First, understand that I speak (or write) as an atheist and a believer in the separation of church and state. That said, I ask, "But what does that mean?"

It should be remembered that neither our history nor the Constitution says that no mention of religion, organized or unorganized, must come within shouting distance of government, that no public officer must utter the word "God".

One must keep in mind the historical background in which the Establishment Clause came about. In the background, the founders were painfully aware of the fact that not only England but almost all previous regimes, in almost all countries, comprised a sort of Siamese-twin relationship between government and some particular organized religion. Government's power and legitimacy was thought to be derived from and to owe huge institutional allegiance to whatever the relevant organized religion was--in England, the Church of England, and in the other countries of Europe, originally the Church of Rome and then the various Lutheran and Presbyterian churches, and on and on. And the Founders were well aware of egregious misuses of that relationship. Attendance at church was legally enforced, with criminal sanctions for non-attendance, as was payment of tithes or other exactions by the Church.

And almost never was there any question that the State and organized religion were joined at the hip, so to speak. And that's true in many countries even today.

The purpose of the Establishment Clause of the Constitution was to keep the power and legitimacy of the State from being declared (explicitly or implicitly) the property of any official church, and that no church was to be so endowed with primacy or support by the State, the tax dollars of the public generally being politically devoted to the beliefs and wishes of some particular portion of the populace.

And to varying extents we have succeeded in carrying that out.

Now, we do (rightly or wrongly) have a long tradition of invocations and benedictions at State Occasions, such as we saw yesterday. I will say that Rick Warren played it cooler than I might have expected, in that he phrased his closing reference so as to refer to what has affected HIS life, as opposed to presuming to speak for either the State or everyone attending, and even then he mentioned four or five different cultures/religions' names for Jesus. Given who Warren is, that's about as far as I could expect him to go in that direction. I think that the invocations and benedictions will continue into the remotely foreseeable future, come hell or high water, sometimes less objectionable and sometimes more so.

The power of the State, under the Constitution, should not allow any official, government-sanctioned prayers, or any special privileges extended to organized religious bodies--including, say I, "In God We Trust" on US coinage and currency, or "Under God" in the pledge. Not that I have any expectation of getting rid of those usages.

BUT, a prohibition against an entering officeholder's choosing to say "So help me God" if that suits him? Awwww, come onnnnn! That's not misusing the power of the State to favor religion, either in the abstract or as to a particular religious institution.

Dave Oesterreich