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Exegesis of the Constitution

 

The importance of firmness in retaining the original meaning of the Constitution for judiciary, legislative and administrative separation merits repeated emphasis.  The duty of unelected judges is to settle disputes based upon the Constitution and Precedents consistent with the Constitution.  Responding to the question, "Is there a role for politics in our judicial system?" Atonin Scalia, who has now served for over twenty years on the Supreme Court, said:  "The absolute worst violation of a judge's oath is to decide a case based on a partisan principle or philosophical basis, rather than what the law [states]."*

 

Prior to the Everson v. Board of Education decision in 1947, the First Amendment protected religious liberty.  Liberals going to court to get the Ten Commandments removed from public property would have been wasting their time.  A disruptive student who objects to the statement "Jesus is the reason for the season" on t-shirts in the public school would not have threatened a lawsuit.  The force of government was on the side of the people's civic right to use their institutions, including public education, to proclaim belief in the nonsectarian God of creation.

 

The First Amendment upholds the unalienable right of the people to share their religious beliefs and make comparisons.  With this knowledge they can then choose what appears to be best.  This competition between the religions strengthens the Higher Authority "government of laws, and not of men" consensus among voters.

 

"On every question of construction, carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed" (June 12, 1823, Thomas Jefferson, Autobiography Notes on the State of Virginia, Public and Private Papers, Addresses and Letters, New York: The Library of American, 1984).

 

Modern_judge

*V.P. Price "Are There Too Many Lawyers?" Parade, September 14, 2008, 9.

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Everson v. Board of Education

The 1947 Everson v. Board of Education decision was a departure from American legal foundations, striking at the very heart of self-government and liberty.  Within fifteen years, radicals on American campuses were gleefully rejecting and attacking core American belief for law.  Everson v. Board of Education appears to have been by far the most harmful court action taken against individual liberty since the Dred Scott v. Sandford decision ninety years earlier.

 

The Everson v. Board of Education decision twisted the meaning of the First Amendment of the Constitution in two ways.  According to Daniel L. Dreisbach, "First, the phrase emphasizes separation of church and state--unlike the First Amendment, which speaks in terms of non-establishment and free exercise of religion.  Second, a wall [term used by the Court] is a bilateral barrier that inhibits the activities of both civil government and religion--unlike the First Amendment, which imposes restrictions on civil government only [not on religious freedom]."*

 

Thomas Jefferson's "wall of separation" metaphor was totally misrepresented by the judges.  He adamantly objected to any such tyranny against religious liberty.  Engraved on the Jefferson Memorial in Washington, DC are his own words:  "I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."  He was a religious seeker and regularly attended church services held on Sundays in the United States Capitol building.**

 

Instead of upholding their oath to abide by the Constitution, judges ruled by "incalculable and changeable decrees."  Rule by men replaced government by established law.  The reasoning behind their decision reflects the old European secular doctrine of open-mindedness for dumbing the people down and transforming society.  Instead of being umpires, unelected judges are trampling on the sacred rights of the people by legislating superior rights for the enemies of responsible liberty.

 

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*Daniel L. Dreisbach, Professor of Justice, Law, and Society at American University in Washington, DC, "How a Misused Metaphor Changed Church-State Law, Policy, and Discourse," essay, Heritage Foundation publication, June 23, 2006, http://www.heritage.org/initiatives/first-principles

**Hutson, Religion and the Founding of the American Republic, 84.

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Marbury v. Madison

The great harm done to America by liberal judges is, in no small part, due to the shameless contrivance and exploitation of the Marbury v. Madison decision.  It was not the intent of the Marbury v. Madison decision to make the court supreme and enable judges to assume the role of the people's representatives and make law.  The court simply settled a dispute as prescribed by the Constitution.  Liberals who believe that unelected judges have the right to originate laws or step in and be administrators in non-court administration matters demonstrate an immoral, supremacist violation of Constitutional separation of powers.

 

Repeating the words of Chief Justice John Marshall:  "The government of the United States has been emphatically termed a government of laws, and not of men… That the people have an original right to establish for their future government, such principles as, in their opinion, shall most conduce to their own happiness, is the basis on which the whole American fabric has been erected.  The principles… are deemed fundamental.  And as the authority, from which they proceed, is supreme… they are designed to be permanent."*

 

John Marshall endured the freezing winter at Valley Forge as a soldier in the Third Virginia Regiment in the War for Independence.  He risked his life to enforce the moral absolutes as the predicate for law outlined in the Declaration of Independence.

 

Further proof of Chief Justice Marshall's rejection and avoidance of secular adventurism in Marbury v. Madison is his letter to Jasper Adams, written May 9, 1833, "The American population is entirely Christian, and with us Christianity and Religion are identified.  It would be strange indeed, if with such a people, our institutions did not presuppose Christianity, and did not often refer to it, and exhibit relations with it."**

 

A notable perversion of the purpose of judicial review came fifty years later in the Dred Scott v. Sandford opinion.  That decision by the court eliminated any doubt about the appetite of some judges for overtaking the role of the people's representatives elected to establish law.  The Dred Scott v. Sandford decision decreed that African Americans could not be citizens under the Constitution because they were "of an inferior order."  What an egregious violation of the Supreme Court's authority!  President Abraham Lincoln opposed the decision, and it did not stand as precedent for long.  Thank God.

 

Marbury_vs_madison

* http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0005_0137_ZO.html

**http://www.errantskeptics.org/FoundingFathers.htm

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John Marshall: A Government of Laws and Not of Men

A related cause of judicial incompetence is the foolishness of judges who have closeted the true role of the nation's basis for law--the non-sectarian Biblical principles of the Declaration of Independence.

 

John Marshall wrote the landmark 1803 Marbury v. Madison opinion that inaugurated the concept of judicial review.  He served as chief justice of the Supreme Court from February 4, 1801 to July 4, 1835.  Marshall saw the importance of biblical morality in civic affairs as did the other Founding Fathers.

 

When writing the Marbury v. Madison opinion, Marshall said:  "The government of the United States has been emphatically termed a government of laws, and not of men… That the people have an original right to establish, for their future government, such principles as, in their opinion, shall most conduce to their own happiness, is the basis, on which the whole American fabric has been erected.  The principles, therefore, so established, are deemed fundamental.  And as the authority, from which they proceed, is supreme, and can seldom act, they are designed to be permanent."*

 

The meaning and intent of Chief Justice Marshall's statement--"The government of the United States has been emphatically termed a government of laws, and not of men"--is clear.  "The government of laws" is based upon impartial Higher Authority moral law, "and not of men."  The benefit is that "government of laws, and not of men" is anchored in the timeless principles revealed by Scripture and proven beneficial in the American experience.  This stands in contrast to arbitrary rule and oppression that follow governments "of men," meaning rule by privileged authoritarians.  Application of this basic understanding preserves the all-important predicate for the safe and impartial application of government power.  It is the "rule of law," emphasized by Moses, that identifies with the desirable outcomes that prevail over circumstances and diverse cultural environments.

 

The rule or "government of laws" occurs when the voting sovereigns base their preferences for government on the wisdom that is available from the Creator and the self-evident boundaries of creation's nature.  The people then elect like-minded representatives to serve as lawmakers.  In contrast, self-righteous liberals, especially law professors who are given captive audiences (not held accountable to those who pay their salaries), fool people by teaching them that God has no relevance.  Citizens and judges must reject the wisdom of creation's God.  Then hierarchical elites slip into the vacuum as god, and society experiences the tyranny of the rule or "government of man."

 

John Marshall's Higher Authority basis for rejecting the atheistic secular government "of men" also concurs in full with the public standard of Benjamin Franklin whose call for prayer was adopted by the delegates at the Constitutional Convention.  In this regard, Henry Steele Commager, eminent historian of the twentieth century, points to the Creator-based Declaration of Independence as the source of America's unique principles of government, and refers to America's new political system for the vindication of God-given rights as "matchless logic" and of "permanent" rather than "transient" value.**

 

Unabashed belief in the providence of the universal and impartial God of creation, as a political principle, is fully American.  This was the source of the courage of the Founding Fathers when risking confrontation by the greatest military force on earth at the time.  The Higher Authority standard for morality in matters of law is indelibly written in American history:  "The Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions… And for the support of this Declaration [of Independence], with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor."

 

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*http://usa.usembassy.de/etexts/democrac/9.htm

**Henry Steele Commager, forward to McGuffey's Sixth Reader (New York: The American Library, 1962), xiv.

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From Chapter 6, The Defilement of the Judiciary

Definite and specific American principles for law do exist.  Under the influence of these principles, our nation became the overwhelming choice of immigrants throughout the world.  Chief among the foundations of the American philosophy for governing is the belief that man is the beneficiary of unalienable rights which come from God and that are superior to secular claims, governments, and things material.

 

The law given from Sinai [Ten Commandments] was civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code; it contained many statutes… of universal application--laws essential to the existence of men in society and most of which have been enacted by every nation which ever professed any code of laws" (John Quincy Adams, the sixth president of the United States).*

 

Under the false premise that professors must be independent from the values of taxpayers and parents for determination of the truth to be used in the behavioral and political sciences, leftist union bosses demand that teachers be sheltered from the people by tenure laws.  This violation of government by and for the people has enabled secular militants to take moral law, which makes liberty achievable, out of soft science curriculums.  Consequently small cadres of atheistic teachers bully the good teachers and dumb down American youth.  The all-out war against the nonsectarian God of life, liberty and human decency is clear.

 

Failure of public schools to teach respect for "In God We Trust," along with the self-evident laws of creation's nature, and emphasize the principles of the Declaration of Independence raises a pertinent question:  "How does this classroom strategy differ from that of the Fascists and the Communists?"

 

Our Federalist approach, which divides and limits the authority of the national government, the states, and thirdly, the authority for controlling the policies of local units, such as counties, cities and schools belongs to the people therein.  Central government authority is needed to facilitate harmony between the states in such matters as interstate commerce, transportation, foreign policy, and national defense.  This protects the nation as a whole.  The central government, however, is not to get involved in domestic policy unless there was a trend in a region of the country that threatened the unity and survival of the nation as a whole.  Because needs within individual states, counties and cities differ and are better resolved locally, the right to make such laws belongs to the individual states and local citizens.  Failure of legislators and judges to respect the superior value of local control in domestic matters leads to a citizen-to-government disconnect and the tyranny of centralized authoritarian rule.

 

In his Farewell Address to the nation, President Washington expressed what has proven to be of vital importance:  "If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution designates.  But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed.  The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit, which the use can at any time yield."

 

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*Letters of John Quincy Adams to His Son, www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/48640.>

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Following the Rules for a Successful Government

All tools that deliver power--automobiles, atom bombs, governments and so forth--must have a moral predicate to guide their use.  The automobile has a steering wheel, accelerator and brake pedal that enable man to guide the tool for achieving a desired destination.  Speed limits, turning rules and stop signs are the predicate, the morally significant basis for safe travel.  Success is assured if the driver is educated to be responsible to avoid pitfalls and proceeds accordingly.

 

The  Constitution, which serves as the tool for governing, has seven articles with short subsections and a preamble that starts with the sovereigns under God, "We the People."  The moral predicate for guiding the use of the Constitution is the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights that was added later to the Constitution.  The power to finance government flows from the mammoth equivalent of a local Main Street bank, the taxpayer-funded public treasury.  Even small, privately-owned banks need the system of specific policy hurdles and audits to minimize theft by employees as well as decreasing the danger of authorizing bad loans.  For this same reason, many obstacles and verifiable checkpoints were included in the Constitution.

 

Beyond the need for internal checks for monitoring the proper use of the public treasury is the need for the principles of the Creator-based Declaration of Independence, later expanded and codified for the citizens' Bill of Rights.  The Bill of Rights provides specific protections against the violation of citizens' rights as the sovereigns under God over government by government employees.  This is necessary to protect society from pretender-gods who, as government officials, interfere with man's "unalienable rights" and industry.

 

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In his Farewell Address to the nation, President Washington said:  "Towards the preservation of your government, and the permanency of your present happy state, it is requisite, not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority, but also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however specious the pretexts.  One method of assault may be to effect, in the forms of the Constitution, alterations which will impair the energy of the system, and thus to undermine what cannot be directly overthrown."*

 

Liberals in our midst understand the value of stealthy, cradle-to-grave government (socialism) as a tool for subduing, ruling and exploiting the people.  They object to the impartial Creator-based principles, the absolutes for constitutional law that keep government on the side of citizen self-rule for liberty.  

 

"If we and our posterity reject religious instruction and authority, violate the rules of eternal justice, trifle with the injunctions of morality [allow leftist secular militants to dictate what students are taught], and recklessly destroy the… Constitution which holds us together, no man can tell how sudden a catastrophe may overwhelm us that shall bury our glory in profound obscurity" (Daniel Webster, January 18, 1782-October 24, 1852, an attorney and statesman who argued several cases before the John Marshall court).**

 

Let us reverse the tragic move to atheistic secular jurisprudence!  Morality of the God-honoring Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights are the design, and the Constitution is the tool for implementing that design.

 

 

 

*http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/washing.asp

**http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Daniel_Webster

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Government by Written and Permanent Law: Stability vs Manipulation

The most significant correction that came with the American Revolution was that citizens themselves were recognized as sovereigns under God over government.  In the United States, people looked to creation's God for higher authority.  The First Amendment rejection of power, claimed by government authoritarians, kings, academians, clergy, etc., unleashed competition for religion, education and speech among the people that enabled America to become the greatest nation in world history.

 

William Ellery Channing wrote, "Erase all thought and fear of God from a community, and selfishness and sensuality would absorb the whole man.  Appetite knowing no restraint, and poverty and suffering having no solace or hope, man would trample in scorn on the restraints of human laws.  Virtue, duty, principle would be moved and scorned as unmeaning sounds.  A sordid self-interest would supplant every feeling, and man would become… a companion of brutes."*

 

"Government by written and permanent law" is not complicated.  No matter what one's religion, birthright or political view, the principles of the Declaration and universal absolutes shown here clearly distinguish right from wrong.  Stealing property that belongs to another is violating an unalienable right upon which liberty depends.  Adultery is a violation of the sacred obligations of marriage and family, creating stress and shortening life.  Dishonesty cheats the victim out of an unalienable, God-given right and undermines the reliable communication upon which commerce and community depend.  Deliberately stopping the heart of an unborn child is an horrific offense to the God of life as well as to society.

 

How then can the people protect themselves from cavalier authoritarians who manipulate changes in laws that enable radicals to dumb down students and, by extension, over time, manipulate society?

 

Historians Will and Ariel Durant pointed out Solon of Athens' recognition of the critical procedural choice that is directly related to limiting the options for political deception.  Do we insist upon "government by written and permanent law," or do we permit "government by incalculable and changeable decrees?"**

 

Impressions of Solon of Athens and other lawmakers from different cultures, with the focus on Moses and the Ten Commandments, are displayed on the Supreme Court building in Washington, DC.  Although Solon did not support his understanding with references to the Old Testament for reliable standards, he did recognize the ongoing dangers of deception by authoritarians who manage to dominate soft sciences.

 

"Government by written and permanent law" provides long-term stability.  Mankind is protected from short-lived popular fantasies and preserved from the inroads of political deception.  Secular elitists who insist that the American charter for the use of government power is a "living constitution" now artfully advance "government by incalculable and changeable decrees."  To retain respect for the family and liberty, the Constitution must be anchored to the political truth adopted by the Founding Fathers.

 

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*William Ellery Channing, 1820, The Great Doctrine of Retribution: The Founders' Views of the Social Utility of Religion, cited by James H. Hutson in a presentation to the John Courtney Murray Seminar at the American Enterprise Institute, 1150 Seventeenth Street, NW, Washington, DC, June 6, 2000.

**Will and Ariel Durant, The Story of Civilization, the Solon of Athens "government by incalculable and changeable decrees" Vol. II, The Life of Greece, 1939, 118.

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Government by Written and Permanent Law: Republic vs Regime

The American system of government is a Federal Republic, meaning a confederation of many--a central government and state governments.  James Madison describes the American system as "a Republic--a federation, or combination, of central and state republics--under which: the different governments will control each other…" (Federalist No. 51).

 

The powers are divided between the legislative, executive and judicial branches of government which remain subject to the sovereignty of the people (electorate) under creation's God per the Declaration of Independence.  "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence" (Article IV, Section 4 of the United States Constitution).

 

The federal and state governments are Republics which are distinguished by the fact that they are representative and limited in their power by written constitutions (Federalist No. 45).  The citizen electorate adopts the constitutions, and they are only changeable from the original through amendment by the people.  


The law has been defined as "a set of rules for conduct prescribed by a controlling authority and having binding legal force" (Black's Law Dictionary).*  The overriding concern is: What are the beliefs of the controlling authority?  Sadly, some public servants, including some law professors, do not respect the fact that government gets its power from the sovereigns, the taxpayers who created the government and pay their salaries.

 

In Europe, kings, popes, academician elites and others claimed to be supreme.  This is comparable to what self-indulgent judges are now doing in America.  Rejecting the meaning and intent of the Constitution, they seek to impose societal values of their own choosing.  When federal laws dealing with local concerns descend downward, they become oppressive and often harmful to society.  

 

What sets the American constitution apart from those of so many other nations is that its use is rooted in the Higher Authority Judeo-Christian tradition for civil order.  The Constitution is a tool composed of directives, checks and obstacles.  When the principles of the Creator-based Declaration articulated in the Bill of Rights are upheld, the obstacles built into the Constitution become morally effective, and it becomes difficult for government employees to empower a partisan political agenda or line their pockets with taxpayers' money.

 

"Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force.

Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."

George Washington

 

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Government by Written and Permanent Law: Liberty vs Oppression

"Government is frequently and aptly classed under two descriptions, a government of FORCE [arbitrary and changeable decrees imposed by authoritarians], and a government of LAWS [governments that derive 'their just powers from the consent of the governed']; the first is the definition of despotism--the last Liberty" (Alexander Hamilton, Tully Papers, 1794).

 

In the words of Chief Justice John Roberts:  "Governments in world history have so often abused the power, and people have suffered because of it.  The framers decided they were going to lay down some rules to try to keep that from happening--that's what the Constitution is.  Of all the major written constitutions in history, it is the shortest.  It's not an elaborate code.  They were laying down basic principles that they wanted to endure and it is timeless… our Constitution is different from a lot of others.  Many countries that have constitutions--they're really just political documents."**

 

Corruption is limited when the development of law comes from the people unless, of course, they become estranged from God and the moral certainties of creation's nature.  When this happens the people become vulnerable to exploitation and paternalistic authoritarians.

 

"In questions of power let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."

Thomas Jefferson

 

The American Principles One through Fifteen, Chapter 1, in the Restoring Education Central To American Greatness book that we have listed in previous blogs are changeless, practical and appropriate for government "by written and permanent law."  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."

 

George Washington reminded future generations that they cannot neglect the personal responsibility for upholding the moral predicate for law:  "It is easy to foresee, that from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth ('keep alive the spirit of Liberty'); as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively directed.*

 

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*Chief Justice John Roberts, discussing the role of Constitutional American politics with C-Span host Lamb on August 5, 2006.

**George Washington, Farewell Address, September 17, 1796, in The Writings of George Washington from the Original Manuscript Sources 1745-1799, published by the authority of Congress, ed. John C. Fitzpatrick, vol. 35, 214-38.

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America's Civic Religion in Light of Its Judges

In times past, our nation's judges recognized that America has a civic religion.  In 1952, Justice William O. Douglas wrote, "We are a religious people and our institutions presuppose a Supreme Being."*  Civic religion is different than the personal faith of individuals--their manner of worship, fellowship and practice.

 

American courts and judges honored the benevolent providence of God unabashedly.  "On Monday last the Circuit Court [Portsmouth, NH, May 24, 1800] of the United States was opened in this town.  The Hon. Judge Paterson presided.  After the Jury was impaneled, the Judge delivered a most elegant and appropriate charge…  Religion and morality were pleasingly inculcated and enforced as being necessary to good government, good order, and good laws, for 'when the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice [Proverbs 29:2]'…  After the charge was delivered, the Rev. Mr. [Timothy] Alden addressed the Throne of Grace in an excellent, well adapted prayer."**

 

In 1892, the Supreme Court of the United States cited eighty-seven precedents and proclaimed:  "Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teachings of the Redeemer of Mankind.  It is impossible that it should be otherwise:  and in this sense and to the extent our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian…  This is a religious people.  This is historically true.  From the discovery of this continent to the present hour, there is a single voice making this affirmation… we find everywhere a clear recognition of the same truth."***

 

The Supreme Court had reviewed eighty-seven decisions for settling disputes by previous courts and they all followed Biblical principles of right and wrong.  Respect for this truth can be traced historically to the founders' Christian faith.  Human authoritarianism was rejected.  The principles of the nonsectarian God of creation, spoken of in the American Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights were viewed as supreme.

 

Legislation drafted by the United States Senate and House of Representatives adding the words "under God" to the American Pledge of Allegiance was signed by President Eisenhower in 1954.  In 1964, the Supreme Court rejected a challenge to the law.

 

The obligations that apply to theistic religions also apply to atheistic religions.  By refusing to admit that faith-dependent atheism is religious (concerned with beliefs about origin, meaning and purpose of life), secular militants hope to escape responsibility for civil standards of morality.  While demanding supremacy for their God-rejecting faith, they deny public freedom for the Creator-based civic creed in the soft sciences, most particularly in the study of biology, economics, American government, history and judicial foundations.  When secular militants succeed here, they then move to deny belief in God--period--even as the basis for personal faith.

 

Student understanding of American civic religion in taxpayer-funded schools is a foremost curriculum requirement.  By excluding the denominational creeds and biases that tend to be divisive, the people unify in support of governments that honor "In God We Trust" as a nonsectarian creed.

 

"Human law must rest its authority ultimately upon the authority of that law which is divine…  Far from being rivals or enemies, religion and law are twin sisters, friends, and mutual assistants.  Indeed, these two sciences run into each other."

James Wilson

Signer of the Constitution

U.S. Supreme Court Justice

 

Under_god

 

 

*Zorach v. Clauson, Docket 431, citation 343 US 306, 1952.

**Barton, Original Intent, 118-19.  See also The Documentary History of the Supreme Court, Vol. III, 436.

***Ibid.

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