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Religion and Reason in American Politics
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 February 2016
Extract
Whatever has been achieved in the recent debate regarding religion and politics in America, we have not yet clarified the proper place of religion in our public life. All parties endorse the terse formulation of the first amendment, “congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” but there is persisting disagreement about the public philosophy which is there implied. Some fear a secularized state, that is, a state which is independent of all religious convictions, and insist that disestablishment does not preclude a foundation of religious values in the Republic. Others fear a state that is religiously partial and insist that the “wall of separation” prescribes civil neutrality toward religion as such. Each side asserts that the other misrepresents its position. The “religionists,” as I will call them, deny that they seek to impose any particular religious conviction; the “separationists,” as I will call them, deny that they are hostile to religion.
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- Special Section—Religion and American Public Life
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- Copyright © Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University 1984
References
1. In this essay, I will not discuss the difference and possible conflict between the two religion clauses in the first amendment. As will become apparent, I am concerned with the proper place, if any, of religion in the political process, such that the constitutional prohibition of establishment is here the relevant clause. The protection of religious freedom, then, is here discussed only insofar as it is an implication of disestablishment.
2. See Tillich, P., Dynamics of Faith (1957)Google Scholar.
3. Horowitz, , John Dewey, in History of Political Philosophy 746 (Strauss, L. and Cropsey, J., eds. 1963)Google Scholar.
4. Dewey, J., A Common Faith (1934)Google Scholar.
5. Bellah, R., Civil Religion in America, in Daedalus (1967)Google Scholar.
6. See Krauthammer, , America's Holy War, The New Republic, 04 9, 1984Google Scholar.
7. My understanding of the founders' thought regarding the disestablishment of religion is indebted to the work of Sidney E. Mead. See Mead, S., The Lively Experiment: The Shaping of Christianity in America (1963)Google Scholar and The Nation with the Soul of a Church (1975).
8. Mead, S., The Lively Experiment 82 (1963)Google Scholar.
9. Id. at 61.
10. Id. at 64.
11. My argument here is designed only to illustrate—and, therefore, is based solely upon–the understanding of the disestablishment clause which I have presented. I do not intend to judge whether the plaintiffs in McRae persuasively argued their first amendement claim in relation to the tests for establishment previously formulated by the Supreme Court. Should the judgment in that regard be affirmative, however, I would then wish to ask about the coherence of the theory implied in the Court's formulations. For the sake of clarity, I should also note that nothing which I have said intends to present an argument for or against the prohibition of abortion.
12. In saying this, I do not deny that the United States Constitution generally, and the first amendment particularly, also specify many other respects in which purposes may not be legitimately coerced. My point is simply that the disestablishment clause alone entails the noncomprehensive character of the state's activities.
13. Based upon just such a definition of religion, I myself claimed in an earlier essay that the first amendment requires American citizens to be religious. See Gamwell, , Religion and the Public Purpose, 62 J. of Religion 284–285 (1982)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. As the present text goes on to suggest, however, I now think that religion should be more precisely—and, therefore, more strictly— defined. Still, the substantive point that I wish to make namely, that the first amendment prohibits the state from teaching any view of the fundamental grounds for evaluation, may be formulated given either definition.
14. My understanding of the relation between religious claims and common experience and reason is indebted to Schubert M. Ogden. To the best of my knowledge, Ogden is the Christian theologian who has formulated this matter most clearly and systematically. See Ogden, S., Faith and Freedom 26-30, 115–24 (1979)Google Scholar; The Point of Christology 1–4 (1982)Google Scholar; and, especially, The Task of Philosophical Theology, in The Future of Philosophical Theology (Evans, R.A., ed. 1971)Google Scholar.
15. Contrary to the argument presented above, some may claim that a religious believer might coherently affirm both a nonrational religious conviction and disestablishment if his or her religion prescribes tolerance of other faiths. Something like this is at least one reading of the grounds upon which John Courtney Murray recommended the first amendment to American Roman Catholics. See Murray, J., We Hold These Truths (1960)Google Scholar. But this resolution does not avoid an implied commitment to religious establishment. If the prescription of religious tolerance is indeed dependent upon the nonrational tenets of one's particular religion (if, that is, the latter is a necessary condition of the former), then the first amendment could not be coherently affirmed unless this particular religion is also affirmed. In that event, the first amendment would (inconsistently) prescribe that citizens be taught to adhere to the religion in question. If, to the contrary, it is said that these particular religious convictions are not a necessary condition for religious tolerance, then the religious convictions do not constitute a comprehensive purpose, i.e., do not constitute a religion in the sense that I have been using the term. Religious tolerance is now publicly prescribed on secularistic grounds. In sum, adherence to disestablishment must be possible without adherence to any particular religious convictions. Given that a religion affirms some comprehensive purpose, I hold that the first amendment can mean nothing other than the recognition of human fallibility and the commitment to public assessment of religious claims.