On John Kennedy and Throwing Up

When John Kennedy ran for president, he gave a speech about the separation of church and state and about anti-Catholic sentiment. Rick Santorum wants to throw up when he hears it. Why?

Because the first line, first substantive line in the speech says, "I believe in America where the separation of church and state is absolute." I don't believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute. The idea that the church can have no influence or no involvement in the operation of the state is absolutely antithetical to the objectives and vision of our country.

This is the First Amendment. The First Amendment says the free exercise of religion. That means bringing everybody, people of faith and no faith, into the public square. Kennedy for the first time articulated the vision saying, no, faith is not allowed in the public square.

This is incredibly important, and not because Rick Santorum said it. (I happen to believe that his values are far outside the American mainstream, and I would hate to see him as my president. But that's a post for a different day.) This statement is important because it highlights two very different concepts of what church/state independence should look like. The American legacy on this issue is quite different than that of much of the rest of the world, and it bears some emphasis.


Many countries in the world have a true separation between church and state. In such countries, the state declares which activities exist within its purview and which exist within that of established religion, and it enforces the separation between these two domains. For example, in France, it is illegal to wear religious garb in public schools. This is like the Establishment Clause run amok, but in reverse: it is an establishment of no religion at all. Mr. Santorum is right to be nauseated by this model; it would be an affront to American traditions and values. Fortunately for him and for us, it would also be an affront to the American constitution, which gives us a Free Exercise Clause as well.

In the United States, we have freedom of religion. Freedom of religion means that the people express their religious convictions, or lack thereof, and the government stays out of their way. It neither hinders such expression nor competes with it.

The line from Kennedy's speech that Santorum quotes is ambiguous about which of these meanings is intended, but the rest of the speech is not. It is not a speech about the public square or about limiting expressions of faith by individuals. It is about the surrender of national sovereignty to church officials, the compulsion to religious observance by state officials, and public prejudice against people based on their religious affiliation -- any of which I hope that Mr. Santorum would wholeheartedly oppose. The speech is frank, specific, and exhaustive. I wonder whether Mr. Santorum has actually listened to the rest of it.