The Debate over Church and State
This is an unusually long post for me to place in my blog. It is, however, addressing an issue that has been a concern of mine for many years and moreso, since it has been the focus of the liberal lawmakers who are re-interpretting the First Amendment to suit their leftist agenda. Please take the time to read this because it presents a viable explanation of what has been happening at the legislative level. You may agree or disagree, but this article presents some good evidence.
In recent years controversies have emerged over the people’s right to religious expression. Where there once was no controversy, today battles are being fought in the courts to prevent the First Amendment from being redefined. Some of these disputes have reached the U.S. Supreme Court. Consequently, nine unelected individuals now exert control by placing restrictions over how, where, when or if public religious activities will occur, even though the First Amendment says, “Congress shall make no law…prohibiting the free speech thereof.”
The court has arrived at this position of religious restriction through their modern, out-of-context interpretation of the phrase “separation of church and state.” With these five words as the standard, the court has now declared many American customs and traditions unconstitutional. However, it doesn’t stop there. Subsequent over-zealous applications by state and local officials have brought to us even greater religious restrictions than those handed down by the courts. Some examples would include forbidding a prayer at a school assembly or preventing crosses from being displayed at a roadside memorial.
Through continuous usage over recent decades, the separation language has now become so commonplace that many Americans believe it to be a constitutional phrase found in the First Amendment. It is not.
Former Chief Justice William Rehnquist called the expression “separation of church and state” a “misleading metaphor.” So if the term “separation of church and state” is not in the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution, then where did it come from?1
This phrase appeared in a letter written by Thomas Jefferson to the Baptist Association of Danbury, Connecticut. When Jefferson was elected president, many Baptists were excited because Jefferson was America’s first anti-federalist president. Anti-federalists were those who opposed granting strong, centralized power to the federal government. They favored a greater distribution of power among each individual state. The fact that the Baptists were not in favor of centralized power is understandable; from their beginnings in the Rhode Island settlement of the 1630s to the time of the federal Constitution of the 1780s, the Baptists had always sustained persecution from the centralization of power.2
The Danbury Baptists wrote a letter to Jefferson that expressed their concerns over the wording of the First Amendment:
Our sentiments are uniformly on the side of religious liberty: that religion is at all times and places a matter between God and individuals, that no man ought to suffer in name, person, or effects on account of his religious opinions, [and] that the legitimate power of civil government extends no further than to punish the man who works ill to his neighbor. But sir, our constitution of government is not specific…[T]herefore what religious privileges we enjoy (as a minor part of the State) we enjoy as favors granted, and not as inalienable rights.3
The Baptists were concerned that since the Constitutional protection for the “free exercise of religion” was a government-given right (thus alienable) and was not described as God-given (inalienable), therefore one day the government could attempt to regulate religious expression. The Baptists were highly opposed to this possibility—unless one’s religion was somehow harmful to another person.4
Jefferson appreciated their concern; it was his concern also. He made numerous statements affirming the importance of keeping the government from interfering with or restricting religious expression. For example:
[N]o power over the freedom of religion…[is] delegated to the United States by the Constitution. Kentucky Resolution, 1798
In matters of religion I have considered that its free exercise is placed by the Constitution independent of the powers of the general [federal] government. Second Inaugural Address, 18055
Thomas Jefferson in no way approved of allowing the government to regulate, restrict, or interfere with public religious practices. Jefferson concurred with the other Founders that the First Amendment was written to prevent the federal establishment of a national denomination.6
On January 1, 1802, Jefferson wrote a reassuring reply to the Danbury Baptists. In it, he said:
…Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God; that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship; that the legislative powers of government reach actions only and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church and State…I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights…7
The use of the term “natural rights” by Jefferson was a common legal term of that day, which substantiates his belief that religious liberties were inalienable rights. While those words spoke volumes to people back then, today it would mean little to most citizens.8
“Natural rights” include everything God has promised within His Holy Scriptures. Therefore, the Danbury Baptists were assured by Jefferson that freedom of religion was an inalienable God-given right and above federal jurisdiction.9
The clarity of Jefferson’s understanding of the Source for America’s inalienable rights was so absolute that he doubted America’s ability to keep those rights if this understanding was ever lost. He wrote:
And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure if we have lost the only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath?10
Jefferson believed that God was the Author and Source of our rights, not government. The government was to be denied interference with those rights. The “wall” in the Danbury letter was not to restrict religious displays in public; instead, it was to minimize the power of the government to prohibit or interfere with religious expression.11
When we look at Jefferson’s usage of the phrase “separation of church and state” in its full context, we can see that his intent was to reassure the Danbury Baptists that their religious liberties were secure. The First Amendment is very clear about that. Unfortunately, some now want us to believe that Jefferson meant something different. His original intent is being distorted beyond recognition. If left unchallenged, our nation will one day be unrecognizable. America’s Christian heritage will be a distant memory, if not forgotten entirely.
Resource: "The Communion of Church and State", by Dave Meyer. Enjoying Everyday Life, February, 2008.
