Chronology of 1st Amendment Debate

On September 25, 1789, The Congress of the United States voted on the final version of the first ten amendments to the Constitution known as the Bill of Rights.

“Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

On June 8, 1789, the initial draft of the First Amendment was proposed by James Madison.

"The civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretext, infringed.”

The House Select Committee, after a great deal of discussion revised the wording of the proposed amendment.

“No religion shall be established by law, nor shall the equal rights of conscience be infringed.”

Peter Sylvester, Representative of New York, objected to the Select Committee’s version.

“It might be thought to have a tendency to abolish religion altogether.”

James Madison proposed the insertion of the word “national” before the word “religion” but was rejected. Madison’s interpretation of the wording of the amendment was as follows:

“That Congress should not establish a religion, and enforce the legal worship of it by law, nor compel men to worship God in any way manner contrary to their conscience.”

Congressman Huntington suggested:

"The amendment be made in such a way as to secure the rights of religion, but not to patronize those who professed no religion at all.”

Roger Sherman opposed the ratification of an amendment. He believed the federal government was not to any say in what was under the jurisdiction of the states.

Madison realized that Congressman Benjamin Huntington:

“…apprehended the meaning of the words to be, that Congress should not establish a religion and enforce the legal observation of it by law, nor compel men to worship God in any manner contrary to their conscience.”

Madison agreed with Congressmen Huntington and Sylvester and responded:

“…believes that the people feared one sect might obtain a preeminence, or two (Congregational and Anglican) combine and establish a religion to which they would compel others to conform.”

On August 15, 1789, Samuel Livermore of New Hampshire proposed the following wording of the proposed amendment:

“Congress shall make no laws touching religion, or infringing the rights of conscience.”

The House agreed and accepted the first five words of his version.

Fisher Ames of Massachusetts, on August 20, 1789, introduced the language:

“Congress shall make no law establishing religion, or to prevent the free exercise thereof, or to infringe the rights of conscience.”

The House accepted the proposal and delivered it to the Senate for discussion and debate. The Senate proposed several versions in succession on September 3, 1789.

"Congress shall not make any law infringing the rights of conscience, or establishing any religious sect or society.”

“Congress shall make no law establishing any particular denomination or religion in preference to another, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, nor shall the rights of conscience be infringed.”

“Congress shall make no law establishing one religious society in preference to others, or to infringe on the rights of conscience.”

On September 3, 1789, the Senate finally accepted this version at the close of the day:

“Congress shall make no law establishing religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

The Senate agreed on the subsequent version on September 9, 1789.

“Congress shall make no law establishing articles of faith or a mode of worship, or prohibiting the free exercise of religion.”

The proposal was sent to a joint committee of the Senate and House to reconcile differences.

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

On December 15, 1791, The Bill of Rights was ratified by the states. This was a declaration of what the federal government was forbidden to do; leaving the individual states free within each of their state constitutions.

“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 of the right of the people to peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

The Separation of Church and State

Constitution of the United Soviet Socialist Republic (1922-1991) declared:

“Article 124: In order to ensure to citizens freedom of conscience, the church in the U.S.S.R is separated from the State, and the school from the church.”

Constitution of the United States of America (June 21, 1788 - ) By June 21, 1788, nine of the states had ratified the Constitution, establishing the Constitution.

“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 of the right of the people to peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

Supreme Court of New York 1958, declared in the case Baer v. Kolmorgen, 181 N.Y.S. 2d. 230, 237 (Sup. Ct. N.Y. 1958):

“Much has been written in recent years concerning Thomas Jefferson’s reference in 1802 to ‘a wall of separation between church and State.’ …Jefferson’s figure of speech has received so much attention that one would almost think at times that it is to be found somewhere in our Constitution.”

Roger Williams (1603-1683) was the “Father of Rhode Island” and founder of Providence and Rhode Island Plantations. He founded the town of Providence in 1636 on land given to him by the Narragansett Indians. Providence, Rhode Island was the first place in world history where freedom to worship was separated from the control of the state. Williams organized the First Baptist Church in the New World. A founding principal of Providence was that the state could not interfere or restrict free and open worship of God according to the Bible. The Charter of Rhode Island was granted to Roger Williams in July of 1663 by King Charles II.

“That they, pursueing, with peaceable and loyall mindes, sober, serious and religious intentions…in the holie Christian faith…a most flourishing civil state may stand and best bee maintained…grounded upon gospel principles.”

Roger Williams declared in a message:

“When they have opened a gap in the hedge or wall of separation between the garden of the church and the wilderness of the world, God hath ever broken down the wall itself…And that there fore if He will eer please to restore His garden and paradise again, it must of necessity be wall in peculiarly unto Himself from the world…”

On January 1, 1802 Jefferson wrote to the Danbury Baptist Association of Danbury Connecticut. Jefferson wrote to calm their fears that Congress was not in the process of choosing a single Christian denomination to become the “state” denomination as in the case of Anglican England and Virginia. The Baptists has suffered severe persecution for their faith. Jefferson borrowed a phrase from the Baptist minister Roger Williams. As I cited previously, Williams declared, “the hedge or wall of separation between the garden of the church and the wilderness of the world, God hath ever broken down the wall…”

Thomas Jefferson declared:

“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies soley between a man and his God, that he owes account to none other for faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with solemn 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.”

Consequently, Jefferson assured the Danbury Baptists in this personal letter that the Federal Government was forbidden to interfere with, or in any way control, the decisions and religious affairs of the American churches.

Thomas Jefferson was not a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1787 nor did he sign the Constitution of the delegates to the convention. Jefferson wasn’t present when religious freedom and the First Amendment was debated in the first session of Congress in 1789. Jefferson was the Minister to France when these events occurred. Jefferson heard neither the debates nor the comments made by the Founders regarding the First Amendment. Thus, Jefferson relied on 2nd hand information concerning what transpired during the first session of Congress. Jefferson’s letter to the Danbury Baptist was written 13 years after the First Amendment. Consequently, Jefferson’s letter to the Baptists is ineligible to be considered as a “first-hand" account of what transpired and the intent of the framers of the First Amendment.

In Jefferson’s Second Inaugural Address he declared,

“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. I have therefore undertaken on no occasion to prescribe the religious exercises suited to it, but have left them, as the Constitution found them, under the direction and discipline of the church or state authorities acknowledged by the several religious societies.”

Jefferson correctly places the “wall of separation” surrounding the church; protecting it from infringements by the federal government.

As early as 1879, the Supreme Court declared Jefferson’s “wall of separation” phrase as “almost an authoritarian declaration of the scope and effect of the [First] Amendment.”

It is interesting that the Supreme Court used Jefferson’s “wall of separation” to justify removing prayer and Bible reading from the public schools.

As President of the United States Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809) chaired the school board of the District of Columbia. He authored the first plan of education adopted by the city of Washington D. C. His plan used the Holy Bible and Isaac Watts’ "Psalms, Hymns and Spiritual Songs", 1707 as the principal books to teaching reading to the students.

Jefferson was founder of the University of Virginia and recommended that students be permitted to meet together on the campus to pray and worship together. They were encouraged to meet and pray with their professors on campus.

Edward S. Corwin clearly indicates in “American Constitutional History” the purpose of the First Amendment to the Constitution was “to exclude from the national government all power to act on the subject…of religion.”

James Madison declared, “There is not a shadow of right in the general [federal] government to intermeddle with religion…the subject is, for the honor of America, perfectly free and unshackled. The government has no jurisdiction over it.”

Constitutional attorney, John W Whitehead declares,

“The First Amendment, therefore, provides freedom for the Christian religion, not freedom from religion.”

In a letter to Samuel Miller on January 23, 1808, Jefferson declared:

“I consider the government of the U.S. as interdicted [prohibited] by the Constitution from intermeddling with religious institutions, their doctrines, discipline, or exercises. This results not only from the provision that no law shall be made respecting the establishment, or free exercise, of religion, but from that also which reserves to the states the powers not delegated to the U.S. [10th Amendment].
Certainly no power to prescribe any religious exercise or to assume authority in religious discipline, has been delegated to the general government. It must then rest with the states as far as it can be in any authority.”

On June 12, 1823 Jefferson wrote a letter to Justice William Johnson regarding the meaning of the Constitution.

“On every question of construction, carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may ne squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed.”

Philosophic Basis of the 1st Amendment

Franky Schaeffer states:

“It has been convenient and expedient for the secular humanist, the materialist, the so-called liberal, the feminist, the genetic engineer, the bureaucrat, the Supreme Court justice, to use this arbitrary division between church and state as a ready excuse. It is used, as an easily identifiable rallying point, to subdue the opinions of that vast body of citizens who represent those with religious convictions.”

The framers of our Constitution provided the First Amendment specifically to limit the federal government in several areas concerning the basic rights of American citizens: freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and petition of grievances. The freedom of religion was paramount to the founders of our Republic under God. Religious freedom is the base for exercise of the other freedoms. Martin Luther’s assertion of the ‘priesthood of all believers’ came to be known as the liberty of conscience.

In "The Travail of Religious Freedom", Roland Bainton proclaims:

“…all freedoms hand together…Civil liberties scarcely thrive when religious liberties are disregarded, and the reverse is equally true. Beneath them all is a philosophy of liberty, which assumes a measure of variety in human behavior, honors integrity, respects the dignity of man, and seeks to exemplify the compassion of God.”

Eminent jurist James Kent declared in his classic work "Commentaries on American Law",

“The free exercise and enjoyment of religious profession and worship may be considered as one of the absolute rights of individuals, recognized in our…law.”

This was the heritage of the Reformation and was developed from William Blackstone by James Kent. Kent published his Commentaries adapting the title and structure parallel to Blackstone. They shared the same faith in the divine order of the law.

Although the Constitution makes no direct reference to God; it is technical document, a contract, an agreement, a covenant between the federal government and the people collectively in the states.

They did not want the federal government to have any authority over the church and religion. It incorporates the theistic principles of colonial constitutions and the Declaration of Independence.

Notice the term in the preamble to the Constitution, “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity”. The Constitution was ordained to “secure the blessings of liberty” that already existed in 1789. The liberties already existed in the state constitutions which were Christian.

“We…the people of Massachusetts, acknowledging with grateful gratitude hearts, the goodness of the great Legislator of the Universe, according us, in the course of His providence, an opportunity, deliberately and peaceably, without fraud, violence, or surprise, of entering into an Original, explicit, and Solemn Compact with each other…” Massachusetts Constitution of 1780.

The purpose of the 1st Amendment to the Constitution was to prevent the Federal Government from establishing a national church. James Madison declared that the 1st Amendment was ratified because the “people feared one sect might obtain preeminence, or two combine together, and establish a religion to which they would compel the others to conform.”

The philosophic base of the First Amendment is denominational-pluralism. The First Amendment protected a healthy coexistence of all Christian sects. This is not to be confused with the contemporary pluralism of our era which commands complete acceptance of all views including non-theistic world view of secular humanism. At the ratification of the First Amendment in 1791, several of the states were supporting a church or religion. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black acknowledged this fact in the 1962 Supreme Court decision banning prayer from public schools.

“Indeed, as late as the time of the Revolutionary War, there were established churches in at least eight of the thirteen former colonies and established religions in at least four of the other five.”

This continued into the early part of the nineteenth century. Massachusetts paid salaries to Congregational ministers until 1833. Although American states had Christianity as their foundation; it did not mean they were theocracies. (Theocracies are governments of state officials who are regarded as divinely guided.)

It meant that laws and civil government were based upon biblical principles. The state government did not tell how one should worship.

In 1785 session of the General Assembly of the State of Virginia, James Madison explained in "Religious Freedom, A Memorial and Remonstrance" why he was opposed to the establishment of religion by law.

“It is the duty of every man to render to the Creator such homage…Before any man can be considered as a member of Civil Society, he must be considered as a subject of the Governor of the Universe.”

“Because the policy of the bill is adverse to the diffusion of the light of Christianity. The first wish of those who ought to enjoy this precious gift, ought to be, that it may be imparted to the whole race of mankind. Compare the number of those who have as yet received it, with the number still remaining under the dominions of false religions, and how small is the former! Does the policy of the bill tend to lessen the disproportion? No; it at once discourages those who are strangers to the light of Truth, from coming into the region of it…”

Wilst we assert ourselves a freedom to embrace, to profess, and to observe the Religion which we believe to be of divine origin, we cannot deny an equal freedom to those whose minds have not yet yielded to the evidence which has convinced us. If this freedom be abused, it is an offence to God, not against man: To God, therefore, not to man, must an account of it be rendered.”

Earnestly praying, as we are in duty bound, that the Supreme Lawgiver of the Universe by illuminating those to whom it is addressed, may, on the one hand, turn their councils from every act which would affront His holy prerogative, or violate the trust committed to them; and, on the other, guide them into every measure which may be worthy of blessing.”

United States Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story declared in his work A Familiar Exposition of the Constitution of the United States, 1840:

“We are not to attribute this prohibition of a national religious establishment (in the First Amendment) to an indifference to religion in general, and especially to Christianity (which none could hold in more reverence than the framers of the Constitution)…
Probably, at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, and of the Amendment to it now under consideration, the general, if not the universal, sentiment in America was, that Christianity ought to receive encouragement from the State so far as was not incompatible with the private rights of conscience and the freedom of religious worship.
Any attempt to level all religions, and to make it a matter of state policy to hold all in utter indifference, would have created universal disapprobation, if not universal indignation...The real object of the amendment was not to countenance, much less to advance Mahometanism, or Judaism, or infidelity, by prostrating Christianity; but exclude all rivalry among Christian sects, and to prevent any national ecclesiastical establishment which should give to a hierarchy the exclusive patronage of the national government.”

Constitutional attorney John W. Whitehead declared,

“The Constitution separated the institution of the church from the institution of the state but not the Christian religion from the federal state – far less Christian individuals from any meaningful activity within the state and society at large.”

Therefore, the idea of a Christian being excluded from practicing his Christian principles except at home and in the church was unthinkable.

In the First Amendment, the word “Congress” means the Federal Government. The word “Respecting” is literally defined as “having anything to do with.” Historically the term “establishment” means “government support of a single church or government preference of one creed or denomination over another.”

In contemporary language as Attorney Whitehead declares the First Amendment would read:

“The federal government shall make no law having anything to do with supporting a national denominational church, or prohibiting the free exercise of religion.”

The word “religion” as used in the First Amendment was defined by the founders in terms of Judeo-Christian theism. James Madison termed “religion” as:

“Religion, or the duty we owe to our Creator, and manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence…”

Religion was to be protected by the First Amendment and had its reference point in God. The entire Bill of Rights were restraints and restrictions upon the Federal Government and not the state governments.

Shortly after the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment; the courts determined that the states should be restricted by the Bill of Rights. This is one of the greatest distortions of Constitutional doctrine.