CHAPTER III
HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
This chapter will survey the historical background of the Baptist movement in Europe and the United States as it concerns the chaplaincy, religious liberty, church-state relations, and allied issues. This type of historical survey is necessary in order to understand where Baptists are today and how they arrived at this point. From this, some trends can, hopefully, be discovered which indicate directions for the future.
European Baptists
During the time of the Reformation in Europe there were many groups of Christian believers, called Anabaptists, who claimed complete civil and religious freedom and practiced many of the same practices as present-day Baptists and believed much the same distinctive doctrines. They believed in a voluntary church membership of baptized believers who were baptized on their personal profession of faith in Jesus Christ. They rejected Infant Baptism, and demanded "a pure Church" with local autonomy and discipline. They were the first Protestant advocates of separation of church and state as a result of their theological beliefs about the church and discipleship. Most of these early Anabaptists refused to serve in any official or civil positions, and rejected war, force, and violence. They could not accept the compulsory State Church and therefore differed sharply with Luther and Calvin on several rather basic issues.
Although most of the ideas of the European Anabaptists agreed with most present Baptist beliefs, there were some areas in which their doctrines differed from those of twentieth century Baptists in America. These will be noted as the study progresses.
One noted Anabaptist leader was Menno Simons. The conduct of the members of this Dutch group was controlled by the spirit of the Sermon on the Mount. They participated in civil life more than some other Anabaptists, but they did not take oaths or participate in war or in the administration of civil justice. Some did not, however, object to paying taxes to the state in time of war. Others considered this a compromise.
The Anabaptists believed that the state was ordained of God for the good of society, but they contended that it had absolutely no authority over spiritual matters. Some of them were so convinced of this that they could not conceive of a Christian holding any civil office of the state, bearing arms, or fighting in war. But not all Anabaptists maintained these convictions. Some felt that a man could be both a magistrate and a Christian at the same time. Baltasar Hubmaier said that Christians were under obligation to bear the sword on behalf of Christian governors. But Anabaptists consistently held to the principle of religious freedom and separation of church and state.
It is widely recognized that among the few European voices for religious liberty which were heard in the two centuries after the time of Luther, the place of honor is undoubtedly to be accorded to the Anabaptists. Their doctrine insisted that freedom of conscience and of worship was fundamental, and that religion should be entirely exempt from the regulation or interference of the civil power, so that a man's religion should not result in his loss of civil rights. They also taught that the church should be composed exclusively of regenerate membership, not conditioned upon residence or birth. In this they anticipated, by more than two centuries, that position by Edwards which shattered the union of church and state in America.
The Anabaptists of Europe and Baptists of England belonged to a separatist tradition which arose out of the Reformation Period. Their separatist view of church-state relations was to receive its ultimate and complete expression in the United States. It, nevertheless, clearly commenced in the arguments of some of the Anabaptists and early Baptists that the civil authorities were not to intermeddle in religious affairs. The same conditions which caused the Protestant revolution also resulted in the widespread acceptance of the principle of religious liberty, and ultimately of the principle of separation of church and state.
Several English Baptist congregations which developed in the early part of the seventeenth century broke away from the Anabaptist influence of Menno Simons and permitted their members to swear in a court of law, to take part in war, and to take official state positions. These were led by Thomas Helwys and John Murton. In 1611 or 1612 Thomas Helwys and a handful of followers met secretly and organized a Baptist church at Spitalfield, just outside of London's walls. This was the first Baptist church on English soil for whose origin there is historical proof. Thomas Helwys was an educated man with training in law at London. In a series of books written between 1611 and 1612 he set forth his beliefs. He controverted the Mennonites' teaching that Christians should not participate in civil government, and he attacked the established churches for robbing men of their freedom in Christ. It is said that his fourth book, A Short Declaration of the Mistery of Iniquity, was the first claim for freedom of worship to be published in the English language. A key passage set forth Christian obedience to the king "in all earthly things" but asserted their passive resistance to his attempted authority "in heavenly or spiritual things."
Another significant contribution to religious liberty was made in 1612 or 1614 by John Smyth, the leader of a little English congregation in Amsterdam. One article of his long confession is one of the earliest statements in behalf of religious liberty:
That the magistrate is not by virtue of his office to meddle with religion, or matters of conscience, to force or compel men to this or that form of religion, or doctrine: but to leave Christian religion free, to every man's conscience, and to handle only civil transgressions (Ram. 13)... for Christ only is the king, and lawgiver of the church and conscience (James 4:12).
Another group of English Baptists appeared apart from Mennonite influences. They were called Particular Baptists and were calvinistic in theology. In 1644 fifteen Particular Baptist ministers incorporated a plea for religious liberty in a confession of fifty articles of faith which they signed. Seven Particular Baptist churches adopted this London Confession, as it came to be known. This confession advocated submission to the government in civil laws but not in ecclesiastical laws.
John Locke, the great English rationalist and political theorist, said the English Baptists were "the first propounders of absolute liberty, just and true liberty, equal and impartial liberty."
Another example of the ardent support of religious liberty is illustrated in a petition presented by Leonard Busher to James I in 1614:
Kings and magistrates are to rule temporal affairs by the swords of their temporal kingdoms, and bishops and ministers are to rule spiritual affairs by the Word and Spirit of God, the sword of Christ's spiritual kingdom, and not to inter-meddle one with another's authority, office, and function.... It is not only unmerciful, but unnatural and abominable, yea, monstrous, for one Christian to vex and destroy another for difference and questions of religion.
Up to the period of the Commonwealth (1640-1660) English Baptists were not strong enough to work very effectively in behalf of religious freedom. Baptists and Independents thought that in Oliver Cromwell they had found one who favored their cause. Baptists supported the Parliamentary cause, which was the cause of religious liberty as well as civil liberty. Baptist doctrines on religious liberty are reflected in the Standard Confession of 1660. Many Baptists served in the armies of Parliament, and some of them rose to high military rank. Their zeal in Cromwell's "New-Model Army" indicated sharply their difference from the pacifist Mennonites. In the camps, Baptist laymen who were officers frequently did the preaching in place of the clergy. They looked on the Civil War as a struggle for political and religious liberty which justified the use of arms. Baptists also held government positions such as commissioners and members of various boards. This brief honeymoon with government ended with the Test Act of 1673 by which every officer of the Crown was required to renounce the doctrine of transubstantiation and to receive the Lord's Supper at his local Episcopal parish house. By this test, Baptists, Catholics, and other nonconformists were removed from military, civil, and municipal services.
During the period 1677-1689 a new Baptist confession appeared which was to have far-reaching effects on the doctrines and positions of Baptists for decades and centuries. It was first published anonymously but was adopted in 1689 by messengers of 107 Baptist churches in England and Wales. It asserted the crucial importance of liberty of conscience. It approved Christian acceptance of civil office in the government and participation in warfare "upon just and necessary occasions."
American Baptists
Baptists in the Colonial Period
For the purposes of the present study the focus of attention now shifts from England and Europe to the American colonies in the seventeenth century. This will lead to the church-state position among Baptists in America at the time of the Revolutionary War, the adoption of the Constitution, and the early national period. This explains the necessity to lay a solid historical foundation before moving on to consider in detail other specific areas which are at the center of the primary objective—the development of a Southern Baptist stance toward the military chaplaincy that is consistent with past pronouncements and actions in church-state relations.
The majority of Baptists in the colonies came from the British Isles. They naturally brought with them the doctrines and traditions they held in England. They had a passionate love for religious liberty and advocated a clear separation between the functions of church and state.
Baptists in New England
The earliest Baptist colonists came to New England. In Massachusetts Colony they met with much opposition when they refused to accept the control of the state church over their conscience and religious practice.
The founder of the first Baptist church in America was Roger Williams, known as the "father of religious liberty in America." He established the church at Providence, Rhode Island, in the year 1639. The only other Baptist church to contest the claim, the First Baptist Church of Newport, Rhode Island, was founded by another capable fighter for religious liberty, John Clarke. He was so distressed at the theological intolerance in the Massachusetts colony that he proposed to some friends that they settle in some new location where they could enjoy religious freedom. On the advice of Roger Williams they settled on the small island of Aquidneck.
From 1638 to 1644 Clarke conducted public worship both for the Congregational and Baptist elements in the new community. By 1644 he had joined the Baptists and founded and became the first preacher of the Baptist Church in Newport, now called the First Baptist John Clarke Memorial Church. His theology indicated that he was in the tradition of the Particular Baptists.
In 1647 the town of Newport, which dominated the old Rhode Island colony, united with the towns of Portsmouth, Warwick, and Providence in forming the Colony of Providence Plantations, which afterward became the state of Rhode Island. The preamble of the General Laws of this united colony guaranteed complete liberty of conscience.
In 1651 Clarke went to England with Roger Williams to promote the interests of Rhode Island. While there he published, in 1652, a remarkable little book entitled Ill Newes from New-England: or a Narrative of New-England Persecution. The subtitle refers to the fact "that while old England is becoming new, New England is becoming old," a reference to the fact that the government in New England was considered reactionary and that intolerance was rampant. This pamphlet is one of the ablest defenses of religious liberty which early New England produced. It started with an account of the persecution which Clarke had himself experienced at the hands of the established order. He referred to being among those "who together for liberty of their consciences, and worship of their God, as their hearts were persuaded, long since fled from the persecution of another type."
In the closing section of Ill Newes Clarke considered the arguments for religious liberty. He emphasized the fact that "no servant of Jesus Christ hath any liberty, much less authority, from his Lord, to smite his Fellow-servant," and that Christ taught his disciples "to be meek, and lowly and gentle." He denied that anyone had authority "to persecute, prosecute, or enforce others." He stated clearly that:
...This outward forcing of men in matters of conscience towards God to believe as others believe, and to practise and worship as others do, cannot stand with the Peace, Liberty, Prosperity, and safety of a Place, Commonwealth, or nation.
There were many influential Baptists witnessing and suffering for religious liberty in New England besides Roger Williams. Nevertheless, Roger Williams towers above all the others, and now attention must be directed to his magnificent contribution to the cause of religious liberty and the separation of church and state.
Roger Williams
Roger Williams is not remembered or honored for being a Baptist, for he professed to be a Baptist only about three or four months; but he is honored primarily for his staunch devotion to the principle of religious liberty, to which Baptists are devoted. He has been called "the apostle of the American system of a free Church in a free State." Some feel that his influence on American democratic thought has rivaled that of Thomas Jefferson. He was a prophet of the future who was so far ahead of his times that even our generation in some respects has not caught up with him. The scholarly Vernon L. Parrington said, "The gods, it would seem, were pleased to have their jest with him by sending him to earth too soon."
Shortly after he arrived in Massachusetts the Puritan establishment learned that this very promising young clergyman held views that challenged the foundations of their structure. He denied that the state had a right to enforce religious uniformity and to collect taxes for the support of the church and clergy. He taught that the power of the state was limited to matters pertaining to "the Bodies and Goods and outward state of men," and that it had no authority over the conscience of men or over their method of worship. He was positive in proclaiming his belief in the absolute freedom of conscience and the complete separation of church and state. After he was banished from Massachusetts and later founded the colony of Rhode Island, he had an opportunity to put his faith into practice in separating church and state, granting full religious freedom to all, and incorporating a bill of rights and modern democratic devices.
Williams' pamphlet, The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution for Cause of Conscience, has already been discussed from the standpoint of its scriptural content, but it must be further considered here from the standpoint of its contribution to the place it holds in the history of religious freedom and the separation of church and state. It has been compared in this respect with Jefferson's Act for Establishing Religious Freedom, Madison's Memorial and Remonstrance, and the First Amendment to the Constitution, as one of the cornerstones of the American experiment.
Some of the principles of The Bloudy Tenent are:
All Civil States with their Officers of justice in their respective constitutions and administrations are proved essentially Civil, and therefore not Judges, Governors or Defenders of the Spiritual or Christian State and Worship.
It is the will and command of God, that (since the coming of his Son the Lord Jesus) a permission of the most Paganish, Jewish, Turkish, or Anti-christian consciences and worships, be granted to all men in all Nations and Countries....
An enforced uniformity of Religion throughout a Nation or civil state, confounds the Civil and Religious, denies the principles of Christianity and civility, and that Jesus Christ is come in the Flesh....
More than a century before the Declaration of Independence stated that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, Williams wrote that "the Sovereign power of all Civil Authority is founded in the consent of the People." He felt that the "power of true discerning the true fear of God" is not one of the powers that the people have transferred to the civil authority. He said:
All lawful Magistrates in the World … can have no more Power than fundamentally lies in the Bodies or fountains themselves, which Power, Might, or Authority, is not Religious, Christian, etc. but natural, humane and civil.
The arguments of Roger Williams can be summarized in three main elements. First, he provided exposition of New Testament texts which show that even the most erroneous conscience imaginable is not to be disturbed in its errors by force. Second, he ruthlessly disposed of all the Old Testament "typology" precedents which the established church used to justify their church-state position. In doing this Williams taught that Israel was only a symbol of the spiritual church of Christ, and that to invoke it as a model for coercive institutions was a tragic mistake. Third, he provided a series of scattered but keen expositions of the nature of church and state as completely different societies.
He felt that forced worship is contrary to the will of God and that religious liberty is the only wise and Christian way of maintaining peace in the world. The real sufferers from the doctrine of forced worship have always been the saints of God. It places them at the mercy of any error which clerical authority may commit, and it invites the political government to impose its ideas in a realm in which it is absolutely unfit to do so. One key theme of Williams was what he called "soul liberty" by which he meant that the church would simply be a voluntary corporation within a secularized state, and that all churches, true and false, are to have the same liberty. It was one of the most astounding and revolutionary concepts ever presented up to that time.
For many years Williams was misunderstood. Now more scholars are beginning to appreciate him. Some previously considered his doctrine of soul liberty to be primarily a political doctrine, but now it is generally understood as a religious belief which has roots in Williams' strong conviction of the sovereignty and grace of God. His emphasis on the church as the New Israel—as distinct from the ancient Israel which was a national church—is necessary to interpret properly the attitude regarding the relation of the church and state. For Williams the ancient alliance between church and state is no longer binding for "...the Lord Jesus has abolished the national state and instituted and appointed his worshipers and followers to be the Israel of God, the holy nation and proper antitype of the former Israel.... "
Many cannot understand why Williams regarded the churches of his day as apostate. The reason is that he traced the origin of the apostasy of the church to the alliance effected between church and state in the fourth century. Williams regarded the unholy alliance of church and state as the greatest disaster which had ever befallen the Body of Christ.
In New England, as in old England and all states with an established church, all citizens were required to pay a tax for the support of the established church, regardless of whether they were members of that faith or of another faith or of no faith. To Roger Williams and the Baptists and other separatists and dissenters, this taxation was unjust.
Williams held that since scripture and history show that "the first Churches of Jesus Christ ... were gathered and governed without the aid, assistance, or countenance of any Civil Authority," certainly the churches of later generations could and should be supported by their members and not by non-members or the state.
At the same time when Williams and others were protesting in the colonies against taxation for religious purposes, the Levellers (supported by Baptists and other separatists) made a strong protest to the British Parliament (March, 1647). They demanded that forced giving to established churches be stopped and that all ministers be paid only by those who voluntarily choose them, and contract with them for their labors.
To Williams the orderly administration of government and the maintenance of peace were most important. He wrote:
Government and order in families, towns, etc., is the ordinance of the Most High—for the peace and good of mankind. Mankind cannot keep together without some government. Till matters come to a settled government, no man is ordinarily sure of his house, good, lands, cattle, wife, children, or life. Hence is that ancient maxim, "It is better to live under a tyrant in peace, than under the sword, or where every man is a tyrant."
When Williams started his small new society in Rhode Island, based upon liberty of conscience, separation of church and state, and universal democratic suffrage, many thought it would not last. But it did last and eventually overcame the establishments in the other colonies and spread the influence of its laws and principles throughout a large part of the globe. Williams was not the first to discover the principles of religious liberty. Many others in his generation and before it had held the same principles. But he was the first to proclaim these great principles in all their full implications and to found and build upon them a political and social community with these principles as the basis of its constitution and charter.
Isaac Backus
There were many who followed in the tradition of Roger Williams but the "most active and effective Baptist follower of Williams in the struggle for religious freedom and separation of church and state was the pastor Isaac Backus." Formerly a Congregationalist, then a Separatist, in 1756, at age 19, Backus and others joined together in forming the First Baptist Church of Middleborough, Massachusetts. He continued to serve as pastor of this church for fifty years until his death in 1806. After becoming a Baptist he was soon accepted and recognized as an outstanding leader among them. He, along with James Manning, the first president of Rhode Island College (Brown University), and his brother-in-law, John Gano, a New York City pastor and later chaplain during the war, were chiefly instrumental in the formation of the Warren Association at Warren, Rhode Island. One of the chief purposes of this association was to strengthen their fight for religious liberty. Later Backus was engaged by the Warren Association as its agent to promote the cause of religious freedom. He was the author of numerous pamphlets, including nine written in the interest of liberty of conscience and separation of church and state. Seven of these were written within the ten-year period 1770-1780.
Several petitions written by Backus or under his direction in behalf of the Baptists and religious liberty are important documents in the evolution of the American way of government and life. They are important because the arguments are not based on practical grounds, but on the ideological ground of the state's incapacity to intermeddle in matters of religion. This concept had been expressed by Roger Williams in less explicit from, and it was to be later stated even more clearly by Jefferson and Madison.
Isaac Backus is a good example of the way in which Baptists benefited from the Great Awakening in New England. However, the movement eventually broke with formal church religion. The Awakening resisted coercion by the established churches. Hundreds and thousands of people left the Congregational Church and became Baptists.
The separation in Backus' home church took place in 1744 when the pastor openly declared that the church would admit communicants without an inward change or personal regeneration. When the church majority voted to adopt this policy a considerable number withdrew. Isaac Backus and his mother were among those who withdrew. Those who separated from the Congregational churches became dissenters, and they were persecuted even more than the Baptists and Quakers were. Many of the dissenters moved into the Baptist ranks beginning about 1750 and continuing for at least twenty years. By 1768 there were 78 Baptist churches in New England. Of course, much of the growth of Baptists during this period was largely the result of the evangelistic and missionary work of the leaders.
In addition to drawing men like Isaac Backus into the Baptist movement, the Great Awakening also hastened the separation of church and state. The emphasis on the individual Christian and his inner religious experience tended to support the concept of religious liberty. The converts were often scorned by the established Anglican and Congregationalist churches, and this directed them into the dissenting groups which opposed the establishment of religion and advocated the separation of church and state.
According to one author, the Great Awakening revived the same outlook among many people in the eighteenth century which had produced views of democracy and church-state separation in the 1640's:
The evangelical doctrines ... produced a democratic feeling, developed a degree of self-respect, and inculcated ideas of self-government.... The Great Awakening gave rise to popular forms of church government and thus accustomed people to self-government in their religious habits. The alliance of Church and State, the identification of religious with civil institutions, was found to be detrimental to the cause of religion.
The Great Awakening certainly revived the same concerns among Baptists of the eighteenth century which had occupied them and Roger Williams and other dissenters and separatists in the early seventeenth century. Almost all of the converts of the Great Awakening became ardent advocates of the separation of church and state.
The long ministry and work of Backus covered the Revolutionary War period and extended into the first part of the nineteenth century. Now the study moves on to a survey of Baptists in the Middle Colonies during the colonial period.
Baptists in the Middle Colonies
Although Baptists in the middle colonies were not persecuted as were their fellow Baptists in Virginia and New England, they readily identified with them on issues involving religious liberty. There was far greater tolerance in the middle colonies. The incidents of intolerance against Baptists were largely confined to New Amsterdam, and these practically ceased when complaints reached the Dutch West India Company's headquarters in Holland. This problem was solved when New Amsterdam surrendered to the English in 1664. The disestablishment of the Dutch Reformed Church, however, did not result in the separation of church and state. In New York there was the interesting situation in which freedom of worship was allowed, but at the same time the state exercised jurisdiction over all the churches. This has been called "multiple establishment." There Baptists joined others in protesting this interference by the state in ecclesiastical affairs.
Since Pennsylvania and New Jersey offered religious liberty, the Baptist churches in that area became the most influential of all Baptist churches in the colonies. The Quaker policy of religious toleration in Pennsylvania, and the absence of a state church there or in New Jersey, provided a favorable atmosphere for Baptist growth in the middle colonies.
The persons who formed the earliest Baptist churches in the middle colonies were Baptists before they emigrated to the New World, and most of them were English. Several of the small Baptist congregations began to have joint meetings as early as 1688. The purpose of these general meetings was to deal with the questions which arose from time to time, usually regarding the administration of baptism, ordination of ministers, and sharing of fellowship and inspirational preaching. On July 27, 1707, the nature of these annual meetings became fixed and a decision was made by five small Baptist churches to organize the Philadelphia Baptist Association as "an association of messengers authorized by their respective churches to mediate and execute designs of public good."
The Philadelphia Association was loose in structure and without authority or power to exercise any jurisdiction over the churches composing it. It was considered merely as an advisory council, but it was looked to for decision and guidance in certain matters.
To provide a basis for doctrinal agreement, the Philadelphia Association in 1742 adopted as its statement of faith practically the same statement which Particular Baptists of London had adopted in 1689. This influential statement of faith strongly advocated religious liberty on scriptural grounds.
In 1757 the Philadelphia Baptist Association had a membership of twenty-five small, struggling, widely-separated churches located in Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Virginia, and Maryland. The association provided a pattern of democratic polity, guidance, and unity, which was very influential and welcomed in the liberty-loving colonies.
Baptists in the middle colonies during the colonial period produced some great leaders, but they were not known for their work in religious liberty, the chaplaincy, or related issues. There were no great pioneers in religious liberty such as Roger Williams or Isaac Backus. Since religious liberty was not a burning issue with them, their leaders could concentrate on the areas of evangelism, missions, and building the denomination.
Baptists in the Southern Colonies
Baptists found in the southern colonies their most fertile and successful field for evangelization of the great masses of unchurched population. In Virginia alone the number of Baptist churches grew from six to 205 in the thirty-four years from 1754 to 1788. Many churches were founded in Kentucky and the Corolinas during the same period.
Prior to the time of the Great Awakening most of the Baptists were located in the North. Only a few scattered congregations were in Virginia and the Carolinas. Baptist growth throughout the colonies prior to the outbreak of the great revival was slow and difficult. Not until the Great Awakening did Baptists become strong enough to make much of an influence on the spiritual vacuum and fluid political situation of religious freedom and church-state relations.
Unlike some of the other colonies, Virginia was not settled by religious refugees who came to the New World because they had been persecuted by an established church. From the beginning Virginia was a colony with a charter which provided for the legal establishment of the Church of England. Church buildings were constructed from public tax funds, and ministers' salaries were paid from the same. Fines were imposed for not attending church services, and the payment of tithes was compulsory.
For almost 150 years the Church of England was practically unchallenged in any significant way in Virginia. Besides the few Baptist churches, a few Presbyterian churches were in existence. As early as 1758 the Baptists and Presbyterians joined forces in the common cause of religious liberty and sent joint petitions to the Virginia General Assembly requesting that the Established Church be abolished and that dissenting clergymen be allowed to preach freely and perform marriages.
In Virginia the reason for the persecution of the Baptists was that they refused to obey the Act of Toleration which required dissenting ministers to secure a license to preach in various localities. They did not feel that one who had received a divine call from God to preach should be required to secure a license from men. They believed that this constituted an unwarranted intrusion of the state into the affairs and functions of the church and thus violated the separation of church and state.
There were sharp differences between the Baptists and the Anglican clergy. The latter were almost unanimously Tory in sympathy, and the Baptists were ardent patriots of the revolutionary cause of the colonies. In fact, Baptist support of the patriot cause in the American Revolution was seen by them as support for the combined cause of civil and religious liberty.
Baptists in the Revolutionary Period
Baptists sensed in the environment of the Revolutionary Period a situation that promised hope in the achievement of some of their goals for religious liberty and separation of church and state. They realized that thoughtful persons could easily see the inconsistency between the practices of religious discrimination and the natural-rights doctrines of liberty which were being so loudly proclaimed at that time. They felt that this was a strategic opportunity to obtain concessions that had been long denied in the colonies.
Isaac Backus
Reference was made above to Isaac Backus, one of the organizers of the Warren Association in Rhode Island. In 1772 that association appointed a special Committee on Grievances for the purpose of pressing the Baptist case for full religious liberty. Backus held the position as agent for the association and committee with distinction for the next ten years.
A law was passed by the General Court of Massachusetts in 1772 which provided that Baptists might be exempt from paying the church tax if they furnished the authorities certificates indicating their good standing as Baptists. This did not satisfy the Baptists, for they felt that obedience to the law implied a recognition of the government's right to determine the religious standing of its citizens. Backus was arrested for refusal to pay the precinct tax in support of the religious establishment. He presented a memorial against the tax in which he stated:
The free exercise of private judgment, and the unalienable rights of conscience, are of too high a rank and dignity to be submitted to the decrees of councils, or the imperfect laws of fallible legislators... Religion is a concern between God and the soul with which no human authority can intermeddle.
Backus urged Samuel Adams to adopt a consistent policy of separation of church and state, pointing out that British taxation of American Colonies was no more unjust than Massachusetts' taxation of Baptists for support of a state church. His letter to Adams deserves to be quoted:
I fully concur with your grand maxim, that it is essential to liberty that representation and taxation go together. Well, then, since people do not vote for representatives in our legislature from ecclesiastical qualifications, but only, by virtue of those which are of a civil and worldly nature, how can representatives thus chosen have any right to impose ecclesiastical taxes? Taxes laid by the British Parliament upon America are not more contrary to civil freedom, than these taxes are to the very nature of liberty of conscience, which is an essential article in our character.
Later, commenting on the provision in the Federal Constitution against any religious test, Backus said:
Nothing is more evident, both in reason and the Holy Scriptures, than that religion is ever a matter between God and individuals, and therefore no man or men can impose any religious test without invading the essential prerogatives of the Lord Jesus.
Not since the time of Roger Williams had the position of separation of church and state been so clearly and unequivocally set forth.
An event took place in September 1774 which vividly illustrates the diligent work of Baptists in the effort for religious liberty. The Continental Congress was meeting in Philadelphia. The Warren Association decided to take advantage of this significant meeting and requested Isaac Backus to go to Philadelphia to present their claims for religious liberty to the members of the Continental Congress. When Backus arrived in Philadelphia he met with the Philadelphia Association which was then in session. It appointed a large committee to help him in his task. Through their joint efforts, a conference was arranged for the evening of October 14 with the delegates of Massachusetts to the Congress and some delegates from New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The purpose of this preliminary meeting was to secure an opportunity to present the Baptist grievances before the entire Continental Congress.
President Manning of Rhode Island College read the memorial prepared and sent by the Warren Association. Backus explained the matter of conscience, for he could not comply with the official laws on religion without acknowledging "that power in man which ... belongs only to God." But the memorial was not received with much sympathy by the delegates present. The four-hour conference ended with only a promise on the part of the Massachusetts delegates that they would do what they could for the relief of the Baptists. This was the memorable occasion when John Adams gave them a warning that they might as well expect a change in the solar system as to expect Massachusetts to give up her establishment.
It is important, especially in our day, to note that Backus defended resistance to laws that violate the Christian's conscience. Such disobedience was in harmony with the colonists of the Revolutionary Period to whom resistance became a sacred duty. They were all supported by John Locke who justified disobedience of the magistrate in the case of conscience. He believed that dissenting Christians not only had the right to protest against the laws of the religious establishment, but it was also their duty to do so.
The Revolutionary War raised serious questions for some Christians about the part they should have in war. Backus spoke about this subject, and we may assume that his position rightly reflects a large number, or an overwhelming majority, of Baptists of that time. When writing of the increased oppression of Great Britain, he says: "No way appeared to avoid abject slavery, but an appeal to Heaven, and to repel force with force." He dealt as follows with some questions which perplexed "many serious minds":
1. What warrant can subjects have to resist their rulers? Answer: Rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil; and such ought never to be resisted: but when men in a foreign country presume to violate solemn contracts, and assume the power to force away our money, and to give it to officers who were intirely dependent upon them for their places and support, how could such answer this character which the word of truth gives of rulers, any more than blind men could, of safe guides?...
2. What have Christians to do with the sword, which Christ has excluded from his Kingdom? Matt. 26:52; John 18:36. Answer: He indeed excluded it from having any place in the government and support of his church;… and Christians must belong to civil states as long as they are in the world. Matt. 13:30,38; I Cor. 5:10-13. And they are required to be subject to the ordinances thereof for the Lord's sake. Rom. 13:1-10; I Pet. 2:13-14. In these passages a bearing and fighting with the sword is expressly said to belong to earthly kingdoms; and does not a being subject thereto imply activity in a defensive war?… The use of the magistrate's sword is, not to compel men to be religious, which is out of their power, but to defend all against such as would work ill to their neighbours.
While Backus defended the right of the Christian citizen to participate in war, and along with his fellow Baptists supported the Revolution, yet in the midst of the War he contended that no man ought to be compelled to bear arms who was a conscientious objector. Moreover, Backus never defended The Christian's participation in offensive warfare, but only in defensive warfare. He considered true religion as "directly against all offensive war." On the other hand, he says, "The people have a right to bear arms for the defense of themselves and the State." He did not support having a standing army in times of peace. In the same discussion he also said, "The military should be kept under strict subordination to, and governed by, civil power." He recognized the evil effects of war and looked forward to a time in the future when wars would cease. He felt that the complete separation of state and church would hasten the coming of liberty and peace.
Although Backus believed in the separation of church and state, he apparently did not believe in such strict separation as Roger Williams held. The latter had expressed the view that the state stands so completely on its own legs that the church is unnecessary to it. Backus wrote of the "sweet harmony" which should prevail between church and state. This harmonious relationship should defend and vindicate civil freedom for the sake of pure religion and expect the state to maintain conditions congenial to pure religion. This need not be by active cooperation but rather by keeping hands off the church and religion and urging others to do the same. He subscribed to the view that religion "keeps alive the best sense of moral obligation … and hence it is of special importance in a free government … being always friendly to the sacred rights of conscience." He was aware of the importance of religion and of its utility to human society. He would agree that whatever health persists in the republic may be attributed to the love of God penetrating its citizens and institutions: but "the state cannot lay hands on religion without despoiling it."
John Leland
One of the most effective leaders in the cause of religious freedom during the revolutionary and constitutional period was John Leland. He had been brought up as a Congregationalist but became a Baptist. He worked in Virginia and Massachusetts in behalf of complete religious liberty. He was a powerful preacher, missionary, evangelist, and pastor, but he considered his work to vindicate the civil and religious rights of all men to be of equal importance with his ministry to promote piety.
After going to Virginia in 1775 Leland frequently appeared before the Virginia Assembly as a Baptist spokesman in behalf of religious freedom. He was chairman of the general committee of the Baptists of the state, which took such an active part in the Virginia struggle against an established church. He was especially instrumental in the repeal of the Incorporation Act and in working to have some of the church's lands returned to the state.
Later, after the Constitution of the United States had been drafted, he was greatly disappointed because it contained no clear guarantee of the religious freedom desired. Public opinion in the state was divided between two major groups: one led by Patrick Henry, opposing Virginia's ratification of it on the ground of its lack of a bill of rights; and the other led by James Madison, who believed it best to get the Federal government under way by ratifying the Constitution as it stood, and then to secure an amendment containing a satisfactory bill of rights. Leland was the candidate of the former group from his county for the convention called to ratify the Constitution; Madison was the candidate of the other group. During the controversy preceding the state convention they agreed to meet in discussion or debate. The arguments of Madison based on the expediency of ratifying the Constitution as drafted were so cogent that, after hearing them and securing Madison's pledge that if it were ratified he would work earnestly for an amendment containing the desired guarantee of religious freedom and of other rights, Leland withdrew as a candidate, and the Baptist votes of the county went to Madison. This meant Madison's election, and virtually assured the ratification of the Constitution by the powerful state of Virginia.
In 1791 Leland returned to Massachusetts, making his home in Cheshire where he lived most of the remaining years of his life (to 1841). In 1791 he also wrote a tract entitled Rights of Conscience and therefore Religious Opinions not Cognizable by Law, in which he stated the "Government has no more to do with the religious opinions of men than it has with the principles of mathematics."
His second great contribution was in helping to secure the overthrow of the established church in Connecticut and Massachusetts, and the guarantee of complete religious freedom in these states. In 1820 in his Short Essays on Government, he proposed an amendment to the Constitution of Massachusetts to separate church and state. Leland was one of the foremost early advocates in the United States of complete religious freedom. He had contempt for mere toleration.
Government should protect every man in thinking and speaking freely, and see that one does not abuse another. The liberty I contend for is more than toleration. The very idea of toleration is despicable; it supposes that some have a pre-eminence above the rest to grant indulgence; whereas all should be equally free, Jew, Turks, Pagans, and Christians. Test Oaths and established creeds should be avoided as the worst of evils.
Virginia Baptists
Baptists played such an important part in the struggle for religious liberty in Virginia, and the victory of this cause in Virginia was so important to the entire United States during this revolutionary and constitutional period, that it is difficult to overemphasize this single contribution.
In 1772 the Baptists of Virginia began their long series of memorials to the Assembly for "Liberty of Conscience." They declined to accept any act of mere toleration. They wanted absolute freedom in religious and church matters. In 1775 representatives of the Baptist General Association appeared before the Provincial Convention and secured some minor concessions for the release of their persecuted brethren. This same year the association also began to circulate petitions to the General Assembly for the abolition of the church establishment and the protection of all religious societies in the peaceable enjoyment of their own religious principles and modes of worship.
In August, 1775, the association adopted an address to the Colonial Convention of that year, which was merely the House of Burgesses acting under a new name during the Revolutionary period, in which it expressed an earnest desire that its ministers should be given "the liberty of preaching to the troops at convenient times, without molestation or abuse." The Richmond Convention granted their request and decided to allow dissenting chaplains to minister in the army. This simple request proved an opening wedge for the full religious freedom which the Baptists were to secure before the end of the century. Hawkes in his History of the Protestant Episcopal Church of Virginia states that he believes this to have been the first step made toward placing the clergy of all denominations upon an equal footing in the state.
The convention of 1776, which adopted the Declaration of Rights, received only one petition from any religious body. That was from the Baptists, who saw a good opportunity to advance their favorite cause. Their memorial outlined many proposals on which the state was to act favorably in the course of the next few years.
When the first republican legislature of Virginia to be elected after the Declaration of Independence met at Williamsburg on October 7, 1776, it had presented to it many petitions on the subject of religious freedom. Nine of these were against the establishment, most of which were from the Baptists; one was from the Lutherans, and one from the Hanover Presbytery.
At this time there was much agitation in the state regarding a general assessment for the support of the ministers of religion. It was understood that if this were adopted each individual might have the right to determine the church or minister to which his assessment should be paid. This the Baptists also opposed as a denial of full religious freedom and of separation of church and state functions. In their words "religion was a thing apart from the concerns of the states."
The time was not yet ripe for the major issues of complete religious freedom and true separation of church and state along with disestablishment of religion to be decided by the 1776 Assembly. It did, however, repeal certain laws restraining some religious freedoms, and exempted dissenters from the required support of the still existing Episcopal establishment.
In 1780 the Baptists presented a petition which stated plainly that their ultimate goal was complete religious freedom. As steps toward that goal they requested the repeal of the Vestry Law and the authorization for their ministers to perform marriages. In December of 1780 the Assembly made it lawful for any minister of a Christian society to perform marriages, and judges were authorized to issue licenses to four ministers of each denomination in a county to perform the marriage ceremony within the bounds of that county alone.
Chaplain John Gano
A good insight into the early Baptist stance toward the chaplaincy can be furnished by the examples of two Revolutionary War chaplains. John Gano was a noted Baptist missionary, pastor, and chaplain during the revolutionary period whose life sheds light on the Baptist position on the military chaplaincy. In his Memoirs he tells of preaching to a large crowd of men and women gathered for a general muster for the local North Carolina county where he was traveling. The colonel had given his permission, and Gano mounted a stage erected in the woods for him and preached on "Paul's Christian Armour." After the service he told the commander that, although he professed loyalty to King George and did not wish to infringe upon the laudable design of the day, yet, he thought the King of Kings ought to be served first; and he presumed that what he had said did not tend to make the men worse soldiers but better Christians.
After his marriage he returned to Morristown, New Jersey, near a small Baptist church where he had formerly preached. There he purchased a small farm and assisted the local church. Here he first contacted a young man named Hezekiah Smith who later became a fine Baptist chaplain and leader. During the War with the Cherokee Indians Gano held a Captain's commission from the governor, but he was not called for service, and he resigned his commission. In 1760 he went to Philadelphia for a time and then moved to New York in 1762 and became pastor of the First Baptist Church where he remained for the next twenty-six years, except for eight years of service as a chaplain during the revolution.
Gano joined with his brother-in-law, President Manning of Rhode Island College, and with Isaac Backus, to organize the Warren Baptist Association at Warren, Rhode Island in 1767. One of the chief purposes of the founding of this association was to strengthen the fight for religious liberty. This action of Chaplain Gano indicates his great concern with religious liberty.
As the war approached Gano turned from his earlier professed loyalty to King George and took sides with the fighters for freedom and independence. He was invited to become Regimental Chaplain of the command of Colonel Charles Webb. At first he declined. Then he was invited to come to the regiment, located just outside New York City, and preach one sermon each Sunday and make pastoral visits every morning. He accepted this latter invitation and served the regiment as a civilian pastor for a time. His church members were leaving the city as the enemy advanced from the Narrows and Staten Island up the North River and East River, landed their troops and took possession of the city. Gano's family moved into a friend's house in Connecticut. He himself eventually had to leave his home and household furniture, and he joined the American military camp. From this time on he thought of himself as a military chaplain and served the American army as one of their chaplains, although he did not get a commission until some time later.
Once while at White Plains during a battle with the enemy Gano somehow found himself out in front of the regiment, although he knew his proper place was at the aid station with the wounded and the surgeons. He dared not leave the front hastily for fear of being charged with cowardice and being a bad example to the young officers and other men. So he remained there at the front and exposed himself to great danger and inspired the other soldiers to courageous fighting.
Gano explained that the American troops consisted mainly of the state militia and of men who had enlisted for one year. Often the term of enlistment expired just at the critical time when they were most needed. The enlistment of the unit with which Gano was serving expired soon after Washington crossed the Delaware to Trenton. General Washington requested them to serve six weeks longer, explaining that by then he expected reinforcement with an army raised either for three years or for the duration of the war. At that time Gano said their affairs were conducted principally by the State Congresses. When the six weeks were expired, and Gano and the rest of the men with whom he served were about to return home, the colonel and officers of the regiment asked him if he would join them if they could raise another body of men for the regiment. He decided that he would, but on his return home he found a letter from a Colonel Dubosque who was stationed at Fort Montgomery on the bank of the North River. He went to Fort Montgomery to decline their invitation, but Dubosque and General James Clinton strongly urged him to accept the office of chaplain, and he finally consented.
Up until this time Gano was serving in a sort of unofficial capacity as chaplain to a group of minutemen in the state militia, but from this time on he served as a military chaplain appointed such by General Clinton and soon after commissioned by the Continental Congress. General Clinton's brigade consisted of two regiments from New York, one from New England, and one from New Jersey. Gano was the only chaplain for the entire brigade. Sometimes other units nearby requested him to come and preach for them. In those days soldiers were required to attend services whenever they could, and unexcused and repeated absences were punished by such details as digging up stumps! The hearers enjoyed sermons containing political material, and if the chaplain did not bring enough politics into his sermon they would politely request him to do so. Gano wrote in his Memoirs, "They ... wished I would dwell a little more on politics than I commonly did."
After brief furloughs with his family, Gano kept returning to the army where he served devotedly and effectively. Toward the end of the war his brigade camped at Newbury and erected some huts and a temporary chapel for public worship on Sundays. They had three services a day, with one chaplain from each brigade preaching in rotation. They continued there for the last winter amidst reports that the British were negotiating a peace with messages going back and forth from the British General at New York and General Washington. As spring came the British evacuated New York, and General Washington entered the city with his American army which was soon after disbanded. Gano and the rest of the men returned to their battered and plundered houses.
Gano rebuilt his house, refurnished it, and started regathering his little flock into the church. During the war his original two hundred members had scattered and dwindled to thirty-seven. Their church had been used by the British cavalry as a stable. Most of those who were left alive returned to the city from the farms in the surrounding areas, and they soon had a large congregation including many new converts. It took two years to bring the membership back to its former size.
There is an unsubstantiated claim that John Gano baptized George Washington by immersion, but the evidence for this is rather meager. Gano did not mention this in his memoirs, and Washington never mentioned it. The only basis for such a claim is that one or more of Gano's relatives or descendants said that Gano told one of them that he did baptize Washington. An artist has painted a scene depicting how he (the artist) imagined the event might have appeared, and this painting hangs in the offices of the Chaplains Division of the Home Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention in Atlanta, Georgia.
Chaplain Hezekiah Smith
The second Baptist chaplain of the Revolutionary War period who deserves our specific attention is Chaplain Hezekiah Smith, who was for thirty-nine years pastor of the Baptist church in Haverhill, Massachusetts. During part of that time he was a chaplain in the American Army. A study of his life is pertinent here for two reasons. First, he was deeply involved in the religious liberty issue. Second, his career as a chaplain provides several interesting points of illumination on the early experience of Baptists in the military chaplaincy.
In 1767 Smith participated in the organization of the Warren Association at Warren, Rhode Island. He provided valuable leadership to New England Baptists in many ways. As soon as the Warren Association was organized it formed a "Baptist Committee of Grievances" to present petitions regarding religious liberty to the Massachusetts authorities. Hezekiah Smith was an active spokesman on this committee. Part of one of their petitions presented to the "General Court," the Council, and the Lieutenant Governor, regarding religious oppression is found at Appendix C.
One central point of the petition's argument was that some of the civil laws of the Province were "ecclesiastical in their nature." They rightly and clearly discerned that here was an impermissable intermingling of functions of church and state which could cause nothing but trouble. They felt that functions of an ecclesiastical nature should be kept quite separate from functions of a civil nature.
When hostilities between the British Government and the Colonies broke out in 1775 the battles of Lexington and Concord fired patriotic hearts. Colonists everywhere rushed to pledge their support in defense of the common cause. The Baptists had always been the friends of civil and religious freedom, and they were almost unanimous in their support of the revolution. Thus Hezekiah Smith, along with his brethren, entered the contest with patriotic zeal and determination. Reuben A. Guild writes:
He became the intimate friend of Washington, and he possessed the confidence and esteem of the officers and men of the whole army. He was in some of the most important battles of the war, and he repeatedly exposed his life, trusting implicitly in the God of battles, and believing, to use his frequent favorite expression, that "every bullet had a commission." He was among the foremost in encouraging the soldiers, and in soothing the sorrows of the wounded and the dying. His military and personal record, which consists of letters, diaries, addresses, and documents covers nearly the entire period of the war. In the enthusiastic assembling of the army at Cambridge, and upon the smoking heights of Bunker Hill, he was present, not merely as the servant of God and the pastor of some who were with him, but as a patriot and a citizen, haranguing the men, and leading them into conflict.
Smith had entered the army within a few days after the battle of Lexington at the request of a Colonel Nixon, and the Haverhill church had voted that their pastor comply with the request and supply as chaplain "the quarter part of the time for the future in his regiments." There were many residents from Haverhill in this state militia regiment. As it worked out Smith supplied as chaplain about half of the time rather than a quarter of the time. He actually served in several rotated tours of duty as a chaplain while alternating in periods as pastor of his church. It is a most interesting arrangement. One wonders how many others served the same way.
Guild says that Smith's first tour as chaplain was from April 19, 1776, to December 17, 1776—a period of eight months. Then he went home to Haverhill for a six months furlough and served his church as pastor. He returned for his second army tour as chaplain from June 17, 1777 to December 13, 1777—a six months tour this time. Then he was given a four months furlough "to return home to visit his family." He was actively engaged in the performance of his duties as pastor of his church until April 28, 1778, when he left home and set out for his third tour of duty as chaplain. This tour lasted six months, or until November 10, 1778. He arrived home on November 18th and was home this time for six months on furlough. At this time his church membership numbered 160, which was the largest in the Warren Association, and Guild tells us that even under these circumstances of their pastor going and coming to and from the army it continued prosperous. A revival broke out in 1778 and added fifty-four members in three years to a total of 190.
His fourth tour of duty as a chaplain lasted seven months—from May 1, 1779, to December 2, 1779, when he went home to Haverhill for a six months furlough to resume his pastorate. On May 28, 1780, Smith started out for his last tour of duty as an army chaplain. He returned in late October of the same year. His church had voted in April to request him to return from the army to his church as soon as he could. The church was large and growing and needed him. By this time he and others could foresee the victorious end of the war in the near future. He had served his country well for over five years during the most difficult time; so he felt free to resign his commission as chaplain and return full time to his church.
A copy of the text of Chaplain Smith's commission from the Continental Congress as an army chaplain throws light on the place of a chaplain within the military structure:
The delegates of the United States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts-Bay, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New-York, New-Jersey, Pennsylvania, the Counties of New-Castle, Kent and Sussex of Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North-Carolina, South-Carolina, and Georgia, to Hezekiah Smith, Gentleman, Greeting:
We, reposing especial trust and confidence in your patriotism, valor, conduct, and fidelity, do by these presents, constitute and appoint you to be Chaplain of a Battalion, whereof John Nixon, Esq., is Colonel, in the Army of the United States, raised for the defence of American liberty, and for repelling every hostile invasion thereof. You are therefore carefully and diligently to discharge the duty of a Chaplain, by doing and performing all manner of things hereunto belonging. And we do strictly charge and require all officers and soldiers under your command, to be obedient to your orders as their Chaplain. And you are to observe and follow such orders and directions from time to time, as you shall receive from this or a future Congress of the United States, or Committee of Congress, for that purpose appointed, or Commander in Chief of the Army of the United States, or any other your superior officer, according to the rules and discipline of war, in pursuance of the trust reposed in you. This commission to continue in force until revoked by this or a future Congress. Dated at Boston, January 1, 1777.
The above commission was given by order of the Congress, attested by Charles Thomson, Secretary, and signed by John Hancock, President.
In 1777 Congress passed a resolution appointing Brigade Chaplains. Chaplain Smith served as a Brigade or Brigadier Chaplain. In one listing of Brigadier Chaplains in 1778 a total of six Baptists, or one-third of the total number of chaplains, appeared. This is remarkable considering the small number of Baptists in relation to the other denominations of the country at that time. Thus it is evident that Baptists have always strongly supported the military chaplaincy. It must be remembered, however, that during this revolutionary period chaplains were not commissioned officers with military rank as is the case today. Most of them served under contracts for periods of six or twelve months.
Baptists in the Early National Period
After the Revolutionary War Baptists continued to press their campaign for full religious freedom. This effort was particularly strong in Virginia.
In the spring of 1783 a Baptist petition for full equality said:
We do not ask this, Gentlemen, as a favour which you have a privilege either to grant or withhold at pleasure, but as what we have a just claim to as freemen of the Commonwealth, and we trust it is your glory to consider yourselves not as the masters but servants of the people, whom you have the honour to represent, and that you will not fail in any instance, to recognize the natural rights of all your constituents.
Throughout these years from the end of the Revolutionary War into the beginning of the next century Baptists consistently pressed for disestablishment of the remaining state churches and resisted every effort to permit government to sponsor any religion or collect any tax assessment for any church. As usual, the Baptists were most vocal and active in opposing laws that would require tax revenue support for religious purposes and in urging that every person ought to be left entirely free in respect to matters of religion.
The Presbyterians temporarily faltered, but soon returned to their former position of opposition expressed by the Hanover Presbytery. Jefferson's Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments followed precisely the Baptist and Presbyterian position of the government's lack of jurisdiction over matters of religion. This resulted in the speedy defeat of the Assessment Bill and the passage of Jefferson's Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom.
In 1783 the General Committee of the Baptists was established to consider all the political grievances of the whole Baptist Society in Virginia. This was a joint committee made up of the various groups of Regular Baptists, Separate Baptists, General Baptists, and New Light Baptists.
In 1785 the committee voted to ask the General Assembly of Virginia to repeal the marriage laws and the vestry laws, both of which favored the Episcopalians, and to give up the proposal for a general assessment for the support of ministers, The Baptists objected to these laws and the proposed assessment on the ground that they were contrary to their principles of separation of church and state. This was their position:
Resolved … that the holy Author of our religion needs no such compulsive measures for the promotion of his cause; that the gospel wants not the feeble arm of man for its support; that it has made, and will again, through divine power make its way against all opposition; and that should the Legislature assume the right of taxing the people for the support of the gospel, it will be destructive to religious liberty.
One of the Baptist appeals of 1786 expresses so clearly their conviction as to the vital importance of having church and state separated, that it deserves to be quoted:
New Testament Churches, we humbly conceive, are, or should be established by the Legislature of Heaven, and not earthly power; by the Law of God and not the Law of the State; by the acts of the Apostles, and not by the Acts of an Assembly. The Incorporating Act then, in the first place appears to cast great contempt upon the divine Author of our Religion, whose Kingdom is not of this world, and Secondly, to give all the property of the State established church to one Society, not more virtuous, nor deserving than other Societies in the Commonwealth, appears contrary to justice, and the express words of Article IV of the Bill of Rights, which prohibits rewards or emoluments to any Man, or set of men, except for services rendered the State; and what services that Church has rendered the state, either by her clergy or laity, more than other churches have done, we know not.
If truth is great, and will prevail if left to itself (as declared in the Act Establishing Religious Freedom) we wish it may be so left, which is the only way to convince the gazing world, that disciples do not follow Christ for loaves, and that preachers do not preach for benefices.
Although Baptists had one representative at the Second Continental Congress, which adopted the Declaration of Independence in 1776, they were unrepresented at the Constitutional Convention in 1787. They, therefore, sent Isaac Backus to Philadelphia to request, on behalf of the Baptists, a guarantee of religious freedom in the Constitution. The only item that was actually included in the Constitution concerning religion was a clause in Article VI prohibiting the requirement of any religious "test" for office-holding. This did not satisfy most Baptists, who generally opposed the Constitution on the ground that it did not specifically guarantee religious liberty. After the Constitution was ratified Baptists joined with political liberals in a campaign for an amendment specifically safeguarding religious freedom and preventing the establishment of a national church. The contribution of the Virginia Baptists toward this goal has been previously discussed in this study.
In 1788 the General Committee was vitally concerned with the Federal Constitution which was adopted the previous year. The members of the committee unanimously felt that it did not provide adequately for religious liberty. They were, therefore, very active in securing in the first amendment or Bill of Rights that liberty of conscience, dearer to them than property or life, which they feared was not sufficiently secured in the Constitution itself.
It has been noted that Baptists throughout the new nation staunchly supported Madison and Jefferson in their strict adherence to the separationist principle in church-state relations. It was a group of Baptists from the Danbury Association in Connecticut who occasioned Jefferson's well-known metaphor of the "wall of separation between church and state." A committee of the Danbury Association wrote a letter late in 1801 to Jefferson in which they condemned any alliance of church and state as unconstitutional. Jefferson's letter of reply to the Danbury Baptist Association was reviewed and approved from a legal standpoint by his Attorney General. This is what he wrote under the date of January 1, 1802, deliberately and for the first time, as far as is known, using the metaphor of the "wall of separation":
Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign 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 significance of this letter and its clear separationist principle was underlined seventy-six years later when the Supreme Court in a unanimous decision quoted Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptists. Chief Justice Waite said of Jefferson's letter, "coming as it does from an acknowledged leader of the measure, it may be accepted almost as an authoritative declaration of the scope and effect of the amendment."
In April 1809, a month after his retirement from the presidency, Thomas Jefferson said to the members of the Baptist church of Buck Mountain in Albemarle: "...We have acted together from the origin to the end of a memorable Revolution, and we have contributed, each in the line alloted us, our endeavors to render its issue a permanent blessing to our country."
Indeed, the Baptist contribution to the triumph of the American principle of separation of church and state had been much and great. From Roger Williams, John Clarke, and the little band of Baptists in Rhode Island, it had been a long and difficult road. But by the 1790's no politician could be popular without including the cause of religious freedom in his platform and campaign. This fact supplies striking evidence of the triumph and popularity of the religious liberty and church-state principle first espoused by a small group of despised Baptists.
Summary and Conclusions Drawn From Survey of the Historical Background
The following statements summarize some characteristic principles held by European Anabaptists. They believed in complete civil and religious freedom. They understood from the scriptures the nature of the church as a voluntary, regenerated membership, separated from the"world" and the state. They believed the state was ordained of God for the good of society, but it had no authority over spiritual matters. They rejected war, force, violence, and participation in official civil positions. Some of them held that a man could be both a magistrate and a Christian at the same time. Some even said that Christians were obligated to fight in wars on behalf of Christian rulers. There was diversity of belief almost from the beginning. Some paid taxes to the state in time of war; others considered this a compromise.
The English Baptists developed their own characteristic principles, often departing from some of the strict positions of the continental Anabaptists. These may be summarized as follows: They did not object to taking an oath in court, to participating in war, or taking official civil positions under the state. They advocated freedom of worship or religious liberty. They advocated obedience to civil authorities in "all earthly things." They denied the king's authority in "heavenly or spiritual things." They believed in the separation of church and state. They based their belief in religious liberty and separation of church and state on the scripture. They were not pacifists, but were, on the other hand, conscientious participants in just warfare, especially when they felt religious and civil liberty were endangered.
The following conclusions can be drawn from the experience of Baptists in the American Colonies: They advocated freedom of conscience and religious liberty. From the time of Roger Williams and John Clarke they clearly believed in and advocated the separation of church and state. All churches were to be voluntary corporations within a secularized state, and all were to have equal liberty. This doctrine had its roots in biblical theology of the sovereignty and grace of God. Churches were to be supported by their members and not by non-members or by the state. Ministers were to be paid only by those who voluntarily chose them and contracted with them for their services. They believed that government and order are essential for society and peace. They used denominational organization and Christian higher education to promote religious liberty and separation of church and state. They based their arguments not only on scriptural grounds but also on ideological grounds of the state's incapacity to intermeddle in matters of religion. The evangelical doctrines of individual Christian experience tended to look on the alliance of church and state as detrimental to vital religion.
Certain conclusions drawn from Baptists in the Revolutionary Period can be summarized as follows: They believed that religion is a concern between God and the soul with which no human authority can intermeddle. They advocated a consistent policy of separation of church and state. They differed regarding the degree of separation of church and state. Some advocated a harmonious relationship which should defend civil freedom, and they expected the state to maintain conditions congenial to pure religion. They resisted and disobeyed laws that violated their conscience. They joined in warfare as an alternative to "abject slavery." They justified rebellion against unjust rulers, Romans 13 notwithstanding. They said Christians are not to use the sword in support of the church, but that they are to use it (inasmuch as they belong to a civil state in this world) in a defensive war against "those who work ill." They opposed participation in offensive war. They defended the right of conscientious objection. They recognized the evil effects of war. Baptists opposed having a standing army in times of peace. They recognized the evil effects of war. They looked forward to a time in the future when wars would cease. They worked as a modern lobby with the legislature for repeal of certain laws and enactment of others. They negotiated with politicians on issues and took advantage of opportunities. They worked directly to overthrow the established church and guarantee complete religious freedom for all—Jews, Turks, Pagans, and Christians. They believed that the only way to convince the world that preachers do not preach for money and other benefits was to allow truth to prevail on its own merits rather than to be supported by the state. They asked that their ministers be allowed to preach to the troops, and they were permitted to minister as chaplains in the army.
Baptist laymen served as combat soldiers in the army, and some Baptist pastors combined the chaplaincy and pastoral ministry. Pastors frequently served nearby troops as civilian chaplains (or pastors) before being commissioned as military chaplains. They then served as regular military chaplains for periodic enlistments or for part of the time and received furloughs to return to their pastorates. Baptist chaplains were highly motivated from evangelical and patriotic impulses, and they easily justified the use of military force in defense of civil and religious liberty. Baptists from the beginning have strongly supported the military chaplaincy.