1st Amendment and Religious Freedom
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. I will agree that prohibiting the free exercise thereof should allow you to pray, including in school, if it doesn’t interfere with school or another schooling.
Jefferson wanted to be remembered by Virginia statute as well as the constitution and so clearly gives the reason for the 1st amendment of the constitution. Divided into three paragraphs, the statute is rooted in Jefferson's philosophy. It could be passed in Virginia because (particularly Baptists, Presbyterians, and Methodists) had petitioned strongly during the preceding decade for religious liberty, including the separation of church and state.
Jefferson had argued in the Declaration of Independence that "the laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle [man]…." The first paragraph of the religious statute proclaims one of those entitlements, freedom of thought.
To Jefferson, "Nature's God," who is undeniably visible in the workings of the universe, gives man the freedom to choose his religious beliefs. This is the divinity whom deists of the time accepted—a God who created the world and is the final judge of man, but who does not intervene in the affairs of man. This God who gives man the freedom to believe or not to believe is also the God of the Christian sects.
The second paragraph is the act itself, which states that no person can be compelled to attend any church or support it with his taxes. It says that an individual is free to worship as he pleases with no discrimination. “be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief, but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of Religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish, enlarge or affect their civil capacities.”
The third paragraph reflects Jefferson's belief in the people's right, through their elected assemblies, to change any law. Here, Jefferson states that this statute is not irrevocable because no law is (not even the Constitution). Future assemblies that choose to repeal or circumscribe the act do so at their own peril because this is "an infringement of the natural right." Thus, Jefferson articulates his philosophy of both natural rights and the sovereignty of the people.
