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After Independence, there was widespread agreement that there should be no nationally established church. The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, principally authored by James Madison, reflects this consensus.
The Establishment Clause is a limitation placed upon the United States Congress preventing it from passing legislation establishing an official religion, and by interpretation making it illegal for the government to promote theocracy or promote a specific religion with taxes.
Modern times in church-state relations began in 1947 with the Supreme Court’s decision in Everson v. Board of Education.1 The Justices in both the majority and the dissent said they were interpreting the Establishment Clause based on the intent of the founding generation.
- Carl H. Esbeck
- 2021
Establishment Clause commands strict government neutrality on all religious issues, including neutrality between religious beliefs and nonreligious beliefs. The other view is that the Establishment Clause only forbids the government from favoring one religion over others, but
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting th e free exercise th ereof; or abridging th e freedom of speech, or of th e press; or th e right of th e people peaceably to assemble, and to petition th e Government for a redress of grievances.
The Supreme Court's first encounter with a Free Exercise Clause claim came when a Mormon polygamist in the Utah Territory challenged his conviction under a federal anti-polygamy law in Reynolds v U. S. (1878).
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Establishment clause, clause in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution forbidding Congress from establishing a state religion. It prevents the passage of any law that gives preference to or forces belief in any one religion. It is paired with a clause that prohibits limiting the free.
