Issue Position: Secular Values versus Religious Values

Issue Position

'm an advocate for the "wall of separation between church and state". If you think this phrase is in the US Constitution, you would be wrong. It comes from a letter written by Thomas Jefferson to the Danbury Baptist Association. In this letter he was explaining how the First Amendment protected their religious freedoms by the state remaining secular and not intruding into their theology and that the government, to be neutral to all citizens, should not be invaded with religion. When this letter was written, the Baptists were in a minority and were afraid the Catholics would take over the government and make laws harmful to the Baptists.

The concept of separating church and state is often credited to the writings of English philosopher John Locke (1632--1704). According to his principle of the social contract, Locke argued that the government lacked authority in the realm of individual conscious, as this was something rational people could not cede to the government for it or others to control. For Locke, this created a natural right in the liberty of conscience, which he argued must therefore remain protected from any government authority. These views on religious tolerance and the importance of individual conscience, along with his social contract, became particularly influential in the American colonies and the drafting of the United States Constitution.

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