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Oppose. I have reworded the paragraph to take into account that this case is unclear. User:Vary seems to be of the opinion that this should only be debated in the article American Atheists. I am of the opinion that this case, regardless of what Bush (Snr) actually said, should be debated in this article. If even the Washington Times mentioned it, it should be notable, and I would consider it a POV-Fork no to debate it in THIS article. However, if you can reach a broad consensus that it should not be debated in this article (but at American Atheists) I won't care. The sociological debate on this is more interesting, anyway. Zara1709 ( talk) 19:06, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
While I don't think there should be an entire section on this comment here, a brief mention would certainly not be superfluous. It is highly notable to the topic to quote an US president (alright, a "special" US president) who appears to have no practical knowledge or perception of the legal principle. Try to find a constructive compromise. dab (𒁳) 11:39, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
As I commented some time ago when a report on this was filed at the BLP noticeboard, whether or not he actually said it, it is notable that he did not apparently deny it once reports circulated that it had been said. It certainly seems notable enough from that standpoint. Plus it was reported - or the controversy was covered - in several unimpeachable sources. If many RSes are "teaching the controversy", to borrow a phrase, then so might we - in the context of controversy, which is how it should be phrased. Relata refero ( talk) 14:22, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
What does WP:BLP actually say? If you take a look at Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons, you will see in the 2nd sentence that it does only supplement and emphasize the three main Wikipedia policies of Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:No original research (the last of which is not an issue here). You, Vary, are of the opinion that we would need to verify whether Bush actually said the statement to include is in this article. I should point out here, that I never explicitly was of the of the opinion that one could verify it. After I took a look at the sources that I gathered largely myself, I would actually say that one can't verify it. Nevertheless, even if the statement was actually wrong, it would not violate Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons to include it in the article George H. W. Bush in this case, if one would make clear that he did not actually say it. A search on the Internet turns up enough pages on this to make it notable. "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a tabloid;" This is to be included because it was part of a public discussion, but Wikipedia is not a tabloid that would decide for the reader wether he actually said it or not, unless of course, either one of the viewpoints could be reliably sourced. I mean, I don't care about the issue that the American public has with atheism. But some people are likely to look up Wikipedia to see if we have something on the rumour about Bush having said something against Atheists, and it would be better to say that it is not clear whether Bush actually said it than to say nothing.
How does Wikipedia really work? I would otherwise rest it here, but Vary was determined to tell me how it [Wikipdia] works. On the right side you can find a flowchart of basic consensus decision-making process. If you disagree about something, you should usually discuss it first. I had intented the merge propasal to give the room for the discussion.
The claim that the material needed to be removed because of WP:BLP is nonsense. If you take ANOTHER look at the last revision that was removed, you will see that I did not say anything about whether this statement was true or not. But I was referring to the Tucson Weekly saying that it would be "one of the most famous quotes about atheists in American society." That Newspaper (that should be a reliable source) also does not say whether Bush actually said it, but it mentions that "Atheistic journalist and activist Robert Sherman attributed the statement to him". Of course, one newspaper article is not enough to establish notability, but one could easily find some more references , and you know that there are other reliable sources for the point that Shermann HAS ATTRIBUTED this statement to Bush, too. So you removal was not covered by wp:BLP and I consider it quite offensive. But I will assume that you acted in good faith.
On the actuall issue: Anyway, if this was an issue for wp:blp, it needed to be removed from American Atheists, too. But this is not the case, and a removal there would clearly be a violation of wp:NPOV that mandates that all significant viewpoints need to be included. The only real question here is, whether the attribution of this quote to Bush is significant enough to included in this article. That would be probably a question for a Requests for comment, but I still think that we can solve the other issues here with common sence. Again: Nobody is insisting that Bush actually said: "I don't know that atheists should be regarded as citizens, nor should they be regarded as patriotic. This is one nation under God." What I am insisting on is that it has been alleged by Bob Sherman that he said it. Naturally, the use of the word 'alleged' does not violate wp:NPOV, since this has in fact been alleged. Similarly, the use of the word 'eminently' is not POV. The phrase "it has been eminently been argued by" is like a standart phrase for summarizing academic discussion. Only that this topic is here not considered to be an academic question which one can discuss in a relaxed atmosphere, but a political topic in the bad sense of the word political. Here a discussion means complelety denying any other point of view. Zara1709 ( talk) 15:47, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
I found another newspaper who reported on it. Washington monthly: [3], [4]. This should be a reliable source. There also is a statement in a forum, that even CNN and the New York Post reported on this. [5]. But anyway, I also found out that Wikipedia already has an article Discrimination against atheists which says: "In the 1988 U.S. presidential campaign, Republican presidential candidate George H. W. Bush reportedly said, [the statement]". I'd guess Vary and Cool Hand Luke will object to the way that this is currently written there, so I propose that we just move the debate there an settle here with another sentence in the section that does not mention the statement by Bush, but links Discrimination against atheists instead. Zara1709 ( talk) 16:30, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
The word 'Eminently' is inherently pov, and the way it's being used here does not add anything to the article itself. It effectively says "I think this guy knows more about this than anyone else and you should listen to him." That's not what an encyclopedia should do.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau coined the term 'civil religion' a good hundred and fifty years before Bellah was born, so saying that Bellah coined the term is problematic.
And the statement that The article Civil Religion won't get any better if you delete the 'eminently' here puzzles me, as I don't know what one has to do with the other. -- Vary | Talk 21:08, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
Shouldn't there be cases in this article? Supreme court cases, like Wallace against Jafree, I mean. 204.147.20.1 ( talk) 23:45, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
This section contain only the views of critics of the mordern concept of church and state. It should include views from the other side too. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bobisbob ( talk • contribs) 00:32, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
I want to create this section quickly. I will discuss in more detail in a few minutes. Pooua ( talk) 00:51, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
I would like to explain why the following sentences are inappropriate in this or most other Wikipedia articles. I removed the words,
However, Article 6 of the United States Constitution provides that the Constitution, and the laws and treaties of the United States made in accordance with it, are "the supreme Law of the Land" and that "the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, any thing in the laws or constitutions of any state notwithstanding."
1) As I recently learned when I was editing the Treaty of Tripoli article, the quoted words are WP:SYNTH. That automatically means they cannot be used.
2) The quoted words are misleading. The fact that treaties are considered "the law of the land" has no bearing on the separation of church and state, or even on the phrase in Article 11 that states that "the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion." The reason it is irrelevant is, no treaty could retroactively change the historical facts of the founding of the U.S. government, no treaty is superior to the U.S. Constitution or of federal law and the phrase in Article 11 was an observation, not a regulation.
3) The quoted text does not apply to the Treaty of Tripoli because the Treaty is not "the supreme law of the land," having been broken and replaced by a new treaty (and the new treaty also is not in force).
I know, you want to argue that Article 11 of the Treaty of Tripoli somehow made it a law that the U.S. government is not Christian, but that was never possible for this treaty, and it is all the less possible now that the treaty is nothing more than an historical artifact. Pooua ( talk) 01:03, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
I forgot a point.
4) By international law, copies of treaties are only valid inasmuch as they are accurate translations of the original. Article 11 is not an accurate translation of the original, and so has no weight in law.
Most treaties for the last few centuries have been written in French, because the French language allows for many subtle shades of differentiation. However, the Treaty of Tripoli was written in Arabic, because the men who wrote it primarily spoke and wrote in Arabic. It was translated into English for Joel Barlow and James Leander Cathcart. As far as I can find, Barlow did not have any formal training in Arabic, though he undoubtedly picked up some in his time in the Barbary nations. Cathcart probably knew Arabic well, as he had spent several years as a slave in the Barbary nations, eventually becoming chief Christian clerk to the Dey of Algiers. In any event, the English translation that was given to Barlow is crude, and the English Article 11 doesn't even exist in the Arabic. The Cathcart translation is more accurate, and also does not contain Article 11. In fact, the only version of the Treaty of Tripoli that contains Article 11 is Barlow's copy.
Now, secularist pundits will point out that Barlow's copy was the copy that was ratified by Congress and signed by President John Adams, and has since then been considered the official treaty. But, legally, it isn't, according to the American Society of International Law:
"National translations are valid only as they are good translations, however official they may be." [1]
Still, the existence of the paragraph - and the fact that it appears in the congressionally ratified copy of the treaty - does appear to support the argument being made here, which is that the founders of the United States intended for it to be religiously neutral. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.6.178.220 ( talk) 22:23, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
So... the problem here is that the quoted text does not, as Iadmitmybias... points out, directly address separation of church and state. SCOTUS may have said what it said but the application of those words to the doctrine of separation of church and state still involves interpretation. What the quoted text does seem to assert is that the United States is a "religious nation", a "religious people", even a "Christian nation".
What we don't have is a clear statement of how those facts affect separation of church and state and freedom of religion. Perhaps it can be found elsewhere in that SCOTUS decision. More importantly, we don't have an analysis of how the doctrines of freedom of religion and separation of church and state have evolved since those days. This is what secondary sources can do for us. They can trace the historical development of these doctrines through the legislative and judicial branches showing us what precedents have been set and how we have gotten from there to here.
Another important key is the way that the nation has evolved from being a religious Christian nation to a somewhat different nation. This provides the necessary context to understand the evolution of these doctrines. Any effort to do this with primary sources such as SCOTUS decisions is fundamentally OR. I don't doubt that much has been written by secondary sources on both sides of this issue. What's needed is to abandon the effort to insert these citations from primary sources and to go find secondary sources that provide scholarly treatments of the issue.
I personally think it's reasonable to assert that the Founding Fathers were mostly interested in making sure that no Christian Church became established as the official church of the U.S. in the way that the Church of England was the official church of the United Kingdom. There focus was in making sure that Protestants (and maybe Catholics) could practice their faith in freedom without interference from the state. However, the doctrine of separation of C&S has evolved as has our concept of freedom of religion as has our entire concept of the role of religion in the U.S. However, you need more than a 100-year old SCOTUS decision to assert that fact in Wikipedia. Come on, really. It's not as if this is a topic that has been ignored by scholars. Dust off the books and come up with some reliable sources already.
-- Richard ( talk) 04:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
what california law required students so say the pledge of allegence? I do not recall being required to I was in school until 2003 so I would have been effected had it existed considering I hadnt even left the state of california until i was 13 and didnt move out until just this past july so i only went to cali schools, i could see a school policy but the article says CA law-- Shimonnyman ( talk) 02:02, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
Could somebody take over from me, please? I have already reverted the latest edit twice, and I still do not think that it should be in the article... KarlFrei ( talk) 08:40, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
The following quote is a more complete explanation of Jefferson's intent regarding the separation of Church and State: "Jefferson believed that God, not government, was the Author and Source of our rights and that the government, therefore, was to be prevented from interference with those rights. Very simply, the "fence" of the Webster letter and the "wall" of the Danbury letter were not to limit religious activities in public; rather they were to limit the power of the government to prohibit or interfere with those expressions." This quote was taken from a writing from Bavid Barton's website: http://www.wallbuilders.com/libissuesarticles.asp?id=123 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.179.227.59 ( talk) 05:08, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
Probably the #1 issue in all of the above is the degree of separation of church and state that we shall have. This is a subject of national debate, with opposing sides. It's a weakness of Wikipedia that articles on contentious topics are unstable with ongoing strife. I think that this falls into two categories:
Possibly recognition of this would help a little.
I would like to bring up a second and narrower core issue. "Separation of Church and State" is a vague and thus potentially massively reaching or overreaching phrase, going far beyond the law or the constitution. Contrary to widespread mis-impressions, that phrase is not US law, nor is it in the US Constitution. That phrase has been used by the Supreme Court when making judgments which implement the actual provisions of the Constitution. Use of a phrase in discussions does not make the phrase (and all of it's interpretations by everybody ) the law nor the constitution. The article sort of leaves the opposite impression, thus furthering a common mis-impression where it should instead be providing the facts to dispel it. North8000 ( talk) 02:24, 17 June 2010 (UTC)
This page is blatantly POV. It asserts as fact that the ban on laws establishing a state church somehow "de-Christianizes" the nation. Actually knowledgable people know that in Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States Chief Justice Fuller specifically stated that:
this is a Christian nation... Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teachings of The Redeemer of mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise; and in this sense and to this extent our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian… (source)
As you can clearly see, an actual supreme court case ruled that the Establishment Clause did not sever all connections between the government and the Church, nor did it condone any doctrine similar to the "separation of church and state" that this article describes.-- Axiom talk 17:44, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
BTfromLA, very well written and I agree with you 100%. But you are not addressing the issue of the discussion here which is the statements that I tagged. which (briefly paraphrasing) are that that phrase/broader concept is "embedded in the US Constitution", and "became a definitive part of Establishment Clause" Sincerely, North8000 ( talk) 21:52, 26 November 2010 (UTC)
Sorry I did not notice your question until today. My issue here is very very narrow, and is one merely of preciseness in an area where mis-conception is common. Briefly, "separation of church and state" is a very broad statement, (only) a portion of which is incorporated in the constitution. Anything that says or implies otherwise is misleading. North8000 ( talk) 10:31, 30 November 2010 (UTC)
North8000, you seem very concerned about the first bit in this section, and I don't understand why. I had presumed that your objection was to the word "definitive," but I obviously got that wrong. I will agree that the section is not well written ("since 1947" has to go, for starters, if we're starting with a nineteenth century case), but I don't understand why you are so exercised about mentioning the first Supreme Court case that cited Jefferson's letter as authoratative... this is also mentioned in the introduction to the article, and you've had no objection to it there. In other words, please clarify your concern, preferably with a proposed alternative draft. -- BTfromLA ( talk) 17:08, 28 November 2010 (UTC)
North8000 ( talk) 17:49, 28 November 2010 (UTC)
Editors disagree about the introductory section: is it appropriate to introduce this topic as a phrase that "describes a legal and political principle embedded in the Constitution of the United States," or is it the case that the intro should reflect that "the core fact is that the 'Separation of Church and State' statement is broader than what is in the constitution"? BTfromLA ( talk) 20:49, 27 November 2010 (UTC)
North8000, I think I've said everything that needs saying above, but I will make one more attempt to communicate with you.
1. As to my request that is "too vague to respond to," perhaps I wasn't explicit enough. What I'm saying is that the fact that "separation..." refers to a constitutional principle is so fully supported by the first two paragraphs of the article (for a start) that no additional citation is needed or appropriate. We could add a footnoted reference to Jefferson's comment, or to the Supreme court decision saying ""The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state," or to any number of similar sources, but since they are right there in the body text, it seems both silly and tendentious to insert a note where none is called for. Likewise, your "elements of.." version of the sentence is confusing, unsubstantiated and tendentious. So, to be very clear: I am saying that the original first sentence is fully "sourced" by the sources quoted and described in the first two paragraphs, and even more sources are available in the Supreme Court section and elsewhere in the article. Again, so there's no mistaking: you are denying a well-established fact. Declaring that the moon is made of green cheese doesn't go any distance toward making it so, and doesn't mean that the "moon" article needs to add sources to demonstrate that no part of it is cheese.
2. Of course, the "separation..." phrase is not written in the constitution. This is well known, and the article does nothing to imply that it is. That is irrelevant to the question at hand. The principle of church/state separation IS reflected in the constitution (including by omission, by the way... the conspicuous absence of any mention of God, bible, Jesus, etc. could not have been lost on any of the framers). You've offered no evidence to the contrary. The argument that the principle isn't there because the exact phrase isn't there is childish: are you going to deny that the constitution establishes "three branches of government" or "the right to a fair trial" because those phrases don't appear? Come on... no thought or conversation is possible without metaphors and analogies. And the "separation" idea is indeed in the law, assuming you see court decisions as part of the law. The separation principle is discussed as such in most of the important first amendment cases having to do with religion.
3. As to your description of "things covered by that broad reaching statement that are NOT embedded in the constitution," you are confusing categories. The sort of things you mention--prohibitions against the word God on government seals, for example--are not principles! They are individual cases to which the law may be applied. Whether a court interprets the law to mean "God" can or can't be in a given seal says nothing about whether "separation of church and state" is a constitutional principal. This may help: look at the quote from the 1971 Lemon case in the Supreme Court section: ""Our prior holdings do not call for total separation between church and state; total separation is not possible in an absolute sense. Some relationship between government and religious organizations is inevitable." See what's going on there? The court is saying that the principal exists, yet when applied to specific cases, it does not connote the sort of "total" separation that the phrase seems to conjure in your mind.
I truly don't mean to offend, but I have concluded that my comment that you disliked above about your being so blinded by a political POV that you should recuse yourself from editing here holds true. Your examples are all political controversies--and you are making a direct political argument by implying that certain court decisions constitute "reverse discrimination" and are somehow unconstitutional. It appears that you are trying to slant the article to favor your personal political views. Either that, or it is just a question of your being confused about what a constitutional principle is...in that case, I hope my efforts here have been of some value to you.
As to your objection to the Supreme court section... I honestly don't have a clue what your concern is, but you keep mentioning it. Are you are saying that the separation concept hasn't been used by the courts? Of course it has... just read the section. If not that, what is the problem? -- BTfromLA ( talk) 22:27, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
(outdent) I have been noodling on this and I keep coming back to "The phrase separation of church and state (sometimes "wall of separation between church and state") describes a legal and political principle. Elements of it are embedded in the Constitution of the United States." or
"The phrase separation of church and state (sometimes "wall of separation between church and state") describes a legal and political principle, elements of which are embedded in the Constitution of the United States."
This turns an erroneous (= "cite required" in WP terms) sentence into a correct one, and leads right into the following sentence.North8000 19:22, 15 December 2010 (UTC)
Good grief, North8000, these "elements" (and the supposed gulf between the "separation" principal and the constitutional principal), exist only in your head--they are pure POV (and utterly unsubstantiated to boot). I am removing, with the request that you come up with sources to validate this "elements of" business. I note that you completely ignored all of my requests for you to explain why the many sources, from Jefferson on down, validating the use of the separation metaphor as a description of the the constitutional principal are somehow lacking. -- BTfromLA ( talk) 20:07, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
BT, I'd like to ask a question that might be helpful. In short, what I am asserting is that "Separation of Church and State" is broader than what is in the Constitution, and so a statement that it is (fully) embedded in the Constitution is incorrect. And so I am not asserting the "elements of" qualifier, I am asserting the overall statement is inaccurate and unsourcable unless it has such a qualifier. Now, which is the case?:
Sincerely,North8000 15:29, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
Since the talk page discussion is so long and convoluted, this section exists for any third-party editors who would be so kind as to weigh in on the disputed first sentence. Briefly, the contesting versions are : "The phrase 'separation of church and state' (sometimes "wall of separation between church and state") describes a legal and political principle embedded in the Constitution of the United States," and, "The phrase [...] describes a legal and political principle, elements of which are embedded in the Constitution of the United States." One editor asserts that "... describes a legal and political principle embedded in the Constitution" is inaccurate and inadequately justified; the other editor addresses similar criticism toward the inserted phrase "elements of which...". 00:05, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 |
Oppose. I have reworded the paragraph to take into account that this case is unclear. User:Vary seems to be of the opinion that this should only be debated in the article American Atheists. I am of the opinion that this case, regardless of what Bush (Snr) actually said, should be debated in this article. If even the Washington Times mentioned it, it should be notable, and I would consider it a POV-Fork no to debate it in THIS article. However, if you can reach a broad consensus that it should not be debated in this article (but at American Atheists) I won't care. The sociological debate on this is more interesting, anyway. Zara1709 ( talk) 19:06, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
While I don't think there should be an entire section on this comment here, a brief mention would certainly not be superfluous. It is highly notable to the topic to quote an US president (alright, a "special" US president) who appears to have no practical knowledge or perception of the legal principle. Try to find a constructive compromise. dab (𒁳) 11:39, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
As I commented some time ago when a report on this was filed at the BLP noticeboard, whether or not he actually said it, it is notable that he did not apparently deny it once reports circulated that it had been said. It certainly seems notable enough from that standpoint. Plus it was reported - or the controversy was covered - in several unimpeachable sources. If many RSes are "teaching the controversy", to borrow a phrase, then so might we - in the context of controversy, which is how it should be phrased. Relata refero ( talk) 14:22, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
What does WP:BLP actually say? If you take a look at Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons, you will see in the 2nd sentence that it does only supplement and emphasize the three main Wikipedia policies of Wikipedia:Neutral point of view, Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:No original research (the last of which is not an issue here). You, Vary, are of the opinion that we would need to verify whether Bush actually said the statement to include is in this article. I should point out here, that I never explicitly was of the of the opinion that one could verify it. After I took a look at the sources that I gathered largely myself, I would actually say that one can't verify it. Nevertheless, even if the statement was actually wrong, it would not violate Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons to include it in the article George H. W. Bush in this case, if one would make clear that he did not actually say it. A search on the Internet turns up enough pages on this to make it notable. "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a tabloid;" This is to be included because it was part of a public discussion, but Wikipedia is not a tabloid that would decide for the reader wether he actually said it or not, unless of course, either one of the viewpoints could be reliably sourced. I mean, I don't care about the issue that the American public has with atheism. But some people are likely to look up Wikipedia to see if we have something on the rumour about Bush having said something against Atheists, and it would be better to say that it is not clear whether Bush actually said it than to say nothing.
How does Wikipedia really work? I would otherwise rest it here, but Vary was determined to tell me how it [Wikipdia] works. On the right side you can find a flowchart of basic consensus decision-making process. If you disagree about something, you should usually discuss it first. I had intented the merge propasal to give the room for the discussion.
The claim that the material needed to be removed because of WP:BLP is nonsense. If you take ANOTHER look at the last revision that was removed, you will see that I did not say anything about whether this statement was true or not. But I was referring to the Tucson Weekly saying that it would be "one of the most famous quotes about atheists in American society." That Newspaper (that should be a reliable source) also does not say whether Bush actually said it, but it mentions that "Atheistic journalist and activist Robert Sherman attributed the statement to him". Of course, one newspaper article is not enough to establish notability, but one could easily find some more references , and you know that there are other reliable sources for the point that Shermann HAS ATTRIBUTED this statement to Bush, too. So you removal was not covered by wp:BLP and I consider it quite offensive. But I will assume that you acted in good faith.
On the actuall issue: Anyway, if this was an issue for wp:blp, it needed to be removed from American Atheists, too. But this is not the case, and a removal there would clearly be a violation of wp:NPOV that mandates that all significant viewpoints need to be included. The only real question here is, whether the attribution of this quote to Bush is significant enough to included in this article. That would be probably a question for a Requests for comment, but I still think that we can solve the other issues here with common sence. Again: Nobody is insisting that Bush actually said: "I don't know that atheists should be regarded as citizens, nor should they be regarded as patriotic. This is one nation under God." What I am insisting on is that it has been alleged by Bob Sherman that he said it. Naturally, the use of the word 'alleged' does not violate wp:NPOV, since this has in fact been alleged. Similarly, the use of the word 'eminently' is not POV. The phrase "it has been eminently been argued by" is like a standart phrase for summarizing academic discussion. Only that this topic is here not considered to be an academic question which one can discuss in a relaxed atmosphere, but a political topic in the bad sense of the word political. Here a discussion means complelety denying any other point of view. Zara1709 ( talk) 15:47, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
I found another newspaper who reported on it. Washington monthly: [3], [4]. This should be a reliable source. There also is a statement in a forum, that even CNN and the New York Post reported on this. [5]. But anyway, I also found out that Wikipedia already has an article Discrimination against atheists which says: "In the 1988 U.S. presidential campaign, Republican presidential candidate George H. W. Bush reportedly said, [the statement]". I'd guess Vary and Cool Hand Luke will object to the way that this is currently written there, so I propose that we just move the debate there an settle here with another sentence in the section that does not mention the statement by Bush, but links Discrimination against atheists instead. Zara1709 ( talk) 16:30, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
The word 'Eminently' is inherently pov, and the way it's being used here does not add anything to the article itself. It effectively says "I think this guy knows more about this than anyone else and you should listen to him." That's not what an encyclopedia should do.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau coined the term 'civil religion' a good hundred and fifty years before Bellah was born, so saying that Bellah coined the term is problematic.
And the statement that The article Civil Religion won't get any better if you delete the 'eminently' here puzzles me, as I don't know what one has to do with the other. -- Vary | Talk 21:08, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
Shouldn't there be cases in this article? Supreme court cases, like Wallace against Jafree, I mean. 204.147.20.1 ( talk) 23:45, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
This section contain only the views of critics of the mordern concept of church and state. It should include views from the other side too. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bobisbob ( talk • contribs) 00:32, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
I want to create this section quickly. I will discuss in more detail in a few minutes. Pooua ( talk) 00:51, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
I would like to explain why the following sentences are inappropriate in this or most other Wikipedia articles. I removed the words,
However, Article 6 of the United States Constitution provides that the Constitution, and the laws and treaties of the United States made in accordance with it, are "the supreme Law of the Land" and that "the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, any thing in the laws or constitutions of any state notwithstanding."
1) As I recently learned when I was editing the Treaty of Tripoli article, the quoted words are WP:SYNTH. That automatically means they cannot be used.
2) The quoted words are misleading. The fact that treaties are considered "the law of the land" has no bearing on the separation of church and state, or even on the phrase in Article 11 that states that "the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion." The reason it is irrelevant is, no treaty could retroactively change the historical facts of the founding of the U.S. government, no treaty is superior to the U.S. Constitution or of federal law and the phrase in Article 11 was an observation, not a regulation.
3) The quoted text does not apply to the Treaty of Tripoli because the Treaty is not "the supreme law of the land," having been broken and replaced by a new treaty (and the new treaty also is not in force).
I know, you want to argue that Article 11 of the Treaty of Tripoli somehow made it a law that the U.S. government is not Christian, but that was never possible for this treaty, and it is all the less possible now that the treaty is nothing more than an historical artifact. Pooua ( talk) 01:03, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
I forgot a point.
4) By international law, copies of treaties are only valid inasmuch as they are accurate translations of the original. Article 11 is not an accurate translation of the original, and so has no weight in law.
Most treaties for the last few centuries have been written in French, because the French language allows for many subtle shades of differentiation. However, the Treaty of Tripoli was written in Arabic, because the men who wrote it primarily spoke and wrote in Arabic. It was translated into English for Joel Barlow and James Leander Cathcart. As far as I can find, Barlow did not have any formal training in Arabic, though he undoubtedly picked up some in his time in the Barbary nations. Cathcart probably knew Arabic well, as he had spent several years as a slave in the Barbary nations, eventually becoming chief Christian clerk to the Dey of Algiers. In any event, the English translation that was given to Barlow is crude, and the English Article 11 doesn't even exist in the Arabic. The Cathcart translation is more accurate, and also does not contain Article 11. In fact, the only version of the Treaty of Tripoli that contains Article 11 is Barlow's copy.
Now, secularist pundits will point out that Barlow's copy was the copy that was ratified by Congress and signed by President John Adams, and has since then been considered the official treaty. But, legally, it isn't, according to the American Society of International Law:
"National translations are valid only as they are good translations, however official they may be." [1]
Still, the existence of the paragraph - and the fact that it appears in the congressionally ratified copy of the treaty - does appear to support the argument being made here, which is that the founders of the United States intended for it to be religiously neutral. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.6.178.220 ( talk) 22:23, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
So... the problem here is that the quoted text does not, as Iadmitmybias... points out, directly address separation of church and state. SCOTUS may have said what it said but the application of those words to the doctrine of separation of church and state still involves interpretation. What the quoted text does seem to assert is that the United States is a "religious nation", a "religious people", even a "Christian nation".
What we don't have is a clear statement of how those facts affect separation of church and state and freedom of religion. Perhaps it can be found elsewhere in that SCOTUS decision. More importantly, we don't have an analysis of how the doctrines of freedom of religion and separation of church and state have evolved since those days. This is what secondary sources can do for us. They can trace the historical development of these doctrines through the legislative and judicial branches showing us what precedents have been set and how we have gotten from there to here.
Another important key is the way that the nation has evolved from being a religious Christian nation to a somewhat different nation. This provides the necessary context to understand the evolution of these doctrines. Any effort to do this with primary sources such as SCOTUS decisions is fundamentally OR. I don't doubt that much has been written by secondary sources on both sides of this issue. What's needed is to abandon the effort to insert these citations from primary sources and to go find secondary sources that provide scholarly treatments of the issue.
I personally think it's reasonable to assert that the Founding Fathers were mostly interested in making sure that no Christian Church became established as the official church of the U.S. in the way that the Church of England was the official church of the United Kingdom. There focus was in making sure that Protestants (and maybe Catholics) could practice their faith in freedom without interference from the state. However, the doctrine of separation of C&S has evolved as has our concept of freedom of religion as has our entire concept of the role of religion in the U.S. However, you need more than a 100-year old SCOTUS decision to assert that fact in Wikipedia. Come on, really. It's not as if this is a topic that has been ignored by scholars. Dust off the books and come up with some reliable sources already.
-- Richard ( talk) 04:37, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
what california law required students so say the pledge of allegence? I do not recall being required to I was in school until 2003 so I would have been effected had it existed considering I hadnt even left the state of california until i was 13 and didnt move out until just this past july so i only went to cali schools, i could see a school policy but the article says CA law-- Shimonnyman ( talk) 02:02, 11 October 2009 (UTC)
Could somebody take over from me, please? I have already reverted the latest edit twice, and I still do not think that it should be in the article... KarlFrei ( talk) 08:40, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
The following quote is a more complete explanation of Jefferson's intent regarding the separation of Church and State: "Jefferson believed that God, not government, was the Author and Source of our rights and that the government, therefore, was to be prevented from interference with those rights. Very simply, the "fence" of the Webster letter and the "wall" of the Danbury letter were not to limit religious activities in public; rather they were to limit the power of the government to prohibit or interfere with those expressions." This quote was taken from a writing from Bavid Barton's website: http://www.wallbuilders.com/libissuesarticles.asp?id=123 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.179.227.59 ( talk) 05:08, 20 May 2010 (UTC)
Probably the #1 issue in all of the above is the degree of separation of church and state that we shall have. This is a subject of national debate, with opposing sides. It's a weakness of Wikipedia that articles on contentious topics are unstable with ongoing strife. I think that this falls into two categories:
Possibly recognition of this would help a little.
I would like to bring up a second and narrower core issue. "Separation of Church and State" is a vague and thus potentially massively reaching or overreaching phrase, going far beyond the law or the constitution. Contrary to widespread mis-impressions, that phrase is not US law, nor is it in the US Constitution. That phrase has been used by the Supreme Court when making judgments which implement the actual provisions of the Constitution. Use of a phrase in discussions does not make the phrase (and all of it's interpretations by everybody ) the law nor the constitution. The article sort of leaves the opposite impression, thus furthering a common mis-impression where it should instead be providing the facts to dispel it. North8000 ( talk) 02:24, 17 June 2010 (UTC)
This page is blatantly POV. It asserts as fact that the ban on laws establishing a state church somehow "de-Christianizes" the nation. Actually knowledgable people know that in Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States Chief Justice Fuller specifically stated that:
this is a Christian nation... Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teachings of The Redeemer of mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise; and in this sense and to this extent our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian… (source)
As you can clearly see, an actual supreme court case ruled that the Establishment Clause did not sever all connections between the government and the Church, nor did it condone any doctrine similar to the "separation of church and state" that this article describes.-- Axiom talk 17:44, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
BTfromLA, very well written and I agree with you 100%. But you are not addressing the issue of the discussion here which is the statements that I tagged. which (briefly paraphrasing) are that that phrase/broader concept is "embedded in the US Constitution", and "became a definitive part of Establishment Clause" Sincerely, North8000 ( talk) 21:52, 26 November 2010 (UTC)
Sorry I did not notice your question until today. My issue here is very very narrow, and is one merely of preciseness in an area where mis-conception is common. Briefly, "separation of church and state" is a very broad statement, (only) a portion of which is incorporated in the constitution. Anything that says or implies otherwise is misleading. North8000 ( talk) 10:31, 30 November 2010 (UTC)
North8000, you seem very concerned about the first bit in this section, and I don't understand why. I had presumed that your objection was to the word "definitive," but I obviously got that wrong. I will agree that the section is not well written ("since 1947" has to go, for starters, if we're starting with a nineteenth century case), but I don't understand why you are so exercised about mentioning the first Supreme Court case that cited Jefferson's letter as authoratative... this is also mentioned in the introduction to the article, and you've had no objection to it there. In other words, please clarify your concern, preferably with a proposed alternative draft. -- BTfromLA ( talk) 17:08, 28 November 2010 (UTC)
North8000 ( talk) 17:49, 28 November 2010 (UTC)
Editors disagree about the introductory section: is it appropriate to introduce this topic as a phrase that "describes a legal and political principle embedded in the Constitution of the United States," or is it the case that the intro should reflect that "the core fact is that the 'Separation of Church and State' statement is broader than what is in the constitution"? BTfromLA ( talk) 20:49, 27 November 2010 (UTC)
North8000, I think I've said everything that needs saying above, but I will make one more attempt to communicate with you.
1. As to my request that is "too vague to respond to," perhaps I wasn't explicit enough. What I'm saying is that the fact that "separation..." refers to a constitutional principle is so fully supported by the first two paragraphs of the article (for a start) that no additional citation is needed or appropriate. We could add a footnoted reference to Jefferson's comment, or to the Supreme court decision saying ""The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state," or to any number of similar sources, but since they are right there in the body text, it seems both silly and tendentious to insert a note where none is called for. Likewise, your "elements of.." version of the sentence is confusing, unsubstantiated and tendentious. So, to be very clear: I am saying that the original first sentence is fully "sourced" by the sources quoted and described in the first two paragraphs, and even more sources are available in the Supreme Court section and elsewhere in the article. Again, so there's no mistaking: you are denying a well-established fact. Declaring that the moon is made of green cheese doesn't go any distance toward making it so, and doesn't mean that the "moon" article needs to add sources to demonstrate that no part of it is cheese.
2. Of course, the "separation..." phrase is not written in the constitution. This is well known, and the article does nothing to imply that it is. That is irrelevant to the question at hand. The principle of church/state separation IS reflected in the constitution (including by omission, by the way... the conspicuous absence of any mention of God, bible, Jesus, etc. could not have been lost on any of the framers). You've offered no evidence to the contrary. The argument that the principle isn't there because the exact phrase isn't there is childish: are you going to deny that the constitution establishes "three branches of government" or "the right to a fair trial" because those phrases don't appear? Come on... no thought or conversation is possible without metaphors and analogies. And the "separation" idea is indeed in the law, assuming you see court decisions as part of the law. The separation principle is discussed as such in most of the important first amendment cases having to do with religion.
3. As to your description of "things covered by that broad reaching statement that are NOT embedded in the constitution," you are confusing categories. The sort of things you mention--prohibitions against the word God on government seals, for example--are not principles! They are individual cases to which the law may be applied. Whether a court interprets the law to mean "God" can or can't be in a given seal says nothing about whether "separation of church and state" is a constitutional principal. This may help: look at the quote from the 1971 Lemon case in the Supreme Court section: ""Our prior holdings do not call for total separation between church and state; total separation is not possible in an absolute sense. Some relationship between government and religious organizations is inevitable." See what's going on there? The court is saying that the principal exists, yet when applied to specific cases, it does not connote the sort of "total" separation that the phrase seems to conjure in your mind.
I truly don't mean to offend, but I have concluded that my comment that you disliked above about your being so blinded by a political POV that you should recuse yourself from editing here holds true. Your examples are all political controversies--and you are making a direct political argument by implying that certain court decisions constitute "reverse discrimination" and are somehow unconstitutional. It appears that you are trying to slant the article to favor your personal political views. Either that, or it is just a question of your being confused about what a constitutional principle is...in that case, I hope my efforts here have been of some value to you.
As to your objection to the Supreme court section... I honestly don't have a clue what your concern is, but you keep mentioning it. Are you are saying that the separation concept hasn't been used by the courts? Of course it has... just read the section. If not that, what is the problem? -- BTfromLA ( talk) 22:27, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
(outdent) I have been noodling on this and I keep coming back to "The phrase separation of church and state (sometimes "wall of separation between church and state") describes a legal and political principle. Elements of it are embedded in the Constitution of the United States." or
"The phrase separation of church and state (sometimes "wall of separation between church and state") describes a legal and political principle, elements of which are embedded in the Constitution of the United States."
This turns an erroneous (= "cite required" in WP terms) sentence into a correct one, and leads right into the following sentence.North8000 19:22, 15 December 2010 (UTC)
Good grief, North8000, these "elements" (and the supposed gulf between the "separation" principal and the constitutional principal), exist only in your head--they are pure POV (and utterly unsubstantiated to boot). I am removing, with the request that you come up with sources to validate this "elements of" business. I note that you completely ignored all of my requests for you to explain why the many sources, from Jefferson on down, validating the use of the separation metaphor as a description of the the constitutional principal are somehow lacking. -- BTfromLA ( talk) 20:07, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
BT, I'd like to ask a question that might be helpful. In short, what I am asserting is that "Separation of Church and State" is broader than what is in the Constitution, and so a statement that it is (fully) embedded in the Constitution is incorrect. And so I am not asserting the "elements of" qualifier, I am asserting the overall statement is inaccurate and unsourcable unless it has such a qualifier. Now, which is the case?:
Sincerely,North8000 15:29, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
Since the talk page discussion is so long and convoluted, this section exists for any third-party editors who would be so kind as to weigh in on the disputed first sentence. Briefly, the contesting versions are : "The phrase 'separation of church and state' (sometimes "wall of separation between church and state") describes a legal and political principle embedded in the Constitution of the United States," and, "The phrase [...] describes a legal and political principle, elements of which are embedded in the Constitution of the United States." One editor asserts that "... describes a legal and political principle embedded in the Constitution" is inaccurate and inadequately justified; the other editor addresses similar criticism toward the inserted phrase "elements of which...". 00:05, 23 December 2010 (UTC)