Why is America Cowering to the ACLU?

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Why is America Cowering to the ACLU?

Separation of Church and State - Is A Myth

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has launched an all out

assault against our "One Nation under God". The ACLU is promoting the

myth that the United States Constitution requires that there must be

a total separation between God and State. Nowhere in the United

States Constitution or in The Bill of Rights is there any mention of

the words "separation of Church and State". However, the "separation

of Church and State" is mandated in the constitution of the old

Soviet Union and other tyrannical regimes. The ACLU's assault on

America's religious foundations is fueled by distorted

interpretations of the establishment and free-exercise clauses of the

First Amendment to the Constitution. Here is what the First Amendment

says:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion

or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..."

It should not take a lawyer to understand the clear meaning of these

words. We can read here NOTHING, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING that says or even

remotely implies that GOD must be eliminated from government. The

operative words are ESTABLISHED RELIGION, not total exclusion of

divine recognition.

The First Amendment is unique among the Bill of Rights, which makes a

plain and explicit restraint that ("Congress shall make no law...").

No other Amendment in our Bill of Rights follows this formulation.

The Tenth Amendment outlining federalist principles provides

that "The powers not delegated to the United States by the

Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the

States respectively, or to the people." The First amendment prohibits

only the United States Congress from making any law establishing a

religion but allows the individual States or anyone else for that

matter, to establish their own official religion if they would like

or each State to enact a similar laws prohibiting an established

religion within their own State. We can only conclude that the intent

of the First Amendment is to protect religious freedom and the rights

of the individual States in religious matters and each State could

adopt or prohibit an official religion within their State. When the

First amendment was being debated in Congress, some of the individual

states had already established, an official State religion. The

Founders of the First Amendment wanted to allow individual States to

be able to establish or not to establish a State religion. The

Founding Fathers did not, however, want the Federal government

establishing a National religion that might interfere with the

individual stats.

The United States of America was conceived with the authority of God.

The ACLU's exclusion of God in the government of the United States is

hardly what Thomas Jefferson and the Founding Fathers intended or

what the First Amendment to the Constitution guarantees. The intent

of the Founding Fathers was expressed often and in many forms. Our

Declaration of Independence refers to "the laws of nature and of

nature's GodWhen, in the course of human events, it becomes

necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have

connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the

earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and

of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of

mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them

to the separation." It would be an odd logic to assert that the

American colonies could use the law of God "to dissolve the political

bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the

powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws

of nature and of nature's God entitle them," but not to include God

as the fundamental basis of our values and traditions. Thomas

Jefferson professed the importance of God being essential to

foundation of the state when he said, "Can the liberties of a nation

be secure once we have removed the conviction that these liberties

are the gift of God?" Clearly, they cannot be. Without an

understanding that individuals have rights beyond the power of the

state, rights could be sweep away when inconvenient to the State and

people get trampled on. Americans should be skeptical of anyone who

would deliberately destroy America's "Trust in God". "Natural liberty

is a gift of the beneficent Creator to the whole human race, and

civil liberty is founded in that; and cannot be wrested from any

people, without the most manifest violation of justice." --Alexander

Hamilton

The Founding Fathers would not want the federal government's official

allegiance to a specific religious dominion but we must conclude,

however, that the Founders' expressions of divine belief and

gratitude, as were so often written, they were most likely referring

to the God worshipped by Christians and Jews. He is the only God

whose believers praise Him for granting us our natural liberties and

to whom we owe a duty of "Forbearance, Love and Charity towards each

other." We do not see much love or forbearance required or even

honored by other major religions. The ACLU wants none of this. They

want any mention of God and symbols of Christianity removed from all

governmental documents, property, etc. When the ACLU says they want

to "protect" us from mentions of God are really only establishing

their own dogmatic religion, secular humanism, which elevates each

person to be his own god, and that gets people and society into

trouble. The almighty God is the foundation of The United States of

America, the greatest nation ever to exist on the face of the earth.

Americans should reject those who want to replace our trust in God

with an inferior ethic, especially one that glorifies anti-spiritual

values, such as secular humanism. The Judeo-Christian ethic, as

imperfectly as we practice it, is still the basis of Western

civilization and the major force for enlightenment in the world. We

must, however, not mistake the omission of references to religion in

the body of the Constitution as being purely secular. Most of the

Founding Fathers were careful to not interject into the foundation of

the new government anything that would imply one religious dominion

over another but make their intent obvious to future generations that

the Christian God is the foundation of the nation. Religious freedom

in the United States minus official State religious dogmatism is the

essence of the First Amendment of the Constitution. "Congress shall

make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting

the free exercise thereof..." Religion is a menace to a free society

only when it becomes an official instrument of government. An

instrument of the State in our case would be the establishment of an

official United State religion with dominion over all other religious

sects in the United States. The simple mention of God or the display

of Judeo Christian symbols in a government context is not in any way

shape or form establishing a religion.

The correct understanding of The First Amendment was applied not only

during the time of the Founders, but for 170 years afterwards. James

Madison, the fourth president, known as "The Father of Our

Constitution and the Bill of Rights" (1751-1836), clearly articulated

this concept of separation when explaining the First Amendment's

protection of religious liberty. He said that the First Amendment to

the Constitution was prompted because "The people feared one sect

might obtain a preeminence, or two combine together, and establish a

specific religion to which they would compel others to conform."

Madison intended the realm of American religion and religious

traditions in this context to only include the Judeo Christians as he

said, "We have staked the whole of all our political institutions

upon the capacity of mankind for self-government, upon the capacity

of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to

sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God." Patrick

Henry, that patriot and Founding Father of our country reinforces the

intent of the founders by his declaration, "It cannot be emphasized

too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded not by

religionists but by Christians, not on religions but on the Gospel of

Jesus Christ".

Thus, any historian could say that it is profoundly clear that our

Founding Fathers truly believed that the Nation could not survive

without trust in divine intervention. The founding fathers believed

that only through the ultimate authority of God could a government be

legitimized and thus they made Trust in God as the underpinnings of

our government. So without a doubt, the intent of the Founding

Fathers when it comes to questions of church verses state is clear.

It is understood that the State must not enforce how citizens should

practice religion but it is clear that a government promoting and

trusting in God is essential to freedom and the success of that

government. Human dignity derived from God is the cornerstone of this

nation. The United States was founded on the trust and belief in the

Christian God along with the freedom of religion. What the Founding

fathers rejected was government forced dogmatism and sectarianism.

However, there can be no absolute separation between God and State as

per the Constitution and the intent of the Founding Fathers. "I

consider ethics, as well as religion, as supplements to law in the

government of man." --Thomas Jefferson to Augustus B. Woodward

 

How then, have we gotten to the point that everything professing a

trust in God in our government, as we have done for 220 years in this

country is now suddenly wrong and unconstitutional? The ACLU is

clearly wrong when it maintains that God has no place in public life

or government. The complete and radical disassociation between God

and the State that is advocated now by the ACLU is not what any of

the Founding Fathers had in mind. It was never intended for our

government bodies to be "separated" from God. The world was not to

corrupt the church, yet the church was free to teach the people

religious values. It keeps the government from running the church but

makes sure that divine principles will always legitimize our

government.