The Virginia Act For Establishing Religious Freedom
Thomas Jefferson, 1786
Well aware that Almighty God hath created the mind
free; that all attempts to influence it by temporal punishments or
burdens, 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 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 endeavoring 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 temporal rewards, which proceeding from an
approbation of their personal conduct, are an additional incitement to
earnest and unremitting labors for the instruction of mankind; that our
civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, 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 the 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 also to
corrupt the principles of that very religion it is meant to encourage,
by bribing, with a monopoly of worldly honors 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 the 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 therefore 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
burdened 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 opinions in matters of
religion, and that the same shall in nowise diminish, enlarge, or affect
their civil capacities.
- And though we well know this Assembly, elected by the people for
the ordinary purposes of legislation only, have no powers equal to
our own and that therefore to declare this act 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 will be an infringement
of natural right
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