As I wrote in my newspaper column this week (link), it is wrong to claim, as many do, that the Founding Fathers put up a “wall of separation between church and state” in order to discourage the practice of religion in our public life. On the contrary, the Founders encouraged religious beliefs and practices, even in the public square, because nearly all religious faiths teach moral principles — the difference between right and wrong, good and bad. Moral principles positively influence human behavior, and the Founders believed a functioning society depended on the good behavior of the citizens. Public order, for example, was much more likely if the people had a natural predisposition to obey the laws because of their religiously inspired moral principles. And as it happened, the day after the Bill of Rights was ratified (this week) in 1791 — which included the First Amendment’s freedom-of-religion protections — Congress asked President Washington to “recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging, with grateful hearts, the many signal favors of Almighty God.”
We have come a long way since then. In Montgomery County, Md., near where I live, the school board recently responded to a Muslim group seeking equal status for Muslim religious holidays with those of Christian and Jewish holidays by eliminating all religious holidays. Students will still get time off for Christmas, Easter, Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah, but it won’t be acknowledged as a holiday vacation. Rather, one of the school board’s members explained, the schools will be closed for “operational reasons.” Even the Muslim group seeking equal status for Muslim holidays was dismayed by that reaction.
But it’s part of a trend. In many places “Christmas Trees” are now called “Holiday Trees.” Nativity displays are either outlawed or actively discouraged in town squares. Many schools have banned Christmas pageants, relabeling them “Winter Concerts,” and forbidding songs with religious themes such as “The First Noel” and “Oh Come all Ye Faithful.” Retail stores hardly mention Christmas at all.
The Founders would have found this unfathomable. The First Amendment makes two statements with respect to religion. First, the government can’t “establish” a particular religion, meaning it can’t treat one religion more favorably than another. Second, the government can’t prohibit “the free exercise” of religion. Citizens can practice any religion they want, anytime, without government interference, provided the tenets of that religion don’t violate the law (human sacrifices, for example.)
Fortunately, not everyone is buying into this multiculturalism run amok. Last winter a Christmas tree salesman in Texas had a sign in front of his lot that said, “Christmas Trees: $5 a Foot. Holiday Trees: $15 a foot.” The Founders would have smiled.
