million
strawberrycrop was rotting in the fields. Blackcherry growers in
Washington watchedripened crops shrivel in the sun. Michigan
growers also scrambled to findcherry pickers as poultry farmers
inTexas and tobacco growers in the Carolinas were worried . Tough
immigrationlaws and a crack-down on illegal alienscaused a labor
shortage of Mexicanswho regularly cross the border to dothis work
many U.S . citizens shun. 8Disneyland in California fell
pitifullyshort of the needed 2,000 summer employees while offering
salaries of $4.25per hour or more. Denny's Restaurant
The Counsel of Chalcedon, October, 1988
in Hyannis, Massachusetts closed sinceit was unsuccessful in
having theneeded summer employees to handlecrowds flocking to Cape
Cod. A nearbyStop and Shop supermarket transportscashiers by
company van from NewBedford, 40 miles away. The GeorgiaDepartment
of Labor, serving a fastgrowing area north of Atlanta, couldfind
employees to fill only 293 of 883retail-sales jobs during the last
elevenmonths.9 According to AP reports,Massachusetts, especially
the Bostonand Cambridge areas , are experiencing asevere labor
shortage . Some McDonald 's restaurants offer a startingwage of $7
.00 an hour. Help wantedsign s adorn business windows in
greatnumbers throughout these areas. WhenConell Wolf, a hard
working black
man, moved his family to the ScudderHomes public housing
project, a towering development in Newark, NewJersey, be was an
oddity. His wifeMinnie remembers her husband roaring,loud enough
for the neighbors to hear,
Am I the only fool working in thisbuilding? 10
Certainly all able bodied Americansshould be g iven the
opportunity to earntheir living through labor. Indeedeveryone
should be required to fulfillthe obligation of work in order to
reap
the benefits of life. In a land wheregovernment backed farmers
are paid notto produce and welfare families areallowed to re ap
from America's bountywithout worldng, we have turned ourbacks to
God and the Bible. In a landwhere men trudge the treadmill of
workwithout proper purpose and meaning,we are doomed to failure. It
has beenwell stated by RJ. Rushdoony, Butmodem man lacks calling;
he hasexcellent working conditions but nosense of vocation . 11
Once again ourPuritan forefathers , who shaped anddeveloped this
great land by hard workand dependence on Christian valuesthrough
Scripture, have set the examplefor us in history . Those of us
workingin the area of Biblical charity realizethat work is central
to our efforts -- notfree hand-outs, but earned rewards.
1. Daniel T . Rodgers, The Work
Ethic in Industrial America 1850-1920(Chicago, illinois :
University of Chicago Press, 1978)
2. Samuel Eliot Morison, TheOxford History o the American
PeopleVolume I New York New YorlcOxford University Press, 1972)
3. Rodgers : The Work Ethic inIndustrial Amer i ca
1850-1920.
4. Morison: The Oxford History ofthe American. People Volume
I
5. Rousas J. Rushdoony, TheMessianic Character o f
AmericanEducation (Phillipsburg, New Jersey:Presbyterian and
Reformed PublishingCompany , 1963)p . 218
6. Rodgers : The Work Ethic inIndustrial Ameri ca 1850-1920.
7. Cal Thomas , ook Burning(Westchester, Illinois: Crossway
Books, 1987) pp. 92-938. Time (June 22, 1987): 499. Time (July
20, 1987): 5510. Time (August 14, 1987): 2011. Rousas J.
Rushdoony,
Intellectual Schizophrenia (Phillipsburg, New Jers ey:
Presbyterian andReformed Publishing Company, 1961)p.97 D
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