Theocracy in America

Click to Listen to the Show (24 MB MP3)

What would Thomas Jefferson say? Not about Harriett Miers for the Supreme Court, but about President Bush’s explicitly religious thought in nominating her? What would Jefferson say about Karl Rove’s call enlisting Reverend James Dobson with assurances that Ms. Miers is “an Evangelical Christian… from a very conservative Church???? What would Jefferson say about the now militant alignment of media ministers for Miers led by Pat Robertson?

Jefferson wanted to be remembered not as a President of the United States but as author of the Virginia rule of religious freedom which established that people’s free opinions in matters of religion “shall in no wise diminish, enlarge or affect their civil capacities,??? meaning: no religious tests for public office. In Jefferson’s absense, who is to notice, who is to protest a violation of that American space between church and state, religion and politics?

Joseph Ellis

Professor of History at Mt. Holyoke College

Author of American Sphinx and Founding Brothers

Clay S. Jenkinson

Thomas Jefferson impersonator

Author of Becoming Jefferson’s People