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Taejong of Joseon

Taejong (16 May 1367 – 10 May 1422), personal name Yi Bang-won, was the third monarch of the Joseon dynasty of Korea and the father of Sejong the Great. He was the fifth son of King Taejo, the founder of the dynasty. Before ascending to the throne, he was known as Prince Jeongan.

Early life and founding of Joseon
Born in 1367 as the fifth son of Yi Song-gye and his first wife Lady Han, Yi Bang-won qualified as an official in 1382. He studied under Confucian scholars such as Won Cheon-seok. During his early years, he assisted his father in gathering the support of the commoners and of many influential figures in the government; Yi Bang-won also helped in the founding of Joseon by assassinating powerful officials who remained loyal to Goryeo, most prominently Chŏng Mong-ju.

Strifes of Princes
After contributing heavily to the overthrowing of the previous dynasty and the establishment of Joseon, he expected to be appointed as successor to the throne. However, his father and Chief State Councillor Jeong Do-jeon favored Taejo's eighth son and Yi Bang-won's youngest half-brother (second son of Queen Sindeok), Yi Bang-seok. This conflict arose chiefly because Jeong Do-jeon, as the principal architect of the ideological, institutional and legal foundations of the new dynasty, saw Joseon as a kingdom led by its ministers by virtue of the king's appointment. In contrast, Yi Bang-won sought direct rule through an absolute monarchy. These differences ultimately contributed to an environment of deep political tension.

In 1398, following the sudden death of Queen Sindeok, Yi Bang-won led a coup d'état while King Taejo was still in mourning for his second wife. This event led to the deaths of Jeong Do-jeon and his supporters, as well as the deaths of the late Queen Sindeok's two sons, including the crown prince. The incident became known as the "First Strife of Princes". Aghast at the fact that his sons were willing to kill each other for the crown, and psychologically exhausted by the death of his second wife, Taejo abdicated; his eldest surviving son, Yi Bang-gwa (posthumously King Jeongjong), immediately became the new ruler.

Yi Bang-won quickly emerged as the real force behind the throne and was soon in conflict with his disgruntled elder brother, Yi Bang-gan, who also yearned for power. In 1400, General Park Bo, who found the rewards for his deeds during the First Strife of Princes lacking, allied with Yi Bang-gan and rebelled in what came to be known as the "Second Strife of Princes". Yi Bang-won successfully defeated his brother's forces, then executed Park Bo and exiled Yi Bang-gan. King Jeongjong, now fearful of his formidable younger brother, named Yi Bang-won his successor and abdicated in the same year. At long last, Yi Bang-won (posthumously King Taejong), assumed the throne of Joseon and became the dynasty's third monarch.

Consolidation of royal power
One of Taejong's first acts as king was to abolish the privilege to maintain private armies which was enjoyed by the aristocracy and the upper echelons of the government. His revoking of the right to keep independent forces effectively severed the upper class' ability to muster large-scale revolts, and drastically increased the number of soldiers employed by the national army.

Taejong's next act was to revise the existing legislation concerning land taxation. With the discovery of previously hidden land, national wealth increased twofold.

In addition, Taejong created a strong central government. In 1400, before taking the throne, he had played a key role in eradicating the Dopyeong Assembly, a branch of the old administration that had monopolized the executive power during the waning years of Goryeo, in favor of the Privy Council; during Taejong's reign, the Privy Council was replaced by the State Council. Taejong also issued a decree according to which all decisions passed by the State Council could only come into effect with the approval of the king. This ended the custom of court ministers making decisions through debate and negotiations among themselves, and thus brought the royal authority to new heights.

Shortly thereafter, Taejong installed a new department known as the Sinmun Office, to hear cases in which aggrieved subjects felt that they had been exploited or treated unjustly by officials or aristocrats.

Reforms and policies
Depite being the one responsible for Chŏng Mong-ju's assassination, Taejong posthumously honored him as Chief State Councillor, leading to a great irony — Jeong Do-jeon, whose policies governed Joseon for five centuries, was vilified throughout the dynasty, while Chŏng Mong-ju was revered in spite of his opposition to its founding.

Taejong promoted Confucianism as the state ideology, thus demoting Buddhism, which consequently never recovered the glory and great power it had enjoyed during the Goryeo period. He closed many Buddhist temples; their vast possessions were seized and added to the national treasury.

In foreign policy, he was a straight hardliner — he attacked the Jurchens at the northern border and the Japanese pirates on the southern coast. Taejong is also remembered for being the initiator behind the Ōei Invasion of Tsushima Island in 1419.

He set up the system of hopae, an early form of identification which consisted of tags recording the bearer's name and residence; those tags were used to control the movements of the population.

In 1403, Taejong ordered 100,000 pieces of metal type and two complete fonts. Predating Gutenberg and Laurens Janszoon by several decades, he accomplished the metal movable type.

He promoted press, commerce, and education, and also reformed the Sapyeongsunwibu, Joseon's early military and law enforcement agency, and separated the Uigeumbu as Joseon's law enforcement agency but without military functions.

Later life and death
In 1418, Taejong abdicated in favor of his third legitimate son, Yi Do (posthumously King Sejong, commonly known as Sejong the Great), but continued to rule with an iron fist and decide on important matters.

Along the years, as a means to strengthen royal authority and subdue corruption, he executed or exiled some of the supporters who helped him ascend to the throne; he also executed the four brothers of his wife Queen Wongyeong, as well as Sejong's father-in-law Shim On and his younger brother Shim Jeong, in order to limit the influence of in-laws and powerful clans.

King Taejong died four years after his abdication, on 10 May 1422, in Sugang Palace. He was buried alongside Queen Wongyeong at Heonneung, part of the Heonineung burial ground, in present-day Seocho District, Seoul, South Korea.

Legacy
Taejong remains a controversial figure in Korean history who eliminated many of his rivals (such as Chŏng Mong-ju and Jeong Do-jeon) and yet ruled effectively to improve the populace's lives, strengthen national defense, and lay down a solid foundation for his successor's reign.

Family
Consort(s) and their respective issue
 * Father: King Taejo of Joseon (11 October 1335 – 24 May 1408)
 * Grandfather: Yi Cha-chun, King Hwanjo of Joseon (1315 – 18 April 1360)
 * Grandmother: Queen Uihye of the Yeongheung Choe clan (1304 – ?)
 * Mother: Queen Sinui of the Cheongju Han clan (4 September 1337 – 23 September 1391)
 * Grandfather: Han Gyeong, Internal Prince Ancheon
 * Grandmother: Lady Shin of the Saknyeong Shin clan, Grand Madame of Samhan State
 * Queen Wongyeong of the Yeoheung Min clan (11 July 1365 – 10 July 1420)
 * Princess Jeongsun (1385 – 25 August 1460), first daughter
 * Princess Gyeongjeong (1387 – 6 June 1455), second daughter
 * First son
 * Second son
 * Third son
 * Princess Gyeongan (1393 – 22 April 1415), third daughter
 * Yi Je, Grand Prince Yangnyeong (1394 – 7 September 1462), first (fourth) son
 * Yi Bo, Grand Prince Hyoryeong (11 December 1395 – 11 May 1486), second (fifth) son
 * Yi Do, Grand Prince Chungnyeong (10 April 1397 – 17 February 1450), third (sixth) son
 * Princess Jeongseon (1404 – 25 January 1424), fourth (fifth) daughter
 * Yi Jong, Grand Prince Seongnyeong (9 July 1405 – 4 February 1418), sixth (eleventh) son
 * Eleventh (sixteenth) son (1412–1412)
 * Royal Noble Consort Myeong of the (old) Andong Kim clan (? – 1479)
 * Royal Noble Consort Ui of the Andong Kwon clan (1384 – ?)
 * Princess Jeonghye (? – 6 October 1424), fifth (sixth) daughter
 * Royal Noble Consort Hyo of the Cheongpung Kim clan (? – 26 February 1454)
 * Yi Bi, Prince Gyeongnyeong (13 December 1402 – 9 September 1458), fourth (ninth) son
 * Royal Noble Consort Shin of the Yeongwol Shin clan (1377 – 2 February 1435)
 * Yi In, Prince Hamnyeong (26 December 1402 – 30 September 1467), fifth (tenth) son
 * Yi Jeong, Prince Onnyeong (1407 – 12 May 1454), seventh (twelfth) son
 * Princess Jeongshin (? – 26 September 1452), sixth (seventh) daughter
 * Princess Jeongjeong (1410 – 28 February 1456), seventh (eighth) daughter
 * Princess Sukjeong, eighth (ninth) daughter
 * Princess Suknyeong, tenth (twelfth) daughter
 * Princess Soshin (? – 16 June 1437), eleventh (thirteenth) daughter
 * Princess Sosuk (? – 12 November 1456), thirteenth (fifteenth) daughter
 * Princess Sukgyeong (1420–1494), sixteenth (eighteenth) daughter
 * Royal Noble Consort Seon of the Sunheung Ahn clan (? – 17 June 1468)
 * Yi Ji, Prince Hyeryeong (1407 – 25 June 1440), eighth (thirteenth) son
 * Yi Chi, Prince Iknyeong (1422 – 10 July 1464), thirteenth (eighteenth) son
 * Princess Gyeongshin, twelfth (fourteenth) daughter
 * Princess Sukan (? – 12 May 1464), fourteenth (sixteenth) daughter
 * Royal Noble Consort So of the Jangyeon No clan (? – 23 October 1479)
 * Princess Sukhye (1413 – 19 July 1464), ninth (eleventh) daughter
 * Royal Noble Consort Jeong of the Go clan (? – 13 July 1426)
 * Yi Nong, Prince Geunnyeong (1411 – 15 November 1461), ninth (fourteenth) son
 * Royal Consort Sug-ui of the Choe clan
 * Yi Ta, Prince Huiryeong (1412 – 7 July 1465), tenth (fifteenth) son
 * Royal Consort Sug-ui of the Yi clan
 * Yi Gan, Prince Hunyeong (1419 – 6 October 1450), twelfth (seventeenth) son
 * Royal Princess Sukgong of the Cheongdo Gim clan
 * Royal Princess Uijeong of the Hanyang Jo clan (? – 1454)
 * Royal Princess Hyesun of the Goseong Yi clan (? – 5 March 1438)
 * Royal Princess Shinsun of the Seongju Yi clan (1390 – ?)
 * Princess Deoksuk of the Yi clan
 * Princess Hyeseon of the Hong clan
 * Princess Sunhye of the Andong Jang clan (? – 26 July 1423)
 * Princess Seogyeong
 * Concubine Gim
 * Princess Sukgeun (? – 1 August 1450), fifteenth (seventeenth) daughter
 * Lady Yi
 * Princess Suksun (1421 – c. 1481), seventeenth (nineteenth) daughter
 * Unknown
 * Fourth daughter (1400–1402)
 * Seventh son (1400–1401)
 * Eighth son (1402–1404)
 * Tenth daughter (1412–1414)

In popular culture

 * Im Hyuk-joo in the 1983 KBS1 TV series Foundation of the Kingdom.
 * Lee Jung-gil in the 1983 MBC TV series The King of Chudong Palace.
 * Yoo Dong-geun in the 1996–1998 KBS1 TV series Tears of the Dragon.
 * Kim Yeong-cheol in the 2008 KBS TV series The Great King, Sejong and the 2016 KBS1 TV series Jang Yeong-sil.
 * Baek Yoon-sik in the 2011 SBS TV series Deep Rooted Tree.
 * Choi Tae-joon in the 2012–2013 SBS TV series The Great Seer.
 * Park Yeong-gyu in the 2012 film I Am the King.
 * Ahn Jae-mo in the 2014 KBS1 TV series Jeong Do-jeon.
 * Ahn Nae-sang in the 2015 JTBC TV series More Than a Maid.
 * Jang Hyuk in the 2015 film Empire of Lust and the 2019 JTBC TV series My Country: The New Age.
 * Nam Da-reum and Yoo Ah-in in the 2015–2016 SBS TV series Six Flying Dragons.
 * Kam Woo-sung in the 2021 SBS TV series Joseon Exorcist.
 * Joo Sang-wook in the 2021–2022 KBS1 TV series The King of Tears, Lee Bang-won.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Taejong of Joseon


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History of Taiwan (1945–present)

As a result of the surrender and occupation of Japan at the end of World War II, the islands of Taiwan and Penghu were placed under the governance of the Republic of China (ROC), ruled by the Kuomintang (KMT), on 25 October 1945. Following the February 28 massacre in 1947, martial law was declared in 1949 by the Governor of Taiwan, Chen Cheng, and the ROC Ministry of National Defense. Following the end of the Chinese Civil War in 1949, the ROC government retreated from the mainland as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) proclaimed the establishment of the People's Republic of China. The KMT retreated to Taiwan and declared Taipei the temporary capital of the ROC. For many years, the ROC and PRC each continued to claim in the diplomatic arena to be the sole legitimate government of "China". In 1971, the United Nations expelled the ROC and replaced it with the PRC.

In 1987, martial law was lifted and Taiwan began a democratisation process, beginning with the abolition of the Temporary Provisions and culminating with the first direct president election in 1996. By 2000, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) came to power and began to pursue Taiwanese independence and identity.

Due to Taiwan's ambiguous political status, the ROC has participated in a number of international organizations under the name "Chinese Taipei". Under its One-China policy, the PRC holds that the ROC ceased to exist and that Taiwan is an inseparable part of the PRC despite the fact that it has never controlled the island. Moreover, the PRC refuses diplomatic relations with any country that recognizes the ROC. However, the ROC still controls Taiwan, Penghu, Quemoy, Lienchiang, and other minor islands.

Early postwar society
The Second World War's hostilities came to a close on 2 September 1945, with the defeat of the Empire of Japan and Nazi Germany. Taiwan, which had been ceded to Japan by the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895, was placed under the control of the Kuomintang-led Republic of China (ROC) by the promulgation of General Order No. 1 and the signing of the Instrument of Surrender on that day.

He Yingqin, the ROC representative at the Japanese surrender ceremonies, established the separate from the provincial-level executive system on mainland China. After the establishment of the provincial executive office, Chen Yi was appointed Chief Executive. Chen proclaimed 25 October to be Retrocession Day. However, because Japan had not formally relinquished the sovereignty of Taiwan at that time, Allies of World War II did not recognize the unilateral annexation of Taiwan by the Republic of China.

Chen Yi's administration was marred by corruption, as well as a lack of discipline in the military police assigned to occupation duties, resulting in a severe undermining of the chain of command. With the rampant corruption in his administration, Chen Yi began to monopolize power. In addition to this, the island's post-war economy was failing and headed into a recession, causing people on the island to endure economic hardship. The government's program of "De-Japanization" also created cultural estrangement, along with tensions between the growing population of migrants from the mainland and the pre-war residents of the island. The building tensions erupted in 1947, when the arrest of a cigarette vendor by government agents led to the death of a bystander. The clashes between police and residents that followed quickly spread across the island, and grew into a general rebellion against Chen Yi and the Chief Executive's Office in what came to be known as the February 28 incident. Several weeks later, government troops were sent to Taiwan from the mainland to handle the crisis and to suppress any opposition or resistance to the government. Many prominent individuals in Taiwanese society, as well as other residents of the island, many of whom had nothing to do with the incident, were either killed, imprisoned without trial, or simply disappeared. The February 28 Incident was a prelude to the White Terror of the 1950s, resulting in ethnic tensions between pre- and post-war residents, as well as the genesis of the Taiwanese independence movement.

After the February 28 Incident, the Kuomintang-led ROC government reorganized the local government, abolishing the Chief Executive's Office, while establishing a new provincial government. Wey Daw-ming, whose parents were scholars, became the first Governor of Taiwan Province and, during his administration, reduced the scope of the public enterprises, which had grown significantly under Chen Yi.

Wey was succeeded as governor by Chen Cheng in 1949. Wey reformed the currency system, replacing the devalued Old Taiwan dollar with the New Taiwan dollar, at a 40,000:1 exchange rate, and implemented the, easing the inflationary situation.

The KMT viewed the population of Taiwan as corrupted by Japanese influence and neither fully Chinese or fully trustworthy. This perceived influence led the KMT to believe that the population of Taiwan was backwards and required re-education. The KMT sought to remove any trace of Japanese influence and to force a new Chinese identity on the people of Taiwan.

After Japan's surrender, most of Taiwan's approximately 300,000 Japanese residents were expelled. The KMT also seized properties from Japanese colonists either for sale or for their own use. In modern Taiwan these appropriated properties are considered ill-gotten assets. The KMT also took assets which had belonged to the Japanese colonial authorities. In 2017 a court ordered the KMT to pay compensation for 458 properties which had been expropriated in this way.

Authoritarianism, martial rule and cold war

On 20 July 1946, Chiang Kai-shek launched a large-scale assault on CCP territory in Huabei with 113 brigades (a total of 1.6 million troops), starting a new phase of the Chinese Civil War. Chen Cheng, who served as the chairman of Taiwan Provincial Government and commander of Taiwan Garrison Command, declared martial law on the island on 19 May 1949. A part of the Republic of China, Taiwan inherited the international pronouncement of the ROC government including the 1932 Note Verbale to France, where China declared that its southernmost territory was the Paracels.

In December 1949, the Republic of China Armed Forces and the Kuomintang were defeated in the Chinese Civil War, forcing the Government of the Republic of China to relocate to Taiwan. This allowed the CCP to declare the establishment of a new Chinese state: the People's Republic of China.

Following their retreat to Taiwan the KMT viewed their retreat as a temporary one with Chiang Kai-shek saying “prepare for one year, counterattack in two years, sweep out the enemy in three years and succeed within five years.” This led them to prioritize military armament and preparation over economic development.

After the February 28 Incident, the Nationalist government launched a campaign of suppression against political dissents. The KMT mostly imprisoned Taiwan's intellectual and social elite out of fear that they might resist their rule or sympathize with communism.

Up and until 1958, small-scale military campaigns between the ROC forces and the People's Liberation Army (PLA) were carried out across the strait. An attempt by the CCP government to take the ROC-controlled island of Quemoy was thwarted in October 1949, halting the PLA advance towards Taiwan.

In April 1950, amphibious operations were successful in conquering Hainan Island in April 1950, leading to the capture of Wanshan Islands off the Guangdong coast (May–August 1950) and Zhoushan Island off Zhejiang (May 1950).

This period of tension lasted until the Second Strait Crisis, in which the United States pledged to protect the island from the mainland. From that point on, both sides of the strait have ceased all major hostilities against each other, with the ROC Navy having resumed unilateral combat and escort duties while the US Navy secretly and quietly removed their extra warships from the Taiwan Strait.

Democratic reforms
The Republic of China entered into the development phase of constitutional democracy with the promulgation of the Constitution of the Republic of China in 1947. Subsequently, the National Revolutionary Army was also renamed as Republic of China Armed Forces and was nationalized. However, due to the Chinese Civil War, the Temporary Provisions Effective During the Period of Communist Rebellion were passed as an amendment to the Constitution of the Republic of China. This established martial law in Taiwan and curtailed civil liberties and democracy. The official rationale for the Provisions was the ongoing Chinese Civil War and ROC was effectively under the military rule of the KMT during the period of mobilization. Taiwan was effectively under martial law.

However, with the demise of the KMT single-party system and democratization movement during the 1980s, martial law was eventually lifted in 1987 (and its provisions were eventually rescinded in 1991). Constitutional democracy was restored in ROC after 1987.

When the Republic of China relocated to Taiwan in 1949, the Chinese Youth Party, China Democratic Socialist Party, and KMT were the only legal political parties in Taiwan. The other established parties operated under the Tangwai movement.

Until the early 1970s, the Republic of China was recognized as the sole legitimate government of China by the United Nations and most Western nations, which refused to recognize the People's Republic of China (PRC) on account of the Cold War. The KMT rule of Taiwan under martial law until the late 1980s had the stated goals of being vigilant against Communist infiltration and preparing to retake mainland China. Therefore, political dissent was not tolerated.

The late 1970s and early 1980s were a turbulent time for the Taiwan-born as many of the people who had originally been oppressed and left behind by economic changes became members of Taiwan's new middle class. Free enterprise had allowed native Taiwanese to gain a powerful bargaining chip in their demands for respect for their basic human rights. The Kaohsiung Incident would be a major turning point for democracy in Taiwan.

Taiwan also faced setbacks in the international sphere. In 1971, the ROC government walked out of the United Nations shortly before it recognized the PRC government in Beijing as the legitimate holder of China's seat in the United Nations. The ROC had been offered dual representation, but Chiang Kai-shek demanded to retain a seat on the UN Security Council, which was not acceptable to the PRC. Chiang expressed his decision in his famous "the sky is not big enough for two suns" speech. In October 1971, Resolution 2758 was passed by the UN General Assembly and "the representatives of Chiang Kai-shek" (and thus the ROC) were expelled from the UN and replaced as "China" by the PRC. In 1979, the United States switched recognition from Taipei to Beijing.

Chiang Kai-shek died in April 1975 at the age of 87, and was succeeded in the presidency by Yen Chia-kan while his son Chiang Ching-kuo succeeded to the leadership of the Kuomintang (opting to take the title "Chairman" rather than the elder Chiang's title of "Director-General"). Formerly the head of the feared secret police, Chiang Ching-kuo recognized gaining foreign support to securing the ROC's future security required reform. His administration saw a gradual loosening of political controls, a transition towards democracy, and moves toward Taiwanization of the regime. Opponents of the Nationalists were no longer forbidden to hold meetings or publish papers. Though opposition political parties were still illegal, when the Democratic Progressive Party was established as the first opposition party in 1986, President Chiang decided against dissolving the group or persecuting its leaders. Its candidates officially ran in elections as independents in the Tangwai movement. In the following year, Chiang ended martial law and allowed family visits to mainland China.

Chiang selected Lee Teng-hui, a Taiwan born technocrat to be his vice president, first in the line of succession to the presidency. The move followed other reforms giving more power to native-born citizens and calmed anti-KMT sentiments during a period in which many other Asian autocracies were being challenged.

After Chiang Ching-kuo died in 1988, his successor, President Lee Teng-hui, continued to democratize the government. Lee transferred more government authority to Taiwanese-born citizens, and Taiwan underwent a process of localization. In this localization process, local culture and history was promoted over a pan-China viewpoint. Lee's reforms included printing banknotes from the Central Bank instead of the usual Provincial Bank of Taiwan. He also largely suspended the operation of the Taiwan Provincial Government. In 1991 the Legislative Yuan and National Assembly, elected in 1947, were forced to resign. These groups were originally created to represent mainland China constituencies. Also lifted were the restrictions on the use of Taiwanese languages in the broadcast media and in schools. Lee Teng-hui believed that agriculture was the backbone of a nation and promoted it extensively. He implemented health insurance and occupational hazard insurance programs for farmers. He also emphasized the Japanese roots of much of Taiwan's agricultural infrastructure.

Attempting to maintain good relations with the PRC, Taiwan avoided any criticism of the Tiananmen Square Massacre and the media was largely barred from reporting on it. A group of students who attempted to sail a chartered ship into the Formosa Strait and beam pro-democracy broadcasts into China via amateur radio were foiled by the government by putting various obstacles in their way that caused them to abandon the attempt.

However, Lee failed to crack down on the massive corruption that pervaded the government and many KMT loyalists felt that Lee betrayed the ROC by taking reforms too far, while those in the opposition felt he did not take reforms far enough.

Democratic period
Lee ran as the incumbent in Taiwan's first direct presidential election in 1996 against DPP candidate and former dissident, Peng Min-ming. This election prompted the PRC to conduct a series of missile tests in the Taiwan Strait to intimidate the Taiwanese electorate so that electorates would vote for pro-unification candidates, Chen Li-an and Lin Yang-kang. The aggressive tactic prompted U.S. President Clinton to invoke the Taiwan Relations Act and dispatch two aircraft carrier battle groups into the region off Taiwan's southern coast to monitor the situation, and PRC's missile tests were forced to end earlier than planned. This incident is known as the 1996 Taiwan Straits Crisis.

One of Lee's final acts as president was to declare on German radio that the ROC and the PRC have a special state-to-state relationship. Lee's statement was met with the PLA conducting military drills in Fujian and a frightening island-wide blackout in Taiwan, causing many to fear an attack.

The 2000 presidential election marked the end of the Kuomintang's status as the ruling party. The DPP candidate Chen Shui-bian was elected president with Annette Lu as vice-president, after a three-way race that saw the Pan-Blue vote split by independent James Soong (formerly of the Kuomintang) and Kuomintang candidate Lien Chan. Chen garnered 39% of the vote. After the election, Soong formed the People First Party (PFP).

In August 2002, President Chen openly indicated that the relationship between Taiwan and the mainland is "One Country on Each Side". This declaration led to disputations throughout Taiwan, in mainland China and in the United States. In 2004, the day before the 2004 presidential election, there was a supposed assassination attempt on President Chen and Vice-president Lu. They were re-elected the next day, although the Pan-Blue Coalition disputed the legality of the result due to the close margin of the election and the shooting incident. In 2005, an ad hoc National Assembly passed constitutional amendments ruling that elections for the Legislative Yuan change to use of parallel voting, aiding the formation of a two-party system. As a result of scandals in the DPP administration, on 9 September 2006, former chairperson of the DPP, Shih Ming-teh, led an anti-Chen Shui-bian campaign called the Million Voices Against Corruption, President Chen Must Go but did not achieve the desired result of President Chen's resignation.

The KMT also retained control of the legislature in the Legislative Yuan elections in January 2008. In the presidential election in May 2008, KMT candidate Ma Ying-jeou ran on a platform supporting friendlier relations with mainland China and economic reforms and defeated DPP candidate Frank Hsieh with 58.48% of the vote.

Ma was re-elected, and the KMT retained its majority in the Legislative Yuan, in combined elections in January 2012. In the 2016 elections, the DPP regained power with Tsai Ing-wen becoming Taiwan's first female president.

On 24 May 2017, the Constitutional Court ruled that same-sex couples have a right to marry, and gave the Legislature Yuan two years to adequately amend Taiwanese marriage laws. According to the court ruling, if amendments are not passed within two years, same-sex marriages will automatically become legal. In effect, Taiwan (ROC) became the first country in Asia and the first non-UN sovereign state to allow same-sex marriage in May 2019.

The local elections held on November 24, 2018, resulted in a major setback for the DPP majority and led to President Tsai Ing-wen resignation as leader of the party. The DPP lost a total of nine legislative seats, giving the KMT control of the majority of the 22 seats. KMT mayoral candidates won in New Taipei City, Taichung and Kaohsiung, the latter of which has been a political stronghold for the DPP for 20 years.

In May 2019, Taiwan became the first country in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage.

In January, 2020, Tsai Ing-wen was re-elected in the presidential election. In the parliamentary election President Tsai's Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won majority 61 out of 113 seats. The Kuomintang (KMT) won 38 seats.

The 2022 visit by Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan resulted in increased tensions between Taiwan and China while reinforcing US-Taiwan ties. In response to the trip the PLA conducted military exercises around Taiwan, included missile launches which overflew Taiwan.

In January 2024, William Lai Ching-te of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party won Taiwan's presidential elections. However, for the first time since 2004, no party won a majority in the simultaneous legislative election. Instead, 51 seats were secured by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), 52 seats by the Kuomintang (KMT), and the Taiwan People's Party (TPP) secured eight seats.

Cross-straits relations and international position
At the end of 1943, the Cairo Declaration was issued, including among its clauses that all territories of China, including Formosa (Taiwan), that Japan had occupied would be returned to Republic of China. This declaration was reiterated in the Potsdam Declaration, issued in 1945. Later that year, World War II ended, and Japan accepted the Potsdam Declaration, surrendering unconditionally. The Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces commanded that the Japanese forces in Taiwan surrender to the government of the Republic of China, which acted as the representative of the Allied Forces. On 25 October 1945 in Taipei Zhongshan Hall, the Japanese government in Taiwan surrendered to the representative of the Republic of China, Chen Yi, the Republic of China formally receiving Taiwan. In 1951, Japan formally signed the Treaty of San Francisco, but, due to the unclear situation of the Chinese civil war, the peace treaty did not clearly indicate to whom Taiwan's sovereignty belonged. In the second article of the 1952 Treaty of Taipei, following the Treaty of San Francisco, Japan reiterated its abandonment of sovereignty of Taiwan, the Pescadores, the Spratlys and the Paracels.

The People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC) continued a state of war until 1979. In October 1949 a PRC attempt to take the ROC controlled island of Kinmen was thwarted in the Battle of Kuningtou halting the PLA advance towards Taiwan. The Communists' other amphibious operations of 1950 were more successful: they led to the Communist conquest of Hainan Island in April 1950, capture of Wanshan Islands off the Guangdong coast (May–August 1950) and of Zhoushan Island off Zhejiang (May 1950).

In June 1949 the ROC declared a "closure" of all mainland China ports and its navy attempted to intercept all foreign ships. The closure covered from a point north of the mouth of Min River in Fujian Province to the mouth of the Liao River in Manchuria. Since mainland China's railroad network was underdeveloped, north–south trade depended heavily on sea lanes. ROC naval activity also caused severe hardship for mainland China fishermen.

After losing mainland China, a group of approximately 12,000 KMT soldiers escaped to Burma and continued launching guerrilla attacks into south China. Their leader, General Li Mi, was paid a salary by the ROC government and given the nominal title of Governor of Yunnan. Initially, the United States supported these remnants and the Central Intelligence Agency provided them with aid. After the Burmese government appealed to the United Nations in 1953, the U.S. began pressuring the ROC to withdraw its loyalists. By the end of 1954, nearly 6,000 soldiers had left Burma and Li Mi declared his army disbanded. However, thousands remained, and the ROC continued to supply and command them, even secretly supplying reinforcements at times.

During the Korean War, some captured Communist Chinese soldiers, many of whom were originally KMT soldiers, were repatriated to Taiwan rather than mainland China. A KMT guerrilla force continued to operate cross-border raids into south-western China in the early 1950s. The ROC government launched a number of air bombing raids into key coastal cities of mainland China such as Shanghai.

Though viewed as a military liability by the United States, the ROC viewed its remaining islands in Fujian as vital for any future campaign to defeat the PRC and retake mainland China. On 3 September 1954, the First Taiwan Strait Crisis began when the PLA started shelling Quemoy and threatened to take the Dachen Islands. On 20 January 1955, the PLA took nearby Yijiangshan Island, with the entire ROC garrison of 720 troops killed or wounded defending the island. On January 24 of the same year, the United States Congress passed the Formosa Resolution authorizing the President to defend the ROC's offshore islands. The First Taiwan Straits crisis ended in March 1955 when the PLA ceased its bombardment. The crisis was brought to a close during the Bandung Conference.

The Second Taiwan Strait Crisis began on 23 August 1958 with air and naval engagements between the PRC and the ROC military forces, leading to intense artillery bombardment of Quemoy (by the PRC) and Amoy (by the ROC), and ended on November of the same year. PLA patrol boats blockaded the islands from ROC supply ships. Though the United States rejected Chiang Kai-shek's proposal to bomb mainland China artillery batteries, it quickly moved to supply fighter jets and anti-aircraft missiles to the ROC. It also provided amphibious assault ships to land supply, as a sunken ROC naval vessel was blocking the harbor. On September 7, the United States escorted a convoy of ROC supply ships and the PRC refrained from firing. On October 25, the PRC announced an "even-day ceasefire" — the PLA would only shell Quemoy on odd-numbered days.

Despite the end of the hostilities, the two sides have never signed any agreement or treaty to officially end the war.

After the 1950s, the "war" became more symbolic than real, represented by on-again, off-again artillery bombardment towards and from Kinmen. In later years, live shells were replaced with propaganda sheets. The bombardment finally ceased in 1979 after the establishment of diplomatic relations between the People's Republic of China and the United States.

During this period, movement of people and goods virtually ceased between PRC- and ROC-controlled territories. There were occasional defectors. One high-profile defector was Justin Yifu Lin, who swam across the Kinmen strait to mainland China and is now Chief Economist and Senior Vice President of the World Bank.

Most observers expected Chiang's government to eventually fall in response to a PRC invasion of Taiwan, and the United States initially showed no interest in supporting Chiang's government in its final stand. Things changed radically with the onset of the Korean War in June 1950. At this point, allowing a total Communist victory over Chiang became politically impossible in the United States, and President Harry S. Truman ordered the United States Seventh Fleet into the Taiwan Strait to prevent the ROC and PRC from attacking each other.

After the ROC complained to the United Nations against the Soviet Union supporting the PRC, the United Nations General Assembly Resolution 505 was adopted on 1 February 1952 to condemn the Soviet Union.

In 1987, the March 7 Incident (Lieyu massacre) in Lesser Kinmen cast a profound ripple on the cross-strait relation between China and Taiwan—4 months later on July 15, the martial law in Taiwan was lifted; and 5 months later on December 15, the ROC government began to allow visits to mainland China. This benefited many, especially old KMT soldiers, who had been separated from their family in mainland China for decades. This also proved a catalyst for the thawing of relations between the two sides. Problems engendered by increased contact necessitated a mechanism for regular negotiations.

In order to effect negotiations with mainland China on operational issues without compromising the government's position on denying the other side's legitimacy, the ROC government under Chiang Ching-kuo created the "Straits Exchange Foundation" (SEF), a nominally non-governmental institution directly led by the Mainland Affairs Council, an instrument of the Executive Yuan. The PRC responded to this initiative by setting up the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), directly led by the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council. This system, described as "white gloves", allowed the two governments to engage with each other on a semi-official basis without compromising their respective sovereignty policies.

Led by highly respected elder statesmen Koo Chen-fu and Wang Daohan, the two organizations began a series of talks that culminated in the 1992 meetings, which, together with subsequent correspondence, established the 1992 Consensus, under which both sides agreed to deliberate ambiguity on questions of sovereignty, in order to engage on operational questions affecting both sides.

Also during this time, however, the rhetoric of ROC President Lee Tung-hui began to turn further towards Taiwan independence. Prior to the 1990s, the ROC had been a one-party authoritarian state committed to eventual reunification with mainland China. However, with democratic reforms the attitudes of the general public began to influence policy in Taiwan. As a result, the ROC government shifted away from its commitment to the One-China policy and towards a separate political identity for Taiwan. Jiang Zemin, General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, was also unwilling to compromise. Jiang notoriously attempted to influence the 1996 ROC election in Taiwan by conducting a missile exercise designed to intimidate Taiwanese voters and interfere with international shipping, leading to the Third Taiwan Strait Crisis. By 1998, semi-official talks had broken down.

Chen Shui-bian was elected President of the ROC in 2000. Politically, Chen is pro-Taiwan independence. Chen's repudiation of the 1992 Consensus combined with the PRC's insistence that the ROC agree to a "One China" principle for negotiations to occur prevented improvement in cross-strait relations.

Up until the 1970s, the international community generally considered the Kuomintang on Taiwan to be the legal representative of China, but acknowledgment of the nation of the People's Republic of China slowly increased. In 1954, the Republic of China and the United States signed the Mutual Defense Treaty between the United States of America and the Republic of China. In 1971, the United Nations acknowledged the People's Republic of China to be the sole legal representative of China (United Nations General Assembly Resolution 2758). The KMT government strengthened their "Han and the thief cannot both stand" (漢賊不兩立) stance and announced withdrawal from the United Nations. After this, the international position of the Republic of China slid to a large extent. In 1979, when the United States broke relations, it created an even more severe attack on the diplomatic plight of the ROC. In recent years, the ROC government has tried several times to apply anew to enter international organizations such as the United Nations and the World Health Organization, but, under the opposing side's powerful obstruction, there has been no success.

The question of the political status of Taiwan or whether the two sides are moving toward unification or seeking de jure independence is still unresolved. The assertion of the People's Republic of China both domestically and internationally is "Whether from the perspective of history, government or international law, Taiwan is an inseparable part of China. The political status of Taiwan is a Chinese domestic affair, and, under the premise of no hope for unification as well as certain other (conditions), (the Chinese government) does not abandon (the possibility of) the use of force to resolve it." Those persons promoting Taiwan independence feel that, because of the Treaty of San Francisco signed by Japan and the United States and the unclear indication of the handover of Taiwan's sovereignty (the status of Taiwan was not decided on), Taiwan's future direction should be decided upon by the people of Taiwan and that the People's Republic of China not be permitted to threaten the use of force.

On 14 March 2005, the National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China passed the Anti-Secession Law, making clear for the first time in legal form the One-China principle. Some people in Taiwan felt dissatisfied about this, and, on March 26, hundreds of thousands of people went to the streets of Taipei, participating in the 326 Protect Taiwan Demonstration, indicating their strong dissatisfaction with and protest of the law. Beginning on 26 April 2005, KMT, and various Pan-Blue political parties visited mainland China, creating an upsurge in the political dialogue between the two sides (see 2005 Pan-Blue visits to mainland China), but cross-straits relations are still full of uncertainty.

Mainland China and Taiwan resumed regular weekend cross-strait charter direct flights on 4 July 2008, for the first time in six decades, as a "new start" in their tense relations. Liu Shaoyong, the China Southern Airlines chair, piloted the first flight from Guangzhou to the Taipei Songshan Airport. Simultaneously, a Taiwan-based China Airlines flew to Shanghai. A total of five mainland Chinese cities will be connected with eight Taiwan airports, with four days a week, 36 round-trip flights across the Taiwan Strait, thereby eliminating time-consuming Hong Kong stopovers.

On 7 November 2015, a meeting was held by ROC president Ma Ying-jeou and CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping in Singapore.

Recognition of the ROC has dwindled over the years. Recognition was withdrawn by The Gambia in 2013, São Tomé and Príncipe on 21 December 2016, Fiji in May 2017 (with unofficial relations from 1996 onwards), Panama on 13 June 2017, the Dominican Republic on 1 May 2018, Burkina Faso on 24 May 2018, El Salvador on 20 August 2018, Kiribati and the Solomon Islands in September 2019, Nicaragua in December 2021, Honduras in March 2023, and Nauru in January 2024. Only 11 UN member states (Guatemala, Belize, Eswatini, Haiti, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Paraguay, Tuvalu, Marshall Islands and Palau) and the Holy See maintain relations with the ROC.

Economic growth
During the post-war period, Taiwan was lacking in goods and materials, the economy was depressed, and inflation was severe. After the national government moved to Taiwan, agriculture was first to grow, and, in 1953, Taiwan's economy returned to its pre-war level. After this, the government pursued a policy of "Nurture industry with agriculture"(以農養工) on the foundation established during Japanese rule. With the capital, manpower, and skilled labor that was in Taiwan, American aid, etc., Taiwan's economy progressively moved toward rapid growth. In the 1950s, the government carried out an import substitution policy, taking what was obtained by agriculture to give support to the industrial sector, trading agricultural product exports for foreign currency to import industrial machinery, thus developing the industrial sector. The government raised tariffs, controlled foreign exchange and restricted imports in order to protect domestic industry. By the 1960s, Taiwan's import exchange industry was faced with the problem of saturating the domestic market. At the same time, the factories of some industrialized nations, because of rising wages and other reasons, slowly moved to certain areas that had both basic industry and low labor costs. Consequently, the economic policy of Taiwan changed to pursue export expansion. In 1960, the government enacted the "Regulations for Encouraging Investment," actively competing for foreign business investment in Taiwan. In 1966, the government established the Kaohsiung Export Processing Zone, Asia's first export processing zone, to expand the manufacturing production. In the role of a manufacturing relay station, Taiwan became a link in the international system of division of labor. In 1963, the proportion of Taiwan's economy occupied by industry exceeded that of agriculture. From 1968, Taiwan maintained two-digit long-term annual average economic growth up until the 1973 oil crisis. In 1971, Taiwan had a foreign trade surplus and continued from then on in an export state and a major producer of electronics goods.

After retreating to Taiwan, Chiang learned from his mistakes and failures in the mainland and blamed them for failing to pursue Sun Yat-sen's ideals of Tridemism and welfarism. Chiang's land reform more than doubled the land ownership of Taiwanese farmers. It removed the rent burdens on them, with former land owners using the government compensation to become the new capitalist class. He promoted a mixed economy of state and private ownership with economic planning. Chiang also promoted a 9-years compulsory education and the importance of science in Taiwanese education and values. These measures generated great success with consistent and strong growth and the stabilization of inflation.

Sports
Football was introduced to Taiwan in 1916 by Edward Band who was the principal of Tainan's Chang Jung High School. The Chang Jung High School team is considered to be the first football team in Taiwan with all current teams being in some way descendant of it.

Following the Chinese Civil War the International Olympic Committee (IOC) recognized both the PRC and the ROC Olympic Committees in 1954. In 1958, The PRC withdrew its membership from the IOC and nine other international sports organizations in protest against the two-Chinas policy. After the withdrawal of the PRC, the IOC had been using a number of names in international Olympic activities to differentiate the ROC from the PRC. "Formosa" was used at the 1960 Summer Olympics, and "Taiwan" was used in 1964 and 1968. In 1975, the PRC applied to rejoin the IOC as the sole sports organization representing the whole China. The Taiwanese team, competing under the name of Republic of China at the previous Olympics, was refused to represent itself as the "Republic of China" or use "China" in its name by host Canadian government at the 1976 Summer Olympics. In April 1979, the IOC recognized the Olympic Committee of the PRC and maintained recognition of the Olympic Committee located in Taipei. In 1981, the ROC government formally accepted the name "Chinese Taipei".

title: History of Taiwan (1945–present)


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私は言語間リンクを貼りに来た日本語版Wikipediaの利用者です.

I'm an inter language wiki link user from ja:wikipedia.

title: User:Bit~enwiki


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Trans–Asian railway

The Trans-Asian Railway (TAR) is a project to create an integrated freight railway network across Europe and Asia. The project is of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP).

The project was initiated in the 1950s, with the objective of providing a continuous 8750 mi rail link between Singapore and Istanbul, Turkey, with possible further connections to Europe and Africa. At the time shipping and air travel were not as well developed, and the project promised to significantly reduce shipping times and costs between Europe and Asia. Progress in developing the TAR was hindered by political and economic obstacles throughout the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s. By the 1990s, the end of the Cold War and normalisation of relations between some countries improved the prospects for creating a rail network across the Asian continent.

The TAR was seen as a way to accommodate the huge increases in international trade between Eurasian nations and facilitate the increased movements of goods between countries. It was also seen as a way to improve the economies and accessibility of landlocked countries like Laos, Afghanistan, Mongolia, and the Central Asian republics.

Much of the railway network already exists as part of the Eurasian Land Bridge, although significant gaps remain. A big challenge is the differences in rail gauge across Eurasia. Four major rail gauges (which measures the distance between rails) are in use across the continent: most of Europe, as well as Turkey, Iran, China, and the Koreas use the gauge, known as Standard gauge; Russia and the former Soviet republics use a  gauge; Finland uses a  gauge, both known as Russian gauge; the railways in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka use the  gauge, known as Indian gauge; and most of Southeast Asia has  metre gauge. For the most part the TAR would not change national gauges; mechanized transfer facilities would be built to transload shipping containers from train to train at the breaks of gauge.

Routes
By 2001, four corridors had been studied:

 * The Northern Corridor will link Europe and Northeast Asia via Germany, Poland, Belarus, Russia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, China, North Korea and South Korea, with breaks of gauge at the Polish-Belarusian border ( to ), the Kazakhstan-Chinese border and the Mongolian-Chinese border (both to ).  The 5750 mi Trans-Siberian Railway covers much of this route and currently carries large amounts of freight from East Asia to Moscow and on to the rest of Europe. Due to political problems with North Korea, freight from South Korea must currently be shipped by sea to the port of Vladivostok to access the route.

 * The Southern Corridor, also called ITI-DKD-Y (Istanbul-Tehran-Islamabad-Delhi-Kolkata-Dhaka-Yangon), will go from Europe to Southeast Asia, connecting Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, and Thailand, with links to China's Yunnan Province and, via the Southeast Asian corridor, to Malaysia and Singapore. Gaps exist between Imphal-Moreh in India and to Tamu- Kalay (also called Kale and Kalemyo) in Myanmar, between Chittagong-Cox's Bazar in Bangladesh to Myanmar and between Myanmar and Thailand. The section in eastern Iran between Bam and Zahedan has been completed. Breaks of gauge occur, or will occur, at the Iran-Pakistan border ( to ), the India-Myanmar border ( to ), and to China ( to ).

 * A Southeast Asian network; this primarily consists of the Kunming–Singapore Railway.

 * The North-South Corridor will link Northern Europe to the Persian Gulf. The main route starts in Helsinki, Finland, and continues through Russia to the Caspian Sea, where it splits into three routes: a western route through Azerbaijan, Armenia, and western Iran; a central route across the Caspian Sea to Iran via rail ferry; and an eastern route through Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan to eastern Iran. The routes converge in the Iran's capital of Tehran and continue to the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas.

Agreement
The Trans-Asian Railway Network Agreement is an agreement signed on 10 November 2006, by seventeen Asian nations as part of a United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) effort to build a transcontinental railway network between Europe and Pacific ports in China. The plan has sometimes been called the "Iron Silk Road" in reference to the historical Silk Road trade routes. UNESCAP's Transport & Tourism Division began work on the initiative in 1992 when it launched the Asian Land Transport Infrastructure Development project.

The agreement formally came into force on 11 June 2009.

Network
The Trans-Asian Railway system will consist of four main railway routes. The existing Trans-Siberian railway, which connects Moscow to Vladivostok, will be used for a portion of the network in Russia. Another corridor to be included will connect China to Korea, Mongolia, Russia and Kazakhstan. In 2003, the president of Kazakhstan proposed building a standard gauge link from Dostyk (on the Chinese border) to Gorgan in Iran; it has not yet been built.

Standards
World RR Gauge Map.agr.png (914 mm)}} {{legend|#6000ff|Meter gauge (1,000 mm)}} {{legend|#0500e0|Cape gauge (1,067 mm)}} {{legend|#000000|Standard gauge (1,435 mm)}} {{legend|#c00100|Russian gauge (1,520 mm)}}

{{legend|#ffa000|Irish gauge (1,600 mm)}} {{legend|#ffc000|Iberian gauge (1,668 mm)}} {{legend|#ffe000|Indian gauge (1,676 mm)}}]] Complicating the plan is the differences in rail gauges currently in use across the continent. While China, Iran, Laos and Turkey use tracks, tracks of Russia and Central Asia are gauged at. In South Asia, India's and Pakistan's tracks are gauged at. In South East Asia, the tracks of Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia are with some dual gauge tracks near the China–Vietnam border and within Bangladesh, and tracks in Indonesia and Japan are mostly  gauge. This leads to time-consuming interchanges or transloading to handle the break of gauge at main connecting points in the network.

Other standards to consider include allowing for interoperability:
 * Railway electrification – 25 kV AC the world standard for new long distance and heavy duty construction since the 1950s.
 * Couplings – buffers and chains, Alliance, or SA3. Some dual couplings and adapters or barrier vehicles are possible.
 * Brakes – air, with or without electronically controlled pneumatic brakes (ECP).
 * Loading gauge and structure gauge – able to take tallest possible shipping container. Possible double stacking.
 * Signalling systems – where signals are electronic, not physically visible, and must be 'read' by equipment in the locomotives, or where the train must interact in different ways with the infrastructure
 * Electromagnetic interference – where radio waves (noise) from electric motors can interact with different signalling systems
 * Rules and regulations.
 * Language, including Seaspeak.
 * Break of gauge devices, such as dual gauge, Train on Train piggybacking or variable gauge axles.

Participating nations
Transportation and railway ministers from forty one nations participated in the week-long conference held in Busan, South Korea, where the agreement was formulated. The proposed 80,900-km railway network will originate from the Pacific seaboard of Asia and end on the doorsteps of Europe. The agreement's cosigners included the following participating countries:

 * 🇦🇫 Afghanistan
 * 🇦🇲 Armenia
 * 🇦🇿 Azerbaijan
 * 🇧🇩 Bangladesh
 * 🇧🇾 Belarus
 * 🇧🇹 Bhutan
 * Brunei
 * 🇰🇭 Cambodia
 * 🇨🇳 China
 * 🇮🇳 India
 * 🇮🇩 Indonesia
 * 🇮🇷 Iran
 * 🇰🇿 Kazakhstan
 * Laos
 * 🇲🇳 Mongolia
 * 🇳🇵 Nepal
 * 🇵🇰 Pakistan
 * 🇰🇷 South Korea
 * 🇷🇺 Russia
 * 🇱🇰 Sri Lanka
 * 🇹🇯 Tajikistan
 * 🇹🇭 Thailand
 * 🇹🇷 Turkey
 * 🇹🇲 Turkmenistan
 * 🇺🇿 Uzbekistan

The 28 countries that did not sign the agreement at the conference had until 31 December 2007, to join and ratify the agreement.

On 5 May 2007, officials in Bangladesh announced that the nation will sign on to the agreement at an upcoming meeting in New York City. The plan for the network includes three lines between India and Myanmar that traverse Bangladesh. India made a similar announcement on 17 May 2007. As part of the agreement, India will build and rehabilitate rail links with neighboring Myanmar in projects that are estimated to cost more than ₹ 29.41 billion (US$730 million). Bangladesh finally signed the agreement on 10 November 2007.

India's Look-East connectivity policy has resulted in the launch of several connectivity projects with China and ASEAN nations.

Progress
The Northern Corridor was in operation as early as the 1960s, although at first only for Soviet Union-China trade. The Southern corridor has progressively opened up after 2000. Successes so far include:

Northern Line

 * Rail link from China to Kazakhstan (Turkestan–Siberia Railway and Lanxin railway, with break-of-gauge) has been completed since 1990, allowing cargo services such as Yiwu–London and Chongqing–Xinjiang–Europe lines
 * Second link from China to Kazakhstan (line Zhetigen–Khorgos, completed in December 2011).
 * Direct freight service between Germany and China through Russia and Mongolia or Kazakhstan, operating from the first decade of the 2000s (transloading of container at break-of-gauge).

Southern Line

 * The Eurasia Marmaray Tunnel connecting European Turkey and Asian Turkey, opened in 2013. At that time the tunnel was isolated from rail network but finally got connected with the completion of Marmaray project in 2019. The first international freight train transporting magnesite and connecting Çukurhisar (in Tepebaşı, Eskişehir) to Austria ran through the tunnel last week of October 2019. Before this, there was a freight-train ferry there.
 * A train ferry across Lake Van, from 1970s allowing rail services between Turkey and Iran.
 * Link from Iran to Central Asia (Trans-Caspian railway; branch Tejen–Sarakhs–Mashhad, completed in 1996).
 * Link from Iran to Herat in Afghanistan completed 2013.
 * Iran-Pakistan: A Bam–Zahedan link, with a break-of-gauge at Zahedan (Pakistan railway uses broad gauge and Iran railway uses standard gauge ). In August 2009 a goods train carrying containers traveled from Islamabad, Pakistan to Istanbul, Turkey; by April 2011, trains were running regularly.
 * In 2016, Bangladesh decided to connect to the network with a rail line from Dohazari to Gundum near Myanmar border.

Southeast Asia

 * The Boten–Vientiane railway opened in December 2021, completing the Central section of the line and forming a near through-train connection from Kunming to Singapore (with a break-of-gauge in Vientiane).

North–South Transport Corridor

 * Agreement in 2014 between Iran, Azerbaijan and Russia on completing the north–south corridor. The missing link is Astara–Rasht, 167 km. On 7 January 2017, it was announced that construction on this section would start in 2017.

title: Trans–Asian railway


text:
Talk:History of religion in the United States

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 24 August 2021 and 15 October 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Thomas Lazuli Quickdagger. Peer reviewers: Gemjk19, Kalebbscott.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 23:39, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Creation of article
I created the initial page as imports from loc.gov and census.gov sites. All public domain. Please feel free to edit it for accuracy, grammar, format and general copyed. Davodd 10:31, Mar 2, 2004 (UTC)

 * While I hesitate to make the direct claim that this article fails as NPOV, the parts about the Founding Fathers look like they come close. I feel like this article is just barely dodging NPOV.  Does anyone else feel this way?  Rhesusman 22:41 17 June 2005 (UTC)

Seems to me much of the article is trying to lead reader to conclude that religion is important in republican gov't. The gov't site took that approach too - perhaps I could find it again --JimWae 00:23, 2005 Jun 18 (UTC)

 * I agree. A lot of articles have content which makes pointing out NPOV easy.  This is tough, but I can't help but think that I know what the author's position on the church-state controversy is, and that can't be good for NPOV.  Rhesusman 22:23 7 July 2005 (UTC)

 * There's another problem with this article. It makes no mention of the growing numbers of religious minorities like Muslims or Buddhists that have been the results of conversions or immigration in the past hundred years.  This further leads me to believe that there's a political agenda behind this article.  I would think someone motivated to be purely descriptive would not omit this.  Rhesusman 06:24 8 July 2005 (UTC)

The article is hopelessly POV. Its hard to express precisesly how, but as you read you get bombarded with biased wording and language. Like Rhesusman, I can tell the author's position on a number of issues just by the phrasing that is being used. IMO, if you can do something like that, its a pretty clear sign that the article is POV. There is also the occasional passage that even with my limited knowledge I can tell is a misrepresentation at the very least. For example, the passage "The efforts of the founding fathers to find a proper role for their support of religion..." seems to imply that all or virtually all of them had some great interest in the "support of religion", when I know that a remarkable number of them were Deists and pretty much actively opposed to organized religion. The Deism section, incidentally, is also pretty poor, failing to so much as mention that Deists believe in a non-interventalist god or the writings of Thomas Paine, and I can't help but feel this sort of thing is intentional. Nothing major, but a pretty consistent pattern. Someone with more time and knowledge than me needs to give the thing a major overhaul. Be brutal, IMO a lot of sections need to pretty much dissapear and be replaced by completely new writing that gives the same (or better) information. In any case, I have given it the POV Check - it does nothing but hurt wikipedia's reputation to have articles like this without it (with the implication that it is considered NPOV), it will encourage people to help edit it, and I don't think anybody is really arguing it is okay as is. As far as non-POV issues go, a lot of it just isn't worded in the style wikipedia usually adopts. That sort of thing can easily be fixed when the rest of it is being reworded. 24.156.86.181 05:04, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

Now that I know the source, http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/ I wish I had been bolder in my earlier edits of it. I thought it was crafted by somebody who had taken a great deal of time & would object to significant changes that could not be completely backed up - and did not want to spend lots of time arguing over changes. It seems this could be a 1st amendment violation by the Library of Congress website - (besides a copyvio problem in keeping it here). --JimWae 06:07, 2005 July 20 (UTC)

The 18th Century section leaves much to desire. "Anglicans" are "left behind" in the Great Awakening, yet they praise Whitfield AN ANGLICAN. It speaks nothing of the Methodist movement and the Moravians. In addition, despite the fact that many founding fathers were Diests, many still were members of mainline Christian denominations, giving money and time serving on Church councils. For example, George Washington was a vestry member of an Episcopal Church, and Benjamin Franklin gave tons of money to one Episcopal parish in particular. CJJDay 22:21, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

--- I'm cleaning this thing up... --Verditer 02:58, 23 June 2006 (UTC) I really want to change this, but I don't know what exactly I can do, and I think I might be veering into Uncyclopedia's realm...so good luck fixing this article. It needs it (not to mention the government who wrote the article), and I can't do it NPOV. Verditer 03:07, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Uh... Where is all of the 20th Century/21st Century Info?!
Unless I miss my guess the religious history of america did not end in the year 1899, where is the rest of the article?! The Fading Light 02:43, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Where are all the citations to back up any of this? Who knows who the quotes are from, for all we know whoever wrote this could just be making it up! 24.17.59.67 04:42, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Makes me want to tag every single sentence citation needed. This article is poorly written and very factually challenged. I cleaned up a bit, and did add one citation in the Diest area, but this article is hopelessly pov and may as well be deleted. Alexr

Incorrect History
I'm compiling data for my final paper in a seminary/master's level course that has a lot to do with US Church History, and some of the facts presented in this article are completely false. The biggest one is this: While there were some communities within individual colonies that shared common faith, overall church attendance in the colonies hovered near 10%. I'm considering starting a new page on here when I'm done to present my research. It was very disappointing to see that so much of what we grow up learning through grade school and high school - even undergraduate work - regarding this nation's founders, is simply fabricated. Regardless of one's own personal inclinations, it is not good news to learn we have been lied to. Godsmaverick 15:50, 27 July 2007 (UTC)godsmaverick

 * Each page is an article. Don't start a new page unless it is on a new subject. Can you imagine the confusion if there were multiple articles on the same topic? If you have corrections to make, please do so as long as you can reference published information.  Data from an unpublished thesis would not be very helpful.  --Blainster 21:21, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

19th Century Discussion is very limited
The discussion of 19th Century religion in the U.S. is far too limited. It states, explicitly, that evangelical Christianity was the dominant religious influence in the early-mid 19th Century, which is misleading, to say the least. There ought to be some discussion of major 19th Cen. religious trends, such as the immigration of large numbers of Catholics to the US, the "Deism" practiced by Thomas Jefferson, and others. The bias toward evangelical Christianity on this page is disturbing. Cntreras 10:58, 20 October 2007 (UTC) Limited? My YES! How can one discuss the 19th century religious history of the U.S. and not even mention William Miller. Charles Taze Russell is noted with no mention of what is generally considered a seminal influence upon his work. Gnuwhirled (talk) 09:02, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Plagiarized
Oddly, part is stolen from http://www.richmondhillhistory.org/clergy.html

Go figure. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.215.38.170 (talk) 05:23, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

rm Kemetic Orthodoxy (undue weight)
I am confused, how does this fall under undue weight? There is no discussion of why some religions are included in the list and not others. Can someone explain this to me please? - IanCheesman (talk) 04:13, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

It doesn't state it explicitly, but the criterion is one of general importance. If every religion founded in this country were listed, the list would be enormous, so only the most important examples are listed. If you have evidence that this twenty-year-old Neo-Pagan practice is as important to the topic as are Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Christian Science, then that's an argument for keeping Kemetic Orthodoxy in the list; if there's no evidence of this (and there probably isn't), then listing it with the others risks wrongly portraying it as equally important, a violation of our neutral point of view policy (specifically, "undue weight", as noted). Hence, I removed it. I am willing to listen to an argument for keeping it, but not to violate the policy I linked previously. — Gavia immer (talk) 04:36, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree with its removal. Kemetic Orthodoxy is not notable enough to the history of religion in the U.S. for inclusion in such a general article as this. —Angr 09:33, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

 * thank you for your response. Maybe some criteria should be spelled out, as when I first saw the list, I naturally assumed that it was an open list for inclusion.  Maybe the title of the list should be changed to explain what the list is and is not.  Of course then the question begs to be asked, what is the definition of "important" in this article (for comparison, look at the repeated discussion on the List of new religious movements, List of religions and spiritual traditions, and Major religious groups.  Is it simply numbers (and if so, where is the cut-off), number of court cases involving the group, presence in national politics...?  Some more definition will help both readers and future contributors, I believe. - IanCheesman (talk) 20:46, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
 * It's been 10 months since I've asked for more information on what is deemed "important", and received no response. It is the largest and most influential of all the Kemetic religions, has international membership, etc.  Again, I ask for more specific requirements, both for this entry and for all others (such as "spiritualism", which has just been requested). - IanCheesman (talk) 17:57, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

 * As I said, specifically, above, it's a question of prominence and importance. As a minimum requirement, at least, they are religions that people in the United States have generally heard of. I'm afraid that Kemetic Orthodoxy does not belong on the list; you seem to be looking to add it as a way of promoting your religion (I assume it's your religion), but that is definitely not what the list is for.

 * As to Spiritualism, I have no particular opinion on discussing it, except that it shouldn't be added without discussion. I suppose the most obvious objection is that it's not an organized set of religious beliefs, but rather a loose set of metaphysical beliefs. If there's an interest in adding it - by more than one person - I don't object. — Gavia immer (talk) 18:22, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

 * No problem, actually, I admit I had forgotten about this completely over the summer ;). My main question was simply about what this group felt the meaning of the word "important", and thus the deciding factor for what is in the article and what is not.  I agree some line must be drawn, the topic is way to broad to be covered completely.
 * I do worry, however, that the article has very little coverage of anything that is not a Judeo-Christian faith. What about the 100s of religions that existed before Europeans came across the ocean?  What about the other religions that have sought peace and freedom in the US (such as Sikhism and Bahai)?  What about the religious practices that have been met with fear and hatred by americans (such as Islam, Voodoo, Wicca, and many others)?  What about the wide variety of religions that have started in the US that may not have wide public view or numbers?  What about those who claim to be non-religious, and the issues they have had to deal with in such a religious, yet not officially religious country?
 * Not sure where the line should be drawn on any of these, and I'm not seeking to push one religion out of relation to it's actual size or "importance", but the article does seem a bit one-sided. That hurts the credibility of both the article and the authors.  It seems there is a lot more out there that could be added to the article to make it better.  If there is too much info, maybe some of the more detailed info that is already in here should be split off into it's own articles.
 * Anyways, just some thoughts, take them as you will. - IanCheesman (talk) 02:06, 14 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree that there is an absence of religions other than Judeo-Christian, especially First Nations. Is there someone we can recruit who may know how to include this? Ngfarb (talk) 14:14, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

Catholic POV of article
The large size of the Anti-Catholic section made me wonder if the author is Catholic. Are we to now feel sorry for them and give them extra privelage as a result?

Also note the section about persecution in Europe. The article makes it seem like the persecution of Protestants by Catholics was on the same scale as persecution of Catholics by Protestants, but how could it be when the Catholic Church had unlimited civil powers for something like a millenium and killed (so I have read) 50 million Protestants because of their religious beliefs? That was a large portion of the population for those days, because we had the plague, wars, etc. killing millions too. Hisreason (talk) 12:31, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

 * While it is true that I am sort of Catholic, that was not the motivation behind the creation of the "Anti-Catholicism" section. (Assume good faith!)  Because I had done a lot of work on both Anti-Catholicism in the United States and Antisemitism in the United States, I brought text from both articles over here on the premise that these were important subtopics.  Looking just at the size of the Anti-Catholicism section in this article, I suspect that it could be trimmed back quite a bit so as not to be disproportionate.  I probably did a straight copy of the text and did not make enough of an effort to trim it down.  I'll try to take a stab at doing that when time permits.

 * As for the section on "European persecution", that section collapses into incoherence and incomprehensibility at the end because it is talking in very general, vague terms. It seems like an attempt to describe persecution in Europe but without a clear point.  I think what we're trying to say is that many early immigrants to the U.S. were fleeing religious persecution.  Specifically, many Protestants were fleeing neo-Catholic persecution by the Church of England (I say, "neo-Catholic" because the Church of England was (and to some extent, still is) a Catholic Church that is not in communion with the Pope).  Maryland was founded by Lord Calvert as a haven for English Catholics.  The Cajuns in Louisiana were evicted by the British but that was not strictly religious persecution per se.  In any event, the "European persecution" section clearly needs rewriting.  I'll try to take a stab at that also when time permits.

 * Thank you for your comments.

 * --Richard S (talk) 18:11, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Omission
Spiritualism is completely missing from the article. This is also an American religion, founded in New York. See: http://www.nsac.org/history.htm —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cfhillen (talk • contribs) 16:01, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Also missing is any discussion of colonization and settlement before the 1600s. E.g., the Spanish colonization of Florida and the US Southwest. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.223.117.239 (talk) 17:39, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Catholics as percentage of colonial population
The source article cited, Roman Catholicism in the U.S., states that Catholics were less than 2% of the population, yet someone changed that in this article to read "less than 1%." That is intellectually dishonest, to cite an original source article, and to then edit its content. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.145.71.178 (talk) 17:28, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

 * I note that the edits of this percentage have fluctuated between 1 and 4 percent. Your own edits have been both 2% and 4%.  I don't have the book cited, but Googling got me an essay, Let None Dare Call it Liberty, The Catholic Church in Colonial America, by Marian T. Horvat, Ph.D., which states, "...the first general report on the state of Catholicism by John Carroll in 1785...estimated the Catholic population in [the 13] colonies to be 25,000. ...Considering that the population in the first federal census of 1790 totaled 3,939,000, the Catholic presence was less than one percent, certainly not a significant force in the original 13 British colonies."  So let's be accurate.  Is it 4%, 2%, 1% or less than 1%?  I'm not an expert on Catholicism, so I'll leave it to someone else, but please don't alter what a source specifies...   Eastcote (talk) 20:04, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

I think part of the confusion here has to do with whether we are citing Catholics as a percentage of the white colonial population, or of the entire population, which would include 800,000 Africans. At 25,000 (and 35,000 is a total which is also frequently cited), Catholics would indeed be less than 1% of the entire population. But at 25,000 or 35,000, they would be closer to 2% of all whites. Please keep in mind that members of ALL denominations in America in the late 18th century represented less than 20% of the white population, so Catholics were something like 10% of all religious members at that time.

My citation of 4% was a mistake. However, I repeat my assertion that when you cite "less than 1%," you reference a source which says "less than 2%." I am respectfully requesting that you change your entry to accurately reflect the source that you are citing. Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.145.71.178 (talk) 17:13, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

 * I believe the source used in the article, and the quote above, support "less than 1%". By anyone's math, 25,000 is less than one percent of 4 million. Eastcote (talk) 22:43, 23 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Eastcote is right. Note that the Catholic figure includes black Catholics. Rjensen (talk) 22:50, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

George Washington a deist?
According to the verbiage under deist, Washington adhered to deism (or Unitarianism)... Where did this come from? Looking at the George Washington wikipedia page tells a completely different story: "he was primarily affiliated with the Anglican and, later, Episcopal church." That indicates that he was a deist? Further, the article points to these comments by Chernow: "Before the Revolutionary War he was Anglican – Church of England – which meant after the war, he was Episcopalian. So, he was clearly Christian....He was quite intensely religious, because even though he uses the word Providence, he constantly sees Providence as an active force in life, particularly in American life. I mean, every single victory in war he credits to Providence. The miracle of the Constitutional Convention he credits to Providence. The creation of the federal government and the prosperity of the early republic, he credits to Providence... I was struck at how frequently in his letters he's referring to Providence, and it's Providence where there's a sense of design and purpose, which sounds to me very much like religion..." Does this look like Washington should be placed under the deist section or that POV was poking it ugly head up? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.161.14.168 (talk) 09:28, 11 August 2012 (UTC)  After looking, John Adams can also be moved from deism according to his wikipedia page...72.161.14.168 (talk) 09:43, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

 * David L. Holmes, in The Faiths of the Founding Fathers, argues that Washington's religion was not as strong as you think it is. Holmes concludes Washington was a deist. Others disagree. There's no "right" answer—respectably scholars can be found on both sides of the debate. Binksternet (talk) 16:17, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

 * If this is the case, should the Washington (and Adams) pages be changed accordingly? 72.161.12.157 (talk) 00:55, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

Historical religious demographics of the United States
I have tagged the new article Historical religious demographics of the United States for merger into this one.

The demographics article relies on a single primary source, and fails WP:NOTSTATS because it lacks either context or secondary commentary to interpret the data. Merging it to this article would at least add context. -- Brown HairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 10:12, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Not npov: Pre-Columbian Religion excluded
The entire history of native religion is dismissed with a single paragraph before launching into a history of christianity? What could be more biased?

Change the article title to history of European Religions in the US, if that is the real topic. FigureArtist (talk) 22:09, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Native religion is well covered in many articles (on each major tribe); at present here are a few thousand adherents so it gets appropriate attention. Rjensen (talk) 02:30, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

I think this is a real problem. I could see saying that the religious history of the United States began in 1776, but if it began before then, we really ought to start the article with at least a mention of the fact that Europeans didn't invent religion in the area that is now the United States. This problem was only made worse by the edits of 4 July 2014, which make the ludicrous assertion that religion began with the Mayflower, despite the fact that even English religion has existed continuously in the area of the United States since before 1620 (let alone Spanish religion or, say, Hawaiian religion). Lereman (talk) 23:56, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
 * the article follows the standard scholarly sources like Ahlstrom. Rjensen (talk) 00:14, 12 September 2014 (UTC)
 * No, it doesn't follow Ahlstrom. Ahlstrom places the beginning of the religious history of the American people with Leif Erikson, not the Mayflower. He also devotes two full chapters to discussing the Catholicism of New Spain and New France before turning his attention to the Reformation in England (let alone the arrival of English Protestant settlers in America). Furthermore, Ahlstrom's subject is different from the subject of this article. Ahlstrom is discussing the religious history of the American people, a group he seems to define as European immigrants in North America. This article purports to discuss the history of religion in the United States — a place, not a people. If the article does not begin with the 1776–1783 period, then it should begin with the earliest identifiable religions of the area, even if those religions get no more than a brief hyperlinked mention. Lereman (talk) 20:31, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Yes it does Follow Ahlstrom. Ahlstrom "A religious history of the American people " (1976) begins with an opening "European prologue" section dealing with the religious background in Europe, and other major European colonizing powers (England, France, Spain ) introduced their Catholic or Protestant religions into the New World in the context of building empire, commerce and religion. That material is very well covered in Wikipedia's other articles. Ahlstrom then turns to colonial New England.  As for 1776 -- the standard practice among historians and reference books is to write histories of the United States that cover the colonial era. The complaint here is "Not npov: Pre-Columbian Religion excluded". Ahlstrom  excludes the pre-Colombian religions. Likewise so does  The Religious History of America: The Heart of the American Story from Colonial Times to Today by Edwin S. Gaustad and Leigh Schmidt (2004). The pre-Colombian religions are all thoroughly covered in other Wikipedia articles dealing with pre-Colombian populations. Rjensen (talk) 20:59, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
 * "The pre-Colombian religions are all thoroughly covered in other Wikipedia articles dealing with pre-Colombian populations" — which should be mentioned and linked to at the start of this article. After all, the standard practice among historians and reference books is (note the present tense) to write histories of the United States that at least mention that Europeans didn't show up to empty shores on the western Atlantic. To offer an (admittedly derivative) example, see History of the United States. Lereman (talk) 21:11, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

WP:NOR applies to inclusion, not to removal. Burden of evidence is on restoration.
Rjensen,

"The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material".

"Wikipedia articles must not contain original research", the key word being "contain". WP:NOR applies to inclusion, not to removal. By the reasoning in your | edit summary, all removals for lack of citation (or for some other reason) would be invalid because only one editor "originally" noticed the problem and acted. (And it would be a silly demand to insist on a citation for every asserted fact that X doesn't meet some standard for inclusion, citations simply cannot exist for such new facts!)

The graph was removed because evidence was not provided that supported "sharp rise". It purported to support "sharp rise", but the sharp rise assertion was dubious and removed for that reason. (It was in fact shown to be a decline as a fraction of the population in the 1st period). Evidence was provided (by you) for the data points themselves, but not for the assertion that the data represented a "sharp rise". Although it's not technically required, very good evidence for dubiousness was provided, but trying to discredit that evidence (of dubiousness) is not the evidence of notability and verifiability you need to justify inclusion.

If you want to include, you must show that the data is verifiable (which you've already done) and that it's applicable to the "sharp rise assertion" (which is harder). Proving verifiably that this particular data indicates a sharp rise in religion in the U.S. would be hard for the reasons already given. However, you might find other data that does make that point, if you look. It would probably be more productive for you to look for different data that does meet standards for inclusion in making the point of a "sharp rise".

I don't have access to the source you cite. I just believe you that the data plotted in the graph is in that source. It's an important point that if the source simply presents the data and doesn't assert that it indicates a sharp rise in the popularity of religion, then that's (probably) reliable. It the source of the data says that the data does indicate a sharp rise in popularity of religion, than that particular assertion is not reliable(!). Citing the source for it's data would be (likely) reliable, but citing the source for that (problematic) conclusion based on the data would be unreliable.

Ubewu (talk) 19:24, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
 * The RS call it "rapid growth." the data plotted is the number of local churches (the cenus did not keep track of church MEMBERS until 1850). We do have Methodist MEMBER data. 58,000 members in 1790, 258,000 in 1820 and 1,661,000 in 1860 (=28.6 x the 1790 number and 6.4x the 1820 number). [Census Bureau, Hist Stats US (1976) p 392]. The national population  was 3.93 million in 1790, 9.68 million in 1820, and 31.4 million in 1860. (=8x the 1790 number and 3.2x the 1820 number). Methodists grew by 28 times, overall population grew only 8 x. So Methodists grew about three times faster than total population, 1790-1860 and twice as fast as the population 1820-1860. QED. For 1780 there were 8500 Methodists, says  Noll calls it a "spectacular expansion" (p 217). Rjensen (talk) 21:00, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

Nice. If the caption is saying that the fraction of Methodists grew as compared to other sects, then the data shown does indeed support that point. Interesting. Maybe we have an opportunity to make an important discernment here -- that there was a re-proportionment favoring Methodists. Is that the same as asserting a big increase in general though? Is SGA supposed to be about an increase in the proportion of Methodism or an increase in the popularity of Christianity as a whole? I see the caption is still the original (problematic) one -- no mention of Methodists. Are you just not finished? I'll step back a bit to allow you time to finish it up. :-) --Ubewu (talk) 21:15, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

 * I tracked down the original source of the data in the graph: it's from Edwin Scott Gaustad, Historical Atlas of Religion in America (2nd ed. 1976) pp 4 (for 1780) and p 43 (for 1820, 1860). Gaustad, Historical atlas  has assembled a great deal of historical pre-1900 data-- he has lots of info, state-by-state, on the number of local churches. Unfortunately, he provides much less detail on the membership data. The Methodists were very methodical in collecting and reporting their membership data – much more so than anyone else.  According to Gaustad's chart p 52 Methodists reached the 200,000 membership  level in about 1816, and the million mark about 1842. They passed the Baptists about 1822. The Baptists reached the 200,000 level around 1805, and the million membership about 1860. The Presbyterians reached the 100,000 level about 1825, and the 1 million level around 1878. Lutherans were about 20,000 1800, and reached the million mark about 1885 the Episcopalians grew very slowly – they reach the hundred thousand mark in the 1850s, and the million mark around 1920. The Lutherans reached 100,000 around 1835, and thanks to the heavy German and Scandinavian immigration reached the million mark by the late 1880s. Alas, Gaustad does not use many tables – he prefers charts and maps with lots of dots showing where each church was located.  On page 37, he says "The expansion, both numerical and geographical, is dramatic; it is epic." Rjensen (talk) 21:39, 1 February 2014 (UTC)

heavy handed POV on Christian Nation theme
[copy ex RJensen talk page]

I'd like to discuss why you felt my edit to Deism and addition of section Founding Fathers in History of Religion in the United States constituted POV. If my material was not factual and well documented from viable sources, I welcome your advice and guidance and will improve it. To omit this section leaves out an important part of American history, so let us discuss it. Seiberth (talk) 04:24, 10 July 2014 (UTC).
 * the material is all taken from highly controversial sources and seems to denigrate Deism. It lacks balance and seems to want to argue for a very recent "Christian nation" position that is designed to affect political debates in the 21st century by attacking secularism. The quotes from Founding Fathers are out of place--Wikipedia much prefers reliable secondary sources by scholars who have examined the material in depth.  It fails to mention that the Constitution ignore religion except to prohibit its use in selecting officials.Rjensen (talk) 04:30, 10 July 2014 (UTC)

 * It looks like we are discussing [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=History_of_religion_in_the_United_States&diff=616163140&oldid=609014952 this series of edits] by Seiberth. I agree that the changes are inappropriate as they attempt to show a very Christian nation when there was plenty of secularism in the colonies and in early USA. The James Thacher source is from 1832 and cannot be considered representative of modern thought. Same with the 1920 Commercial Telegraphers' Journal. The Bob Gingrich book is a self-published source, terribly inadequate to the needs of this article. The lengthy quotes of founding fathers are cherry-picked to make the point that the country was strongly religious, when different quotes can be selected to show otherwise. More useful than quotes is scholarly analysis, which should form the greatest part of this article. Binksternet (talk) 06:39, 10 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Especially interesting was Seiberth's unreferenced assertion:
 * This viewpoint could not have come from a respected scholar because the scholar would never make the false statement about how the US is so strongly Christian in today's world. Furthermore, the assertion makes a logical error in telling about "hotly debated" issues. If the US so successfully resisted secularization, who could be debating? Everybody would be in agreement.
 * This bit shows the political agenda of the author. It cannot stand in the article. Binksternet (talk) 06:46, 10 July 2014 (UTC)

Separation of church and state
The Separation of church and state should be mentioned specifically in the lead section, per WP:LEAD. Binksternet (talk) 06:39, 10 July 2014 (UTC)

Johnny Come Latelies
"The religious history of the United States began with the first Pilgrim settlers who came on the Mayflower in the year 1620." Yeah, if we ignore 13 years of worship in Virginia before the pilgrims arrived. 155.213.224.59 (talk) 17:52, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

inclusion of Native American religion
about, would you be interested in coming up with an entry on the subject of Native America religion? Otherwise simply deleting it seems to rather fit the pattern, no? --Smkolins (talk) 14:56, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * I agree there should be a section. It should take a 300-year perspective.  I will try my hand at it. Rjensen (talk) 14:58, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * examples to consider including borrowing from American Indian Religious Freedom Act, Cultural assimilation of Native Americans and American Indian boarding schools, Native_American_civil_rights, Native American self-determination… seems like plenty of material for a large section all by itself. Then the inclusion of the proposal at the Parliament might feel less undue and would be in context more? (though not in the icumenical section perhaps.) --Smkolins (talk) 15:02, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * and Constitution (the Law of Peace being fundamentally a religious source).--Smkolins (talk) 15:07, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * The last item = politics and is rejected by most historians. Rjensen (talk) 15:49, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * (woops, misread, you mean the constitution affect)… so… it is a minority view and include that as the minority view… but only relevant in the context of documenting the Iroquois in this overall work of Native American religion…. --Smkolins (talk) 17:08, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * "'[Ben Franklin's] famous Remarks Concerning the Savages of North America (Franklin 1987:973–4; P. Wallace 1945: 225–26). This piece represents Franklin's continued interest in the Iroquois, it demonstrates his esteem for the native culture, and it exemplifies his use of that knowledge for social criticism.'" - so taking the right tact with the relationship with the constitution (that Franklin's comments relate to it, that is) I think is ok.--Smkolins (talk) 17:31, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * we're talking religion only here. and we have VERY limited space. Rjensen (talk) 18:32, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Ok - though I think at least the inclusion of the Iroquois as a more significant nation than the Shawnee, if we're limited to space by undue weight, should be considered. The Iroquois had a larger early presence in America (see for example the Beaver Wars) and generally their religious background is more available - it has a defined name in the Great Law of Peace for example. The 18th century revival of Handsome Lake also has at least as much to say about them as Tenskwatawa and Tecumseh. --Smkolins (talk) 18:45, 25 September 2015 (UTC)
 * When dealing with religion, there is a lot on the Prophet and Tecumseh (and far less on the Iroquois). Tenskwatawa, (Shawnee Prophet) launched a revival for quite a few tribes besides Shawnees....I have not heard of a corresponding religious movement for Iroquois.  Rjensen (talk) 19:24, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Treatment of secular trends, now claimed to be America’s Largest “Religious” Group
I recommend including a section describing current trends, especially the trend toward secularism, now claimed to be America’s Largest “Religious” Group. See, for example: http://www.prri.org/research/prri-rns-2016-religiously-unaffiliated-americans/ Thanks! --Lbeaumont (talk) 15:54, 12 October 2016 (UTC)

WP:BRD the discussion part
I made several edits to this page. They were reverted. I’m back, and I would like to discuss why some of these edits were reverted. I understand why the front section edit was reverted, (It’s rather unorthodox) but the other edits corrected content that seemed very biased. Could you explain why you reverted those edits?71.238.19.60 (talk) 20:58, 6 August 2021 (UTC)71.238.10.60

to stub the Islam section?
There appears to be no mention of the rapidly growing number of Muslims - a quick search for the word "Islam" returns only 5 results, of which 3 are in the article itself.

One significant period of growth of Islam in America was the work of Malcolm X (though technically under the Nation of Islam). 22 million black Muslims by 1964 if I recall correctly? 79.66.216.122 (talk) 22:37, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

Undefined References
I noticed that the user @Mikeblas justifiably removed some undefined references added by one of my edits. Thank you. I believe they were added by this edit. I don’t know what to do because I didn’t add these references; I copy- pasted certain sections elsewhere to fit in with the timeline structure of the article and made a few tiny other edits. I think that Wikipedia’s program replaced those references, but something went wrong. Please don’t delete those sections; they have references, which were just lost during a clumsy edit. I’m thinking I could try to copy paste references from old versions of the page or ask a more technical- minded Wikipedian for help. Do you have a solution? MaroonDichotomy (talk) 16:17, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

 * I have fixed this. Ignore this section. MaroonDichotomy (talk) 02:39, 4 December 2023 (UTC)