Democracy’s Greatest Threat Wrapped in Black

 

A black robed figure often represents the Angel of Death or can represent a corrupted soul. As such a figure, it could be used to represent a select group of people who have powers greater than the Congress, the Administration or even the “Deep State,” and one who is unafraid to use its powers. Such a figure could even oppose a President and nullify any action he tried to take. They could completely alter the definitions and intentions of any legislation after it has been passed and signed into law. They could have people taken and held incommunicado for as long as they deemed necessary. In their own opinions and rulings, their powers would be unlimited and could not be denied, opposed, weakened or otherwise moderated by anyone in the government and they would not answer except to others of their own kind. Such are the Federal Judiciary of the Justice Department, the police, law enforcement and special officers who can have arrest, detain or otherwise serve writs as instructed by the Judiciary. Their powers can be enforced by the Attorney General, the BATFE (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives), FBI, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), IRS and the remainder of the various law enforcement agencies under the DHS (Department of Homeland Security). The actual individuals we are referencing are the Judges themselves, specifically the Federal Judges.

 

Relatively recently there were two Federal Judges, one in Hawaii and one in Maryland (no surprise) who annulled a directive to the Immigration Department to restrict immigrants from the same six nations which had been named for special considerations by both President George W. Bush and President Obama. The order was to last approximately ninety days or until sufficient methods were put in place for vetting immigrants from these nations. All of the nations have no actual effective governance and no method for identification of their people and are nesting homes for terrorist groups. Both of these judges, United States District Judge Theodore Chuang and United States District Judge Derrick Watson, were both surprisingly, or not, appointed by President Barack Obama. Judges have found rights in the Constitution which have baffled Constitutional scholars as well as us. Who knew that James Madison intended that bakers must bake a cake as fast as they can for anybody no matter how much of an offense to the baker the cake’s intended celebration may be. You are a devout Christian and a baker and a same sex couple would like a specially designed wedding cake and you must bake it or be sued and lose your business. Why wouldn’t a judge not simply order the couple to go and use another baker, who is not so undisposed to desire their business, instead of seeking out a baker who has Bibles on the shelves of his shop and then try and force them to make their cake. We are willing to bet that had one of the pair requested a wedding cake and stated they would add the couple atop the cake later, as they had a special family heirloom they would use and would bring it out at the ceremony, that they would have their cake already as long as they had not eaten it. But common sense, in many ways, has appeared to have left the building in disgust never to return. And this problem goes beyond court decisions and appears to have spread to the general population across the planet.

 

Judges out of control is not merely a problem in the United States. This is also a big problem in Israel. The originating source of the problem comes from the words of Israeli Supreme Court former Chief Justice Israeli Aharon Barak’s in his statement that “everything is justiciable” which has led to serious threats to the Israeli governance. Fortunately, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked is challenging the broad application (pictured below) which had become a major disruption as the Supreme Court has utilized this to dangerously overstep their powers believing they wield unchallengeable powers. This one statement was made, as a justification for the Supreme Court in particular, and judges generally, to take the extra step to right those things they see as wrong. They are to be the final arbiters of everything in Israeli society, life, governing and even military decisions. The Israeli Supreme Court has nullified laws which were passed by the Knesset and approved by the Prime Minister, in some cases more than once. The Israeli Supreme Court altered the route of the Security Barrier which placed some additional Israelis in direct threat of added terror threats. The Israeli Supreme Court has ordered homes in the disputed territories destroyed without ever demanding proof of Arab ownership and even without questioning or meeting the Arab presumed to have owned the land and simply as a response to charges raised by anti-Zionist NGO’s. The Israeli Supreme Courts countermanded orders during the Gaza and Second Lebanon Wars and also in peace times. The Israeli Supreme Court has enacted laws they believed were necessary without any action by the Knesset or Prime Minister and in all of these cases, the Supreme Court refused to admit that these powers were beyond their delineated powers quoting former Chief Justice Aharon Barak’s “everything is justiciable” statement. Rounding up the Israeli Supreme Court expanded powers which were self-declared is something vital for the survival of the Israeli democratic governance. The Supreme Court cannot claim and actually wield such that their power is unopposable and spans placing them over all other branches of government and even over the generals and officers of the military. The Legislative Branch, the Knesset, and the Prime Minister’s Office and Cabinet cannot function to implement the will of the people if the Supreme Court, which we will explain why it does not represent the people and is getting further from the people every day, can overrule every vote, rescind every law, veto every decision and even enact whatever laws they see fit thus making the Knesset and Prime Minister all but irrelevant. Everything stated about the Knesset and Prime Minister goes double for the military which cannot have a court, even a Supreme Court, second guessing officers and their orders during a war as that gets people’s children killed. The Israeli Supreme Court has overruled Ministers in the Cabinet’s funding decisions when they displease the sensitivities of one of the Justices. What a way to run a country.

 

Minister of Justice Ayelet Shaked

 

The Israeli Supreme Court chooses its new Justices when a vacancy is made in a way which is unique in the entire world. First is the method for determining the Chief Justice and Deputy Chief Justice which is done by simple seniority, the longest serving judges on the court are appointed to the Chief Justice and Deputy Chief Justice positions. Replacing a retiring Justice on the Supreme Court is performed by a nine-member commission. The selection of the members of the commission guarantees that the Israeli Supreme Court almost never varies from the positions taken by the founding justices in the early 1950’s. The Judicial Selection Committee is a nine-member committee with the members selected as follows:

Justice Minister – Chairman.
Cabinet Minister, chosen by the Cabinet.
Two Knesset Members, (one member from the coalition and one from the opposition).
Two members of the Bar Association (selected by the two largest factions).
The Chief Justice,
Two Judges of the Supreme Court

With the two Supreme Court Justices plus the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and two members from the Bar Association who will likely have to represent people or groups in trials before the Supreme Court there are five people who are obliged to curry favor with the existing Supreme Court or are members of said Supreme Court. That is five out of the nine-member committee and thus a majority. Simple math shows rather quickly, as to why the Israeli Supreme Court seldom has a Justice placed on the bench which is any different in their politics from the existing members on the Supreme Court. While the Israeli public and governance has changed significantly over the years as Israel has grown from being an agrarian economy with a GDP of $2.6 Billion in 1960 which became $6.3 Billion in 1970 climbing to $21.9 Billion in 1980 then taking off to $52.5 Billion in 1990 continuing to rise to $132.4 Billion in 2000 then jumping to $233.7 Billion in 2010 finally reaching $318.7 Billion last year in 2016 and an advanced economy leading the world in many computer, medical, agricultural and other scientific areas of excellence (see graph below). This change from an agrarian economy to one centered inside cities largely surrounding Tel Aviv with an active and admirable high tech core plus making advances in medicine, new drugs, treatments as well as an active energy economic segment which includes ecological imperatives for clean energy, Israel has changed remarkably. She has also changed politically becoming more Zionist and the religious core has broadened and continues to grow. Unfortunately, this has not been represented by the Supreme Court which has the same socialist leftist beliefs at its core as it did in 1960.

Israeli GDP from 1960 to 2016

 

Courts which overstep the presumed limits were a fear expressed by the Founding Fathers; so we will close with some quotes.

“ [N]othing in the Constitution has given [the judiciary] a right to decide for the Executive, more than to the executive to decide for them. Both magistracies are equally independent in the sphere of action assigned to them… the opinion which gives to the judges the right to decide what laws are constitutional, and what are not, not only for themselves in their own sphere of action, but for the Legislature & Executive also, in their spheres, would make the judiciary a despotic branch.” Thomas Jefferson

“The powers properly belonging to one of the departments ought not to be directly and completely administered by either of the other departments. It is equally evident, that none of them ought to possess, directly or indirectly, an overruling influence over the others, in the administration of their respective powers. It will not be denied, that power is of an encroaching nature, and that it ought to be effectually restrained from passing the limits assigned to it.” James Madison

“A question arises whether all the powers of government, legislative, executive, and judicial, shall be left in this body? I think a people cannot be long free, nor ever happy, whose government is in one Assembly.”
John Adams

“Our government is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit, by consolidation first, and then corruption…. The engine of consolidation will be the federal judiciary; the two other branches the corrupting and corrupted instruments.” Thomas Jefferson

“There is even now something of ill omen amongst us. I mean that increasing disregard for law which pervades the country — the growing disposition to substitute the wild and furious passion in lieu of the sober judgment of courts, and the worse than savage mobs for the executive ministers of justice. The disposition is awfully fearful in any community; and that it now exists in ours … it would be a violation of truth to deny.” Abraham Lincoln

“The great object of my fear is the federal judiciary. That body, like gravity, ever acting with noiseless foot and unalarming advance, gaining ground step by step and holding what it gains, is engulfing insidiously the [state] governments into the jaws of that [federal government] which feeds them.” Thomas Jefferson

“You seem to consider the judges the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions; a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy. Our judges … and their power [are] the more dangerous as they are in office for life, and are not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective control. The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members would become despots. It has more wisely made all the departments co-equal and co-sovereign within themselves … . When the legislative or executive functionaries act unconstitutionally, they are responsible to the people in their elective capacity. The exemption of the judges from that is quite dangerous enough. I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society, but the people themselves.” Thomas Jefferson

“I fear, dear Sir, we are now in such another crisis, with this difference only, that the judiciary branch is alone and single-handed in the present assaults on the Constitution. But its assaults are more sure and deadly, as from an agent seemingly passive and unassuming.” Thomas Jefferson

We have concluded that Thomas Jefferson had as great a fear of the Judiciary as we have developed and for this reason, as well as others, we really love Thomas Jefferson.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Sick and Tired of the News Media Yet?

 

Listening to news, be it on television or radio, or reading the news, be it in major newspapers or on main Internet news, and you have entered an echo chamber equipped with time slipping capabilities. Should a police officer shoot a black suspect and the media is on that hard and heavy for the two weeks; the investigations takes six weeks, if there is a trial. When the officer is completely cleared by their department, a court case, the FBI and the Justice Department investigation, there is hardly a mouse squeak as it gets one or two reports often on the half hour and is forgotten. Let a white fraternity be accused of rape of a woman and the news media works to get them expelled, their fraternity banned nation wide, and the young men lives ruined as for them and any young man sharing a name with one of the “suspects” as their names will never ever be unlinked from a horrendous rape of a young woman purer than the driven snow. When no evidence can be found of sexual intercourse and despite five-thousand pictures on Facebook from the party not showing the young woman even attending, no matter, coincidence easily ignored, those men must pay for their crimes. When the police get involved and real investigators look into the facts and question all involved and other attendees and the young woman has her story examined and it starts changing to account for discrepancies and finally completely falls apart, the story slowly dies with almost no mention of the fact that the fraternity and the young men were falsely accused, just they were fortunate that more evidence was not discovered. These are remembrances from media lynching over the past five years or so from memory and we probably mixed and matched to make the point.

 

The media will not stop its safari to completely exculpate the left, women and minorities of all wrongdoing while performing a full condemnation of the right, men and whites (especially religious individuals or traditional institutions) of all perceived wrongdoings. Theirs is a slanted profession which has taken sides. This starts with their academia takeover of the social sciences, also called the soft sciences probably for their malleability to fit a prescribed line of thought. With this they control those who will become reporters by controlling journalism schools, who will become teachers through educations departments, who will run the social science agencies in the government thus forming the Deep State, and finally reaching the point of controlling who will receive law degrees by controlling the law schools. Of course, this will be denounced as nonsense and articles from the Washington Post quoting some research from the University of Chicago relating the complete lack of unfair practices in the social sciences at that University. Perhaps there will be a link to Google showing the number of articles which disclaim such theories and another showing all twelve results supporting them. Google has become the new authority on all facts; even Snopes likely will back that just for self-preservation. Proof might come from a Forbes Article about Snopes.com or the mention that Google is now employing Snopes and PolitiFact to verify their reporting, how long before these “fact-checkers become simply two more companies depending upon Google for their ultimate survival. It is claimed we could also receive the same fact-checking by meeting a stringent set of guidelines and likely pay a hefty fee, but we prefer to allow our readers to judge our worth and should they tell us of any errors, we will check and if wrong, admit, edit, and give them thanks in the comments and often the point of the correction if viable. We have had this happen twice if memory serves and when we have disagreed with alternate commentary, we post such comments and allow our readers to ferret out what they find to be the more accurate. Further, though we speak about news, we are more commentary than strictly news reporting. We do on occasion write articles which are instructions on subjects where we often give links where possible and on others many readers have included links often supportive of our descriptions and adding even more information for those desiring to dive in deeper. We are not the number one go-to place for search information, though we would not mind that, but really do not have the employees required for such a large and serious venture. We stick to articles and allow others to write lines of code, tried that once and found it too time consuming, protocol restrictive and too darn persnickety about exactness of order and spelling and without any easy to implement spellcheck.

 

We believe it is the lack of independent thinking in the news media, both sides, and that is one reason Beyond the Cusp has had a constantly growing readership and this has been in part because the news sources, especially on the Middle East about which we comment often, have become untrustworthy and their reporting is predicated on a specific imposed lack of free thought. The media, both ends, have often taken the side given them, hand-fed one might say, by government agencies and Internet mega-companies. Freedom of reporting has slowly died in the United States and been absent from Europe for quite a number of decades if not longer. The remainder of the world has almost never had a free media as the government and their news are one and the same which tends to mean that you are granted propaganda instead of facts. We tell you when we are giving you conjecture usually with the prefacing phrase like “We believe” or “We think” or “In our opinion” and then tell you our opinion. We, in our opinion, are kind of funny that way. When was the last time you felt an article you were reading in a newspaper should have been prefaced with such a phrase at least once if not often? Probably not all that long ago, and you were probably not reading an opinion blog or the editorial section but still on page A-1. The Charleston story was very much an example of such reporting where one could figure out which side the reporter supported by their description of the two sides. What was not seen was an honest description of the two side’s main adversaries which should have read as International Socialists as Communists vs National Socialists as Nazis (depicted from two sides in Charlotte images below). The references to World War II were inaccurate though they had chosen the correct war, the wrong front. The British, American, Canadian, Free French, Australian and other British Commonwealth soldiers were not represented at Charlotte except by some, if not many, of the police who were relegated to taking orders from their leading political entities be they the Charlotte Democrat Mayor Michael Signer or Virginia Democrat Governor Terry McAuliffe, as they did little to keep the two sides separated. The western front was not the correct front; it was closer to the eastern front with the Soviet Union against the Nazis and the two red flags representing the two sides. Two ideologies born in Germany at about the same time but one went east after being chased from Germany by the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, and there is nothing that a national socialist hates more than an international socialist, better known as Communists. These two ideologies worked well together when it came to dividing up Poland but their differences meant a showdown was inevitable ever since they clashed in the streets of Germany as each attempted to take control of the leftist voters, the socialist supporters against the capitalist Weimer Republic, a democracy. Socialists are also often statists who believe that the State rules absolutely, just one believes in the nation state while the other desires and internationalist state encompassing the entire globe. Well, they both desired that in the end, one wanted a world Soviet Empire the other wanted to rename the globe Germany and have its Thousand-Year Reich. In Charlotte, these old adversaries met again on the field of battle to decide which version of imperialist fascist socialist enterprise stands supreme. Both of these philosophies have no place as a majority opinion in American politics and the fact that the media is lavishing praise on either is a disgrace.

 

International Socialists as Communists vs National Socialists as Nazis

 

Just in case there is any doubt, we abhor both sides of the media as supporting either side in the disgrace which took place in Charlotte is an insult to Thomas Jefferson and the principles he outlined in the Declaration of Independence and to James Madison and the outlines he included in the Constitution and to all involved in the drafting of the Bill of Rights. Unfortunately, both the Republican and Democrat parties have drifted far from the principles of limited government and individual liberty and freedoms espoused by the Founding Fathers. The media has mostly also gone to the partisan hacking at one another forgetting the rights they are supposed to be defending and guarding with jealous pride. The media was not envisioned as a party supporting political contrivance used to expound along party line ideals and platforms. This is what has become of what was presumed to be the guardians of the people and the watchdogs over the politicians who were presumed to turn slimy as time progressed. The media was not supposed to climb into the political mud-pits with them. With the media forgetting and betraying their sacred trust, it is little wonder that the people have lost hope that they have any allies in their fight to take back their once great nations and to save their hopes for their children who they are watching, as they are indoctrinated rather than educated. What a short trip it is once the guardians become the deceivers. I think I would trust a talking tree, a raccoon, a green whore, a red tattooed vengeance torn hulk led by a petty criminal to be the guardians of my galaxy over the media of the so-called free world.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Separation of Church and State and the Jefferson Letter

 

The entire concept of the Separation of Church and State has been twisted, spindled and mutilated beyond recognition as well as belief. Jefferson wrote a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association in 1802 to answer a letter from them written in October 1801.

 

The address of the Danbury Baptists Association in the state of Connecticut,
Assembled October 7, 1801.
To Thomas Jefferson, Esq., President of the United States of America.

Sir,
Among the many million in America and Europe who rejoice in your election to office; we embrace the first opportunity which we have enjoyed in our collective capacity, since your inauguration, to express our great satisfaction, in your appointment to the chief magistracy in the United States: And though our mode of expression may be less courtly and pompous than what many others clothe their addresses with, we beg you, sir, to believe that none are more sincere.

Our sentiments are uniformly on the side of religious liberty–that religion is at all times and places a matter between God and individuals–that no man ought to suffer in name, person, or effects on account of his religious opinions–that the legitimate power of civil government extends no further than to punish the man who works ill to his neighbors; But, sir, our constitution of government is not specific. Our ancient charter together with the law made coincident therewith, were adopted as the basis of our government, at the time of our revolution; and such had been our laws and usages, and such still are; that religion is considered as the first object of legislation; and therefore what religious privileges we enjoy (as a minor part of the state) we enjoy as favors granted, and not as inalienable rights; and these favors we receive at the expense of such degrading acknowledgements as are inconsistent with the rights of freemen. It is not to be wondered at therefore; if those who seek after power and gain under the pretense of government and religion should reproach their fellow men–should reproach their order magistrate, as a enemy of religion, law, and good order, because he will not, dare not, assume the prerogatives of Jehovah and make laws to govern the kingdom of Christ.
Sir, we are sensible that the president of the United States is not the national legislator, and also sensible that the national government cannot destroy the laws of each state; but our hopes are strong that the sentiments of our beloved president, which have had such genial effect already, like the radiant beams of the sun, will shine and prevail through all these states and all the world, till hierarchy and tyranny be destroyed from the earth. Sir, when we reflect on your past services, and see a glow of philanthropy and good will shining forth in a course of more than thirty years we have reason to believe that America’s God has raised you up to fill the chair of state out of that goodwill which he bears to the millions which you preside over. May God strengthen you for your arduous task which providence and the voice of the people have called you to sustain and support you enjoy administration against all the predetermined opposition of those who wish to raise to wealth and importance on the poverty and subjection of the people.
And may the Lord preserve you safe from every evil and bring you at last to his heavenly kingdom through Jesus Christ our Glorious Mediator.
Signed in behalf of the association, Nehemiah Dodge
Ephraim Robbins
Stephen S. Nelson

 

President Jefferson replied to the Danbury Baptists Association and this is a transcript of the final letter as stored online at the Library of Congress, and reflects Jefferson’s spelling and punctuation. We have also placed a copy of said response below (emphasis mine).

 

To Messers. Nehemiah Dodge, Ephraim Robbins, & Stephen S. Nelson, a committee of the Danbury Baptist association in the state of Connecticut.
Gentlemen
The affectionate sentiments of esteem and approbation which you are so good as to express towards me, on behalf of the Danbury Baptist association, give me the highest satisfaction. My duties dictate a faithful and zealous pursuit of the interests of my constituents, & in proportion as they are persuaded of my fidelity to those duties, the discharge of them becomes more and more pleasing.
Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.
I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man, and tender you for yourselves & your religious association, assurances of my high respect & esteem.
Thomas Jefferson
Jan. 1. 1802.

 

The First Amendment says absolutely nothing about any wall or separation between Church and State contrary to common belief. It was Jefferson’s letter which used the phrase but which has no standing whatsoever in any court of law as an argument for or against religious liberties. So let us now look at the actual First Amendment with emphasis on the religion sections.

 

Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

 

With all the particulars out of the way and everything set out for all to read, we can now discuss the entirety of the so-called “erecting a wall between church and state is absolutely essential in a free society.” This was the quote utilized in a post on Facebook within the image below as a refutation of Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s comment quoted as, “Separation of Church and State is unconstitutional.” What is interesting is that the intentions of the Founding Fathers were very easily understood simply by reading the language in the actual First Amendment. Their intent was not to protect government from the church but to protect the churches, all religions, from the government. The entirety of the first ten amendments, the Bill of Rights, was solely in order to protect the people and their institutions from being oppressed by the government, being controlled by the government, being restricted by the government.

 

Facebook Slant on First Amendment
and Wall Between Church and State

 

The First Amendment would strike down the entirety of the concept of political correctness suppressing speech if it were to be adopted by government, as some have proposed, would be struck down as against the First Amendment with even Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg voting to strike down such a law. The recent liberation of men of the cloth to speak on political messages and even to support candidates is a breath of fresh air. The claim is that this will only liberate White, Christian Ministers to speak on religious issues. Why would leftists make this claim that only White, Christian Ministers will be freed by this rule is because they already know that in the inner cities the ministers have been backing the Democrat candidates since the early 1960’s completely ignoring any rules against such speech. They have been doing so with impunity because the law enforcement and politicians are all leftists and Democrats as well and support their telling their congregants to vote for the Democrat candidates. Trust that if one were to leave the normal sermon and tell their congregants that the Democrats have lied to them for years and that perhaps it might be wise to try voting for the Republican Party, they would be shut down and arrested for such speech is against the letter of the law, until just the other day.

 

President Trump declared, “No one should be censoring sermons,” while signing an Executive Order relieving the restrictions from within Rose Garden on Thursday. President Trump went further stating, “We will not allow people of faith to be targeted, bullied or silenced again and we will never stand for religious discrimination.” The Executive Order states it is now administration policy “to protect and vigorously promote religious liberty.” This order will alleviate restriction on tax-exempt status rooted in an amendment introduced in 1954 by then-Democratic Sen. Lyndon Johnson that gave the IRS authority to punish tax-exempt charitable organizations, including churches, for making political endorsements or getting involved in political campaigns. The order directs the IRS to exercise maximum enforcement discretion to alleviate the burden of the so-called Johnson Amendment and it instructs the Treasury Department not to target the tax-exempt status of churches and other institutions if they express support for political candidates. This actually levels the playing field as now all pulpits are free to preach and support candidates that are best suited to their congregants’ beliefs. The reality is that the majority of preaching from the pulpit will still support the Democrat Party candidates, or at least this has been my experience. Even in Colorado and Oklahoma, the sermons from the pulpit were expressly left leaning to far left with little difference than those in Seattle, Louisiana, New Jersey, Washington D.C. and Cleveland. I have done a fair bit of traveling in my brief existence of a little over sixty-five years. Most of the Rabbis I have known would have told you that despite our agreement on Torah our politics could not have been more opposite.

 

I have to agree with the image above where they rate the Founding Fathers with one point but they should have credited Jeff Sessions as also having gotten it right. The First Amendment is designed to protect religious institutions from government interference and the people from being forced to follow a religion dictated by the government and imposed upon the population. The First Amendment was the protection for the religious communities to each be permitted their faith and to follow their religious beliefs free from government interference or impingement. There does exist one restriction upon religious institutions, and considering the current political climate, this is a very important restriction, no religion is permitted to use the power of government to restrict other religions or to impose itself as above or privileged over the other religions. Even this last protection is a protection against governmental overreach, even if that overreach is being used by some religion. Nowhere does the First Amendment prevent religious leaders or entire religions from expressing their desires through the ballot box as long as they do not use the power of government against other religions. Still, to this day we hear over and over again how the First Amendment placed a “Wall Between Church and State” despite nothing being further from the truth. The reality is that the First Amendment placed a Wall of Protection between the State and the Church and nothing between the Church and the State with the one restriction that the State must never be used against any religion. It really is that simple, the wall is actually a one way street where religion can, and in many instances, must influence the State hopefully for the best while the State is not permitted any travel in the opposite direction. Religion is the protected entity, not the State. The Founding Fathers meant for the State to be curtailed and directed by people of faith and felt the governance they had set in place was not operable by a people not steeped in religion.

 

We felt it only fitting to end with a series of quotes from the times and persons of the Founding Fathers in their own words.

 

“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” John Adams
“The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe in blood for centuries.” James Madison
“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 distinctness as to avoid collisions and doubts on unessential points. The tendency to 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 Govt. from interference in any way whatsoever, beyond the necessity of preserving public order, and protecting each sect against trespasses on its legal rights by others.” James Madison
“[Why] should not the Bible regain the place it once held as a school book? Its morals are pure, its examples captivating and noble. The reverence for the Sacred Book that is thus early impressed lasts long; and probably if not impressed in infancy, never takes firm hold of the mind.” Fisher Ames (author of the final wording for the First Amendment)
“I am persuaded that no civil government of a republican form can exist and be durable in which the principles of that religion have not a controlling influence.” Noah Webster (author of the first American Speller and the first Dictionary)
“The American states have gone far in assisting the progress of truth; but they have stopped short of perfection. They ought to have given every honest citizen an equal right to enjoy his religion and an equal title to all civil emoluments, without obliging him to tell his religion. Every interference of the civil power in regulating opinion, is an impious attempt to take the business of the Deity out of his own hands; and every preference given to any religious denomination, is so far slavery and bigotry.” Noah Webster (calling for no religious tests to serve in public office)

 

Beyond the Cusp