Scalia: Establishment clause doesn't require government to favor secularism over religion

The real news here is not that Antonin Scalia said this, but that it's the slightest bit controversial. But that's not something that happened overnight. The secular left and their media servants have spent decades pushing the idea that the establishment clause is about protecting the non-religious from maniacal Jesus freaks - especially the nightmare scenario in which the Jesus freaks get a job with any public entity and are guided in any decision by biblical principles. Scalia is a man who actually knows about the founding of the nation and about the thinking behind it. He knows perfectly well that separation of church and state was to prevent the state developing an official state denomination that would be favored over others - as was (and still is, at least nominally) the case in Britain. It was never considered a constitutional imperative that believing in God, or saying so, or being guided by said belief, should be verboten among government officials.

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That's also obvious to the rest of us who know our history, but sometimes a Supreme Court Justice has to slow down and explain things to people:

He told the audience at Archbishop Rummel High School that there is "no place" in the country's constitutional traditions for the idea that the state must be neutral between religion and its absence. "To tell you the truth there is no place for that in our constitutional tradition. Where did that come from?" he said. "To be sure, you can't favor one denomination over another but can't favor religion over non-religion?" He also said there is "nothing wrong" with the idea of presidents and others invoking God in speeches. He said God has been good to America because Americans have honored him. Scalia said during the Sept. 11 attacks he was in Rome at a conference. The next morning, after a speech by President George W. Bush in which he invoked God and asked for his blessing, Scalia said many of the other judges approached him and said they wished their presidents or prime ministers would do the same. "God has been very good to us. That we won the revolution was extraordinary. The Battle of Midway was extraordinary. I think one of the reasons God has been good to us is that we have done him honor. Unlike the other countries of the world that do not even invoke his name we do him honor. In presidential addresses, in Thanksgiving proclamations and in many other ways," Scalia said.

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I would add that if Scalia is right about this last part, the current trend in our culture would suggest we're in for some rough times. If Americans are that determined to go it without God - as it appears they are - we'll see how we like it as a nation when we find ourselves stepping outside His blessings. Do you know anyone else who has $19 trillion? But back to the constitutional issue, Scalia rightly points out that the government - or anyone who is part of it - is under no obligation to keep silent about their faith, nor to refrain for being guided by it in policy-making, nor to refrain from making a person without faith uncomfortable. We want people of good character serving in government and it stands to reason that people of good character would likely be people of faith. The only thing they can't do is pass a law establishing an official state religion - which is something no church recognizing Jesus as Lord would want them to do anyway, because the favor of Washington is not something you want to be reliant upon in doing the work of Christ. Scalia's comments will be treated as controversial, but in actuality they are basic constitutional fact. That so many people don't know this explains a lot.

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