“This clause was introduced for the double purpose of satisfying the scruples of many persons who feel an invincible repugnance to any religious test or affirmation, and to cut off forever every pretence of any alliance between church and state in the national government”—Story's Const. Sc. 1841.
A glance at the motives of Europeans in coming to America will reveal the fact that thousands of the best people of European countries left their homes to escape either religious or political persecution at the hands of the government or the king. Such was true of the Huguenots of France, the Pilgrims and Puritans of England, and only recently, the Jews of Russia.
The laws of “attainder” in England in the early times confiscated the property of persons, however innocent they themselves might be, if they were near relatives of other persons who had committed grave crimes.
Before the passage of the Habeas Corpus Act of 1679 in England, any person of royalty or high official standing in the government could falsely accuse another person of crime and cause that innocent person to languish in prison for years, or even for life, because he could not get before a court of justice to establish his innocence.
In many European countries the peasants were burdened with taxes to support kings and courts without the slightest representation in the tax levying authority. In France, just preceding the French Revolution, the peasants were obliged to purchase a certain number of barrels of salt each year, without having the slightest use for the salt, because the crown lands produced salt and the revenues went to the king.
In many European countries a state church was established and the people obliged to support it by taxes levied against their property, regardless of whether it represented their religious beliefs.
A comparison of the provisions of the Declaration of Independence with those of the Constitution will show the wrongs of the English king righted by the Constitution.
Declaration of Independence.—“He has refused assent to laws the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.”
Constitution of the United States.—A bill if vetoed by the President may be repassed by two-thirds of the senate and house of representatives.
Declaration of Independence.—“He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance.”