Church and state: Always a good decision?

Samuel Adams

Samuel Adams: Always a good decision. You’ve heard the phrase before, but only in relation to a beer commercial. Few remember that Samuel Adams was one of our great founding fathers. Son of a merchant and brewer and cousin to President John Adams, Samuel was a renowned politician in his own right. As a member of the Massachusetts Assembly, he was the first to propose a continental congress of which he was later a member. He was a passionate advocate of independence and was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.

Last night, Glenn Beck used a quote from Adams on his program to describe tyranny and what happens when it runs amok. One particular sentence of that quote stood out: “The religion and public liberty of a people are intimately connected; their interest are interwoven, they cannot subsist separately; and therefore they rise and fall together.”

What was Adams talking about? He was talking about church and state and how they cannot be separated. The state of America is a mess right now and it comes on the heels of banning prayer and religious recognition in public places. People in this country have actually been arrested for praying, something our ancestors were persecuted for in other countries and was a prime motivator for them coming to America. Even children songs about Jesus are now being replaced with lyrics praising Barack Obama, while Obama himself snubbed this year’s National Prayer Day.

In the meantime, kids are beating each other to death with railroad ties in Chicago, and greed has put a stranglehold on our economy.

The other side of the argument suggests that if religion were more integrated in politics then religious persecution would prevail more and particular churches would influence our government and receive special favors. When John F. Kennedy, a Catholic, was elected, a number of people feared the Pope would then have control over the United States.

The church and state separation debate is rooted in an 1802 letter by Thomas Jefferson: “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 legitimate 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.”

The wall of separation Jefferson speaks of suggests the prohibition of establishing a state religion and that there should be no law preventing the citizenry from freely expressing their religion. How Jefferson would view the arrest of Americans for praying is left to our interpretation.

Those that believe the wall between church and state should be less pronounced point to a number of other quotes by our founding fathers who, while they did have their religious differences, believed they were being guided by a higher power to establish the United States of America:

James Madison: “It is impossible for the man of pious reflection not to perceive in it a finger of that Almighty hand which has been so frequently and signally extended to our relief in the critical stages of the revolution.”

Alexander Hamilton: “For my own part, I sincerely esteem it a system, which without the finger of God, never could have been suggested and agreed upon by such a diversity of interest.”

Benjamin Franklin: “All of us who were engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of a superintending providence in our favor. To that kind providence we owe this happy opportunity of consulting in peace on the means of establishing our future national felicity.”

Charles Pinckney: “When the great work was done and published, I was struck with amazement. Nothing less than the superintending Hand of Providence, that so miraculously carried us through the war … could have brought it about so complete, upon the whole.”

George Washington: “No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand, which conducts the affairs of men, more than the people of the United States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency.”

While Beck’s take on Samuel Adams was not a specific concern about church and state, the inclusion of it in relation to tyranny should enable us to examine this debate once again.

The full Samuel Adams quote: “Is it not high time for the people of this country explicitly to declare, whether they will be freemen or slaves? It is an important question which ought to be decided. It concerns us more than anything in this life. The salvation of our souls is interested in the event. For wherever tyranny is establish’d, immorality of every kind comes in like a torrent. It is in the interest of tyrants to reduce the people to ignorance and vice. For they cannot live in any country where virtue and knowledge prevail. The religion and public liberty of a people are intimately connected; their interest are interwoven, they cannot subsist separately; and therefore they rise and fall together. For this reason, it is always observable, that those who are combined to destroy the people’s liberties, practice every art to poison their morals. How greatly then does it concern us, at all events, to put a stop to the progress of tyranny.”