Separation of Church and State should not be judged based on ones religion, in fact it should not even matter what religion you are as long as it does not invade on other peoples rights. In the Yahoo! News article written by Lee-Anne Goodman, entitled Santorum says he doesn't believe in separation of Church and State, Republican Rick Santorum was interviewed for his response on John F. Kennedy’s speech on Separation of Church and State in 1960. Santorum, a Catholic, has been very open about the role of religion in his life and in his political beliefs. "I don't believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute," Santorum said in an interview from Michigan on ABC's "This Week” (Goodman para 2). Out of many founding fathers, John F. Kennedy actually supported absolute separation between church and state. All Kennedy was stating in the beginning of his speech was that “It is not what kind of church I believe in, for that should be important only to me -- but what kind of America I believe in” (JFK Speech). Santorum has no right to judge Kennedy’s speech in such a negative way. America is all about embracing diversity, expressing our freedom and believing in our own values.
Rick Santorum believes that his religious freedom extends over other people’s religious freedom, but ones act against another is an act against all. America is not just about the simple things like freedom or separation, but it is all about embracing diversity within different cultures. A research conducted by the Center for American Progress and PolicyLink funded by the Rockefeller Foundation, proved that “Americans are much more open to diversity and supportive of steps to reduce inequalities between racial and ethnic groups than is co...
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...separation of church and state for the benefit of the church or the state?. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2014. .
"JFK Speech on Separation of Church & State (1960)." YouTube. YouTube, 27 Feb. 2012. Web. 10 Feb. 2014. .
"News & Media." Poll Shows Americans Embracing Diversity and Strongly Supporting Steps to Reduce Racial and Ethnic Inequality : News : The Rockefeller Foundation. N.p., 22 Oct. 2013. Web. 10 Feb. 2014. .
Organ, Christine. "Ethics and Respect Thrive with an Absolute Separation of Church and State." Christine Organ RSS. N.p., 29 Feb. 2012. Web. 10 Feb. 2014. .
Hall, Timothy L. Separating Church and State: Roger Williams and Religious Liberty. University of IllinoisPress, Chicago: 1998,Maryland Assembly. “Act Concerning Religion” [ 1649].
In 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt recognized the place that religion holds in democracy. “Religion, by teaching man his relationship to God, gives the individual a sense of his own dignity and teaches him to respect himself by respecting his neighbor's. Democracy, the practice of self-government, is a covenant among free men to respect the rights and liberties of their fellows. International good faith, a sister of democracy, springs from the will of civilized nations of men to respect the rights and liberties of other nations of men. In a modern civilization, all three—religion, democracy and international good faith—complement and support each other” (Franklin D. Roosevelt: State of the Union message). This statement supported the idea that religion is associated with a well functioning government. However, in the case of Everson v. Board of Education it was stated that, “The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach” (Hugo Black). This case occurred after Roosevelt’s presidency, and left a significant impact on the American government, as it made clear that religion had no place in the government (Hugo Black). In recent years, a larger disconnect between the church and the American court systems has been created with the nationwide
A popular notion among many religious conservatives is the rejection of what is commonly referred to as the separation between church and state. They maintain the United States was founded by leaders who endorsed Christian principles as the cornerstone of American democracy, and that the First Amendment prohibition against government establishment was not intended to remove religion from public life. As a result, a number of disputes have made their way through to the courts, pitting those ready to defend the wall of separation, against those who would tear it down. Two recent cases have brought this battle to the forefront of political debate. The first involves an Alabama Supreme Court justice, who, in defiance of a Federal judge, fought the removal of a granite display of the Ten Commandments from the rotunda of the state courthouse. Also, a California man has challenged the constitutionality of the phrase “under God” in an upcoming Supreme Court case involving student recitation of the pledge of allegiance.
The Myth of the Separation of Church and State retrieved on January 7, 2005 from: http://www.noapathy.org/tracts/mythofseparation.html
The modern state seeks its self-preservation above all else, and history reveals that governments are more than willing to exercise their monopoly on force and coercion in order to cement and defend their authority (5-6). Normally, unified social bodies such as the Church seek to counteract the dominance of the state through their public and political influence. However, when the Church simultaneously abdicates its political connections and powers and interiorizes itself within individual Catholics, it frees the state to exercise its will with little backlash: “Once the church has been individualized and eliminated as Christ’s body in the world, only the state is left to impersonate God”
" There is another reference to religion in Article 6, Section 3. This clause states "the United States" and the several States shall be bound by oath or affirmation to support this Constitution. but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust. under the United States" http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.billofrights.html. For the purpose of this paper I am going to focus on the establishment of religion above mentioned in the The First Amendment..
Wood, James E, Jr. "Religious Human Rights and a Democratic State." Journal of Church and State 4(2004):739. eLibrary. Web. 31 Aug. 2011.
Martin Luther King Jr., speech given to Holt Street Baptist Church, Montgomery, Alabama, December 5, 1955, in Major Problems in American History: Volume II: Since 1865, 3rd ed. Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman, Edward J. Blum, and Jon Gjerde. (Boston, Wadsworth, 2012), 366-367.
Proponents of a highly limited separation of church and state often argue that America’s founding fathers would be appalled at the extent to which the Judeo...
Flax, Bill. "The True Meaning of Separation of Church and State", July 9, Forbes, 2011 Web. 15 May 2015
On January 1, 1802, Thomas Jefferson wrote a letter to the Committee of the Danbury Baptist Association in Connecticut in which he stated:
To open this discussion, I would like to start with the civil liberty of freedom of religion. This liberty was identified in my original Constitution essay through the mentioning of the separation of church and state clause. The reason for my including of this liberty, and my stressing of its importance, is that I feel that the government interprets this liberty in a one sided fashion because of the incorrect interpretation of the already in place separation of church and state clause. I also include it because I believe that recently the attacks upon religion have metastasized and tha...
Thomas, Oliver "Buzz". "How To Keep The 'United' In United States: Coping With Religious Diversity In The World's First 'New' Nation." Church & State Feb. 2007: 19+. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 1 Mar. 2013.
No other independent enlightenment in the world allows individual independence to the United States of America. American courts, especially the Supreme Court, have improved a set of lawful policies that comprehensively shelter all types of the power of appearance. When it comes to appraising the level to which people take benefit of the occasion to convey believes, many members of culture can be accountable for misusing the boundary of the First Amendment through openly offending others through racism or obscenity (Karen O’Connor & Larry J. Sabato 2006). America is what it is because of the Bill of rights and the Constitution of the United States of America. The ratification of the Constitution warranted that religious dissimilarity would continue to develop in the United States. American has enhanced a different nature toward the power of word throughout history.
Religious liberty in public life. (2010, 24 2010). Retrieved 11 24, 2010, from firstamendmentcenter: http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/rel_liberty/free_exercise/index.aspx