About Our Lack Of A National Religion

     Some awful things have happened over the past week, and I'll get into them, but first --

     A commenter took offense at my pointing out, despite the strange and unfounded claims of Indiana Lieutenant Micah Beckwith,* the United States of America is a secular democracy that, by Constitution and law, does not promote or privilege any particular religion but protects the free exercise of all religions. 

     I grew up taking that for granted; it was a bland axiom, as uncontroversial as the sun rising in the east.  "Was" is apparently the operational word there, so let's review, starting with the relevant parts of First Amendment:
     "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof [...]."
     Seems simple enough.  The first part says the Federal government can't make any religion special and the second part says the Feds don't get to stop 'em, either.  Congress has a website with a lot of explanation of the history, intent and application of those few words, with extensive reference footnotes, but there isn't any secret hidden codicil or exemption for some sort or generic Christianity or the slightly wider handwaving of Judeo-Christian belief.†  "No law respecting...or prohibiting" is sweeping.

     With that as background, you've got to wonder what the first generation of Feds thought about it.  After all, they'd lived through it, and could be expected to have a firm grasp of where the Bill of Rights left the relationship between religion and the Federal government.  Oh, if only they'd left us some official word, and not just letters to Danbury Baptists...!

     Thing is, they did.  But first, a digression to Article VI of the U.S. Constitution, which says:
     "This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any state to the Contrary notwithstanding."
     Got that?  Treaties have the force of Federal law.  Presidents and Senators may safely be assumed to know this.

     In 1796, President John Adams signed the Treaty of Tripoli, after the U.S. Senate had approved a resolution of ratification.‡  Adams had been Vice-President when the Bill of Rights was passed and the proposed Amendments were sent to the states; he had taken the VP's job of presiding over the Senate very seriously.  We can expect him to have followed the debate.  Not a few of the original group of U.S. Senators were still on the job, too.

     Article 11 of the version of the Treaty of Tripoli that the Senate approved and President Adams signed begins, "As the Government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion; [....]" and goes on to assure the Pasha that the Feds hold no religious enmity towards him or his country.

     Our President and Senators knew what it said, and they were okay with it; they knew that treaties, once ratified, become part of the "supreme Law of the Land" in the U.S. and they were clearly okay with that.

     The Federal government of the United States of America is a secular government, under which all residents are free to follow their own religious faith, and (if they wish) to look to it for guidance.  Individual members of the three branches of government, elected and appointed, may of course do so -- but the Constitution is the foundation of our law, not religion.

     So when I get comments like this, I know it's nonsensical blather:

     "Wrong. No Established Church does not mean an anti religion nation. That is the alternative. Another  'church' takes it place. Marxism, climate change, LBGTQ+ET.EL. You are anti Christianity and that is a loser in America."

     I invite readers to scrutinize the blog post to which that comment was directed, "Ipse Dixie," for any evidence that I am "anti Christianity" or that I think our country -- in which the Feds are barred from prohibiting the free exercise of religion -- is or ought to be "anti religion."

     As for the commenter's proposed alternatives to Christianity, the only one of them that has claimed to be§ would be Marxism, and you can find folks with conventionally religious -- even Christian -- versions of it.  As an economic and political theory, no version of it has worked out, but people do keep on trying, often with guns.  You can find lots and lots of sincerely churchgoing LGBTQ+ people, climate activists and climate scientists, and -- this being the United States of America, with our Bill of Rights still, so far, intact -- you are welcome to form your own opinions about them, but those other things do not constitute or replace religions. 
________________________
* Recent reporting has revealed his utterly brazen use of State funds and facilities to promote a partisan political agenda.
 
† This is essentially the polite way to say, "Monotheism, but only the right kinds of monotheism," leaving Sikhs and Muslims and several others out in the cold.  Of course, once you've thrown all but two faiths under the bus, there's always the guy who argues that adding just one more won't hardly matter....
 
‡ The Senate doesn't actually ratify a treaty; that happens after all parties have signed it.  What the Senate does (or does not), by a two-thirds majority, is agree that the President ought to sign it.
 
§ Well, kind of.  Classical Marxism calls religion "the opiate of the people," claims it is used as a means of control and aims to suppress it.  Countering this, multiple examples of religiously-based opposition to exploitive or oppressive governments, as well as examples from thousands of years of history, across multiple faiths, demonstrating that telling someone their religion is a lie doesn't stop them from continuing to follow it, often even under threat of force.