"At the very inception of the American Republic the most dynamic popular movements were expressly religious. ... Preachers in the early republic... became the most
effective agents in constructing new frames of reference for people living through a
profoundly transitional age. ... Churches came to be places in which fundamental
political assumptions were forged: ideas about the meaning of America, the priority of
the individual conscience, the values of localism, direct democracy, and individualism,
and the necessity of dynamic communication. ... To understand the democratization of
American society, one must look at what happened to Protestant Christianity in the years
1780-1830."
-Nathan 0. Hatch, historian, "The Democratization of
Christianity and the Character of American Politics," 1990