Every week, we are treated to a corrosive collection of complaints by a cadre of community cynics. They are always complaining, never happy.

            A recent letter complained about National Day of Prayer. This person complained of being distressed by the First Amendment right of freedom of religion, citing some mythical “separation of church and state.”

            The writer claims that the Supreme Court has upheld the idea of separation of church and state citing Justice Hugo Black: “In the words of Thomas Jefferson, the clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect a ‘wall of separation’ between church and state.” She is ignorant of the history here.

            The separation language appears nowhere in the Constitution. Thomas Jefferson wrote a personal letter to a Baptist congregation using the ‘separation’ phrase to assure them of his commitment to there being no establishment of a state religion. The Baptists were concerned about a sanctioned religion like the Church of England being created. Jefferson wrote to uphold the constitutional guarantee that the state cannot prohibit the free exercise of any religion.

            Historically, it was understood that there should be no national religion and no government favoritism of one religion over another. But Justice Black slammed that by decreeing, in the case of Everson v. Indiana, that there was a “wall” between church and state that was so impregnable that it even barred government from supporting all religions equally.

            The Everson case involved the Catholic church, a religion that Hugo Black hated. Black was also a known racist.

            Some people are distressed about the fact that the government is committed to the free exercise of religion. What they are unhappy about is liberty, the very foundation of America, which guarantees us the constitutional right to practice religion in public.

Every week, we are treated to a corrosive col-lection of complaints by a cadre of community cyn-ics. They are always com-plaining, never happy.

A recent letter com-plained about National Day of Prayer. This per-son complained of being distressed by the First Amendment right of free-dom of religion, citing some mythical “separation of church of state.”

The writer claims that the Supreme Court has upheld the idea of separa-tion of church and state citing Justice Hugo Black: “In the words of Thomas Jefferson, the clause against establishment of religion by law was in-tended to erect a ‘wall of separation’ between church and state.” She is ignorant of the history here.

The separation lan-guage appears nowhere in the Constitution. Thomas Jefferson wrote a personal letter to a Baptist con-gregation using the ‘sepa-ration’ phrase to assure them of his commitment to there being no estab-lishment of a state reli-gion. The Baptists were concerned about a sanc-tioned religion like the Church of England being created. Jefferson wrote to uphold the constitu-tional guarantee that the state cannot prohibit the free exercise of any reli-gion.

Historically, it was un-derstood that there should be no national religion and no government favoritism of one religion over another. But Justice Black slammed that by decreeing, in the case of Everson v. Indiana, that there was a “wall” be-tween church and state that was so impregnable that it even barred gov-ernment from supporting all religions equally.

The Everson case in-volved the Catholic church, a religion that Hugo Black hated. Black was also a known racist.

Some people are dis-tressed about the fact that the government is com-mitted to the free exercise of religion. What they are unhappy about is liberty, the very foundation of America, which guaran-tees us the constitutional right to practice religion in public.