Supremes reverse secular extremist course, protect cross!

renewamerica.us ^ | July 5, 2006 | Michael Gaynor

[MuddyWaters2006]

The religious liberty of the Danbury Baptists was already being infringed upon in 1801 by the Connecticut Certificate Law of 1791; which was the primary complaint of the Danbury Baptists in their letter to President Jefferson.

"What religious privileges we enjoy (as a minor part of the state) we enjoy as favors granted, and not as inalienable rights; and these favors we receive at the expense of such degrading acknowledgements as are inconsistent with the rights of freemen."

--Letter from the Danbury Baptists to Thomas Jefferson

The "degrading acknowledgments" were a requirement of the Connecticut Certificate Law. Presented below is John Leland's 1791 description of the Certificate Law.

"The certificate that a dissenter produces to the society clerk, must be signed by some officer of the dissenting church, and such church must be Christian; for heathens, deists, and Jews, are not indulged in the certificate law; all of them, as well as Turks, must therefore be taxed for the standing order, although they never go among them, or know where the meeting-house is.

This certificate law is founded on this principle, 'that it is the duty of all persons to support the gospel and the worship of God.' ...Is it the duty of a deist to support that which he believes to be a cheat and imposition? Is it the duty of a Jew to support the religion of Jesus Christ, when he really believes that he was an impostor? Must the Papists be forced to pay men for preaching down the supremacy of the pope,...? Must a Turk maintain a religion, opposed to the Alkoran ...? I now call for an instance where Jesus Christ, the author of his religion, or the apostles, who were divinely inspired, ever gave orders to, or intimated, that the civil powers on earth, ought to force people to observe the rules and doctrine of the gospel."

--http://classicliberal.tripod.com/misc/conscience.html

[MuddyWaters2006]

Does anyone know the source of the following words attributed to Founder and President John Adams?

"The highest story of the American Revolution is this: it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity." "The general principles, on which the Fathers achieved independence, were . . . the general principles of Christianity."

[steve-b]

You are drawing a distinction without a difference. Any substantive statement by a politician has both principled and pragmatic components (except in the case of an utter sleazebag who has no principles).