The South hopes to ultimately win the Civil War(because in the southerner’s psyche, the Civil Wart is ongoing) by the “southernization” of the United States; that is, to impose southern values as exemplified in Southern Baptist theology and southern culture. Real smart, but we know what’s up. Roger Williams would be shocked, if he were living today, and witnessed the present state of the Baptist Denomination. Roger Williams who was a Baptist, was the major Christian voice for the separation of church and state.
“The United States is a Christian nation.” If I had a nickel for
every time I’ve heard this statement at a religious Right meeting or in
the media, I wouldn’t be rich—but I’d probably have enough to buy a
really cool iPad. The assertion is widely believed by followers of the
religious Right and often repeated—and, too often, it seeps into the
beliefs of the rest of the population as well. But like other myths that
are widely accepted (you use only 10 percent of your brain, vitamin C
helps you get over a cold, and the like), it lacks a factual basis.Over
the years, numerous scholars, historians, lawyers, and judges have
debunked the “Christian nation” myth. Yet it persists. Does it have any
basis in American history? Why is the myth so powerful? What
psychological need does it fill?I’m not a lawyer, and my research
in this area has been influenced and informed by scholars who have done
much more in- depth work. The problem with some of this material, great
as it is,is that it tends to be—how shall I say this politely?—’dense.’
If I were a lawyer (the kind found on television dramas, not a real
one), I would present the case against the Christian nation myth in a
handful of easily digestible informational nuggets. Swallow them, and
you’ll be armed for your next confrontation with Cousin Lloyd who sends
money to Pat Robertson.There are essentially five arguments that
refute the Christian nation myth. I’m going to outline them here and
then take a look at the history of the myth. From there, we’ll briefly
examine the myth’s enduring legacy and how it still affects politics and
public policy today.1. The Text of the Constitution Does Not Say the United States Is a Christian Nation
If
a Christian nation had been the intent of the founders, they would have
put that in the Constitution, front and center. Yet the text of the
Constitution contains no references to God, Jesus Christ, or
Christianity. That document does not state that our country is an
officially Christian nation.Not only does the Constitution not
give recognition or acknowledgment to Christianity, but it also includes
Article VI, which bans “religious tests” for public office.
Guaranteeing non-Christians the right to hold federal office seems
antipodal to an officially Christian nation. The language found in
Article VI sparked some controversy, and a minority faction that favored
limiting public office to Christians (or at least to believers)
protested. Luther Martin, a Maryland delegate, later reported that some
felt it “would be at least decent to hold out some distinction between
the professors of Christianity and downright infidelity or paganism.”
But, as Martin noted, the article’s language was approved “by a great
majority … without much debate.” The Christian nation argument just
wasn’t persuasive.In addition, the First Amendment bars all laws
“respecting an establishment of religion” and protects “the free
exercise thereof.” Nothing here indicates that the latter provision
applies only to Christian faiths.Finding no support for their ideas in
the body of the Constitution, Christian-nation advocates are left to
point to other documents, including the Declaration of Independence.
This also fails. The Declaration’s reference to “the Creator” is plainly
deistic. More obscure documents such as the Northwest Ordinance or
personal writings by various framers are interesting historically but do
not rise to the level of governance documents. When it comes to
determining the manner of the U.S. government, only the Constitution
matters. The Constitution does not declare that the United States is a
Christian nation. This fact alone is fatal to the cause of Christian
nation advocates.2. The Founders’ Political Beliefs Would Not Have Led Them to Support the Christian-Nation Idea
Key
founders such as James Madison and Thomas Jefferson opposed mixing
church and state. They would never have supported an officially
Christian nation.Jefferson and Madison came to this opposition in
two ways. First, they were well-versed in history and understood how
the officially Christian governments of Europe had crushed human
freedom. Moreover, they knew about the constant religious wars among
rival factions of Christianity. Second, they had witnessed religious
oppression in the colonies firsthand.Remember, Madison was
inspired to fight for church-state separation and religious liberty
because he had witnessed the jailing of dissenting ministers in
Virginia. Madison and other founders wrote frequently about the dangers
of governments adopting religion; they often worked alongside clergy who
made similar arguments. John Leland, a Massachusetts pastor and
powerful advocate for church-state separation, said it best: “The notion
of a Christian commonwealth should be exploded forever.”Jefferson’s
Virginia Statue for Religious Liberty, which many scholars consider a
precursor to the First Amendment, guaranteed religious freedom for
everyone, Christian and non-Christian. Attempts to limit its protections
to Christians failed, and Jefferson rejoiced.In his famous
“Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments” Madison
observed, “Torrents of blood have been spilt in the old world, by vain
attempts of the secular arm, to extinguish Religious discord, by
proscribing all difference in Religious opinion.”In his Notes on
Virginia Jefferson observed, “The legitimate powers of government extend
to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury
for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither
picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.”Alexander Hamilton, writing in
“Federalist No. 69,” speaks bluntly to the religious duties of the U.S.
president: There aren’t any. In this essay, Hamilton explains how the
American president would differ from the English king, outlining several
key differences between the two. He writes: “The one has no particle of
spiritual jurisdiction; the other is the supreme head and governor of
the national church!”3. The Key Founders Were Not Conservative Christians and Likely Would Not Have Supported an Officially Christian Nation
To
hear the religious Right tell it, men such as George Washington, John
Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison were eighteenth-century
versions of Jerry Falwell in powdered wigs and stockings. This is
nonsense.The religious writings of many prominent founders sound
odd to today’s ears because these works reflect Deism, a theological
system of thought that has since fallen out of favor. Deists believed in
God but didn’t necessarily see him as active in human affairs. The god
of the Deists was a god of first cause: he set things in motion and then
stepped back.Although nominally an Anglican, George Washington
often spoke in deistic terms. His god was a “supreme architect” of the
universe. Washington saw religion as necessary for good and moral
behavior but didn’t necessarily accept all Christian dogma. He seemed to
have a special gripe against Communion and would usually leave services
before it was offered.Washington is the author of one of the
great classics of religious liberty—the letter to Touro Synagogue
(1790). In this letter, Washington assures America’s Jews that they
would enjoy complete religious liberty—not mere toleration—in the new
nation. He outlines a vision not of a Christian nation but of a
multi-faith society where all are free to practice as they will:The
Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud
themselves for giving to Mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal
policy: a policy worthy of imitation… . All possess alike liberty of
conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that
toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of
people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural
rights. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to
bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that
they who live under its protection, should demean themselves as good
citizens.John Adams was a Unitarian. He rejected belief in the
Trinity and the divinity of Jesus, core concepts of Christian dogma. In
his personal writings, Adams made it clear that he considered the
concept of the divinity of Jesus incomprehensible.In February of
1756, Adams wrote in his diary about a discussion he had had with a man
named Major Greene. Greene was a devout Christian who sought to persuade
Adams to adopt conservative Christian views. The two argued over the
divinity of Jesus. When questioned on the matter, Greene fell back on an
old standby: some matters of theology are too complex and mysterious
for human understanding.Adams was not impressed. In his diary he writes, “Thus mystery is made a convenient cover for absurdity.”
Jefferson’s
skepticism of traditional Christianity is well known. Our third
president did not believe in the Trinity, the virgin birth, the divinity
of Jesus, the resurrection, original sin, and other core Christian
doctrines. Jefferson once famously observed to Adams: “And the day will
come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his
father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the
generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter.”Although not an
orthodox Christian, Jefferson admired Jesus as a moral teacher. He even
edited the New Testament, cutting away the stories of miracles and
divinity and leaving behind a very human Jesus, whose teachings
Jefferson found “sublime.”Perhaps the most enigmatic of the
founders was Madison. To this day, scholars still debate his religious
views. Some of his biographers believe that Madison, nominally Anglican,
was really a Deist. Notoriously reluctant to talk publicly about his
religious beliefs, Madison was perhaps the strictest church-state
separa- tionist among the founders, opposing not only chaplains in
Congress and the military but also government prayer proclamations. As
president, he vetoed legislation granting federal land to a church as
well as a plan to have a church in Washington care for the poor. In each
case, he cited the First Amendment.4. Shortly After the Constitution Was Ratified, Conservative Ministers Attacked It Because It Lacked References to Christianity
Ministers
of the founding period knew that the Constitution didn’t declare the
United States officially Christian—and it made them angry.In
1793, just five years after the Constitution was ratified, the Reverend
John M. Mason of New York attacked that document in a sermon. Mason
called the lack of references to God and Christianity “an omission which
no pretext whatever can palliate.” He predicted that an angry God would
“overturn from its foundations the fabric we have been rearing and
crush us to atoms in the wreck.”Conservative pastors continued
whining well into the nineteenth century. In 1811, the Reverend Samuel
Austin thundered that the Constitution “is entirely disconnected from
Christianity. [This] one capital defect [will lead] inevitably to its
destruction.”In 1845, the Reverend D. X. Junkin wrote, “[The
Constitution] is negatively atheistical, for no God is appealed to at
all. In framing many of our public formularies, greater care seems to
have been taken to adapt them to the prejudices of the INFIDEL FEW, than
to the consciences of the Christian millions.”These eighteenth-
and nineteenth-century pastors knew that the Constitution was secular
and granted no preferences to Christianity. They considered that a
defect.5. During the Post-Civil War Period, a Band of
Politically Powerful Pastors Tried Repeatedly to Amend the U.S.
Constitution to Add References to Jesus Christ and ChristianityNineteenth-century
ministers knew that the Constitution was secular and that the nation
was not officially Christian. They sought to remedy that through an
amendment that would have rewritten the preamble to the Constitution.The
drive was led by the National Reform Association (NRA), a kind of early
religious Right organization that sought an officially Christian
America. This NRA had ambitious goals. It sought laws curtailing
commercial activity on Sunday, mandating Protestant worship in public
schools and censorship of material deemed sexually explicit or
blasphemous. (Thanks to the NRA, freethought societies of this period
often had difficulties mailing periodicals to supporters. The U.S.
Postal Service was under constant siege by the NRA.)The NRA was
successful in many of its legislative endeavors, but it was never able
to secure passage of the Christian nation amendment. The group’s
proposed preamble read as follows:We, the people of the United
States, humbly acknowledging Almighty God as the source of all authority
and power in civil government, the Lord Jesus Christ as the Ruler among
the nations, His revealed will as the supreme law of the land, in order
to constitute a Christian government, and in order to form a more
perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide
for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the
inalienable rights and blessings of life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness to ourselves, our posterity and all the people, do ordain and
establish this Constitution of the United States of America.Congress
did consider the amendment, but the House Judiciary Committee voted it
down in 1874, declaring its awareness of the dangers of putting
“anything into the Constitution or frame of government which might be
construed to be a refer- ence to any religious creed or doctrine.” The
proposal was reintroduced several times after that; in fact, versions of
it were still appearing in Congress as late as 1965.While the
NRA was never successful in getting the Christian nation amendment
passed, the group had better luck with another policy objective: adding
“In God We Trust” to coins. That practice was codified in the North
during the Civil War.Obviously, there would have been no need to
amend the Constitution to declare America officially Christian if the
document already said as much. But it didn’t, which is why the NRA felt
so strongly about its emendation.The Origins of the Christian-Nation Myth
This
last point provides the key to understanding the staying power of the
Christian-nation myth. The myth’s origins go back not to the founding
period but to a much different time in history—the post-Civil War era.During
this period, the country came as close it ever would to being
officially Christian. Many laws did reflect the tenets of that faith.
For example, books, magazines, and even stage productions were banned if
they were deemed insulting to the Christian faith. Protestant prayer
and worship were common in many public schools. Laws curtailed Sunday
commerce. Even the Supreme Court flirted with the Christian-nation
concept in its infamous decision in the Holy Trinity case.The
post-Civil War era was also a period of great social upheaval. The end
of slavery in the South created dislocation and confusion, which left
people grasping for answers in the chaos. Other social changes loomed.
Late in the century, women began advocating for the right to vote. Not
surprisingly, some people reacted to these changes by latching onto
reactionary religious views.Despite the social unrest,
in many ways this period of history is the religious Right’s ideal
society. Think about it: public schools were pushing conservative forms
of Protestantism. Religiously based censorship was common. All people
were required to abide by a set of laws based on Christian principles,
with the government playing the role of theological enforcer.
Significantly, this was also a time of rigidly enforced gender roles and
official policies of racial segregation.Many of these
principles still inspire the religious Right’s agenda today. So when
religious Right leaders or television preachers hearken back to our days
as a Christian nation, remember that they are not talking about the
founding period. What they long for is a return to an aberrant era in
late-nineteenth- century America.The attempt to
“19th-century-ize” modern America continues into the present. It’s not
uncommon to hear the Christian-nation myth invoked in battles over
religion in public schools, displays of religious signs and symbols on
public property, and other church-state disputes. It has also been
raised in questions dealing with tax aid to religious groups through
school vouchers and “faith-based” initiatives. The argument is that it’s
only to be expected that large amounts of taxpayer money will end up in
the coffers of Christian groups because we are, after all, a Christian
nation.The myth also feeds several psychological
needs. It assures religious Right supporters who fear the pace of social
change that things like same-sex marriage and the rise of secularists
are aberrations that run counter to the “real” Christian nature of the
country. It also invokes a “stolen legacy” myth—the idea that a grand
and glorious history (in this case, a Christian one) exists but that it
is being covered up or denied by usurpers who seek to suppress the
nation’s history as part of a power grab.The
Christian-nation myth also has political ramifications. Put simply, it
is often used to motivate people to vote a certain way. Increasingly,
the theocrats of the Far Right are assailing what they call the “secular
Left,” an all-purpose bogeyman guilty of many crimes, including denying
the Christian-nation idea.But the myth is by no means
limited to the religious Right. Polls show great confusion in this
area: in 2007, for example, 55 percent of respondents told the First
Amendment Center they believed the Constitution establishes America as
an officially Christian nation.Misinformation like
this has especially bad consequences for secular humanists. The myth
promotes the pernicious idea that non-Christians are second-class
citizens in “Christian America.” It leads to the idea that the law
mandates only a grudging tolerance of nonbelievers rather than what the
Constitution really extends: full and equal rights to all Americans,
regardless of what they do or do not believe.That the
Christian-nation myth has many supporters among the religious Right
doesn’t mean it has validity. It is, in fact, a form of “historical
creationism” that mainstream scholars have repeatedly shown to be
fallacious. But, like “scientific creationism,” the Christian-nation
myth still has great power and wide acceptance. Humanists must
confront—and debunk—the myth wherever it appears.
Rob Boston is the assistant
director of communications for Americans United for Separation of Church
and State, which publishes Church and State magazine.
5 Reasons America Is Not—And Has Never Been—A Christian Nation
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