From Jamestown to Jefferson: The Evolution of Religious Freedom in Virginia

Introduction

Less than two weeks before his death on July 4, 1826, Thomas Jefferson wrote precise instructions for the inscription to be placed on his tombstone: Here was buried Thomas Jefferson Author of the Declaration of American Independence of the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom & Father of the University of Virginia It is remarkable that of all his accomplishments, including two terms as president of the United States, these are the few for which he “wish[ed] most to be remembered.”1 Commentators have often noted that Jefferson’s epitaph is a fitting tribute to his lifelong goal of expanding political, educational, and religious liberty.2 The Declaration of Independence has become a foundational document in international law, and its language emphasizing natural rights and democratic government has served as a clarion call for change throughout the world.3 The University of Virginia, established in 1819, continues to combine a tradition of excellence with a commitment to accessibility to all. The Statute for Religious Freedom, adopted by the Virginia General Assembly on January 16, 1786, is among the most important and enduring documents produced during the Revolutionary period. Though less well-known than the Declaration of Independence , it was equally revolutionary. It influenced the development of church-state relations in other states for the next several decades, and its core principles, freedom of conscience and church-state Introduction paul rasor and richard e. bond 2 paul rasor and richard e. bond separation, created the model that would be followed by the new federal government. As Martin Marty has noted, the statute marked “an epochal shift in the Western world’s approach to relations between civil and religious spheres of life.”4 Yet for all Jefferson’s brilliance , this remarkable document did not arise in a vacuum. The statute, and more specifically the colonial Virginia context out of which it emerged, form the subject matter of this volume. Jefferson’s statute has received considerable scholarly attention over the years. Historians and legal scholars have stressed its intellectual origins, which lie mainly in a blend of Enlightenment concepts , such as religious toleration and the authority of individual human reason, and the theological commitments of the evangelical churches, including religious voluntarism and church autonomy , in its creation.5 Historians of Virginia have also emphasized the importance of the Revolutionary context for its formation and eventual passage. Evangelical groups such as the Separate Baptists and colonial legislators combined philosophical, theological, and political ideologies to challenge the longstanding public support of the established Anglican Church.6 These influences are important , but they do not tell the whole story. At a more fundamental level, Jefferson’s statute was rooted in the Virginia colonial experience , which began with the landing at Cape Henry on April 26, 1607, and the founding of the Jamestown settlement a few short weeks later. Each of the six chapters in this volume examines key events and players of Virginia’s early religious landscape. The first four chapters highlight the complex interactions between and among the diverse religious groups within the Virginia colony, while the final chapters trace the seismic religious and legal changes unleashed by the statute’s adoption. Taken as a whole, the volume suggests how the evolving political, social, and religious conditions in colonial Virginia gradually helped create a space within which this new understanding of religious freedom could emerge. Jefferson originally composed the text of the statute in 1777, after returning to the Virginia legislature following his service in the Continental Congress. Employing the general drafting strategy he had used in the Declaration of Independence, which recites introduction 3 its philosophical and experiential justifications at length before arriving at the actual claim of independence in the final paragraph , Jefferson devotes more than three-fourths of the statute to the preamble, where he blends theological and political arguments in making his case. Here, as Merrill Peterson and Robert Vaughn have noted, “Jefferson poured all his rage against the cant and falsehood, the corruption and tyranny associated with the history of the alliance between church and state.”7 Beginning with the premise that “Almighty God hath created the mind free,” he condemns 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...