What Jefferson said
I want to correct a statement printed in A Conversation Piece by Skip Mission in the Feb. 2024 issue.
Mission’s article contained the following statement: “Jefferson was not a proponent of the separation of church and state that we have today.”
In fact, it was Thomas Jefferson who coined this very phrase. It was in his letter to the Danbury Baptists on Jan. 1, 1802, that Jefferson wrote, “with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people” (namely, the First Amendment to the Constitution) “build[s] a wall of separation of church and State.”
There is much misinformation about this issue that is spread by religious zealots. As a years-long subscriber to Americans United for Separation of Church and State, I am aware of many cases where religious groups have attributed sayings to the Founding Fathers that AU found to be false. Such statements advocating Christianity were attributed to George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and others. When confronted with the facts, the groups removed the statements.
I will leave with the following quote from Jefferson: “But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god.” These are not the words of a man who believes that America is a Christian nation.
Russ Salk
Windsor Locks