The Truth About Separation of Church and State
By Dr. J. D. Watson
Pastor-Teacher
Grace Bible Church
Meeker, CO 81641
One of the most
frustrating aspects of American society is the blatant dishonesty of the liberal
news media. One of countless illustrations of this dishonesty is the twisting
of the principle of “separation of Church and State” to mean something that it
was NEVER intended to mean. I presented what follows in a sermon I preached on November
19, 2000 (Pilgrims on the Earth), but wanted to repeat
it here in case you might overlook that message. Feel free to distribute this.
It is a fact of American life nowadays
that anytime the Bible, Ten Commandments, or any moral standard based on
Scripture arises, the cry that immediately goes up is, “Oh, but that violates
the separation of church and state; the First Amendment prohibits religious
values in public affairs.” We have heard this rhetoric for decades, but
does the First Amendment really say that? The First Amendment reads
thusly:
Congress
shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the
free exercise thereof.
Not
only are the words “separation of church and state” not found in the First
Amendment, they do not appear in any
founding document. What then does the First Amendment mean?
The U.S. Congressional Records of June
7 through September 25, 1789— the dates in which the Founders framed the First
Amendment—clearly demonstrate the Founders’ intent. The Founders wanted to ensure
that what happened in England did not happen in America, namely, that the
federal government would not be allowed to establishment a national
denomination to the excluding of all others. The records show that in all the
discussions and early wordings of the First Amendment, the Founders used the
word “religion” interchangeably with the word “denomination.” They had absolutely no intention whatsoever
of excluding Biblical principles and religious values in public affairs.
Just one example of many is Fisher
Ames, who, according to the Congressional Record of September 20, 1789, was the
man who actually offered the final wording of the First Amendment. In an
article in a national magazine dated January 1801, Ames wrote of his concern
about all the new textbooks that were appearing. He said that while these are
good, the Bible still must never be replaced as the number one textbook in our
schools:
Why then, if these books for
children must be retained, as they will be, should not the Bible regain the
place it once held as a school book? Its morals are pure, its examples
captivating and noble.
So,
the Bible did not violate Fisher Ames’ view of the First Amendment. Several
other Founding Fathers, such as Benjamin Rush, Noah Webster, John Adams, and
George Washington all warned that removing religious and moral principles from
the classroom would result in serious social problems. And this is precisely
what has happened in America.
From where, then, does the phrase
“separation of church and state” come? It first appeared in a letter written by
Thomas Jefferson in 1801, who was then President. This letter was a reply to
the Danbury Baptist Association of Danbury, Connecticut, who heard a rumor that
the Congregationalist denomination was going to be made the national religion
and wrote Jefferson in protest. In his reply, Jefferson assured them that they
should have no fear of this because:
. . . I
contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people
which declared that their legislation should “make no law respecting an
establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof” [i.e., The
First Amendment], thus building a wall of separation between church and state. [The Writings of Thomas Jefferson,
Memorial Edition (Washington: The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association of the
United States, 1903), pp. 281-282.]
The
context and intent of Jefferson’s letter had nothing whatsoever to do with
removing the Bible and morality from government, rather it dealt with the
original intent of the First Amendment, namely, that there would never be a
national denomination.
But in spite of these historical
facts, in 1962 the phrase “separation of church and state” was ripped
completely from its context and intent. On June 25, 1962, in the court case Engel
v. Vitale, the Supreme Court used that phrase to redefine “church.” For
170 years before this case, the court defined “church” as being a federally
established denomination, but it now meant any religious activity
performed in public. And as we’ve seen, this ruling set America on her downward
course.
The facts are that the intent of the
Founding Fathers was never, never, NEVER to
separate God and government. They believed that God must be at the center of
government. Tragically that is not the case today and we see the results.