ORIGINALISM V. ORIGINALISM: HOW JAMES MADISON'S UNDERSTANDING OF THE ESTABLISHMENT CLAUSE CAN HELP COMBAT CHRISTIAN NATIONALISM

"8 The Supreme Court has recently created a history and tradition test for Establishment Clause cases, thereby taking an explicitly originalist approach.9 Originalism is a school of Constitutional interpretation that demands strict adherence to the text of the Constitution and the original intent of the Framers.10 In the case of the religion clauses, the Framers were concerned with avoiding the violent and destabilizing effects of entangling religion with the government that had belied Europe in the centuries prior to the revolution.11 Originalism would thereby require that Court decisions must keep these concerns and only these concerns in mind when interpreting the Constitution's religion clauses. "19 This portion is divided into two clauses: the Establishment Clause20 and the Free Exercise Clause.21 The interpretation and purpose of these clauses in the Constitution are contested.22 However, generally speaking, the religion clauses protected people's freedom of religion and freedom from religion.23 As with all of constitutional law, the religion clauses arc interpreted in the case law of the Supreme Court. "29 In Everson, the Court considered a statute that allowed parents to be reimbursed for the money that they expended for the transportation of their children to and from religious schools via buses.30 The statute was held to be constitutional, but only because its purpose was to provide for the safe transportation of school children and that the religious schools met the secular educational requirements of the state.31 In other words, Everson established that a statute must have a secular purpose in order for it to be considered constitutional.32 The case of Engel v. Vitale in 1962 expanded on the constitutional limitations that the Establishment Clause placed on the government. The primary reason of the Court for coming to this conclusion is that to allow the government to act religiously has historically led to the entanglement of policy and religious orthodoxy which causes the two to encroach upon one another.37 In other words, policies that entangle religious authority and government authority are unconstitutional because after they arc entangled, there is nothing stopping that authority from encroaching further.38 The Court expanded its interpretation of the Establishment Clause in the case of School District of Abington Township v. Schempp which took place in 1963.