When David Barton and Jon Stewart begin discussing the Treaty of Tripoli (11:30 into the interview), Barton maintains that it simply demonstrates that the US isn’t an anti-Muslim nation like Tripoli’s European enemies. But Article 11 of the treaty clearly states that the US isn’t an anti-Muslim nation because “the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.”

Here is the full text of Article 11:

As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion,—as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen,—and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

Barton goes on to allege that Article 11 wasn’t in the original document. While there is confusion with how Article 11 materialized, there is no doubt that it was included in the treaty that was ratified unanimously by the Senate and approved by John Adams.

Rob Boston found in his research on diplomat Joel Barlow and the Treaty of Tripoli [PDF] that Article 11 was in fact part of the original treaty, negotiated under George Washington and ratified under Adams, and the only version without it is in an Arabic version, not the one ratified by the US: