Is the separation of church and state a lie?

[bouis]

That is not what I'm advocating, but I'll give my opinion nonetheless.

What would happen if a Supreme Court decision were ignored is tough to say. Roosevelt thought he could simply keep appointing Justices until he got a majority. Faced with that threat, the Court of the time backed down and rubber-stamped his policies.

And so now we have an unconstitutional socialist welfare state, and the courts just pretend like it's okay. What bothers me isn't that Congress or even the people wanted it, but that the Courts let it happen. Just like they did gun control. That's what you should worry about.

 

[tcgeol]

If you had been paying attention you would have noticed my first citation was of Article III of the Constitution. The quote from Marbury fully explains how the authority of the judiciary as laid out in Article III makes it necessary for the judiciary to decided on matters where the law might conflict with the Constitution.

Okay, DMF, I copied the wrong sentence from your post, but the only thing you actually quoted was Marbury vs. Madison. The idea of judicial supremacy has been debated throughout American history. This isn't some new idea that we are bantying about. I understand and theoretically agree with your point, but carrying it too far makes the U.S. a country under the rule of judges rather than the rule of law. Judges or justices who disagree with originalism can turn the Constitution on its head. The Supreme Court (along with all the inferior courts) have often ruled against the intent and, in some cases, the plain reading of the Constitution. So who is correct, the Constitution or the interpetation that the judges have read into the Constitution?

 

[rev214]

bouis,
couldn't agree with you more about Rehnquist's dissent in Wallace v. Jaffree...

and nice of President Jefferson during his presidency to attend church services held in the House of Representatives...maybe his wall was made with stained glass...

 

[foob]

is that the Godless libs love to use this one Jefferson letter
to enact their petty laws preventing children from
praying in schools and Boy Scouts from meeting
on Army bases, but they would never let us gunnies use his other letters
which refer to his beliefs about our right to carry guns to enact leglislation.

Whats good for the goose and so forth

Nonsense, those Godless libs wanted to ban mandatory praying in classrooms, led by teachers. Any child can pray all he/she wants in a classroom, and it happens often, especially before and after a quiz. Please don't twist the facts.

Also, there is nothing against Boy Scouts renting/borrowing state/federal property. Instead, cities/state governments/universities want to be allowed to deny permission to the scouts because they believe the scouts' discrimination against gays violates the cities/state governments/universities policy on discrimination. Again, please don't twist the facts.

 

[GoRon]

Am I being bitter or extreme? No. Not at all. This is precisely what history teaches us happens when the Church and the State join in unholy and abominable congress.

There is a difference between a Theocracy and a government that doesn't forbid the religious expression of it's people.

Purging all vestiges of religious expression from the public square is NOT what the founding fathers intended, regardless of the Orwellian doublespeak of the leftists.

 

[saltydog]

It amazes me that things worked out in the beginning when this country was born. God was written everywhere. Buildings, money, even schools used the Bible and was the main book used to teach kids how to read. Now take a trip to around the 1950's and peoples way of thinking started to become "unstable". Now all of a sudden what our original founders established in the beginning isn't what they meant!

Boy ain't we just soooo smart!

I'm sure that peoples brains had started dying before the 1960's though!

Not to change the subject but there was a time in this country when machine guns could be purchased at hardware stores over the counter. No background check, no BATF, no questions asked. At that time we really had a 2nd Amendment to the Bill of Rights. Personally now we have the bill of privilege's that our Govt really intends us to have.

Are people smarter today than they were in the older days? I say B.S.

 

[enfield]

3 pages and no moderator has yet locked this OT thread. We have a moderator participating in it. What is the world coming to?

 

[bouis]

This is hardly off topic. The exact strategy that worked so well in redefining the First Amendment is being applied, today, to the Second.

 

[rev214]

Now, rev214 if you are claiming Jefferson's statement doesn't show the clear intent of "the framers," or "founding fathers," and cannot be used to support the notion that the 1st Amendment was intended to create a "wall of separation between Church and State," then you will need to point that out every time someone claims a statement from the Federalist Papers, Anti-Federalist Papers, or any other writings by one of the "founding fathers," when trying to support a particular interpretation of the Constitution.

sorry DMF, but i disagree with your assessment...i don't equate Jefferson's few-paragraphs/thank-you scribble to the Danbury Baptists with the writings of the Federalists papers and Anti-Federalist papers...

 

[MrZ]

Yes.

1st amendment......

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.


Congress SHALL MAKE NO LAW RESPECTING AN ESTABLISHMENT OF RELIGION!!!

There is NOTHING in the 1st amendment that says the united states government, or ANY other institution, can't PRACTICE a religion, what they CAN'T do is make laws respecting an establishment of religion.


Our constitution has simply been bastardized by nazi's in black robes.

And we do nothing about it...

 

[Helmetcase]

MrZ,
The SCOTUS has long since ruled that "respecting" would include govt sanctioned religion. Nice try...but that's not a compelling legal argument.

Purging all vestiges of religious expression from the public square is NOT what the founding fathers intended, regardless of the Orwellian doublespeak of the leftists.

Talk about doublespeak.

Nobody's saying you can't publicly practice your religion. What we're saying is that our govt and the tax dollars it spends shouldn't be use to promote, endorse, or elevate above others the religious ideas of a particular religious group.

 

[JohnBT]

"Keep your religion to yourself, and outta my govt."

Am I correct in assuming that you are against an opening prayer in the House and the Senate; swearing on the Bible in court; and various appearances by religious officials? Things like the swearing in of the President or the Chief Justice?

I'm not.

Mr. Jefferson may have been in France when they wrote the 1st, but they clearly copied his work. He even saw fit to include religious freedom in his short epitaph.

HERE WAS BURIED
THOMAS JEFFERSON
AUTHOR OF THE
DECLARATION
OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE
OF THE
STATUTE OF VIRGINIA
FOR
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
AND FATHER OF THE
UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA

 

[Lupinus]

depends on the sense that you consider it.

Our founding fathers did not want a theocracy and a place free of religious oppresion. However, they were mostly all very religious Christians and used the moral base heavily.

IMO the seperation is there to prevent a theocracy and a setting up of a national federaly funded church, IE the church of America or something similar but you get the point. I'm not a Christian and I see no problem with the ten commandments in a court house and what not. So long as it isn't a theocracy or violating the right to whatever religion you choose I don't mind people using their religion as the basis of their beliefs.

 

[barnett]

take a deep breath... relax...an spend a couple of minutes reading the Mayflower Compact. this is not a theocracy, but it is a republic, founded on Judeo-Christian law and principles. that is history and fact.

 

[gc70]

The crap you read on WorldNetDaily from google searches is not "history" any more than the National Enquirer is the "news".

So you did not read far beyond the third Google entry (WorldNetDaily) out of 1,480,000... or you would have found substantive information in documents from Princeton and Berkeley and Congressional records.

The SCOTUS has long since ruled that "respecting" would include govt sanctioned religion. Nice try...but that's not a compelling legal argument.

Citation, please.

 

[gc70]

Back to the original topic, Katherine Harris' babbling is nothing more than political posturing.

Our country's founders clearly intended to prevent government and religion from being intertwined to the detriment of personal freedom - a condition with which they were personally and bitterly experienced. However, neither the Constitution nor any of the founders' writings that I have read call for all expression of religion to be minutely expunged from the public arena. But, if that were actually the intention underlying the First Amendment, then each and every President has violated their oath of office at the very moment it was spoken with their hand upon a Bible.

 

[Kim]

It is a legal fiction. One the USSC instituted and the left has supported espically the ACLU. That is a FACT. Whether you think this legal fiction is good or bad is just an opinion. The real problem with the new and improved Left ACLU fiction really comes to harm the people because of the other left fiction of reading the Constitution commerce clause to mean anything. The government is involved where it should not be and hence the misreading of the 1st amendment squashes everyone. I would at least like to see one truthful lefty but they seem to not exsist.(although many do agree that Roe vs Wade was a awful opinion but they like the end) The Means justifices their end as far as Constiutional Law goes. There is almost nothing I dislike than a liar espically on that can do great harm ie. a lawyer or law maker or Judge. But we do not expect much truth from these groups today.

 

[White Horseradish]

The big problem that I see (and I assume they recognized) is that, if there's a government sponsored religion, the masses get swayed pretty easily. Look at fundamental Muslin countries as an example. When the Shah was in Iran, there were Catholics, Jews, Christians, and about every other religion you could name, and they got along pretty well. The fundamental Muslims get in power and it's death to anyone that doesn't agree with you. Reflects what happened here with the Puritans, etc.

Not to mention those Satin worshippers....

 

[White Horseradish]

As opposed to a government founded by atheists? Like, for example,
Soviet Russia? At least the Islamists are fighting for an idea. All our leaders worship
is power and money.

This comment shows that you are quite ignorant of Russian history and Communism is little more than a buzzword that you use without undestanding it's meaning.

Marxists-Leninists also fought for an idea. Quite fervently. There was an entire Civil War over it.

Leninism was not godless. It was a competing religion, it supplanted the Holy Trinity with Marx, Engels and Lenin, icons with portraits of the Politburo, the Bible with Das Kapital (very few people, even among the followers, have read either in their entirety, and even fewer understood what they read), priests with komissars, church services with party meetings, etc.

This was the true state religion, with state as God.

 

[Hkmp5sd]

It's really quite simple. The Founding Fathers didn't want the government to create a state run religion. Religion, especially Christianity, is so intertwined into the US Government, from the day it started until now, there is no way to remove it. Harris is right, there is no separation of church and state. What does the President place his left hand on when taking the oath of office?

Separation of church and state is merely an excuse for the ACLU to whine about nativity scenes on the county courthouse property.

 

[Kelly J]

rev214 , Sir thank you as you got it exactlly right, The phrase "Seperation of Church and State" , does not apear any whare in the Constitutional Documents.

As not seeing Gods Signiture on the Document, I'm not sure in what context that statement was made or intended by the person that made it but by itself I think it is out of place.

The Founding Fathers made several comments on the fact that Religion must play an important role in the Government, and was a necessary ellement of the fibre of it's participants.

As to the First Amendment that is always Quoted as the source of the Seperation Clause which says absolutely nothing about it, in fact the first Amendment says

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;". (Thus we have Freedon of Religion, as was intended by the Framers).

From this simple statement, but very clear statement there is no doubt that the Government is not to SET UP ANY RELIGION AS A NATIONAL RELIGION such as exist in Engand which is "THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND".

This Quote from the First Part of the First Amendment does not imply nor infer a Seperation of CHURCH AND STATE other than I have stated, THE GOVERNMENT CAN NOT ESTABLISH A NATIONAL RELIGION, plain and simple.

 

[foob]

There's so much blind hatred/misunderstanding from the extremes of both sides that further discussion is pointless. All I can suggest is "think, and think hard".

 

[White Horseradish]

With the possible exception of Louisiana, it is true that American law is based upon Roman and English law.

But Roman and English law could not have been influenced by religion?

I know that English law was certainly influenced by Christianity.

In what way do you think English law is Christian?

Biblical law is very different from Roman. There is very little Biblical anything in our laws. Only three of the ten commandments have corresponding US laws, and no matter what your interpretation of the First Amendment is, "Thou shalt have no gods before me" would quite definitely be unconsitutional, were it to be enacted.

 

[gunsmith]

I say we start a Church of the USA!

we can be it's Ministers, be tax exempt and set up schools where you have to know the 4 rules to graduate

Any Way, the Founding Fathers believed in God and prayed for our Republic, I do too.

The aclu can go to Hades!

 

[GoRon]

Nobody's saying you can't publicly practice your religion. What we're saying is that our govt and the tax dollars it spends shouldn't be use to promote, endorse, or elevate above others the religious ideas of a particular religious group.

The problem is the government is an expression of the people. If the government is not allowed to reflect the point of view and values of the electorate then it is no longer representitive.

You want the government to promote, endorse and elevate secularism (materialism) above all religion/philosophies. Even if it doesn't reflect the philosophy/value system of those it purports to represent.