Separation of Church and State

Original Intent of the First Amendment
   

The words "Separation of Church and State" are NOT FOUND in any American Founding Document.

"[In] the Congressional Records from June 7th through September 25th, 1789 (when they framed the first amendment) the founders explained clearly and succinctly that all they wanted to preclude what they had experienced in Great Britain. They did not want the establishment by the Federal Government of one single domination and the exclusion of all others. There is not going to be, by government decree, one national denomination in America. This is why the wording in the first amendment prevents Congress from the establishment of religion, or in the words proposed by James Madison, the chief architect of the constitution, "the establishment of a national religion."[48]

The records show a dozen or so iterations which they, themselves, proposed.[48]

•Original version proposed in the Senate on September 3rd, 1789: "Congress shall not make any law establishing any religious denomination."
•Second version: "Congress shall not make any law establishing any particular denomination."
•Third version: "Congress shall not make any law establishing any particular denomination in preference to others."
•Final version, passed on that day: "Congress shall make no law establishing religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof . . ." agreed upon by the house and the senate. In their words, the word religion was interchangeable with the word denomination.

The First Amendment denied Congress the power of establishing any particular religion or restricting the free exercise of any religion. The people and statesmen who gave us the First Amendment did not want a union of church and state in the sense of a national established church. But neither did they want to divorce Christianity from our national counsels, fundamental law, or laws made pursuant to the Constitution. ... They wanted a separation of church and state without a separation of Christianity and civil government, law or public life.[21]

The Separation of Church and State never meant to separate God from government — Chief Justice Roy Moore, Alabama[23]

"No religious establishment by law exists among us. The conscience is left free from all restraint, and each is permitted to worship his maker after his own judgment. The offices of government are open alike to all. The Mohammedan, if he will come to live among us would have the privilege guaranteed to him by the constitution to worship according to the Koran; and the East Indian might erect a shrine to Brahma if it so pleased him. Such is the spirit of toleration inculcated by our political institutions." — John Tyler, 10th President of the US[22]

  
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