Religion does indeed have a place in politics

Definition: Politics: "the art or science of running governmental or state affairs, including behavior within civil governments" (1) Now I shall begin. C1. The United States is secular The Constitution set up the United States government such that no religious organization would influence internal governmental affairs. a) "Separation of Church and State" Thomas Jefferson first coined this term in 1807 in his letter to the Danbury Bishops. In this one term, he expressed what the intent and purpose of the Establishment Clause and Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. It was not until 1878 that the Jeffersonian concept of "separation of Church and State" became reality. i) Reynolds v. United States 98 U. S. 145 (1878) Within this case, the United States Supreme Court (the final arbitrator of what is constitutional or not) examined the religious history of the United States. Determining that while the Constitution does protect religion it does not defined what religion is. They had to search deeper. "The court found that the leaders in advocating and formulating the constitutional guarantee of religious liberty were James Madison and Thomas Jefferson. Quoting the "separation" paragraph from Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptists, the court concluded that, "coming as this does from an acknowledged leader of the advocates of the measure, it may be accepted almost as an authoritative declaration of the scope and effect of the amendment thus secured. " (2) The Supreme Court affirmed Jeffersonian thinking for the first time. ii) Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U. S. 1 (1947) In this 5-4 decision, the 9 justices agreed on one thing. "The clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect 'a wall of separation between Church and State. " (3) The Supreme Court of the United States ruled that there should be a impassable wall between politics and religion. b) The Constitution is a completely secular document. The Constitution was written to set up the United States government. There is only one place where religion is directly seen in the original text of the Constitution and that is in Article 6 "[N]o religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States. " As you can see, the clause "means that no public position can be required to be held by any one of any religious denomination. It would be unconstitutional for there to be a requirement that the President by Lutheran, or even for the mayor of a small town to be Christian. " This shows the framers did not want any one religion dominating the United States. In fact, James Madison even noted that "Religion itself may become a motive to persecution and oppression". The framers wanted to keep religion out of the government and thus out of politics. Now I shall use my remaining time for rebuttals. C1. Religion in creating the United States States may have had established religions, but, the states played no direct role in drafting the Constitution. That was left in the hands of representatives who created a secular government. No matter what they believed the government was created to be secular. Thus, politics were meant to be secular according to the Constitution. Religion has no place in politics. a) The puritans and the other things you stated All religions believe that they should "spread it to the corners of the earth". This Puritan idea did not impact American decision making. The manifest destiny was the spreading of the United States from East to West. This was purely for economic gain. The "League of Nations", the precursor to the United Nations, was meant to attempt to prevent another world war. (It obviously failed). Iraqi Freedom. .. this was to depose Saddam Hussein because he "supported" al qaeda and "find" WMDs. The Cold War when you have to huge superpowers with conflicting ideologies they are going to fight. Furthermore, religious ideals cannot affect the actual law making and the laws as the government is not allowed to favor one religion over another nor are religious biases allowed to come forth in laws. This means laws cannot be made because of religion. C2) Voting People should not vote based on their religious beliefs. They should vote based on who would bet run the United States. The influence of religion should be discarded simply because the one person may be more religious does not mean they are the best for the job within the government. The government should not ignore religion but, they should not let religion influence their decision making or law passing as the United States is secular. C3) Groups and organizations Why should the Church of the Latter Day Saints not be able to lobby simply because the United States government is not allowed to pass a "religious law". That would be unconstitutional. A law cannot be based upon religious beliefs. Nor can the government allow the passage of the law pushing religious beliefs on others as this will most likely infringe upon the first amendment. Religion has no place within politics. Source: 1. . http://en.wikipedia.org... 2. . http://en.wikipedia.org... 3. . http://en.wikipedia.org...