The Five Thousand Year Leap

The Five Thousand Year Leap: Twenty-Eight Great Ideas That Are Changing the World is a book that was published in 1981 by American Mormon author and attorney W. Cleon Skousen. The book asserts that the United States prospered because it was established upon universal natural law principles that had been passed down from common law and traditional Judeo-Christian morality, as many of the Founding Fathers had been guided by the Bible, among others. Thus, the book asserts that the U.S. Constitution incorporates enlightened ideas.[1][2]

The Five Thousand Year Leap
AuthorW. Cleon Skousen
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
GenreChristianity
Mormonism
Political science
American history
PublisherNational Center for Constitutional Studies
Publication date
June 1981
ISBN978-0-88080-004-4

Here is a list of these principles:

  1. The Genius of Natural Law
  2. A Virtuous and Moral People
  3. Virtuous and Moral Leaders
  4. The Role of Religion
  5. The Role of the Creator
  6. All Men Are Created Equal
  7. Equal Rights, Not Equal Things
  8. Man’s Unalienable Rights
  9. The Role of Revealed Law
  10. Sovereignty of the People
  11. Who Can Alter the Government?
  12. Advantages of a Republic
  13. Protection Against Human Frailty
  14. Property Rights Essential to Liberty
  15. Free-market Economics
  16. The Separation of Powers
  17. Checks and Balances
  18. Importance of a Written Constitution
  19. Limiting the Powers of Government
  20. Majority Rule, Minority Rights
  21. Strong Local Self-government
  22. Government by Law, Not by Men
  23. Importance of an Educated Electorate
  24. Peace Through Strength
  25. Avoid Entangling Alliances
  26. Protecting the Role of the Family
  27. Avoiding the Burden of Debt
  28. The Founders’ Sense of Manifest Destiny

Criticism

Princeton University historian Sean Wilentz disputes the book's claims on taxes, the redistribution of wealth, the separation of church and state, and the "In God We Trust" motto.[3] Wilentz describes The 5,000 Year Leap as "a treatise that assembles selective quotations and groundless assertions to claim that the US Constitution is rooted not in the Enlightenment but in the Bible and that the framers believed in minimal central government."[3] Wilentz categorically disputes those assertions:

Either proposition would have astounded James Madison, often described as the guiding spirit behind the Constitution, who rejected state-established religions and, like Alexander Hamilton, proposed a central government so strong that it could veto state laws.[3]

Wilentz acknowledges that the Founding Fathers rejected what Samuel Adams denounced as "utopian schemes of leveling," but he notes that some of the Founding Fathers were quite pragmatic when it came to policy specifics.

See also

References
  1. W. Cleon Skousen - The Man Behind Glenn Beck By Bill McKeever. Mormonism Research Ministry
  2. Meet the Man who Changed Glenn Beck's Life. Zaitchik, Alexander (2009-09-16). Salon Magazine, September 16, 2009.
  3. Confounding Fathers: The Tea Party’s Cold War Roots by historian Sean Wilentz, The New Yorker, October 18, 2010
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