Jefferson's Letter to the Danbury Baptists

The Danbury Letter written by Thomas Jefferson was a formal written response back to the Baptists of Danbury Connecticut regarding their concerns with the Connecticut State Constitution and government mandated religion.

The Baptists were concerned that their current state government did not prohibit the state from legislating about religious matters. The state of Connecticut set a system of religious taxation that forced the Connecticut Baptists to support the established Congregationalist Church. A concern grew within the Baptists regarding a national establishment of religion and the letter to Jefferson was a political move by the Danbury Baptists to secure their denomination. They knew he was a Deist and founded his principles on rational thought and ethical standards therefore they felt their argument would be better received. Jefferson's reply in his letter to them reflects and upholds the principles of the First Amendment.

In the second paragraph of the Danbury letter Jefferson states that..."legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, "...thus building a wall of separation between Church & State." This quote has been misinterpreted throughout the centuries within camps of both the conservative right and liberal left, when all Jefferson was trying to do was explain that it is an infringement of our natural rights to mandate any religion.

According to Derek Davis' research, a church/state scholar and author of What Jefferson's Metaphor Really Means, Davis explains the Connecticut law as follows; "Connecticut law allowed the Baptists to rout their religious taxes to their own churches, but this involved filling out an exemption certificate and many Connecticut communities either made it difficult to obtain these certificates or refused to approve the exemptions once submitted."(Davis, 13) Davis continues by adding that the Baptists "found their laws unjust and discriminatory, favoring Congregationalism over other denominations". (Davis, 13) According to Davis, the Baptists in Connecticut began petitioning in the early 1800's to put pressure on the government to rescind the tax. Hence, the letter to Jefferson and his reply on Jan 1, 1802.

The "building a wall" metaphor in his letter can be seen as one-dimensional. Although the government attempts to say that church and state are separate, they continue to govern by adhering to Christian principles that continue to heavily influence the government’s actions. The Founding Fathers had already freed themselves and the colonies from the religious reign of the Mother country. They strongly believed that one couldn’t have a free country if it is ruled by a state-sponsored or mandatory religion.

Citizens in the United States continue today to argue over Jefferson's metaphor when it's in their best interest. I believe that this is why Derek Davis wrote his article, to point out that the reason why our country kept religion separate from government proceedings was so it would not repeat the religious-based atrocities that had previously occurred. Jefferson was a Deist believing that "religion is a matter that lies solely between a Man & his God..." Even if the Baptists of Danbury used Jefferson to promote and/or campaign their own denomination, they had a natural right to do so to demand their own religious freedoms.

Davis, Derek "What Jefferson's Metaphor Really Means," Liberty, (Jan/Feb, 1997), p. 13.