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OCTOBER 1, 1803
Notes for annual message, Oct. 17, 1803: alterations and additions, etc [1]
(3) after "assure"-are proposed "in due season, and under prudent
arrangements, important aids to our Treasury, as well as," an ample etc.
Quere: if the two or three succeeding paragraphs be not more
adapted to the separate and subsequent communication, if adopted as above
suggested.
(4) For the first sentence, may be substituted "In the territory between
the Mississippi and the Ohio another valuable acquisition has been made by
a treaty etc."[3.] As it stands, it does not sufficiently distinguish the
nature of the one acquisition from that of the other, and seems to imply
that the acquisition from France was wholly on the other side of the
Mississippi
May it not be as well to omit the detail of the stipulated
considerations, and particularly that of the Roman Catholic Pastor. The
jealousy of some may see in it a principle, not according with the
exemption of Religion from Civil power. In the Indian Treaty it will be
less noticed than in a President's speech.[4.]
[The principle referred to above was the principle of Church (religion)
state (govt) separation.]
FOOTNOTES:
[1.] For TJ's third annual message to Congress, Oct. 17, 1803, see Ford,
VIII, pp. 266-7)
[3.] TI's message announced the acquisition of territory by treaty from the
Kaskaskia Indians; see Ford, VIII, pp. 269-70.
[4.] TJ accepted JM's suggestion to omit any discussion of Indian treaty
requirements to maintain a Roman Catholic priest, leaving the stipulations
in the treaty to "the competence of both houses.... as soon as the senate
shall have advised its ratification"; see ibid.
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: James Madison to Thomas Jefferson, Washington, Oct.
1, 1803, Notes for annual message, Oct. 17, 1803: alterations and
additions, etc.[1.], The Republic of Letters, the Correspondence between
Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, 1776-1826, Edited by James Morton
Smith, Vol. II, 1790 -1804, W. W. Norton & Company, New York, London,
(1995) pp 1297-98)
JUNE 3, 1811
"To the Baptist Churches on Neal's Greek on Black Creek, North Carolina I
have received, fellow-citizens, your address, approving my objection to the
Bill containing a grant of public land to the Baptist Church at Salem
Meeting House, Mississippi Territory. Having always regarded the practical
distinction between Religion and Civil Government as essential to the
purity of both, and as guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States,
I could not have other wise discharged my duty on the
occasion which presented itself"
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Letter to Baptist Churches in North Carolina, June
3, 1811. Letters And Other Writings of James Madison Fourth President Of
The United States In Four Volumes Published By the Order Of Congress,
Vol..II, J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia, (1865) pp 511-512)
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MARCH 2, 1819
"The civil Government, though bereft of everything like an associated
hierarchy, possesses the requisite stability, and performs its functions
with complete success, whilst the number, the industry, and the morality of
the priesthood, and the devotion of the people, have been manifestly
increased by the total separation of the church from the State."
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Excert of a letter to Robert Walsh from James
Madison. MARCH 2, 1819 Letters and Other writings of James Madison, in
Four Volumes, Published by Order of Congress. VOL. III, J. B. Lippincott &
Co. Philadelphia, (1865), pp 121-126. James Madison on Religious Liberty,
Robert S.Alley, Prometheus Books, Buffalo, N.Y. (1985) pp 82-83)
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1817-1833
"Strongly guarded as is the separation between religion and Gov't in the
Constitution of the United States the danger of encroachment by
Ecclesiastical Bodies, may be illustrated by precedents' already furnished
in their short history"
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Excerpt from Madison's Detached Memoranda. This
document was discovered in 1946 among the papers of William Cabell Rives, a
biographer of Madison. Scholars date these observations in Madison's hand
sometime between 1817 and 1832. The entire document was published by
Elizabeth Fleet in the William and Mary Quarterly of October 1946.
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JULY 10, 1822
"Every new and successful example, therefore, of a perfect separation
between the ecclesiastical and civil matters, is of importance; and I have
no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done,
in showing that religion and Government will both exist in greater purity
the less they are mixed together"
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Excerpt of letter to Edward Livingston from James
Madison, July 10, 1822. Letters and Other writings of James Madison, in
Four Volumes, Published by Order of Congress. VOL. III, J. B. Lippincott &
Co. Philadelphia, (1865), pp 273-276. James Madison on Religious Liberty,
Robert S.Alley, Prometheus Books, Buffalo, N.Y. (1985) pp 82-83)
--------------------------------------------------------------
SEPTEMBER 1833
"I must admit moreover that it may not be easy, in every possible case, to
trace the line of separation between the rights of religion and the civil
authority with such distinctness as to avoid collisions and doubts on
unessential points. The tendency to a usurpation on one side or the other
or to a corrupting coalition or alliance between them will be best guarded
against by entire abstinence of the government from interference in any way
whatever, beyond the necessity of preserving public order and protecting
each sect against trespasses on its legal rights by others".
(SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Letter written by James Madison to Rev. Jasper
Adams, September, 1833.Writings of James Madison, edited by Gaillard Hunt,
[not sure what the volume number is but have enough information presented
here to locate the letter] microform Z1236.L53, pp 484-488. )
***********************************************
There is this:
FEBRUARY 2, 1790
a very interesting debate in the House of Representatives, February 2,
1790, when the question of the Federal census was under consideration. The
bill, as reported, provided for the enumeration of farmers, mechanics, and
other groups, but did not include the learned professions. Theodore
Sedgwick of Massachusetts (1746-1813) suggested that it should "specify
every class of citizens, into which the community was divided, in order to
ascertain the actual state of the society." Mr. Madison, in his reply,
said:
FEBRUARY 2, 1790
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
The gentleman from Massachusetts has asked, why the learned professions
were not included? I have no objection to giving a column to the general
body. I think the work would be rendered more complete by the addition, and
if the decision of such a motion turned upon my voice, they shall be added.
But it may nevertheless be observed, that in such a character they can
never be objects of legislative attention or cognizance. As to those who
are employed in teaching and inculcating the duties of religion, there may
be some indelicacy in singling them out, as the General Government is
proscribed from interfering, in any manner whatever, in matters respecting
religion; and it may be thought to do this, in ascertaining who, and who
are not ministers of the Gospel. Conceiving the extension of the plan to
be useful however, and not difficult, I hope it may meet the ready
concurrence of this House. (295)
FOOTNOTE:
295. Gales, Joseph, Sr. Debates and Proceedings of the Congress of the
united States (Washington , 1834) I, 1106-1108
SOURCE OF INFORMATION: Church and State in the United States, Volume I,
Anson Phelps Stokes, D.D., L.L.D, Harper & Bros, N Y (1950) p. 346
**************************************
and there is this, the man even felt that Chaplains was the establishment
of a NATIONAL RELIGION
Excerpts from James Madison's Detached Memoranda (written after 1817)
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/detach.htm
Madison's view in a nut shell was the each, religion/church/beyond worldly
and the civil government/state/worldly each had their own sphere of
influence, importance, etc. However, each functioned best when they were
separated from each other as far and completely as humanly possible to
achieve.
The Pledge to a country or a flag of that country being a
state/civil/worldly thing would not have been a place to add that
religious/church/unworldly wording "under God." That would have been
crossing the line.
That is exactly what ones gets when they read the incorporation veto
message:
To the House of Representatives of the United States:
Having examined and considered the bill entitled "An act incorporating
the Protestant Episcopal Church in the town of Alexandria, in the District
of Columbia," I now return the bill to the House of Representatives, in
which it originated, with the following objections:
Because the bill exceeds the rightful authority to which governments
are limited, by the essential distinction between civil and religious
functions, and violates, in particular, the article of the Constitution of
the United States, which declares, that " Congress shall make no law
respecting a religious establishment." The bill affects into, and
establishes by law, sundry rules and proceedings relative purely to the
organization and polity of the church incorporated, and comprehending even
the election and removal of the Minister of the same; so that no change
could be made therein by the particular society, or by the general church
of which it is a member, and whose support it recognizes. This particular
church therefore, would be so far be a religious establishment by law; a
legal force and sanction being given to certain articles in its
Constitution and administrations. Nor can it be considered, that the
articles thus established are to be taken as descriptive criteria only of
the corporate identity of the society, inasmuch as this identity must
depend on other characteristics: as the regulations established are
generally unessential, and alterable according to the principles and canons
by which churches of that denomination govern themselves; and as the
injunction is a prohibitions contained in the regulations, would be
enforced by the penal consequences applicable to all violation of them
according to local law:
Because the bill vests and said incorporated church an also authority
to provide for the support of the poor, and the education of poor children
of the same; an authority which being altogether superfluous, if the
provision is to be the result of pious charity, would be a precedent for
giving to religious societies, as such, a legal agency in carrying into
effect a public and civil duty.
JAMES MADISON
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