Talk:Separation of church and state/Archive 1

In my opinion (if we think that it is a enciclopedy) the title of this article should be "Separation of church and state in the United States of America". More general stuff should be writed for this title.

I agree. Either have two or more articles, one of them general, or at least have subheadings in this one. This article is one of the examples of Americocentrism here at Wikipedia. --KF 22:46 Feb 22, 2003 (UTC)

"Separation of church and state" is a particularly American concept: it's a phrase formulated in the letters of Thomas Jefferson, writing about his ideas of government for America, and can hardly be written about WITHOUT making reference to the Constitution of the United States. It may be useful, in an expanded article, to place it within a broader historical context, and to discuss its later influence in Europe, with reference to the European tradition of an Established church, but it is natural for this article to concentrate on America. -- Someone else 02:33 Feb 23, 2003 (UTC)

Sorry SomeoneElse, but that's just nonsense. It's a fundamental part of political doctrine in most Western-style democracies, and has been so for centuries. To claim an American monopoly on it is absurd.

However, I see no reason at all why the US constitution should not be mentioned, as the US example played a substantial (and oft-ignored) part in the development of modern systems of government all over the world, perhaps second only to that of the French Revolution.

Also, the US makes a really good example to use for this sort of discussion, as the written constitutional structure is nice and clear and (relatively) simple. In many other countries that (in practice) work in a similar way, unwritten conventions and common law serve large parts of the role that the US Constitution serves, and in consequence they are often difficult to describe briefly and clearly. Consider, for example, the following two statements - not about S of C&S but illustrative just the same:

• In the USA, the President is the chief executive and the head of state.
• In New Zealand, the Prime Minister is, for practical purposes, the chief executive, but formally does not even exist, the function of chief executive being filled by the Governer General, whereas the head of state is technically the Queen but for practical purposes is the Governer General.

Now, the seperation of church and state is much the same in both countries, but if I were writing about S of C&S, which system do you think I'd rather use as an example? :) Tannin 03:12 Feb 23, 2003 (UTC)

I don't really disagree with you (except the "nonsense" part, and the part where you say I claimed it was an American monopoly). Church and State have varying degrees of separation in various places, but the specific phrase "Separation of church and state" arose to describe America's variation on it. -- Someone else 03:42 Feb 23, 2003 (UTC)

I'd need to check on exact dates, but I think you will find that the phrase came into use in a number of places at around about the same time. It's certainly not something that most people would think to associate with the US as opposed to France, the UK, and most of Europe. (Just to stick with the oldest examples.) S of C&S was, for example, a key issue in the French Revolution, and much European law to this day is based on Napoleonic law which (of course) was very much about the S of C&S. Saying it's a "particularly American concept" is bizarre. Tannin

I certainly HOPE most people would associate it with the US rather than the UK, since at least part of the latter has an established church! The phrase's origin was English dissenter James Burgh's book Crito (1767), quoted by Jefferson in a letter explaining his refusal to proclaim a fast day for national reconciliation: "I contemplate with solemn reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and state". The success of the French revolution, and subsequent law, of course had much to do with the prior success of the American revolution, (I did say earlier that the American experience had effects on European ideas) -- just as the American insistance on separation was based on English liberal ideals. -- Someone else 04:18 Feb 23, 2003 (UTC)

And here (with the UK example) we run right away into the sort of complexities I mentioned earlier. (Which is why I used that example.) Formally, the Church of England is an integral part of the state, and yet in practice modern UK governments tend to be more secular than US ones! There is a great deal of territory to be covered by this article, it seems. (Not by me though, I'm not particularly interested in religion as a rule.) Tannin