| Rough Notes from Panel “Religion, Civil Rights and Individual Liberty” at the TVI Main Campus.
Question to Panelists: Should religious groups help set the moral tone for our society? Is it appropriate for religious groups to influence lawmaking and for state government to use public money to support religion?
People of faith are not the bogey man that some would make them out to be. Faith and religious practice played a central role in the founding of America and New Mexico, and religion has and will always play an important role in the civic life of Americans. (Read N.M. Constitution – “We, the people of New Mexico, grateful to Almighty God for the blessings of liberty, in order to secure the advantages of a state government, do ordain and establish this constitution”).
In a diverse society like ours tolerance (I don’t like that word, I like respect and embrace much better) is imperative, not only with regards to race, ethnicity and culture, but with regards to religion, as well. (Share examples of the religiousity of current immigrants).
Further, the morality, ethics and character development that results from religious practice should be encouraged. Within the family, or an institution like a faith community, if rules and codes of conduct are established and practiced, there is a higher likelihood of a law abiding culture. After 9 years in the state legislature I can say without any reservation, that healthy families and strong communities of faith mean more freedom and less government interference. I’d like to make two points in support of this statement.
Point 1: There should never be any doubt that the founders placed value in religion and the morality and character that resulted from religious practice. They were not lukewarm about this issue – they were raving fans of faith in God and religious practice. For their age, they were an extremely diverse group of religious practitioners - (share examples of Protestants and Catholics, Quakers and Shakers). They were aware of the intolerance many colonists had experienced in Europe and that various religious groups immigrated to America seeking religious freedom. The founders sought common ground around their shared faith in God and celebrated it.
Ben Franklin, for instance, was not a churchgoer, but wrote and spoke liberally about his faith in God and His Providence. He was personally interested in the moral code that religion enlisted and, in 1733 (while publishing Poor Richards Almanac, serving in the Penn legislature, inventing the Franklin stove and founding the American Philosophical Society), set for himself a personal goal to achieve moral perfection. He was raised Presbyterian but found his local pastor “very dry, uninteresting and unedifying, since not a single moral principle was enforced, his aim seeming to be rather to make us Presbyterians rather than good citizens.” Letter to Josiah Franklin, 1738.
Interestingly, both Franklin and Thomas Jefferson believed religious ideas should be taught in the public schools and each enumerated on several universal principles that should be taught - principles like the recognition of a Creator, an examination of the Bible as a code of conduct, and the idea that the Creator holds individuals responsible for the way we treat each other.
George Washington (the “Indispensible Man”) filled nearly 1/3 of his first inaugural address to a joint session of Congress with religious passages using phrases like, “every step the United States has taken towards becoming an independent nation has been guided by some token of Providential agency.” In his farewell address he said, “Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail to the exclusion of religious principle.”
Point 2: The myth of a hostility towards religion behind the establishment clause, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise therof” and Jefferson’s statement of “a wall of separation between church and state.”
When the Constitution was adopted at least seven states had established official religions or denominations. The founders expressed anxiety that all religions be encouraged and that all churches or religions assigned preferential treatment should be disestablished from such treatment.
As an assemblyman, Jefferson, on the one hand, introduced a resolution for disestablishing the Church of England in Virginia, but also introduced resolutions to have a day of prayer and fasting. As a citizen, Jefferson proposed using the County Courthouse to be the common temple for the four “sects” in Charlottesville, his home town, and urged the University of Virginia to extend its facilities to the various denominations so that each student could worship and study in the church of his choice. But, as President, he felt it was not the role of the federal government to proclaim religious holidays and that was the spirit of his letter to the Danbury Baptist Association in 1802 when he said the constitution had created a “wall of separation between church and state.”
While Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution lumps together five different rights, including freedom of religion, Section 11 of the N.M. Constitution speaks specifically about every person being free to worship according to the dictates of their own conscience. As you may know, each day the state legislature is conveyed with a prayer, and in past years, we have had a small budget for a Senate chaplain, who is a Jewish rabbi.
So, do I think religious groups have a role in setting the moral tone and is it appropriate for religious groups to influence lawmaking? Absolutely!
Interest groups do have an important role in public policy. Although the sponsoring group of this panel tries to imply it, the religious right is not the only interest group seeking to limit individual freedoms. The religious left tries to do so through initiatives like universal sex education, opposition to gambling, and limits on lending practices. Interestingly, every lawmaker and interest group loves the libertarian argument about individual liberty – we each use it to advocate the causes we believe in. There are natural tensions that make government and society operate – conflict and disagreement is normal.
In conclusion:
- Religious faith and practice is an essential civil right and religious groups are important advocates in a pluralistic society.
- It’s interesting that the conflict between communities of faith - generally - is over what society should NOT do (gambling, lending practices, gay marriage), there is little discussion or agreement about what we SHOULD do. There is much common ground: belief in God and a moral code, strong marriages and families, divorce not the rule but the exception, love your neighbor, building a culture of community service.
- Labels are for envelopes and canned foods, not people. Stop demonizing our opponents - keep an open mind, practice good communication skills, love and respect one another, learn to lose gracefully.
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