by Joshua Cherniss (Originally published in the Yale Journal of Ethics, Spring, 1998). The guarantee of religious freedom and the separation of church and state contained in the First Amendment of the Constitution epitomize, in the words of Leo Pfeffer, "a radical experiment unique in human history." (1) And yet the exact meaning of the words is unclear, and the fate of that experiment uncertain. The problem of church and state, of religion in public life, is one of the most basic, most durable, and most divisive conflicts we face today. For all of the secularization and liberalization of society, religion continues to be a driving force in people's beliefs and behavior. In our own times, in our own country, religion has lost none of its inspiring and disruptive power. It has not, as some critics of American society have claimed, receded from the public sphere, scorned by secularists, mourned by the virtuous, and ignored by the majority. It is present everywhere, and both sustains our societies and threatens our liberties. Although religion and the clergy no longer have the same majestic authority or ability to dominate the national stage as they did in the days of Martin Luther King, Jr., religious and quasi-religious leaders and communities remain central to most social reform movements. At the same time, religiously motivated resentment, intolerance, and paranoia increasingly dominate our politics. One need only look to the domination of the Republican Party by the religiously motivated, ultra-conservative pressure groups collectively known as the Religious Right. There is a certain irony in this: for these same forces who play such a high-profile role in politics based on their appeals to religion complain that modern American society is godless and depraved. Yet theirs is a difficult contention to prove, when they themselves hold so much power, when many states continue to bar atheists from holding public office, and when homosexuals and other "deviants" are constantly the victims of discrimination, condemnation, humiliation, and even violence. The power of religion, and the dangerous consequences of that power, makes its place in a pluralistic democracy a question of great urgency and complexity. As it has done in the cases of other such divisive and potentially disruptive issues, our system of government has resorted to the instruments of law to simplify the complexities and diffuse the dangers of this question. However, as is often the case, the institutions of law have not been able to confine or control the ethical issues at stake. Instead, the law itself has become a battleground, where proponents of different philosophies and different ways of life fight to impose their views and visions on society. In this conflict, the Supreme Court has often used its power to maintain a separation between religion and government. In doing so, it has constantly appealed to the principle of a "wall of separation" between church and state, subscribed to by the Framers of the Constitution and expressed by Thomas Jefferson. The phrase itself, which has been cited in court opinion after court opinion, comes from a letter written by Jefferson in 1802, and addressed to the Baptist Association of Danbury, Connecticut. However, a controversial recent monograph claims that Jefferson's words were less an unadulterated declaration of principle than a canny political move, an attempt to gain support in an election year. The monograph is entitled "Religion and the Founding of the American Republic." Its author is James H. Hutson, the chief of the Library of Congress's manuscript division. Hutson writes that Jefferson did not intend the letter to be used as a foundation of law or as a statement of his governing philosophy. Instead, Hutson claims, an analysis of the original manuscript of the letter, and especially the way Jefferson revised the letter, tailoring it for its audience, shows that the letter was intended to win support from New England constituents. Leaders of the Religious Right have seized this opportunity to once again claim that the Founders intended America to be a Christian nation; that the idea of complete church-state separation is an invention of modern left-liberalism with no authoritative basis in American tradition; and that all of the Supreme Court rulings that employ Jefferson's phrase about the wall of separation are invalid because the phrase was political rhetoric. In response, a group of scholars of church-state issues have released a letter criticizing Hutson's thesis -- and, indeed, Hutson himself, in attacks that are at times distressingly personal and ad hominem. (2) Hutson should, in fact, be thanked, regardless of the accuracy of his thesis: he has opened up an important historiographical debate, and mobilized a number of very fine scholars to reconsider the basis of the principle of church-state separation in American history. Placing Jefferson's words at the center of a substantive debate over ideas and principles, rather than using them as mere fodder for rhetoric, is an important first step to pursuing the sort of discussion about church and state we need to have, in order to understand the true meaning, importance and desirability of "the wall of separation between church and state." Jefferson It is unfortunate that the courts have based so much precedent upon this quotation, and understandable that the Religious Right are now placing such emphasis on it: for reliance on the quotation as the epitome of the Founders' views on religion leads to the neglect of their clearest and most significant writings on this topic. Although scholars quibble over a single phrase, none of them can seriously deny that Jefferson's own religious views are clear: he was a deist who believed in a creator-god perceivable through human reason, and rejected the validity of the Bible and of organized religion. (3) For instance, in a letter to Benjamin Rush in 1800, Jefferson wrote: "They (the clergy) believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly: for I have sworn upon the altar of god eternal hostility against any form of tyranny over the mind of man." (4) Jefferson also likened the story of Jesus's conception to the myths of ancient Greece, and looked forward to a day when it would no longer believed, and when reason would triumph over superstition as the guide to religious belief. Furthermore, he declared that the clergy were invariably hostile to liberty, and equated priestcraft with bigotry. It is easy to see why many of his opponents attacked Jefferson as an atheist; and it is difficult to imagine a politician today attacking organized religion the way Jefferson did. (5) These religious beliefs were part of the same Enlightenment belief in human reason upon which Jefferson based his political thought. Indeed, Jefferson's political, ethical, and religious convictions were inseparable; they were also more radical than many of his more conservative admirers care to admit. Many have, for instance, pointed to the opening of the Declaration of Independence, which declares that all men are endowed with equal rights by a "Creator," as proof that the philosophy of the Founders was based on theism. However, Jefferson's original draft says that all men "derive rights inherent and inalienable" as a result of "that equal creation." (6) In other words, Jefferson himself deliberately avoided mentioning God, going so far as to commit the sin of awkward phrasing. He also bases his argument for inalienable rights not on theism, but egalitarianism: it is as a result of men's being created equal that they have these rights, not the result of the special favor of a god who conforms to the traditional conception of divinity. Once again, the Religious Right are selective in their use of history: they harp on the changes made in the drafting of Jefferson's Danbury letter (the implications of which are obscure), while neglecting to address the changes made to Jefferson's draft of the Declaration. To understand Jefferson's views on politics and religion, it is necessary to understand the intellectual climate out of which his ideas emerged. Jefferson, in his deism, his faith in reason, and his belief in natural rights, liberty, and democracy, was a typical thinker of the Enlightenment. The three thinkers whom Jefferson himself said were the greatest influences in his life were also the intellectual fathers of the Enlightenment: Francis Bacon, Isaac Newton, and John Locke. (7) The latter was probably the most influential political thinker in colonial America. Jefferson's words and arguments in the Declaration often paraphrased Locke. From Locke Jefferson and his contemporaries derived the idea of natural rights -- that is, rights that were inherent to the individual purely by virtue of his or her humanity -- among which was freedom of conscience; and the social contract theory, which held that governments ultimately derived their authority from a contractual agreement between the governors and the governed, and therefore come after, and must respect, natural rights. Locke's view of the nature and origins of the church was similar to that of the state: he believed that a church is "a voluntary society of men, joining themselves together of their own accord." On the other hand, he viewed their functions as being completely different: the state is for the advancement of people's civil interests, while the church is dedicated to saving their souls. In short, religion by its nature lies outside civil society, and those who presume to regulate religion overstep their powers by violating the natural rights to freedom of conscience. This idea was later extended by Jefferson and Madison, and form the basis for their beliefs, and writings, on the role of the state in religion and vice versa. (8) Indeed, many of the colonists, and most of the founders, generally agreed with Tom Paine when he wrote that government should essentially protect every individual's freedom of conscience, and then butt out of religious life. Jefferson definitely shared these views. Throughout his life Jefferson sought to put his own radical version of Locke's ideas into practice. His battle began in Virginia in the 1770s, when he fought to disestablish the Episcopal Church by denying public funds to the clergy. (9) However, he soon went beyond this strategy. On June 13, 1779 Jefferson drafted and proposed "A Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom." The bill was so controversial that passage was delayed until 1786, when Madison was finally able to push his friend's legislation through. As with the writings quoted above, Jefferson's views about this bill and the principles it embodies are absolutely clear and definite. He regarded it as one of the greatest achievements of his life. Before he died, he requested that he be referred to on his tombstone as the author of this bill, and of the Declaration. Jefferson placed this bill, which became a model for the entire nation, on par with one of the two most revered documents in American history. In the bill, Jefferson first declares that God has "created the mind free" and that all attempts to restrain it, to lead it to conclusions against its will or natural inclinations will lead to hypocrisy and meanness. (10) Both civil and ecclesiastical authorities, being human and fallible, have neither the right nor the authority to interfere with the workings of divinely endowed individual reason. These authorities, Jefferson insists, by seeking to turn their own mistaken views into official doctrine, and to force this doctrine onto others, "hath established and maintained false religions over the greatest part of the world." Furthermore, it is "sinful and tyrannical" to compel any individual to "furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves or abhors." It is thus a violation of individual rights and freedom for the government to give money to support religion. Jefferson also asserts that "our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions...and therefore proscribing any citizen as unworthy the public confidence by laying upon him an incapacity of being called to offices of trust or emolument, unless he profess or renounce this or that religious opinion, is depriving him...of those privileges and advantages to which...he has a natural right." So much for the ban on atheists holding public office found in the ledgers of so many states today. Jefferson is not concerned only about the rights of the individual; he is also concerned about the effects that civil power has on religion. He believes that this sort of power corrupts religion itself, by making those who do not truly believe it conform to it in order to acquire wealth and power. Religion becomes a means to an end, piety a mask that the power-hungry must cynically wear and manipulate for profit and advancement. Jefferson goes on to say "the opinions of men are not the object of civil government, or under its jurisdiction." Jefferson believes that the states should have no role in religious debates, both because it violates the proper boundaries between government and the individual, and because the discovery of the truth depends upon an open contest of ideas. Governmental intervention into religious and moral debates, rather than upholding truth and morality, will ultimately damage them by hardening them into dogma. Based on these beliefs, Jefferson prohibits the state from interfering with individuals' expression or observance of their beliefs in any way, either by compelling them to accept or observe doctrines and practices in which they do not believe, or by prohibiting them from, or punishing them for, the observances and opinions that they do believe. Jefferson then concludes that the rights he has asserted are "the natural rights of mankind." It should be clear that the belief in a secular state, in which the power of religion was minimized and education and reason were emphasized as the keys to truth, liberty and happiness, was central to Jefferson's view of human society and morality. However, this does not prove that this vision is embodied in the First Amendment. Indeed, there is something strange about the emphasis placed on Jefferson's views in debates over the original meaning of the Constitution. After all, Jefferson was in France during the drafting of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and played no direct role in the creation or ratification of either (although his advocacy of a Bill of Rights was influential). Those who discuss this issue would do far better to focus their attention on James Madison, "the father of the Constitution," who in addition to being the intellectual leader of the Constitutional Convention and the author of the most important defenses and explications of the Constitution in the Federalist papers, was also responsible for drafting and proposing the Bill of Rights. Madison Jefferson was not alone in his beliefs about church and state. The Founders were almost all deeply influenced by the liberal thought of John Locke and the thinkers of the French and Scottish Enlightenment. Many of them, if not most, believed that religion was a purely private matter and should be kept out of the public, political sphere, and thus must be separated from the state. (11) Madison said that government has no "jurisdiction" over religion. (12) This was why religion was left out of the Constitution: its authors, though almost all sincere Christians, believed that it had no place there, or in any other pronouncement of public policy or governance. While many held this view, few were as devoted to it as was Madison, whose battle to keep religion out of government and vice versa spanned his entire political career, which in turn spanned over half a century. Out of this tireless support came some of the most inspiring, powerful and plainly stated writing on religion and public life in modern history. Madison's crowning achievement in his campaign for the separation of religion and the state was his Memorial and Remonstrance of 1785. Madison's first effort in this direction was in his drafting of amendments to the Bill of Rights of the Virginia Constitution in 1776. These amendments, according to Marvin Meyers, "helped to place religious liberty on the foundation not of toleration but of natural right." (13) However, his greatest contribution to the debate over church and state was his writing the aforementioned "Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments" in 1785. This document is one of the most brilliant analyses of church-state relations, and one of the most forceful and eloquent defenses of complete separation, in American history. Although it employs many of the same arguments as Jefferson's bill, quoted above, it is ultimately more convincing. And, since its author was also the author of the First Amendment, it has a special authority as a statement of the principles underlying the Constitution. In 1784 Patrick Henry, emboldened by public expressions of dismay and disapproval in response to a perceived decay of public morals, sought to reverse Jefferson and Madison's legislation denying public funding to the Episcopal Church. In response, Madison drafted and circulated his "Memorial and Remonstrance." (14) Madison claimed that the public funding of "Teachers of the Christian Religion" was "a dangerous abuse of power" which violated "the great Barrier which defends the rights of people" -- that is, the barrier between church and state. (15) Those who violated this barrier were "Tyrants"; those who submitted to this tyranny were "slaves." (16) Madison's defense of that barrier rests on a compelling and sometimes surprising blend of the ideals of the Enlightenment with respect for religion and concern for its welfare. Madison's attacks on state-sponsored or state-controlled religion would scandalize many modern conservatives, but his argument is not that of a glib secularist. Madison takes religion very seriously, and it is because of this that he is so ardently opposed to religion and the state being combined in any way. Madison makes arguments based on a concern for the interests of religion itself, for the state, and for individuals. In the first item of the Remonstrance, Madison asserts that "The Religion...of every man must be left to the conviction and conscience of every man; and it is the right of every man to exercise it as these may dictate...the opinions of men, depending only on the evidence contemplated by their own minds, cannot follow the dictates of other men." Madison maintains that the right to freedom of conscience should not be abridged by civil society, since it is an inalienable individual right, and that its deeply private nature makes it "exempt" from civil society's "cognizance." (17) A bill that gave civil authority control over what was regarded as religious truth not only threatens liberty, but the authority of religion itself; for such a bill "implies either that the Civil Magistrate is a competent judge of religious truth; or that he may employ Religion as an engine of Civil policy. The first is an arrogant pretension...the second is an unhallowed perversion of the means of salvation." (18) Furthermore, experience has shown that "ecclesiastical establishments, instead of maintaining the purity and efficacy of Religion, have a contrary operation." The legal establishment of Christianity in Europe, for instance, had bred "pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution." The establishment of religion may serve the self-interest of the clergy and the prejudices of zealots; but it will cause a corruption of religion, which all truly God-fearing people should recognize, abhor and avoid. (19) In the case of the state and of public life, Madison notes that "attempts to enforce by legal sanctions, acts obnoxious to...[a] great proportion of Citizens, tend to enervate the laws in general, and to slacken the bands of society." (20) Madison combines this typically "conservative" belief in the importance of law and order with a "liberal" conception of what the state and society should be like. He wishes to "hold forth an asylum to the persecuted." The establishment of religion "is itself a signal of persecution" which "degrades from equal rank of Citizens all those whose opinions in Religion do not bend to those of the Legislative authority." Madison is quite serious about this point, as he makes clear in his next sentence. "Distant as it may be, in its present form, from the Inquisition it differs from it only in degree. The one is the first step, the other the last in the career of intolerance." (22) Beyond these arguments, Madison appeals to what he regards as some of the first principles of government. Establishment of religion violates both individual rights, and "that equality which ought to be the basis of every law...Whilst we assert for ourselves a freedom to embrace, to profess and to observe the Religion which we believe to be of divine origin, we cannot deny an equal freedom to those whose minds have not yet yielded to the evidence that has convinced us. If this freedom is abused, it is an offense against God, not against man: To God, therefore, not to men, must an account of it be rendered." Madison returns to the idea that establishment is a violation of a higher law near the end of the Remonstrance. In this case, the higher law is that of natural human rights. There is a conflict between these rights and state power; we must side with one or the other, "we must say, that the will of the legislature is the only measure of their authority; and that in the plenitude of that authority, they may sweep away all our fundamental rights; or, that they are bound to leave this particular right untouched and sacred." The conflict does not concern religion and secularism so much as it does the limits of government power. Central to the American system of government, and the liberal principles that inspired it, is the belief that there are fundamental human rights that should always be protected, and that in order to do so the power of the government must be limited. The separation of church and state is a vital part of this; if the government is given power to involve itself in religious matters, and to curb religious liberty, what is to prevent it from violating other basic liberties? (23) This is why Madison bound religious liberty -- and the separation of church and state -- together with other fundamental liberties in the First Amendment: all were equally important to him, and he believed that all were inter-dependent. The duty of the government with regard to religion was to protect "every citizen in the enjoyment of his Religion with the same equal hand which protects his person and his property...neither invading the equal rights of any Sect, nor suffering any Sect to invade those of another." (24) Madison was aware of the argument that a little state support of religion isn't such a bad thing -- that a simple, ecumenical prayer or funding of religious schools or charities is innocuous and even beneficial. Madison did not accept this argument. He warned his contemporaries, and warns us today, "to take alarm at the first experiment on our liberties. We hold this prudent jealousy to be the first duty of citizens...Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity...may establish with the same ease any particular set of Christians...That the same authority which can force a citizen to contribute three pence only of his property for the support of any one establishment, may force him to conform to any other establishment in all cases whatsoever?" (25) Madison's call for religious freedom and disestablishment was successful: as copies of the Remonstrance, with long lists of signatures appended, flooded the General Assembly of Virginia, the Assembly finally enacted Jefferson's Bill for Religious Liberty. (26) The drafting of both the Constitution and the Bill of Rights reflected the secularism of the Founders. God was deliberately excluded from the Constitution. No prayers were said for over a month (in contrast to the normal practice in the Continental Congress), and the Founders carefully avoided any mention of God in the text of the document, excluding even a deistic reference to a "creator." Madison himself expressed his intentions, and those of many others, when he said that the Constitution was not to create "a shadow of right in the general government to intermingle with religion." (27) This intent was made explicit in the last clause of Article VI: "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States." This clause was introduced in order to "cut off forever every pretense of any alliance between church and state in the national government," according to Joseph Story, one of the first commentators on the Constitution, a distinguished and influential Supreme Court Justice -- and, in general, an opponent of church-state separation who nevertheless voiced the understanding at the time that this part of the Constitution did, indeed, go some way towards erecting a wall of separation. (28) Madison's writings about the idea of a Bill of Rights reveal much not only of his views on the subject of church and state, but of the basic political philosophy (or, rather, political morality) upon which our system of government is based. Ironically, one of Madison's most important statements about the importance, meaning and purpose of a Bill of Rights can be found in the letter to Jefferson in which he explains his reservations about the adoption of such a document. Madison's two major objections to a Bill of Rights were that it would be ineffective and that by enumerating some rights it would be limiting by seeming to exclude others. Madison was worried that "a positive declaration of some of the most essential rights could not be obtained in the requisite latitude" in a bill that would be stamped by the popular will. Madison was "sure that the rights of conscience in particular, if submitted to public definition, would be narrowed" by putting their enumeration to popular vote. (29) Madison believed, as he wrote to Jefferson, that "Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression." Madison saw that in a democratic or republican form of government the power would reside in "the majority of the community," and that this majority would use the government to invade "private rights." (30) Madison also wrote, "Wherever there is an interest and power to do wrong, wrong will generally be done." (31) Madison's political philosophy was based on a combination of a liberal belief in the primacy of individual rights, and the importance of preserving a private sphere, with a more cautious and conservative distrust of majorities, of power in general and, indeed, of human nature itself. Although he remained skeptical about the efficacy of "parchment barriers" he did see one way of using legislation to foster freedom and curb the corrupting influences of power. Madison hoped that the "political truths declared in that solemn manner [i.e., in the Bill of Rights]" would "acquire by degrees the character of fundamental maxims of free Government, and as they become incorporated with the National sentiment, counteract the impulses of interest and passion." (32) In Madison's view, the success or failure of a liberal form of government depends on public morality. Such a form of government, while it refrains from intervening in the judgments and actions of citizens in a wide range of moral issues that are part of the private sphere, is not amoral. It is not just a matter of political institutions, but of ethical ideas and beliefs; and the people's acceptance of and dedication to these beliefs is ultimately the strongest defense against corruption and oppression. Thus, keeping church and state separate for their mutual well being requires more than the erection of legal barriers. It also makes a difficult demand upon the people, that they be tolerant and respectful towards one another, and that they exercise self-restraint and fairness in not trying to force their beliefs on one another. In this way, liberal government, and the idea of church-state separation, are not examples (as many members of the Religious Right claim) of moral laxity. On the contrary, they make ethical and emotional demands on individuals and the community that many, especially the Religious Right, find it difficult to live up to. The conflict, then, is not between morality and amorality, but between two conflicting and rigorous moralities. My goal here is not to argue that the liberal morality is superior to its opponent, but to show that it is the morality upon which our system of government is based, and that if we reject it we also reject the insights of our political ancestors and put their -- and our -- experiment in freedom at risk. The fact that separation of church and state was a matter of principle -- that it was based on a certain theory of political morality -- is necessary to understanding Madison's intentions, actions, and contributions. Madison expressed his personal views on the issue of religion and the state in a letter to the Rev. Jasper Adams, in 1832. This was no political maneuver: Madison was retired from public life, and only a few years away from death. It is also not at all ambiguous. Madison acknowledges the problem of the relationship between church and state, admitting that "it may not be easy, in every possible case, to trace the line of separation between the rights of religion and the Civil authority with such directness as to avoid collisions & doubts on unessential points." However, rather than being an argument for blurring the line between the two, Madison sees this fact as all the more reason for separating them: "The tendency to a usurpation on one side or the other, or to a corrupting coalition or alliance between them, will be best guarded against by an entire abstinence of the Government from interference in any way whatever, beyond the necessity of preserving public order, & protecting each sect against trespass on its legal rights by others." (34) In this statement of his philosophy, the drafter of the First Amendment clearly argues for a secular state. This argument is based on two assumptions: the belief, central to liberal thought, that there must exist a line between public and private if liberty is to be preserved and the happiness and full development of humanity to be ensured, and that the state should play a minimal part in the private affairs of citizens; and the belief, historical in its base and religious in its inspiration, that church and state are mutually corrupting forces. The two beliefs are closely parallel: one sees the blurring of the lines between public and private, and the other, between religion and state, as being dangerous to both. Indeed, the second premise is a development of the first, and it is in developing and employing it that Madison revealed the profundity of his insight. Conclusion The belief in separation of church and state is clearly central to the liberal political and ethical convictions of the Founders. The principle of individual liberty, and especially freedom of conscience, born out of a century of conflict with religious tyranny, persecution and censorship; the conviction, founded upon a careful, comprehensive and contemplative reading of history, that power corrupts, and therefore that in order to prevent the corruption of both government and religion, their powers must be carefully circumscribed; the distinction, so novel and so essential, between public and private spheres, and the insistence that to violate this distinction in either direction was to violate a part of what makes men and women human and what makes society just; these were the foundations of the American experiment in government, at once bold and cautious, idealistic and realistic. These views were not anti-religious; rather they wished to protect religion from corruption and abuse, and ensure the religious liberty of all. Nor did they insist on moral neutrality in public life. On the contrary, they rest and insist upon a public morality that is at once tolerant and stringent, liberal and severely demanding. It is these humane and wise principles, and not those of any sectarian religion or divinely inspired dogma, that are currently endangered in our society, and that we must defend. If we are to defend the open society to which the Founders and their successors were dedicated, we must reaffirm the Madisonian belief, that separation of church and state benefits not only the state, but also religion, that it is desirable and beneficial to the good not only of the public body, but also of the individual soul. Notes: 1. Leo Pfeffer, Church and State Freedom. Boston: Beacon Press, 1967, p. 1. 2. Goodstein, Laurie, "Fresh Debate on 1802 Jefferson Letter," New York Times, Sept. 10, 1998, p. A20. 3. Most of the founders were, according to Charles and Mary Beard, deists. Jefferson, Franklin, and Tom Paine certainly were; John Adams, George Washington and James Madison all remained nominally Christian, but exhibited leanings towards deism or Unitarianism. See Pfeffer, p. 104. 4. The original of this letter is, incidentally, also in the Library of Congress's collection. When a scholar studied Jefferson's original handwriting in THIS letter he found that Jefferson, in contrast to the general practice of his time, had spelled "god" with a small "g", suggesting that he rejected the Christian conception of God in favor of the more hesitant deistic belief in an impersonal deity. Oddly enough, the Religious Right has not made as much of this example of textual analysis as they have of Hutson's. Quoted in George Seldes, The Great Thoughts, New York: Ballantine, 1985, p. 208. 5. The views described are summaries of the contents of Jefferson's letters quoted by Seldes, pp. 207-8. 6. Ibid., p. 206. 7. Ibid., p. 248. Jefferson said of these three "they were my trinity of the greatest men the world had ever produced." 8. Pfeffer, pp. 101-103. 9. Marvin Meyers. The Mind of the Founder: Sources of the Political Thought of James Madison. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merril, 1973, p. 8. 10. This, and all other quotations from the Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom, are taken from the reprint of the Bill in Saul K. Padover, ed. The Complete Jefferson. New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1943, pp. 946-947. 11. Pfeffer, p. 124. 12. Ibid., p. 128. 13. Meyers, p. 8. 14. Idem. 15. Ibid., p. 9. 16. Ibid., p. 10. 17. Ibid., p. 9. 18. Ibid., p. 11. 19. Ibid., p. 12. 20. Ibid., p. 15. 21. Ibid., p. 13. 22. Ibid., p. 11. 23. Ibid., p. 16. 24. Ibid., p. 13. 25. Ibid., p. 10. 26. Ibid., p. 8. 27. Ibid., p. 122. Emphasis added. 28. Ibid., p. 123. 29. Meyers, The Mind of the Founder, pp. 205-206. 30. Ibid., p. 206. 31. Ibid., p. 207. 32. Idem. 33. Wilson, p. 87. 34. Wilson, p. 78. ----------------- (End of article by Joshua Cherniss, originally published in the Yale Journal of Ethics, Spring, 1998.)
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