THOMAS JEFFERSON
THE LETTER FROM THE DANBURY BAPTIST ASSOCIATON AND THOMAS JEFFERSON'S RESPONSE
In 1801 the Danbury Baptist Association wrote a letter to the newly elected President Jefferson to complain of their states lack of a new constitution. Connecticut was still operating under it's original charter of 1639. That charter founded a democratically represented (congregational) church and then a civil government. The king of England signed off on the charter making Connecticut an independent republic not subject to England's rule so this had already been an independent country for a century. This was a very stable government that no one in Connecticut wanted to change until some unscrupulous men started to use membership in the congregational church to disenfranchise some of those who belonged to other churches. That is what the Danbury Baptist wrote the newly elected president about. In his letter the president answered that an "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." The modern question being: Are these letters meant to convey exactly what they say or is that sentence taken out of the context of these letters meant to convey what a rouge Supreme Court declared in 1947? That Religious principle or expression has no place whatsoever in any public entity according to the courts dictates?