Religion and Politics in America: An Encyclopedia of Church and State in American Life

Religion and politics in the USA can be a baffling topic. The First Amendment to the US Constitution prohibits the establishment of a state religion while protecting the rights of citizens to the free exercise of religion. Making religion an individual right rather than a political enterprise is an expression of the liberté, égalité and fraternité intrinsic to the European Age of Enlightenment. Thomas Jefferson, one-time British subject, third US president and gentleman-farmer tutored in eighteenth-century humanism described this individual right as “a wall of separation between Church and State”. Yet, many have noted that while the US Government was...