“separation of church and state”
If anyone can, please indicate in which of our founding documents, such as either the United States Constitution or the Declaration of Independence or any other founding document, this expression will be found.
Oh, wait a minute. Don’t bother, because you cannot. It is from a congratulatory letter from Thomas Jefferson to the Danbury Baptist Association in Connecticut.
While there are certainly varying interpretations of this letter, (I would argue that Jefferson did not have the intent that judicial activists believe.) two facts are incontrovertible. Nowhere in any founding document do these words appear. Second, the U.S. Constitution only states that there will be no official state religion such as they had in England, and that the government cannot interfere in the free exercise of religion.
Of course the expression “separation of church and state” is drilled into the heads of practically every public school pupil as if they came directly from the U.S. Constitution.
The current attempt to erase all religious symbols from public venues has no constitutional basis. The only reason this expression is so often quoted, is because judicial activists have to have something to base their actions upon. Hence,they rely on an obscure Jeffersonian letter.
Who knows, maybe they can get San Francisco renamed. The very fact of this name must mean that Catholicism is the official religion of this incredibly wonderful city.
