The Late Great Justice Antonin Scalia Speaks
It was an unusually cold but clear January 12, 2003, and Your Author had the opportunity to attend an outdoor speech by the Late Great Supreme Court Justice Antonio Scalia
I attack ideas. I don’t attack people. And some very good people have some very bad ideas. And if you can’t separate the two, you gotta get another day job. You don’t want to be a judge. At least not a judge on a multi-member panel.
The Late Great Justice Antonin Scalia
It was an unusually cold but clear January 12, 2003, and Your Author had the opportunity to attend an outdoor speech by the Late Great Supreme Court Justice Antonio Scalia (3/11/1936-2/13/2016). As a precursor, Color Guards from the Knights of Columbus, Knights Templar, and US Marine Corps marched for about a half-mile from historic downtown Fredericksburg, Virginia, to the monument celebrating the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom.
Across the street from this point of interest is the burial plot of George Washington’s mother, Mary Ball Washington. Behind Mary’s burial plot, another notable fact about this area is the little-known “Meditation Rock.” It is a large boulder where Mary prayed for her son during the revolutionary war.
Judge Scalia spoke to commemorate January 13, 1777, the day that Thomas Jefferson, George Mason, and others met in a Fredericksburg tavern to frame the initial draft of the “Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom.” At that time, the Revolution prompted the disestablishment of the Anglican Church (connected to the royal government), and the Colonists wondered if Virginia should continue to impose taxes for recognized churches. While some supported that measure, they still desired public support of recognized religions. For some, such as Thomas Jefferson, continued support of religion was a disgusting concept.
Thomas Jefferson and James Madison (both who became presidents) declared that religious beliefs were only within the sphere of individual conscience. They and others also averred that such matters must be free from any interference by the government. Jefferson drafted the measure, but it was not until 1786 that Madison successfully worked to ensure adoption by the Virginia legislature. Jefferson’s statute was the basis of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and continues to be an integral component of Virginia’s Constitution. It is worthy to reproduce the text here to show that this document did indeed declare non-interference in religion but at the same time recognized Divine Providence:
Whereas Almighty God hath created the mind free; that all attempts to influence it by temporal punishments or burthens, or by civil incapacitations, tend only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness, and are a departure from the plan of the Holy author of our religion, who being Lord both of body and mind, yet chose not to propagate it by coercions on either, as it was in his Almighty power to do; that the impious presumption of legislators and rulers, civil as well as ecclesiastical, who being themselves but fallible and uninspired men, have assumed dominion over the faith of others, setting up their own opinions and modes of thinking as the only true and infallible, and as such endeavouring to impose them on others, hath established and maintained false religions over the greatest part of the world, and through all time; that to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves, is sinful and tyrannical; that even the forcing him to support this or that teacher of his own religious persuasion, is depriving him of the comfortable liberty of giving his contributions to the particular pastor, whose morals he would make his pattern, and whose powers he feels most persuasive to righteousness, and is withdrawing from the ministry those temporary rewards, which proceeding from an approbation of their personal conduct, are an additional incitement to earnest and unremitting labours for the instruction of mankind; that our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, any more than our opinions in physics or geometry; that therefore the proscribing any citizen as unworthy the public confidence by laying upon him an incapacity of being called to offices of trust and emolument, unless he profess or renounce this or that religious opinion, is depriving him injuriously of those privileges and advantages to which in common with his fellow-citizens he has a natural right; that it tends only to corrupt the principles of that religion it is meant to encourage, by bribing with a monopoly of worldly honours and emoluments, those who will externally profess and conform to it; that though indeed these are criminal who do not withstand such temptation, yet neither are those innocent who lay the bait in their way; that to suffer the civil magistrate to intrude his powers into the field of opinion, and to restrain the profession or propagation of principles on supposition of their ill tendency, is a dangerous fallacy, which at once destroys all religious liberty, because he being of course judge of that tendency will make his opinions the rule of judgment, and approve or condemn the sentiments of others only as they shall square with or differ from his own; that it is time enough for the rightful purposes of civil government, for its officers to interfere when principles break out into overt acts against peace and good order; and finally, that truth is great and will prevail if left to herself, that she is the proper and sufficient antagonist to error, and has nothing to fear from the conflict, unless by human interposition disarmed of her natural weapons, free argument and debate, errors ceasing to be dangerous when it is permitted freely to contradict them:
Be it enacted by the General Assembly, That no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinion in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish enlarge, or affect their civil capacities.
And though we well know that this assembly elected by the people for the ordinary purposes of legislation only, have no power to restrain the acts of succeeding assemblies, constituted with powers equal to our own, and that therefore to declare this act to be irrevocable would be of no effect in law; yet we are free to declare, and do declare, that the rights hereby asserted are of the natural rights of mankind, and that if any act shall be hereafter passed to repeal the present, or to narrow its operation, such act shall be an infringement of natural right.
About 200 people gathered to hear the Judge criticize court decisions that have outlawed public expressions of religious faith in recent years. During his speech, Judge Scalia also said that the statute did not intend to “exclude God from the public forums and from political life.” He mentioned the 2002 California federal court ruling that declared “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance as an unconstitutional ruling and defended “In God We Trust” on our money, military chaplains, nondenominational prayers before high school graduations, and prayers before Congress. He averred that these traditions “reflect the true tradition of religious freedom in America -- a tradition of neutrality among religious faiths.” Scalia scolded those who feel the Constitution is a malleable document – “It is part of the Constitution known as the living Constitution. . . It is a Constitution that morphs. . . . Whatever we think it ought to mean it means, and that new meaning will be imposed on our citizens coast to coast.” Scalia made it a point to mention religions other than Christianity have an equal right to express their faith. After his speech, Scalia placed a wreath at the monument.
Fredericksburg celebrates the 1777 meeting on an annual basis. And to the horror of one protester among the 200 supporters, a Catholic priest presided over the 2003 ceremony by providing an opening invocation. In the end, a nondenominational Christian minister gave the closing prayer. All on public property! When will the ACLU step in and sue the City of Fredericksburg for daring to punch a hole in The Worshiped Wall of Separation?