On the Soapbox

I have long known that the notion that the United States was "founded as a Christian nation" is nothing more than a fabrication of the historical revisionism of the religious right. What I didn't know was that this concept was actually expressed in a government document. As it turns out, the 1796 Treaty of Tripoli, as ratified by the United States Senate, contains the following phrase:

... the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion ...

While reading about this, I also came across these words from the famous infidel who penned the Declaration of Independence:

Because religious belief, or non-belief, is such an important part of every person's life, freedom of religion affects every individual. ... Moreover, state support of the church tends to make the clergy unresponsive to the people and leads to corruption within religion. Erecting the wall of separation between church and state, therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society.

It is amusing, then, to observe the revisionists of the religious right painting this "wall" as a liberal fabrication unsupported by the views of the Founding Fathers. Ironically, members of the religious right should be grateful for this wall of separation, as Jefferson was right about the wall of separation helping stave off corruption. This wall of separation is arguably the most important reason why the United States today is, for better or for worse, more devout than Europe, Canada, or even Israel, where there currently is or has been state-supported religion.