Re: Supreme Court Weasels Out On Separation Of Chu

Although I do not want the U.S. government to become a theocracy (nor do I see much risk of that happening), I can't help but wonder if the chaps you refer to: "Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin,{who} well knew the dangers of religion" were the same Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin who authored and pledged their lives to these words:

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights ...

Bill, I don't think that there is an "answer" or one correct consensus interpretation of this language from the Declaration of Independence. My own opinion is that the founders had varying views on religion, and thus were purposefully ambiguous when drafting the Declaration and later on they protected all types of faith when drafting the free exercise and establishment clauses of the First Amendment.

I posted the beginning of the Declaration because I read the original post to state that certain key founders knew of the “dangers of religion” and acted accordingly. In other words, they acted to protect the government from religion, or maybe they acted to protect the non-religious from religious persons. Both views are IMO incorrect. Actually, the founders were concerned about protecting religion from government.