from all public life. That call for total exclusion rejects the original purpose of the Establishment Clause. The first U.S. Congress, author of the first amendment of the Constitution, without hesitation asked President George Washington to issue a national declaration of a public day of thanksgiving and prayer. Washington's proclamation reads in part: Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor. Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, and also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of nations, and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions. Both or first Congress and our first President knew that proclamations and other statements that encouraged religion did not constitute an "establishment" of religion prohibited by the Constitution. On the second battlefront, we face an enemy who, in the name of compelling State interest, seeks to reduce religion and religious liberty to a puny self-centered claim of conscientious objection. Just recently, this Congress repealed its 50-year commitment that exempted nonprofit organizations from the social security employment tax. Now, churches, religious organizations and other like employers must pay a tax on the privilege of hiring people to assist them to proclaim the truth and otherwise to carry out their ministeries. Allowing an exemption favoring only a few who are conscientiously opposed to the Social Security System, Congress, because of a so-called compelling interest to find additional money to save a financially ailing Social Security System, has, for the first time in its history, levied a direct tax on the churches of America. This drive toward total control has not been confined to Congress nor to economic matters. In State after State, legislatures have steadily expanded their control over education. Just this year, for example, the Virginia House of Delegates enacted a law extending State regulation of education into the home allowing for only one exception favoring those few students and parents whose religious beliefs require home education without such control. In the name of a compelling interest to mold its citizenry as it thinks best, Virginia seeks to capture the hearts and minds of the children from their parents. Yet, in the early history of the American Republic, men like Madison and Jefferson fought for the freedom from just this kind of State control. In their famous statements against the efforts in Virginia to establish tax-supported schools, they called for a rule of law that kept man's mind free from the coercive power of the civil authorities. Jefferson's speech before the Virginia General Assembly is illustrative: Well aware that Almighty God hath created the mind free; that all attempts to influence it by temporal punishment or burdens, or by civil incapacitations, ... 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 persumption of legislators and rulers* who ****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 tyrranical That is Jefferson. If this war on these two fronts is to be won by those who believe in the heritage of religious freedom left by our forefathers, then we must decisively reject the political and legal faith that today dominates the courts, the legislatures, the Executive Offices, the media, and the classrooms in Ameirca, and return to the faith of our fathers. It was not until the mid-19th century that America's scholars became increasingly dissatisfied with the legal and political faith of their Nation's founders, a faith based upon a belief in Almighty God. Under the influence of Darwin's new evolutionary theory about the origin of the universe of man, American jurisprudence shifted to a new assumption that judges did not discover law, but that they in fact made it. This legal philosophy dominates today's law schools in America. Under this view, law, having been liberated from fixed principles, had become subject to judges who make decisions according to changing social values and changing factual circumstances. The fixed law that originally guaranteed our religious freedom has been discarded in favor of a new set of evanescent rules invented by judges. And I do not have time at this time to go into some of those rules, but we find that the court had invented a distinction between science and religion based upon Clarence Darrow's definition of religion when he was an advocate for evolutionary faith. In the early history of the Christian church, the religious department of the Roman Empire commanded the Apostles to stop teaching in the name of Jesus. Having been taught well by their Master to render to Caesar only that which belonged to Ceasar, the church fathers answered: "We ought to obey God rather than men." Acts 5:29. This biblical lesson of jurisdiction inspired America's forefathers to write a constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that would protect themselves and future generations from civil Government tyranny. Only if that jurisdictional principle remains fixed and absolute in American constitutional law will the people remain free. Thank you. Senator HATCH. Thank you, Dr. Titus. [Material submitted for the record follows:] PREPARED STATEMENT OF HERBERT W. TITUS My name is Herbert W. Titus. I am Vice President for Academic Affairs, Dean and Professor of Law in the School of Public Policy, CBN University, Virginia Beach, Virginia. I hold the Juris Doctor degree from the Harvard Law School and have taught and written on constitutional law for approximately twenty years. CBN University is closely affiliated with the Christian Broadcasting Network, Inc. Both organizations have been incorporated as non-profit religious organizations under the laws of the Commonwealth of Virginia. A WAR BETWEEN TWO FAITHS We are at war over religious freedom in America. It is a war between two faiths. On the one side of the battle are those who believe that our constitutional guarantees of religious freedom are God-given, fixed, and governed by the words and intent of our forefathers who wrote the Constitutions of the United States and of the fifty states. On the other side are those who believe that our religious freedoms are man-invented, evolving, and authoritatively defined by the judges who sit on the highest courts of the land. While the major battleground in this war is the United States Supreme Court, skirmishes have been taking place in the lower federal courts and in the state and local courts across the nation. Other battles have occupied legislative bodies and executive offices and agencies at the local, state, and national level. Moreover, they have been waged before school boards, in classrooms, in newspapers and magazines, over television, and even in the churches. On each battleground, we who cherish the liberties of our forefathers are fighting on two fronts. On one front, we face an enemy who, in the name of separation of church and state, seeks to exclude religion totally from the public affairs of the nation. For example, a recent editorial in a major newspaper has criticized President Reagan for a speech in which he called the American people to return to the religious faith of our nation's founders. his customary, "Good night and God bless you," has become suspect to those in the media who believe that such references to God by the President have no place in a pluralistic society. Even This front has been extended from the news media into the courts with the recent effort by the A.C.L.U. and others to stop this Congress and the President from proclaiming 1983 as "The Year of the Bible." While this particular effort has not met with success, these same protagonists have successfully won the fight in the courts to keep the Bible as the Word of God not only out of the public school classroom but off public school grounds altogether. In the name of freedom from the "establishment of religion," these enemies of true religious freedom call for total exclusion of religion from all public life. That call for total exclusion rejects the original purpose of the Establishment Clause. The first United States Congress, author of the First Amendment of the Constitution, without hesitation asked President George Washington to issue a national declaration of a public day of "Thanksgiving and Prayer." In response, and approximately six months into his first term of office, President Washington issued the first National Thanksgiving Proclamation which reads, in part: Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence Both our first Congress and our first president knew that proclamations and other statements that encouraged religion did not constitute an "establishment" of religion prohibited by the Constitution. On the second battlefront, we face an enemy who, in the name of compelling state interest, seeks to reduce religion and religious liberty to a puny self-centered claim of conscientious objection. Just recently this Congress repealed its fifty year commitment that exempted non-profit organizations from the social security employment tax. Now churches, religious organizations, and other like employers must pay a tax on the "privilege" of hiring people to assist them to proclaim the truth and otherwise to carry out their ministries. Allowing an exemption favoring only a few who are conscientiously opposed to the social security system, Congress, because of a so-called "compelling interest" to find additional money to save a financially ailing social security system, has for the first time in its history levied a direct tax on the churches of America. This drive toward total control has not been confined to Congress nor to economic matters. In state after state, legislatures have steadily expanded their control over education. Just this year, for example, the Virginia House of Delegates enacted a law extending state regulation of education into the home allowing for only one exception favoring those few students and parents whose religious beliefs require home education without such control. In the name of a "compelling interest" to mold its citizenry as it thinks best, Virginia seeks to capture the hearts and minds of the children from their parents. Yet in the early history of the American Republic, men like Madison and Jefferson fought for freedom from just this kind of state control. In their famous statements against the efforts in Virginia to establish tax-supported schools, they called for a rule of law that kept man's mind free from the coercive power of the civil authorities. Jefferson's speech before the Virginia General Assembly is illustrative: Well aware that Almighty God hath created the mind free; that all If this war on these two fronts is to be won by those who believe in the heritage of religious freedom left by our forefathers, then we must decisively reject the political and legal faith that today dominates the courts, the legislatures, the executive offices, the media, and the classrooms in America, and return to the faith of our fathers. RELIGIOUS LIBERTY AND THE FAITH OF OUR FATHERS At the heart of religious liberty as understood by our nation's Fathers was their definition of religion and the declaration of its jurisdictional immunity from state interference as exemplified by section 16 of the June 12, 1776, Virginia Bill of Rights: That religion, or the duty which we owe to our Creator, and the |