Linda Stamato’s Confused Understanding of Church/State Separation

Christians, please listen. There is no national religion in America, asserts New Jersey Star-Ledger Guest Columnist Linda Stamato, forgetting it.

To begin with, Stamato identifies America as a “constitutional democracy.” It most certainly is not. America, according to the Founders, is a constitutional republic. In the whole of their defense of the new 1787 Constitution in the Federalist Papers, Jay, Hamilton, and Madison make repeated references to the republican principles underpinning the document, not democratic principles. 

The constitutional republic that the Founders created is a system of limited government whose elected leaders are constitutionally bound to law- and policy-making rooted in the republican principles of protecting individual liberty. A democracy prioritizes elections. The difference is stark and crucial.

Stamato goes on to remind us that America has a secular government. That is true. But what does “secular” actually mean? Stamato clearly doesn’t get it. She seems to think that secular means forbidding traditional religion in governmental functions. But secularism is broader than that.

A truly secular government does not promote any belief system, religious or non-religious. She complains that “the high court has been showing a preference for one faith over others.” That is clearly wrong. But neither should the court promote non-faith beliefs. She seems to equate secularism with non-religious “rational” beliefs. But secularism, properly understood, no more promotes atheism than it does Christianity.

Let us review two examples she cites to “prove” that the church/state doctrine was violated by the Supreme Court. She writes:

[T]he high court used the religion clauses to privilege mostly mainstream Christian beliefs. It allowed a coach to openly pray on a school athletic field (Kennedy v Bermerton) and the use of public funds for private schools (Carson v Makin).

But these cases are diametrically opposed. In the Kennedy case, a coach, acting in his capacity as a public school employee, and at a public school function, led a prayer service on the football field in the middle of the function. This amounted to a state sanction of religion, a clear violation of the First Amendment. But the SCOTUS wrongly ruled for the coach.

In the Carson case, Maine parents sought to use a government education voucher available to families living in districts that run no traditional public schools. But the program denies money to parents who choose religious schools. This restriction clearly privileges non-religious parents, which is contrary to secularism. In this case, the Court rightly ruled that any state program that provides taxpayer funds to parents for private schools cannot discriminate against religious parents. This case was framed as “using public funds at religious schools” when in fact it is the private parents, not the state, who are actually spending the funds. Keep in mind that religious parents are taxpayers, too. If taxpayer funds are made available to parents for private education, religious parents have as much right to choose religious schools as other parents have to choose non-religious schools. By the logic of Stamato and the discriminatory Maine law that was overturned, Social Security payouts should be barred from being used to support the recipients’ houses of worship or other religious purposes. After all, Social Security is as much “public funds” as education vouchers. But with vouchers, as with Social Security, the funds are intended to be spent by the recipient according to the recipient’s choice, not the state’s.

Stamato rightly observes that the government should not favor any religion over other religions. But neither should it favor non-religions. A truly secular government does not favor any belief system, religious, agnostic, or atheistic. The Maine voucher system favored non-religion over religion, which violates secular principles. 

Related Reading:

SCOTUS Attacks Religious Freedom

My Commentary On State/Church Separation—a discussion regarding Thomas Hart’s New Jersey Star-Ledger op-ed What's hard to understand about "separation"?

America; Democracy or Republic or Both--Why it Matters

Separation of Church (or Education) and State

Freedom Of Religion Demands Freedom From Religion, my article in The Objective Standard

RELATED: What Does Freedom From Religion Actually Mean in Practice?

To Keep Government Out of Religion, Keep Religion Out of Government