There are groups called separationists, which continuously fight for the rights and freedoms of all Americans. The members of two well-known groups come from the Americans United and Citizens United. Both of these two groups are known to have stood up to fight for religious freedom and to avail of their Constitutional rights. It is the duty of every American citizen to be able to fully grasp the importance of keeping the laws of the land free from religious intervention. Thus, it is imperative for the citizens to realize what is at stake if both the state and the church will encroach on the boundaries of their inherent powers. The primary consideration in observing the separation of state and church is essentially for the purpose of protecting individual, local, and federal laws.
In the beginning, the founding framers of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights had the intention of imposing the separation of state and church for the sole purpose of protecting individual laws. For one, the American Civil Liberties Union had been considered as one of the main separationist groups which had engaged in extensive discussions to promote the legal strategies involving church and state cases that will require litigation.
Some experts have considered religious liberties and the rights of conscience to be sacred and inviolable (Walker, 2008, p. 693). In fact, scholars believed that religious liberty and the freedom of conscience should be highly revered and must not be under the direct control of any civil authority. The powers of the state and the church should remain untouchable by each of them. Therefore, there is a need to differentiate religious liberty and mere toleration since the latter can be considered to be a weasel word which follows that ideology that “Whatever Caesar had conceded, it also follows that Caesar should be allowed to cancel it” (Walker, 2008, p. 693).
During the late 18th century, historians wrote that some of the American dissenters revered religious liberty to be more compatible with their hopes for themselves and the strength of their Christian faith. Centuries ago, the idea of segregation of the church and the state represented extreme demarcation. In effect, there is a depiction that the church’s purity should be preserved and segregated from worldly desires (Hamburger, 2009, p.21).
Even the pre-democratic societies had been organized to conform to different modes of ruling as pointed out under medieval natural law. Under this ideology, it had been recognized that the model which follows the “participation” of the human mind in the eternal law is the one that should govern. However, modern liberty is mainly based on “separations, which means that local or state laws should be upheld without any interference of outside forces of the church and the clergy” (Hittinger, 2006, p. 52). In fact, there are some scholars who also believed that liberal democracy conforms to a constitutional setting which restricts political power, follows the legal order, and upheld human rights”(Albert, 2005, p.40). Such statement was highlighted in the Virginia Constitution of 1776, which became the initial permanent state constitution and espouses the idea that power is derived from the people and the reason for the existence of government that should work for the benefit of the people. In effect, the people have the power to reform or abolish the government when there is a clear showing that the government has failed to work for interest of the people (Levy, 1986).
Over the years, the federal laws had continuously evolved and remained protected by the Constitution by upholding the principle of separation of state and the church. The First Amendment of the US Constitution under the Bill of Rights provides that “No law should be passed by Congress that will prevent the establishment of religion, or prohibit any person or individual to freely exercise the right to believe and act on one’s belief (Dawson, 2008, p. 677).
The separation of the church and state can be traced back as early as 1872 during a court proceeding which presented valid arguments in favor of religion. These arguments which emphasized that fact that religion is not a part of the government, for it is voluntary and does not derive existence from police power or taxes in order to establish it (Dawson, 2008, p. 681). Furthermore, the federal government does not have jurisdiction over religion which means that it is not given the right to meddle with the affairs of the church.
While the argument of the separation of state and church continued to evolve over several centuries until the present day, the primary consideration is to uphold the freedoms and liberties of every American citizen to choose and practice their own religion. The separation of the affairs of the church and state of two different identities promotes the interest of the people and ensures that individual, local, and federal laws are protected. The separation of both church and state was established as a matter of patriotic faith and became the central tenet of the American constitution (Hamburger, 2009, p.481).
References:
Dawson, J. M. (2008). The Meaning of Separation of Church and State in the First Amendment. Journal of Church & State, 50(4), 677-681.
Hamburger, P. (2009). Separation of Church and State. London: Harvard University Press.
Hittinger, R. (2006). Dissecting a Democratic Illusion. A World Beyond Politics? A Defense of the Nation-State by Pierre Manent. Trans. Marc LePain. Princeton University Press, 50(4).
Levy, L. W. (1986). Constitutional History, 1776-1789. Society, 24(1), 30-39.
Walker, J. B. (2008). The Meaning of Separation of Church and State in the First Amendment. Journal of Church & State, 50(4), 693-696.
