Religion and Politics in the Early Republic: Jasper Adams and the Church-State Debate ed. by Daniel L. Dreisbach (review)

BOOK REVIEWS507 The New York Irish is an outstanding work and is sure to inspire studies of otherAmerican cities whose history was shaped by their Irish populations. It is a pioneering work, and it is a model for further scholarship. Janet Nolan Loyola University Chicago Religion and Politics in the Early Republic:Jasper Adams and the ChurchState Debate. Edited by Daniel L. Dreisbach. (Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky. 1996. Pp. xix, 220. $42.95 clothbound; $16.95 paperback .) Daniel Dreisbach teaches Ln the Department of Justice, Law, and Society at the American University,Washington, D.C. He offers here a weU-edited, interesting , and useful coUection of documents from the early part of the nineteenth century discussing the relation of reUgion and poUtics. For his purpose, Dreisbach focuses on a sermon by the Reverend Jasper Adams, The Relation of Christianity to Civil Government in the United States (1833), with its extensive notes, responses from ChiefJustice John MarshaU,Justice Joseph Story, and President James Madison, and a long, critical review, of uncertain authorship, entitled "Immunity of ReUgion." He offers some historical comments and perspective of his own on a debate which is with us StUl. Adams, related to the Adamses of Massachusetts and a Congregationalist turned an Episcopal priest, was a professor, moral phüosopher, and president of Charleston CoUege. He preached his sermon during a period of"freedom's ferment "with the emergence ofJacksonian democracy,the disestabUshment ofreUgion in Massachusetts in 1833, an attempt to establish a Christian party in poUtics, and a controversy over the deUvery of maU on Sunday. Living in South Carolina, Adams had to deal with the controversy over Thomas Cooper, president of South Carolina CoUege, regarding the latter's vocal criticisms of orthodox Christians.According to Adams,these were uncertain times for reUgion and the RepubUc. In his sermon he acknowledged that the writers of the Constitution ofthe United States intended to reject the Constantinian estabUshments of the Old World. But the issue was larger than the relationship between the churches and the various states of the union and the federal government. Adams claimed that Americans did not intend to disestabUsh Christianity as the reUgion of the nation. He found evidence of this in the practices of the people, in the common law, and Ln the Constitution itself.Although largely sUent on reUgion , the Constitution did acknowledge that it had been written in the "year of our Lord, 1787" and contained an expUcit recognition of the sanctity of Sunday. Christian faith and life was essential for the nation's good health. He argued that American civU, legal, and poUtical institutions should provide for a nonpreferential support ofthe various forms ofChristianity and toleration for aU other reUgions . He buttressed his arguments with lengthy footnotes. Unfortunately, 508BOOK REVIEWS Adams is short on suggestions on what should be done with popular, noisy denominations and cults unlike, for example, the EpiscopaUans, Congregationalists , and Presbyterians, the difficulty of administrating (as in Massachusetts) nonpreferential support of multiplying religious communities (together with more and more Catholic immigrants), a coalition of Christians who claimed that it knew what was the Christian thing to do for the nation's good, and radicals like Cooper who were sowing seeds of doubt about Christianity itself. Moreover ,Adams does not give much attention to the case ofa Jewish merchant who went to the synagogue on Saturday, but wanted to do business on Sunday. Adams circulated his sermon widely and received many repUes, some from notable Americans. Story expressed appreciation for Adams' agreeable references to his Commentaries on the Constitution. He also seems to support Adams' argument by writing that it was not the purpose of the founders to "abolish" Christianity as a part ofthe "antecedent Law of the Land."Rather, Story held, they intended to do away with aU preferences between reUgious persuasions , "whether Christian or otherwise." MarshaU appreciated Adams' effort. He knew no person who questioned the importance of reUgion in this Ufe as weU as for the next. But he also warned that the subject required "great deUcacy" because "freedom of conscience" and respect for "our religion" both claim serious regard. Madison did not like the use of the word toleration m connection with...