Separation of Church and State

The phrase separation of church and state captures a key constitutional principle of freedom from governmental interference with religion. Historically, however, the separation of religion from civic life at local, state, and federal levels in the United States has not been clear-cut. In the past as well as today, the nature and scope of this separation have generated intense political controversy and legal contestation. The constraints of civic life have conflicted with religious requirements concerning prayer in public schools, the public display of Christmas or Easter symbols in government buildings, and dress codes in the military or prisons. The increasingly varied expressions of religious diversity in contemporary public life mean that this relationship between the religious and civic spheres is far from settled. In short, “separation of church and state” serves more as an aspiration for those who believe that religious freedom resides in its separation from civic life or as an obstacle for those who use religious authorities and texts for political and legislative guidance.

This entry first reviews the evolution of the concept of the separation of church and state. Significant First Amendment court cases brought under the Establishment and Free Exercise clauses are then discussed. The entry then addresses the problematic nature of a “secular” U.S. culture that has long been structured to favor Protestant Christianity over minority religions. The entry concludes with an examination of the issues surrounding what role, if any, religion should play in public schools and how educators can make informed and sensitive decisions regarding the study of religion within the curriculum.

Separation of church and state refers to the opening language of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that contains the Establishment and the Free Exercise clauses, which together state that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” In 1802, President Thomas Jefferson wrote to a Baptist congregation in Connecticut that the First Amendment created a “wall of separation between Church and State” and thus allayed fears among dissenting churches in the newly formed Republic that the more powerful southern Anglican or New England Congregationalist church establishments would gain preeminence. The letter also conveyed Jefferson's conviction that government has the power to regulate actions but not opinions. In writing this, Jefferson accurately anticipated a tradition of Supreme Court jurisprudence that would protect individual religious conscience more readily than religious conduct, exercise, or forms of worship.

Freedom of conscience (as distinct from conduct or action) has roots in Enlightenment philosophy and in the realities of colonial sectarian diversity. The prevailing Enlightenment view, derived from John Locke, was that governments lacked authority over individual conscience and that rational beings could only make decisions of conscience for themselves, not for others. This view also reflects the Protestant emphasis on individual conscience and supports the centrality of the individual within U.S. political thought and jurisprudence. The phrase separation of church and state has roots in Biblical texts, Martin Luther, Anabaptist literature, French revolutionary theorists, and advocates of free exercise in the colonies such as Roger Williams, Anne Hutchinson, and James Madison. Jefferson's use of the phrase in 1802 also captures interdenominational conflicts in the early Republic over tax support (the focus of the Establishment Clause) and freedom of conscience and expression (the focus of the Free Exercise Clause).

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