Separation of Church and State: Have We Misunderstood What the Founders Intended?

The phrase “separation of church and state” is one of those expressions that we have heard repeated so often that most people probably assume it is written somewhere in the Constitution. It isn’t. In fact, those words do not appear in the Constitution at all. What the First Amendment actually says is, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” That is a very different statement from the way the phrase is often used today.

What Does the Constitution Actually Say?

There are two ideas contained in that one sentence. Government may not establish religion, and government may not prohibit the free exercise of religion. We seem to hear a great deal about the first and not nearly as much about the second. The Founders had good reason to be concerned about an established religion. They knew the history of Europe and what could happen when the power of government and the authority of the church became intertwined. But protecting the country from a government-established religion was not the same thing as protecting the government from religious people. Somewhere along the way we seem to have confused the two.

Where Did the “Wall” Come From?

The phrase itself came from Thomas Jefferson in a letter he wrote to the Danbury Baptist Association in 1802. Jefferson spoke of the First Amendment as building a “wall of separation between Church & State.” That phrase has become far more famous than the letter itself, but the circumstances surrounding the letter are important. The Danbury Baptists were concerned about religious liberty and government interference in matters of faith. Jefferson was assuring them that the federal government had no authority to interfere with their religious exercise.

Over the years, however, the wall seems to have changed direction. What was used to reassure religious people that government would stay out of their churches is now sometimes used to tell religious people that they should stay out of government. I have a problem with that. If the wall exists to prevent government from establishing or controlling religion, then I am standing firmly behind it. I don’t want government deciding what Christians should believe, what pastors should preach or how churches should worship. But that is quite different from saying that a Christian must somehow leave his Christianity behind when he enters public life.

Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?

This is where both sides can get themselves into trouble. I am not suggesting that the United States was established as a Christian theocracy. It plainly was not. Nor were all of the Founders orthodox Christians. Thomas Jefferson, for example, held theological beliefs that were considerably different from historic Christianity, and we should be honest enough to acknowledge that. But we should be equally honest about the other side of the historical record. Christianity had an enormous influence upon the culture in which America was founded. Biblical thought, Christian morality, natural law and belief in a Creator were deeply embedded in the intellectual and moral world of the time.

George Washington made an interesting statement in his Farewell Address. He said, “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.” Indispensable is a strong word. He didn’t say religion was something the new Republic would reluctantly tolerate as long as it remained safely behind church doors. He regarded religion and morality as necessary supports for the political health of the country. Yet at the same time, Article VI of the Constitution specifically says that “no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”

Those two ideas are not contradictory. The Founders could believe that religion and morality were essential to the character of a free people while also believing that government had no business establishing a national church or requiring a particular religious belief as a condition for public office. That seems to me to be a remarkably sensible balance.

Religious Freedom Must Work Both Ways

Religious freedom cannot be freedom for some and restriction for others. It protects the Muslim who wants to practice Islam, the Jew who wants to practice Judaism, and the atheist who wants nothing whatsoever to do with religion. Surely, then, it also protects the Christian who wants to live openly as a Christian. A Christian does not stop being a Christian when he walks into a voting booth. He does not stop being a Christian when he serves in public office, teaches in a school, runs a business or enters into a public discussion about the direction of the country. Nor should he be expected to.

Every one of us carries a worldview into public life. The atheist does. The secularist does. The conservative does. The progressive does. There is no such thing as a completely neutral human being who arrives at a political opinion without values, assumptions and beliefs. So why should the Christian be expected to put his convictions into a box before participating in society? If one person may vote according to a worldview that excludes God, surely another person may vote according to a worldview that includes Him. That isn’t theocracy. That is freedom.

What About the Treaty of Tripoli?

There is another part of the historical record that needs to be acknowledged because it is frequently raised in this discussion. The Treaty of Tripoli, ratified in 1797, contains the statement that “the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian Religion.” Those words are there, and there is no point pretending otherwise simply because they may be inconvenient to one side of the argument. But look at the setting in which they were written. The United States was dealing with a Muslim nation and making clear that America was not an ecclesiastical Christian government engaged in a religious war against Islam.

I have no problem with that. I don’t want a government-controlled church. I don’t want politicians deciding Christian doctrine, Washington appointing pastors, or government deciding what may or may not be preached from the pulpit. History gives us plenty of examples of what happens when government begins controlling religion. But surely the same principle must work in the opposite direction.

The Wall Has Two Sides

If government should not control the Church, then government should not silence the Church either. There is a great difference between preventing the establishment of religion and demanding the absence of religion. Government can pass laws, but it cannot create character. It can punish dishonesty, but it cannot make a dishonest man honest. It can prosecute violence, but it cannot produce love. It can regulate behavior, but it cannot change the human heart. Somewhere the Founders understood that a free society cannot survive on law alone. It ultimately depends upon the character of the people who live under those laws.

So yes, I believe in the separation of church and state. I don’t want the Church running the government and I certainly don’t want the government running the Church. What I question is the idea that separation of church and state somehow means separation of faith and citizenship, or that biblical conviction has no legitimate place in public life. Those are two completely different things.

Perhaps the real question is not whether there should be a wall between church and state, but what that wall was intended to accomplish. Was it intended to keep religion away from government, or government away from religion? Or was the genius of the First Amendment that it protected both?

We have repeated the phrase “separation of church and state” for so long that I wonder whether we have stopped asking what it actually means. Maybe it is time we went back and read the First Amendment again.

I would be interested to hear what you think.