"The Muhlenberg Brothers" By: AH1Tom
On April 1, 1789, Frederick Muhlenberg was elected the first Speaker of the House of Representatives by the First Congress meeting in New York City. After the Constitution was ratified, the federal government of the United States made its first home in New York City. On April 1, 1789, the House of Representatives had enough members present to begin and elected its first officers. Frederick Augustus Conrad Muhlenberg, a Lutheran minister, businessman and politician from Pennsylvania, was chosen as the first Speaker of the House. Just a few years earlier, he was opposed to his brother’s decision to get involved.
In the 1770s, Frederick’s brother, the Rev. John Peter Muhlenberg pastored two churches in Woodstock, VA. He was also a member of the Virginia legislature. In January 1776, he was attending the legislative session in Williamsburg, and war with Great Britain was looming on the horizon: Boston had been blockaded, Charlestown burned, Lexington and Concord attacked, and the Battle of Bunker Hill fought.
John Peter Muhlenberg returned home and on January 21, 1776, delivered what was to be his farewell sermon. He recounted the crisis then facing America and concluded with these words:
In the language of the Holy Writ, there was a time for all things [Ecclesiastes 3:1-8], a time to preach and a time to pray, but those times have passed away,
Then in a loud voice, he pointed to verse 8, declaring:
There is a time to fight – and that time has now come!
He then bowed his head and offered a dismissal prayer, but instead of following his usual custom of going off the vestry room, he began to disrobe. When he had shed his clerical robes, he stood before the congregation in full military uniform. He descended the pulpit, weapons in hand, and marched to the back of the church, reminding his parishioners that if they did not get involved and protect their liberties, they would have no liberties left to protect. Outside the church, Pastor Muhlenberg ordered drummers to beat for recruits. Some 300 men from his two congregations joined him that day, becoming the Eighth Virginia Regiment.
His brother Frederick wrote to Peter, telling him:
You would have acted for the best if you had kept out of this business from the beginning…I now give you my thoughts in brief: I think you are wrong in trying to be both soldier and preacher together.
However, Peter replied with some strong thoughts of his own:
I am a clergyman it is true, but I am a member of society as well as the poorest layman, and my liberty is as dear to me as to any man. Shall I then sit still?...Heaven forbid it!...I am called by my country in its defense – the cause is just and noble…and so far I am from thinking that I act wrong, I am convinced it is my duty so to do – and duty I owe to God and my Country.
In 1777, the British arrived in New York City. Of the nineteen churches in the city, they burned ten to the ground; they also drove Frederick from his own church and desecrated the building. Frederick thus found himself rethinking his position, and, like his brother, he, too, decided to get involved. After his election as Speaker of the House, he was instrumental in framing the Bill of Rights. In fact, his signature is one of only two that appears on that document. A large painting of him hangs in the Speakers’ Lobby of the U.S. House in honor of his role as America’s first Speaker.