___________________________________
Recap of the first
Minnesota Day of Reason
Statements and Readings from the MNA Event at the State Capitol on May 4, 2006
Introduction (audio)
Below you will find an MP3 audio file of Steve Petersen, Minnesota Atheists Associate Chair, welcoming the crowd and introducing the event.
Click here to listen
Video and Audio of Speakers
The May 4th edition of MNA's Atheists Talk television program featured some Day of Reason speakers reprising their readings. Video downloads can be found here, and audio only can be downloaded here (look for the program titled "Day of Reason 2006"). If you'd like to see or hear more episodes of Atheist Talk as they become available, subscribe by using our podcast page (no iPod is required).
Transcripts
A Proposal for a National Day of Reason
Excerpts from James Madison's "Memorial and Remonstrance"
Quotes from Mark Twain and Thomas Jefferson
Excerpts from Madison's "Detached Memorandum"
_________________________________
A
Proposal for a National Day of Reason
by Cynthia
Egli, copyright 2006
In 1952 the
federal government designated a National Day of Prayer.
Since 1988 the Day of Prayer has had a permanent home on
the first Thursday of May.
I speak for Minnesota Atheists and for many other religious
and non-religious people who would prefer that our
government live within the limits defined by our
constitution and the bill of rights and refrain from making
religious proclamations and sponsoring religious events
such as the National Day of Prayer.
Our Founding Father’s decision to separate state and
church was very deliberate. It was debated intensively and
chosen through democratic processes.
The constitution was written without any references to the
authority of god. Its only reference to religion specifies
that there shall be no religious test for any office in the
governance of our country.
The Oath or Affirmation of Office is specified in the
Constitution and does not make any reference to god or the
bible.
Only the First Amendment makes any specific statement about
the relationship between religion and the government, and
that is, that, “Congress
shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion
or prohibiting the free exercise
thereof…”
Almost since the day the Constitution was ratified there
have been efforts to “fix” the constitution by
putting god and religion into it. This effort has
frequently taken the form of requests for religious
proclamations and days of prayer or fasting.
From the beginning our greatest leaders have resisted these
efforts. In 1808 a minister asked Thomas Jefferson to issue
one of these proclamations and he responded with the
following,
“I
consider the government of the US. as interdicted by the
Constitution from intermeddling with religious
institutions, their doctrines, discipline, or
exercises.…. I do not believe it is for the interest
of religion to invite the civil magistrate to direct its
exercises, its discipline, or its doctrines; nor of the
religious societies that the general government should be
invested with the power of effecting any uniformity of time
or matter among them. Fasting & prayer are religious
exercises.
Every religious society has a right to determine for itself
the times for these exercises, & the objects proper for
them, according to their own particular tenets; and this
right can never be safer than in their own hands, where the
constitution has deposited it…. [E]very one must act
according to the dictates of his own reason, & mine
tells me that civil powers alone have been given to the
President of the United States, and no authority to direct
the religious exercises of his constituents.”
James Madison, who caved in to the requests for such
proclamations, especially during war, commented regretfully
that,
“The
members of a Government as such can in no sense be regarded
as possessing an advisory trust from their Constituents in
their religious capacities. They cannot form an
ecclesiastical Assembly, Convocation, Council or Synod, and
as such issue decrees or injunctions addressed to the faith
or the Consciences of the people.”
He also
criticized such proclamations because, “They
seem to imply and certainly nourish the erroneous idea of
a national
religion.”
Our seventh President, Andrew Jackson, declined to proclaim
a day of prayer and fasting in response to a cholera
epidemic. Later he explained,
“I
could not do otherwise without transcending the limits
prescribed by the Constitution for the President and
without feeling that I might in some degree disturb the
security which religion nowadays enjoys in this country in
its complete separation from the political concerns of the
General Government.”
Ironically, in more recent history, separation of church
and state was one area where leading Democrats and
Republicans were in agreement.
During his presidential campaign John F. Kennedy responded
to concerns that his presidency would be run by the Vatican
with the following statement,
“I
believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic,
Protestant or Jewish – where no public official
either requests or accepts instructions on public policy
from the pope, the National Council of Churches or any
other ecclesiastical source, where no religious body seeks
to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general
populace or the public acts of its
officials…”
I doubt that our current Republican leadership would have
understood Senator Barry Goldwater, an icon of conservative
republicanism, when he stated in 1981,
“By
maintaining the separation of church and state, the United
States has avoided the intolerance which has so divided the
rest of the world with religious wars…. Can any of
us refute the wisdom of Madison and the other framers? Can
anyone look at the carnage in Iran, the bloodshed in
Northern Ireland or the bombs bursting in Lebanon and yet
question the dangers of injecting religious issues into the
affairs of state?”
Since that time the only change one would make to his
statement would be to add or substitute a different set of
countries.
He later wrote the following,
“I am
a conservative Republican, but I believe in democracy and
the separation of church and state.”
The importance of this principle is clearly demonstrated by
the current implementation of the National Day of Prayer.
Most events relating to this day have been promoted and
organized by the National Day of Prayer Task Force. This is
a private, non-profit group headed by Shirley Dobson, wife
of James Dobson. It operates from the headquarters of Focus
on the Family. The Task Force claims that the National Day
of Prayer, “belongs to all Americans”, but its
events are organized exclusively for Christians. Its
volunteers and speakers are required to “have a
personal relationship with Christ.”
Surely, as James Madison said, this seems,
“to
imply and certainly nourish the erroneous idea of a
national religion.”
The Day of Prayer is being used as an opportunity to claim,
with the support of our current President, that this
particular form of Christianity is the common religion of
our nation.
It is not.
It has been claimed that it is a unifying event.
It is not.
We are a nation of many faiths. We are Jewish, we are
Muslim, we are Buddhist, we are Hindu, we are animist, and
we are Wiccan. We are Daoist, Confucian, and Shinto. Each
Native American nation has its own beliefs. The Christians
of our nation are by no means unified behind Dobson’s
version of Christianity.
We are also a nation with a large population that declares
no religious beliefs.
Each of us has the right and the ability to pray, or not to
pray, at any time, in any place, in any way we wish, as
long as we do not violate the laws which apply to all of
us. Religious people do not need help from government to
express their heartfelt beliefs.
As an atheist, a person without a belief in any kind of
supernatural entity, I nevertheless support the rights of
all persons to their own beliefs. I will however, resist
any effort to place the religious beliefs of the few into
the laws of the many.
I seek peace, the peace that is so easily understood, the
peace that comes when we refrain from imposing our
religious beliefs on others. The quality of family and
social gatherings is greatly improved by this restraint.
The quality of our public discourse will benefit from this
restraint as well.
Today we face conflict through the world which threatens to
cause massive destruction anywhere in the world at any
time. Religion is deeply embedded in this conflict. Even
when it is benevolent, the existing suspicions undermine
remediation by religious organizations. Our only recourse
is Reason.
The use of reason, of the scientific method to determine
what is real, of open discourse, of cooperation and
compassionate understanding, is the only way to untangle
the knots that strangle our hopes for international peace
and prosperity.
In New York people gave blood on the Day of Prayer; a
rational gift that makes a real difference.
I suggest that our government, at all levels, encourage the
use of reason to resolve our issues. To indicate the
importance and value of reason, and to remove prayer from
governmental practices, I propose that we change the Day of
Prayer to one that can involve and unite all of our
citizens…to a Day of Reason.
_________________________________
Excerpts
from James Madison's "Memorial and
Remonstrance"
We the
subscribers, citizens of the said Commonwealth, having
taken into serious consideration, a Bill printed by order
of the last Session of General Assembly, entitled "A Bill
establishing a provision for Teachers of the Christian
Religion," and conceiving that the same if finally armed
with the sanctions of a law, will be a dangerous abuse of
power, are bound as faithful members of a free State to
remonstrate against it, and to declare the reasons by which
we are determined. We remonstrate against the said Bill,
1. Because it is proper to take alarm at the first
experiment on our liberties. We hold this prudent jealousy
to be the first duty of Citizens, and one of the noblest
characteristics of the late Revolution. The free men of
America did not wait till usurped power had strengthened
itself by exercise, and entangled the question in
precedents. They saw all the consequences in the principle,
and they avoided the consequences by denying the principle.
We revere this lesson too much soon to forget it. Who does
not see that the same authority which can establish
Christianity, in exclusion of all other Religions, may
establish with the same ease any particular sect of
Christians, in exclusion of all other Sects? that the same
authority which can force a citizen to contribute three
pence only of his property for the support of any one
establishment, may force him to conform to any other
establishment in all cases whatsoever?
2. Because the Bill implies either that the Civil
Magistrate is a competent Judge of Religious Truth; or that
he may employ Religion as an engine of Civil policy. The
first is an arrogant pretension falsified by the
contradictory opinions of Rulers in all ages, and
throughout the world: the second an unhallowed perversion
of the means of salvation.
3. Because experience witnesseth that eccelsiastical
establishments, instead of maintaining the purity and
efficacy of Religion, have had a contrary operation. During
almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of
Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More
or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy,
ignorance and servility in the laity, in both,
superstition, bigotry and persecution. Enquire of the
Teachers of Christianity for the ages in which it appeared
in its greatest lustre; those of every sect, point to the
ages prior to its incorporation with Civil policy. Propose
a restoration of this primitive State in which its Teachers
depended on the voluntary rewards of their flocks, many of
them predict its downfall. On which Side ought their
testimony to have greatest weight, when for or when against
their interest?
4. Because the establishment in question is not necessary
for the support of Civil Government. If it be urged as
necessary for the support of Civil Government only as it is
a means of supporting Religion, and it be not necessary for
the latter purpose, it cannot be necessary for the former.
If Religion be not within the cognizance of Civil
Government how can its legal establishment be necessary to
Civil Government? What influence in fact have
ecclesiastical establishments had on Civil Society? In some
instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny
on the ruins of the Civil authority; in many instances they
have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny:
in no instance have they been seen the guardians of the
liberties of the people. Rulers who wished to subvert the
public liberty, may have found an established Clergy
convenient auxiliaries. A just Government instituted to
secure & perpetuate it needs them not. Such a
Government will be best supported by protecting every
Citizen in the enjoyment of his Religion with the same
equal hand which protects his person and his property; by
neither invading the equal rights of any Sect, nor
suffering any Sect to invade those of another.
5. Because the proposed establishment is a departure from
the generous policy, which, offering an Asylum to the
persecuted and oppressed of every Nation and Religion,
promised a lustre to our country, and an accession to the
number of its citizens. What a melancholy mark is the Bill
of sudden degeneracy? Instead of holding forth an Asylum to
the persecuted, it is itself a signal of persecution. It
degrades from the equal rank of Citizens all those whose
opinions in Religion do not bend to those of the
Legislative authority. Distant as it may be in its present
form from the Inquisition, it differs from it only in
degree. The one is the first step, the other the last in
the career of intolerance. The magnanimous sufferer under
this cruel scourge in foreign Regions, must view the Bill
as a Beacon on our Coast, warning him to seek some other
haven, where liberty and philanthropy in their due extent,
may offer a more certain respose from his Troubles.
6. Because it will destroy that moderation and harmony
which the forbearance of our laws to intermeddle with
Religion has produced among its several sects. Torrents of
blood have been split in the old world, by vain attempts of
the secular arm, to extinguish Religious disscord, by
proscribing all difference in Religious opinion. Time has
at length revealed the true remedy. Every relaxation of
narrow and rigorous policy, wherever it has been tried, has
been found to assauge the disease. The American Theatre has
exhibited proofs that equal and compleat liberty, if it
does not wholly eradicate it, sufficiently destroys its
malignant influence on the health and prosperity of the
State. If with the salutary effects of this system under
our own eyes, we begin to contract the bounds of Religious
freedom, we know no name that will too severely reproach
our folly. At least let warning be taken at the first
fruits of the threatened innovation. The very appearance of
the Bill has transformed "that Christian forbearance, love
and chairty," which of late mutually prevailed, into
animosities and jeolousies, which may not soon be appeased.
What mischiefs may not be dreaded, should this enemy to the
public quiet be armed with the force of a law?
7. Because attempts to enforce by legal sanctions, acts
obnoxious to so great a proportion of Citizens, tend to
enervate the laws in general, and to slacken the bands of
Society. If it be difficult to execute any law which is not
generally deemed necessary or salutary, what must be the
case, where it is deemed invalid and dangerous? And what
may be the effect of so striking an example of impotency in
the Government, on its general authority?
8. Because finally, "the equal right of every citizen to
the free exercise of his Religion according to the dictates
of conscience" is held by the same tenure with all our
other rights. If we recur to its origin, it is equally the
gift of nature; if we weigh its importance, it cannot be
less dear to us; if we consult the "Declaration of those
rights which pertain to the good people of Virginia, as the
basis and foundation of Government," it is enumerated with
equal solemnity, or rather studied emphasis. Either the, we
must say, that the Will of the Legislature is the only
measure of their authority; and that in the plenitude of
this authority, they may sweep away all our fundamental
rights; or, that they are bound to leave this particular
right untouched and sacred: Either we must say, that they
may control the freedom of the press, may abolish the Trial
by Jury, may swallow up the Executive and Judiciary Powers
of the State; nay that they may despoil us of our very
right of suffrage, and erect themselves into an independent
and hereditary Assembly or, we must say, that they have no
authority to enact into the law the Bill under
consideration.
_________________________________
Quotes
from Mark Twain and Thomas Jefferson
From Twain:
"Man is the
Reasoning Animal. Such is the claim. I think it is open to
dispute. Indeed, my experiments have proven to me that he
is the Unreasoning Animal... In truth, man is incurably
foolish. Simple things which other animals easily learn, he
is incapable of learning. Among my experiments was this. In
an hour I taught a cat and a dog to be friends. I put them
in a cage. In another hour I taught them to be friends with
a rabbit. In the course of two days I was able to add a
fox, a goose, a squirrel and some doves. Finally a monkey.
They lived together in peace; even affectionately.
"Next, in another cage I confined an Irish Catholic from
Tipperary, and as soon as he seemed tame I added a Scotch
Presbyterian from Aberdeen. Next a Turk from
Constantinople; a Greek Christian from Crete; an Armenian;
a Methodist from the wilds of Arkansas; a Buddhist from
China; a Brahman from Benares. Finally, a Salvation Army
Colonel from Wapping. Then I stayed away for two whole
days. When I came back to note results, the cage of Higher
Animals was all right, but in the other there was but a
chaos of gory odds and ends of turbans and fezzes and
plaids and bones and flesh--not a specimen left alive.
These Reasoning Animals had disagreed on a theological
detail and carried the matter to a Higher Court."
Mark Twain knew that if we allowed various religions to
take over our government, this country would quickly become
embroiled in violent conflict—as we see in the Middle
East today.
A quote from Thomas Jefferson Letter to the Danbury
Baptists:
"Believing
with you that religion is a matter which lies solely
between man and his God, that he owes account to none other
for his faith, or his worship, that the legislative powers
of government reach actions only, and not opinions. I
contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole
American people which declared that their legislature
should 'make no law respecting an establishment of
religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus
building a wall of separation between Church and
State."
_________________________________
Excerpts
from James Madison's "Detached
Memorandum"
The following is
from a memorandum by James Madison, our fourth president.
He also has been referred to as "the father of the
constitution," and authored the Bill of Rights, the first
amendment of which prohibits the government from making any
law respecting an establishment of religion. These are his
words:
"Strongly
guarded as is the separation between Religion &
Government 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."
Madison then notes the failed attempt by Patrick Henry in
1784 for the sponsorship of Christianity in Virginia by the
government. President Madison recounts that:
"When the
Legislature assembled, the number of copies &
signatures prescribed displayed such an overwhelming
opposition of the people that the proposed plan of a
general assessment was crushed under
it."
Madison also makes specific mention of the practice of
appointing Chaplains for the legislature:
"Is the
appointment of Chaplains to the two Houses of Congress
consistent with the Constitution, and with the pure
principle of religious freedom?
"In strictness the answer on both points must be in the
negative. The Constitution of the U.S. forbids everything
like an establishment of a national religion. The law
appointing Chaplains establishes a religious worship for
the national representatives, to be performed by Ministers
of religion, elected by a majority of them; and these are
to be paid out of the national taxes. Does not this involve
the principle of a national establishment, applicable to a
provision for a religious worship for the Constituent as
well as of the representative Body, approved by the
majority, and conducted by Ministers of religion paid by
the entire nation?
"The establishment of the chaplainship to Congress is a
palpable violation of equal rights, as well as of
Constitutional principles: The tenets of the chaplains
elected shut the door of worship against the members whose
creeds & consciences forbid a participation in that of
the majority."
Later, Madison gives this appraisal of religious
proclamations made by the government, specifically
Presidents and Governors:
"Religious
proclamations by the Executive recommending thanksgivings
& fasts are shoots from the same root with the
legislative acts reviewed.
"Although recommendations only, they imply a religious
agency, making no part of the trust delegated to political
rulers.
"The objections to them are
"1. that Governments ought not to interpose in relation to
those subject to their authority but in cases where they
can do it with effect. An advisory Govt is a contradiction
in terms.
"2. The members of a Government as such can in no sense be
regarded as possessing an advisory trust from their
Constituents in their religious capacities. They cannot
form an ecclesiastical Assembly, Convocation, Council, or
Synod, and as such issue decrees or injunctions addressed
to the faith or the Consciences of the people. In their
individual capacities, as distinct from their official
station, they might unite in recommendations of any sort
whatever, in the same manner as any other individuals might
do. But then their recommendations ought to express the
true character from which they emanate.
"3. They seem to imply and certainly nourish the erronious
idea of a national religion. The idea [just as it related
to the Jewish nation under a theocracy, having been
improperly adopted by so many nations which have embraced
Christianity], is too apt to lurk in the bosoms even of
Americans, who in general are aware of the distinction
between religious & political societies. The idea also
of a union of all to form one nation under one Govt in acts
of devotion to the God of all is an imposing idea."
(Let there be no mistake that the word "imposing" in
Madison's usage describes an unwelcome force.)
Again, these words were written by the author of the first
amendment and can leave no doubt as to its intended
meaning.