Letter to the Editor Response to the Letter to the Editor claiming the Establishment of a State Religion in 1892
TPFP News Staff Writer
I did a quick check and Michael’s claim that “Congress and the Supreme Court declared Christianity to be the State religion in 1892” is not correct.
According to Christian Heritage Fellowship in the article titled Supreme Court Declares America a Christian Nation” by Dr. Stephen Flick, “On February 29, 1892, The Supreme Court declared (in Holy Trinity v. United States) that the historical record of America overwhelmingly demonstrated that the United States…Is a Christian nation.”
That is not the same as establishing a State Religion.
Flick goes on to say, “Thousands of pieces of evidence exist that demonstrate that America was founded as a Christian nation, and Holy Trinity v. United States) is only one of the many pieces of that mosaic of historical truth.”
Congress did not declare Christianity as a state religion in 1892. In the case of Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States, the Supreme Court stated that the United States is a ‘Christian nation,’ but did not declare Christianity as the state religion. This case wasn’t about establishing a state religion, it was about a church hiring a foreign minister, which violated a federal law about importing foreign labor.
The First Amendment of the Constitution guarantees the free exercise of religion and prohibits the establishment of a state religion.