Founding Faith: Providence, Politics, and the Birth of Religious Freedom in America by Steven Waldman (2008)
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Waldman studies the issues around religious freedom in the pre- and post-Revolutionary period, disposing of myths both Left and Right (the Founders to the dubious extent that they can be generalized in their religious beliefs, were neither a gang of radical secularists and Deists, nor were they fervent Christians of the sort that today’s Religious Right would be likely to hang out with; the Founders were not of a mind as to full separation of Church and State, as half were dedicated to that separation and the other half were afraid of Federal intervention into state-level establishments and religious support; on the other hand, it is largely that 14th Amendment that paved the way for most of the court rulings in the later 20th Century that the Right lambastes, not the whims of activist judges).
Along the way, Waldman explores the contradictory characters not only of the big names in the Constitutional debate — Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Franklin, Madison — but of numerous other Founders. He describes what they saw around them in terms of religious establishment and discrimination prior to the Revolution, how the Revolution itself was driven as much by anti-Catholic flame-fanning targeting the Church of England, and how the fight for religious freedom was supported as much by evangelical Baptists (to protect them against established and mainstream faiths) as by rationalists like Jefferson. He also details the Constitutional debates around religious freedom, including the varying degrees that the Founders supported, opposed, and balanced involvement of the state in the support of religious denominations and institutions.
In short, it’s a far more nuanced and complex explanation for the legal conditions behind the “Culture Wars” of the last few decades — but, in the telling, Waldman makes it clear (and celebrates) that the US has a vibrant, diverse, and powerful religious culture, not despite the Right-derided separation of Church and State, but because of it.
I like the book so much, and there’s so much fine primary material in it, that I’ve added the print version to my Wish List, so that I can reread it that way (though David Colacci’s narration of the book is clar, interesting, and pleasant to listen to). Highly recommended for anyone with an interest in the topic of religious freedom, the Constitution, and American History.