by Steve Hale
In a recent poll, 67% of Americans thought that the words "separation of church and state" were in the First Amendment. The First Amendment simply says: "Congress shall make no law regarding an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."
This was to prevent a repeat of what happened in Great Britain -- domination by Catholics and Anglicans. Hence, no one sect or group was to dominate the government, but Christian principles were to remain in government. For example, in Runkle vs. Winemiller in 1796, the court said: "By our form of government the Christian religion is the established religion, and all sects and denominations of Christians are placed on equal footing."
Furthermore, I don't know of any Christian that wants ecclesiastical rule of government. I know I don't. However, I very much want the government to maintain those Christian principles the Founders clearly intended!
So, where did this concept of separation of church state originate? In 1801, the Danbury Baptist Association of Danbury, Connecticut was worried about a rumor that indicated the Congregationalists were about to be made the national religion. They wrote a letter that broached this subject with President Thomas Jefferson.
On January 1, 1802, Jefferson wrote his reply, and in that reply, coins the now famous phrase "separation of church and. state." But, in the context of his letter Jefferson made it clear that this was a one directionai wall. In others words, the government was to keep its hands off of the church, but Christian principles were to remain in government.
This is substantiated by Congressional reaction to a petition in 1853 to completely separate church and state. This petition was referred to the respective Judiciary Committees of the House and Senate in order to see if it was possible to separate Christian principles from our government.
On March 27, 1854, the Committees finished their research, and gave a stunning report! Both Committees gave similar reports...this is the House version: "Had the people, during the Revolution, had any suspicion of any attempt to war against Christianity, that Revolution would have been strangled in its cradle."
The committee went on to explain that no one sect was to dominate. But, the Founders said there could be no "substitute for Christianity...that was the religion of the Founders of the Republic...and they expected it to remain the religion of their descendants...
Finally, the committee concluded: "The gre?t, vital, and conservative element in our system is the behef of our people in pure doctrine and divine truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ." Folks, this nation was founded on Christian principles! More next week...
The above article appeared in the Mt. Juliet Messenger on July 28, 1996.
by Steve Hale
In 1878, in Reynolds vs. the United States, another challenge was made in an effort to separate Christian principles from government. Here, the court pulled out Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptist Association in its entirety. The court concluded that the government should not interfere with the church, but that Christian principles should remain in government. The court consistently used Jefferson's letter in this way for the next fifteen years.
That's the way it was until 1947. In a case called Everson vs. Board of Education, the C,ourt used only eight words out of Jefferson's letter, and used them out of context. This was the first in our history as a nation that the court said the first amendment was to protect the government from the church.
Dr. William James, commonly called the "father of modem psychology," was a major proponent of this brand of new doctrine. His strategy was, in his own words: "There is nothing so absurd but if you repeat it often enough, people will believe it."
From 1947 until 1962, political liberals kept up the phrase "separation of church and state." It got so brazen, that in a 1958 case, Bayer vs. Cole Morgan, one of the Justices wrote a stinging dissent! In it, he said that if these people didn't quit saying "s'eparation of church and state," the public would come to believe it was in the constitution.
So finally, in Engel vs. Vitale of June 25, 1962, We had the first separation of religious principles from public education. This is when court banned prayers from the public schools. A year later, June 17, 1963, in Abington vs. Schempf, Bible reading was outlawed in the public schools.
Amazingly, and for the first time, the court gave no legal, historic, or moral precedents for these new decisions. It was simply a brand new doctrine and a liberal agenda pursued by the court. In contrast, in 1892, in a case called "Church of the Holy Trinity vs. the U.S., the Supreme Court upheld biblical principles in government. Among other things, it said: "Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teaching of the Redeemer of mankind."
In contrast of the new doctrine, the court here cited 87 legal and historic precedents! It said it could have cited more, but these should be sufficient to show they had made the correct decision!
According to a study cited earlier by the University of Houston, 94% of the U.S. Constitution was drawn from biblical principles. What's next? Will the court then
outlaw the reading of the Constitution? "Thus says the LORD: 'Stand in the ways and see, And ask for the old paths, where the good way, and walk in it; Then you will find rest for your souls..." ( Jeremiah 6:16a).