On Farewell, Justice Souter, defender of Mr. Jefferson’s wall

Posted on June 22 at 4:44 a.m. ( Suggest removal )

Dear Editor:

The “Jefferson’s wall” editorial from the First Amendment Center demonstrates why many Americans do not easily comprehend the essence of the religion commandments in the Constitution for the United States of America.

Thomas Jefferson was in France from 1784 to 1789 and had absolutely nothing to do with drafting the Constitution or the First Amendment. He was not at the Constitutional Convention or in the First Congress. As the first Secretary of State, he did assume that office in time to certify state ratification of the Bill of Rights, but he had no part in the composition of either the Constitution or the First Amendment.

Reference to President Jefferson’s “wall of separation between between Church & State” comes from his January 1, 1801, letter to the Danbury, Connecticut, Baptists. In other words, Jefferson’s inaccurate and famous wording came into existence several years after the Constitution and the First Amendment were drafted.

The person who personally had a direct part in composing the wording of the Constitution’s three religion commandments was James Madison, who was a member of both the 1787 Convention, which drafted the Constitution, and the 1789 six member joint
Senate-House conference committee, which drafted the words of the First Amendment.

Better understanding of the religion commandments in the Constitution comes from James Madison, not Thomas Jefferson. The word “church,” as used by Jefferson in his letter to the Baptists, is not in the Constitution and is a distortion of what the religion commandments in the Constitution actually say. The Constitutional word is “religion,” the whole subject, not just church.

Therefore, the most accurate and useful quotation is from James Madison because it provides a more authoritative understanding of the essence of the religion commandments in the Constitution: “Strongly guarded as is the separation between Religion and Government in the Constitution of the United States, the danger of encroachment by Ecclesiastical Bodies may be illustrated by precedents already furnished in their short history,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3:555. This quote too was cited, in a footnote, by the 1947 Everson Court.

Gene Garman, M.Div.
Author of The Religion Commandments in the Constitution
P.O. Box 1482
Pittsburg, KS 66762
620-404-9667
americasrealreligion.org