Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Date:         Fri, 18 Dec 1992 04:23:33 EST
From:         JEK@NIHCU.BITNET
Subject:      Re; Christian Nation

Michael A Kline, Senior (MAKS) posted from the Ankerberg Show a
quotation from the North Carolina Constitution as adopted in 1776,
stipulating that no one who should "deny the being of God, or the
truth of the (Christian) religion, or..." was eligible for public
office. The use of parentheses about the word "Christian" suggests
editing, and some listmembers have asked what the original wording
was.

A listmember on another list has quoted the passage in another
context. It seems that the document reads "the truth of the
Protestant religion".

This may be taken to mean that the candidate for office must be a
Christian and not a Roman Catholic. However, in at some legal
documents of the seventeenth century, the stipulation that someone
must be a Protestant meant that he must be a member in good standing
of the Church of England. The term excluded Presbyterians,
Congregationalists, and Quakers no less than Romanists.  It strikes
me as a distinct possibility that the 1776 Constitution of North
Carolina was simply reproducing the language of the colonial
charter, which was reproducing English usage, and that the intent
was to restrict office to Anglicans.

       *       *       *       *       *       *       *

Michael also quotes a state Constitution that requires
office-holders to be Christians, and then goes on to say that "No
religious test" shall be applied to them. One might wonder what this
phrase (also found in the U S Constitution) means.

In England, in 1776, a requirement for holding certain positions was
that the candidate must not merely declare that he believed Anglican
doctrines, but demonstrate his belief by receiving the Holy
Sacrament in an Anglican Church.  The law requiring this was called
the Test Act, and it was widely abhorred both by Anglicans and by
non-Anglicans, as encouraging not only hypocrisy but blasphemy. It
makes sense that many Americans in the 1700's would think it proper
to ask a prospective mayor, "Are you a Christian?" but would draw
the line at requiring him to participate in a certain act of worship
to prove it.

       *       *       *       *       *       *       *

Michael quotes extensively from a Supreme Court Case of 1892, Holy
Trinity Church vs. the United States of America. The background of
that case is as follows:

The Congress had passed a law forbidding any American firm from
hiring someone not living in the United States and bringing him here
to work. The Church of the Holy Trinity hired an English clergyman
as its pastor, and was cited for violating the law. The court ruled
that, although the words of the law, taken at face value, clearly
prohibited the action of the Church, it was clear that the Congress
had not intended anything of the kind, and that the law should be
interpreted accordingly. The Court cited two reasons for being sure
that the Congress never intended to restrict the hiring of foreign
clergy.
     (1) The legislative history of the law made it clear that the
intention was to restrict the hiring of cheap, foreign, unskilled
manual laborers.
     (2) Numerous pieces of evidence (such as the State
Constitutions cited) showed that the Federal and State governments
recognized the importance and value of Christian Churches, and would
never do anything to discommode them, such as restricting their
right to hire foreign clergy.

Usually, when the case is cited today, it is as a precedent for the
view that the plain language of a law may be set aside if there is
evidence that the law-making body did not mean to say what the law
says on a particular point.  Thus, in recent hearings on the spotted
owl controversy in Oregon, where the counsel for one side was
arguing that Congressional intent favored his side,, although the
wording of the law did not, the judge asked him, "Is this a 'plain
speech' issue or a 'Holy Trinity' issue?" The Holy Trinity was
mentioned several times in the ensuing discussion, much to the
confusion of the reporters covering the hearings, who were at a loss
to understand how ecology had suddenly given way to theology.

 Yours,
 James Kiefer
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU