SEPTEMBER 20, 1777
PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA
DAY
It’s war.
Formal fighting between the Americans and the Crown is now more than two years old. Philadelphia is so far untouched by the conflict, but word has reached the city that George Washington, commander of the Continental Army, has been defeated by British general William Howe in the Battle of Brandywine Creek, thirty miles away from Philadelphia, which is now defenseless. It is only a matter of time before enemy troops occupy America’s first capital city.
The nation is no longer a collection of colonies. The people have renamed it the United States of America. They have also declared their freedom from England, issuing a document of liberty, crafted on Chestnut Street at the Pennsylvania State House. Fifty-six patriots affix their signatures to this Declaration of Independence and will henceforth be known as America’s Founding Fathers. *
A two-thousand-pound copper and tin bell tolled to summon Philadelphia residents for the first public reading of the declaration. The State House Bell, as it is known, has a large crack and is used sparingly. Loyalists rejoiced when George III ascended to the throne in 1760, with the bell pealing in his honor. But, four years later, the king was reviled as the bell rang to publicly protest the Stamp Act.
In 1775, the bell once again alerted Philadelphians that British troops had fired on Americans at Lexington and Concord. That confrontation began the war of revolution.
The “Liberty Bell” will not be so named until 1835, but its significance is already apparent to Philadelphians. They also understand that the bell will be melted down to make British cannon after the city is occupied. So it is placed on a horse-drawn cart and escorted out of town, destined for a secret location.*
It is that way for the Founding Fathers, as well. Signing the Declaration of Independence is an act of treason. Their lives are in jeopardy if they are captured by the British.
On the run, the rebellious Founders must avoid capture while at the same time forging a new country. That will become an exceedingly difficult task, as Americans are divided on many issues.†
Thomas Jefferson is safe, at least for the moment.
Now thirty-four and the author of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson returns to his western Virginia plantation after signing the document. He spends hours each day reading the words of philosophers and other great thinkers throughout history. Jefferson has recently focused on the ideas of a man close to him in Virginia—a lawyer named James Madison. The twenty-six-year-old attorney argues that religious liberty is an inalienable right: “All men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience,” Madison writes.
James Madison stands just five-foot-four and weighs one hundred pounds. His writing is ponderous. The lawyer’s views on freedom of religion are clear but controversial. The Virginia General Assembly—no longer known as the House of Burgesses—is struggling with the issue. Some of Madison’s ideals are written into the state’s new Declaration of Rights. Yet, amazingly, the state of Virginia still recognizes the Anglican Church as the official religion. Therefore, all Virginians are forced to pay taxes to its clergy, most of whom support King George.
Thomas Jefferson wants that to change.
Writing with quill and ink, he pens the new legislature’s Bill Number 82, which calls for establishing religious freedom.
“The opinions and belief of men depend not on their own will but follow involuntarily the evidence proposed in their minds; that Almighty God hath created the mind free,” Jefferson writes. He is fierce in his belief that there should be no “official” religion in America.
“No man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer, on account of his religious opinions or belief.”
But Jefferson’s bill fails. The Virginia General Assembly takes no action. On June 18, 1779, with Thomas Jefferson now serving as the state’s governor, the bill is once again introduced. It fails again.
There is one large problem standing in its way.
His name is Patrick Henry.
Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry now despise one another.
This did not occur due to a single incident. It happened over time. James Madison is the current object of Jefferson’s intellectual admiration, even as Henry has fallen far in the governor’s estimation. Jefferson is in attendance at Saint John’s Church in Richmond on that night in 1775 when Henry gives a rousing speech demanding “liberty or death.” Yet Thomas Jefferson is not impressed. Having observed his former friend in the legislature, and then again as his predecessor in the governor’s seat, Jefferson believes Henry revels in theatrics instead of deep commitment.
“His imagination was copious, poetical, sublime,” Jefferson will write of Patrick Henry. “But vague also. He said the strongest things in the finest language, but without logic, without arrangement, desultorily.”
Jefferson will also write a shocking private note to James Madison. The topic is Patrick Henry: “What we have to do, I think, is devoutly to pray for his death.” *
The greatest divide between Jefferson and Henry is religion. In a contradiction of his “Parson’s Cause” speech, Henry still favors taxation to fund state-sponsored churches. Anglicans and Presbyterians take his side in this debate. Among them is George Washington, who continues to participate in the Anglican Church.†
Thomas Jefferson and James Madison believe churches should be funded like businesses. Citizens should pick the church of their choice—or attend no church at all. Baptists, Methodists, Quakers, and Lutherans rally to that cause. Catholics in Maryland, persecuted since 1704 and double taxed for their faith, are also keen to support this freedom.
It was religious persecution that originally brought the pious to America. Now, more than 150 years later, beliefs in the proper method of worshipping God remain divisive. Despite the Declaration of Independence’s statement that mankind is entitled to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” a debate continues about whether this applies to matters of religion.
In New England, the Puritan grip on the population is slipping. Prosperity has made the fire-and-brimstone clergy almost obsolete. Also, the legacy of the witch executions remains a stigma on the Puritans, whose extreme views have moderated but only a bit.
In fact, all throughout the new nation, religious controversies continue to brew.
Finally, on January 16, 1786, James Madison pushes Thomas Jefferson’s bill through the Virginia General Assembly. It will become known as the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom. Patrick Henry is once again serving as governor but has no vote. Henceforth, the Anglican Church is “disestablished” in Virginia. It is no longer the official state religion.
Jefferson, now the American minister to France, is relieved—calling his state’s debate over religious freedom “the severest contest in which I have ever been engaged.”
Despite Jefferson and Madison’s victory in Virginia, not every state enjoys religious freedom. On May 25, 1787, the Founding Fathers meet at the Philadelphia State House to begin the Constitutional Convention. American independence is now assured, so delegates gather to vote on the structure of a new nation. George Washington is the convention’s president. The first priority is finding common ground on the subject of religious freedom.
Rhode Island protests, choosing not to attend the convention because its delegates fear a federal government that would control the new states.
And so it is that the Founding Fathers are far apart on many issues. But one subject is particularly intense: the future of religion in America.*