The Due Process clause essentially extends all prohibitions on the federal government established in the Bill of Rights to the states. Not just Freedom of Religion, but all of them.
Essentially… yes. That would be the Due Process clause.
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Thanks.
2nd Amendment, too?
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Correct
… and city and local governments, which before then would occasionally ignore the Bill of RIghts.
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Yes, absolutely… all levels of government. Counties, parishes, school districts, townships, etc.
Hmm, my understanding is that the other states looked at recently-Puritan Massachusetts, and said, “hell no, we want to avoid that”.
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Naw. Rhode Island did, to some extent. Connecticut and New Hampshire and Massachusetts all had established Congregationalist churches (which evolved from Puritanism). None were abandoned until the 19th century. The Carolinas, Virginia, Maryland and New York all had establish Anglican churches.
Here’s more about some of the other states and the religious tests they had:
And I should care what Mass. did in 1805, why? A lot has changed over the years. Just look at suffrage. No more wealth requirements.
I am heartened by the progress. YMMV
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Perhaps you don’t care. I was merely responding that
isn’t really an accurate assessment, considering that most early states had state established churches and religious requirements for basic things like voting and holding office and in some cases even being deserving of civil rights.
Er, some did, and some were actually run by people fleeing the heavy hand of religion. Like Pennsylvania.
I do think it’s funny that the Puritans, who sound awful, have evolved into Congregationalists. That’s a pretty mellow branch of Christianity.
Pennsylvania did not have an established church, but it was hardly a beacon of religious tolerance. There was a lot of violence between Quakers and Presbyterians, and William Penn himself felt that Protestants needed to band together to stop the scourge of Catholicism.
Only people who professed faith in God were entitled to civil rights in Pennsylvania, and in practice that meant you had to be Protestant.
In order to hold office in Pennsylvania you had to take the following oath:
By the standards of the 18th century that was pretty free, but let’s not kid ourselves and pretend that it was cool to be Catholic or Jewish or atheist or agnostic or practice a tribal religion because it certainly was not.
It actually was cool to be Jewish. At least, Pennsylvania, Rhode island, and new York offered a much safer haven for Jews than pretty much anywhere in Europe. New York even had a law allowing Jews who had to take an oath to leave out the bit about “Jesus” in the canned verbiage. Georgia and the Carolinas were also fairly friendly to the Jews.
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I mean… they wouldn’t kill you or anything (probably), but don’t try to do anything uppity such as run for office.
As I said, free by 18th century standards but not by today’s. And in the Carolinas and New York Jews were certainly paying taxes that went directly to the Anglican Church.
And of course Jefferson was famously a deist who thought Jesus was a good moral teacher
Still, together with James Madison, Jefferson carried on a long and successful campaign against state financial support of churches in Virginia. Jefferson also coined the phrase “wall of separation between church and state” in his 1802 letter to the Danbury Baptists of Connecticut. During his 1800 campaign for the presidency, Jefferson even had to contend with critics who argued that he was unfit to hold office because of their discomfort with his “unorthodox” religious beliefs.
So, i guess he eventually won that one.
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Slight edit.
Let’s not forget that Europe is still fighting wars over religious dominion. Maria Theresa’s Hapsburg empire was in the 7 years war against Prussia, very much about her distaste for their Protestant ways. Picking a religion was pretty central to absolute monarchies and divine right. Established churches were the norm. “The Holy Roman Empire” pretty much sums it up.
I’ve always felt that the separation of church and state was primarily aimed at undercutting one of the foundations for absolute monarchies. Not so much designed to grant religious tolerance. It is divine right that sits at the juncture of religion and State.
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And, he was pretty proud of it.
Yes. He was greatly aided by the fact that the Anglican Church was in great turmoil at that point as the clergy had previously been required to take an oath of allegiance to the King of England until shortly after the end of the Revolution. By that point there were hardly any clergymen remaining. Virginia had intervened, and established a Church of Virginia that was essentially the Anglican Church minus the loyalty to the king part, but the clergy who had previously sworn allegiance were divided and the damage was done by the time Jefferson came along. Further adding to the church’s woes were the loss of members to the rapidly growing Methodist church. That said, the Methodists were also officially loyal to the king and, rather bizarrely IMO, favored keeping the Anglican established church. (Partially out of gratitude for allowing them to exist despite not having officially licensed clergy, I’m guessing.)
Still, I think it’s fair to say that there was rather a lot of chaos surrounding religion in Virginia in Jefferson’s day.
There was also a lot of dislike for established religion. He would not have gotten traction without public sentiment against it. Deists were common. So were people who simply didn’t trust large institutions. And the infant US had a lot of religious diversity, including not only Anglicans and Puritans, but Quakers, Jews, and many others.
I’m not sure if you guys are arguing or just reciting wiki entries at this point
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Is there a difference?