FIRST AMENDMENT RESTRICTS GOVERNMENT

Endangered:  The Constitution Part 2

http://finance.townhall.com/columnists/markbaisley/2013/03/31/endangered-the-constitution-part-2-n1553734/page/full/

Townhall – Mark Baisley – 3/31/2013

Statists have fought the purity of the First Amendment for decades.  The ACLU has managed to inculcate a popular belief in American culture and court systems that asserts the oppression that Thomas Jefferson railed against.  And amazingly, they have used Jefferson’s words to accomplish their deceitful deed.  In a letter of assurance to the Danbury Baptists Association of Connecticut, Jefferson wrote,

“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and 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 and State.”

Without a Congressional debate, nor vote in the Senate, or ratification of the states, the ACLU has managed to establish “separation between church and state” as constitutional dictum. 

But the United States was not founded on agnosticism.  And if the courts were to examine the whole of Jefferson’s writings they would find that it is wholly proper for governments to avow the existence of the God who was acknowledged at the signing of the declaration that begat the nation. 

“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, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” 

Implied herein is that this Creator

(1) is God of the laws of nature,

(2) is the creator of humans,

(3) intended for humans to share equal status among themselves,

(4) endowed all humans with unalienable rights which include life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  Not every god fits this description; Sorry.

The acknowledgment of the existence and authority of God by government entities is no way in conflict with the First Amendment.  Otherwise, the Declaration of Independence, believed by many in 1789 to be the original Bill of Rights, would itself be categorically unconstitutional.

A CITIZEN IS INCAPABLE OF VIOLATING THE FIRST AMENDMENT.  As is evident with every one of the Bill of Rights, the First Amendment was never intended as a restriction on citizen behavior.  It is a restriction on government alone.  

On matters of religion, government is to remain reverent and meek as a reflection of the noble manner that the Creator invites His followers while gracing them with free will.

Northwoods Patriots - Standing up for Faith, Family, Country - northwoodspatriotscomm@gmail.com