New Preamble to the Constitution

Some people are physically wounded by swear words. It may very well be quite real, Annie.

 

Boy, you guys are really making me do my homework. Fortunately I have an extensive library and "Bookmarks" list to fall back on.



It is not my intent to inflame the debate, simply adding clarification.

Besides, Tango asked!

As stated above the founding fathers had come from Europe where only state approved churches were allowed to operate and the people were forced to attend and submit to. The battle between Catholicism and Protestantism had been raging for many centuries prior to the creation of the United States. The founders of this new and radical form of self governance were determined to restrict the state from forcing adherence to any one "Church" or denomination.

Amendment I​

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for redress of grievances."

1. Words "separation of church and state" are not in the First Amendment.

2. The 56 founding fathers never mentioned even once during the framing of the First Amendment (June 7 - September 25, 1789) a "separation of church and state." (See Congressional Record.)

3. The same day Congress passed the First Amendment (Sept. 25, 1789); they approved a resolution requesting President George Washington to proclaim "...a day of public thanksgiving and prayer...."

4. Thomas Jefferson wrote this phrase, "thus building a wall of separation between church and State...." on January 1, 1802, (11 years after the First Amendment was ratified) in a private letter to the Danbury Baptist Association to assure them that the federal government could not and would not try to establish a national denomination. Jefferson was an ambassador in France during the time of the Constitutional Convention.

However, while President of the United States, Thomas Jefferson was
also made president of the Washington, DC public school system in which he placed the Bible and the Isaac Watt's hymnal as the two primary reading texts!

Jefferson's phrase was used only twice by the U.S. Supreme Court from 1802 to 1947; and it was not until 1947 (Everson case) that it was taken out of context and given a meaning never intended (first use was 1878 in Reynolds case).


<DIR>"In matters of religion, I have considered that its free exercise is placed by the Constitution independent
of the powers of the General [federal] Government."


<DIR><DIR>(Thomas Jefferson, 1805, in his second Inaugural Address.)


</DIR>
"There is not a shadow of right in the general [federal] government to intermeddle with religion....This
subject is, for the honor of America, perfectly free and unshackled."


<DIR>(The Writings of James Madison, Vol. 5, pp. 176, 132.)


</DIR></DIR></DIR>5. Applies to Congress, not the states.

6. First English language Bible printed in America was by Congress in 1782 "for use of schools."

7. The founding fathers gave speeches, read from the Bible, and prayed at public school graduations.

8. The U.S. Capitol was used as a church building by the founding fathers.

9. Founding father judges had prayer in their court rooms with the jurors.

10. A view from the Washington Monument forms a perfect cross.
　
　
　
　
The words separation of church and state don't appear in any official government documents authored by the founding fathers. This concept and these particular words were invented by an ACLU attorney named Leo Pfeffer in 1947 in the Supreme Court case of Everson versus Board of Education of Ewing Township. That liberal supreme court imposed it on the nation by a 5 to 4 vote. The ACLU and other anti-Christian organizations and individuals have used it to harass Christians with ever since. It is also used by evolutionists to try to keep a theistic explanation of origins out of the public schools. Many young people today are not aware of the fact that this concept is an ACLU invention, and that it is the extreme opposite of what our founding fathers actually intended. In other words, there is virtually no constitutional support whatsoever for it. Let's examine two of the most common myths about the founding fathers that most public school students are being taught today because of the history revisionists.
　
Myth #1: Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptists is the basis for separation of church and state
Some misguided people try to claim that this quote from Thomas Jefferson establishes the "separation of church and state" that we now have today:


<DIR>"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God; that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship; that the legislative powers of government reach actions only and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church and State". <SUP>1</SUP>


</DIR>The first problem with that assertion is that this quote is not from an official government document. The second is that it was Jefferson's original intent that this meant that the church was to be protected from the government, not the reverse (which is the case today).
　
27 of the 56 founding fathers had Christian seminary degrees
　

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The Facts
Of Separation​

Fact: The Constitution does not separate Church and State. The Constitution is Christian but does not speak to religion because it is non-denominational. A Presbyterian state, Anglican state, Con- gregational state, Baptist state and even a Quaker state joined together with other Christian states to establish a Christian nation.

Fact: The Bill of Rights does not separate church and state. The Bill of Rights restricts the Federal government and even the States but not the individual or the church.

So how did this separation of church and state myth originate? In 1947, in the case Everson v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court declared, "The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach."

This faulty idea of separation of church and state does not come from any lawful document but is taken from a letter written by Thomas Jefferson to the Baptist Association of Danbury. Most courts had treated it exactly as it was — a private personal letter.

However, there was one previous court before 1947 that quoted the letter. In 1878 after publishing the entire letter and not just the eight-word phrase the Court stated:

"Coming as this does from an acknowledged leader of the advocates of the measure, it [Jefferson’s letter] may be accepted almost as an authoritative declaration of the scope and effect of the Amendment thus secured. Congress was deprived of all legislative power over mere [religious] opinion, but was left free to reach actions which were in violation of social duties or subversive of good order."

They concluded with these words:

"[T]he rightful purposes of civil government are for its officers to interfere when principles break out into overt acts against peace and good order. In th[is] . . . is found the true distinction between what properly belongs to the church and what to the State."

What the Danbury Baptist and many others were concerned about was the establishment of a state church. The First Amendment was not to keep this from being a Christian nation, keep State governments from promoting Christianity and the Bible but to keep every recognized historical denomination equal. Therefore, one denomination could not gain control and persecute the others.

Chief Justice Rehnquist wrote in is dissent in Wallace v. Jaffree:

"There is simply no historical foundation for the proposition that the Framers intended to build the 'wall of separation' that was constitutionalized in Everson. But the greatest injury of the 'wall' notion is the mischievous diversion of judges from the actual intentions of the drafters of the Bill of Rights.[N]o amount of repetition of historical errors in judicial opinions can make the errors true. The ‘wall of separation between church and state’ is a metaphor based on bad history, a metaphor which has proved useless as a guide to judging. It should be frankly and explicitly abandoned."

The "separation of church and state" in Jefferson’s letter nor the "freedom of religion" in the First Amendment does not advocate secularism nor pluralism. It is a myth which has been designed to remove Christianity from national power.






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To be fair, I completely agree with MM's post -but bear in mind that not all of our forefathers were of the same mind as Jefferson. There were quite a few who fought tooth and nail to have just that single phrase included in the constitution, which by all measures DOES limit the government from establishing a religious base for control.

The general idea was to not stand in the way of the individual's freedom of religion without granting any similar privilege to the government at the same time. If, for instance, the *majority* were to ever conceive that their religion must become mandatory prerequisite for inclusion to a political party *cough conservatives*, then the power of religious conviction will certainly make any logical debate (i.e., there is no God unless you can prove it, as I cannot disprove a negative) useless. Added to this, the religious-political movements would undoubtedly grant their political masters extreme power to do whatever they choose (Bush Dynasty) without accountability.

Thank you 700 Club and Pat Robertson for proving beyond a shadow of a doubt just how controlling your brainwashing schemes really can become, and how it managed to win Slavery, Incorporated the White House on at least two occasions thus far.

Weep for your nation, People.