Trump Religious – A draft 224-page report from a DOJ-linked Religious Liberty Commission argues the founders meant to enshrine belief in God at the center of American law and life. Critics say the commission’s reading cherry-picks history and overlooks how shifting U.S. religio
Last week, a draft 224-page report tied to a White House-led effort set off a fight over what “religious freedom” has meant in America—and who gets to define it.
The Religious Liberty Commission. housed within the Department of Justice. released the draft report pushing the idea that “belief in God should be the bedrock of American law and society.” The commission argues that when the Founders declared independence. drafted the Constitution. and debated the Bill of Rights. they “drew from religious traditions of man being made in the image of God. ” and that belief in a Christian God was the starting point for individual rights. It describes the “uniquely American approach to religious liberty” as one “in which religion is not merely indulged by the government. but rather honored as a natural right. fundamental to the flourishing of a free society.”.
The commission’s account. however. hinges on a historical turn it says was corrupted in the 20th century by “a new [European] philosophy.” In that telling. philosophers including Friedrich Nietzsche. Michel Foucault. and Jean-Paul Sartre rejected God and inspired American thinkers and leaders to embrace relativism. The report claims this constructed a “‘Berlin wall’ of separation” that restricts religious life today.
From there, the commission argues the federal government took an “increasingly hostile view towards those who embrace Judeo-Christian values,” pointing to legal limits on practices such as school prayer and open displays of religious texts in public buildings.
It then lays out what it wants next: creation of a national religious liberty violation hotline, a DOJ task force to enforce freedom and hear claims of violations, and the appointment of federal judges who, as the commission defines it, err on the side of religious liberty.
The draft report also points to alleged religious oppression in schools, workplaces, the military, and the healthcare system. It cites restrictions on teachers. coaches. and students leading prayers. limits on students wearing religious symbols and delivering religious speech. and limits on displaying the Ten Commandments in public schools. It also points to the pushing of “gender ideology” on Christian students and requirements for faith-based college groups to accept non-believers.
In the military context, the report cites COVID-19 vaccine mandates as violations of religious liberty. It also describes what it characterizes as coercion for religious medical providers to offer care that conflicts with their beliefs, and it says military chaplains face overly restrictive rules.
The commission’s central claim is that government should be welcoming religion into daily public life rather than limiting or restricting it—“even if it’s in the name of religious pluralism.” Its critics say the alternative history the report relies on does not match what historians describe.
One historian who challenged the commission’s framing, Matthew A. Sutton, said Protestant Christianity did infuse public life in the colonial era and that colonists believed it should continue. Sutton said “you can find example after example of the government endorsement of not just religion. but a very particular kind of religion. Protestant Christianity.” But he also argued there was not religious liberty for those outside the boundaries.
Sutton noted that the commission acknowledges that context while still asserting that the Founders took a more pluralistic approach while encouraging widespread public adoption of faith.
At the center of the commission’s presentation is the First Continental Congress in 1774. where colonial leaders put aside religious differences and. inspired by Samuel Adams. prayed together as they prepared for war. The draft report also retells the writing of the Declaration of Independence as rooted in belief in a Christian God and describes religious liberty in the Constitution as the “first freedom” from which other liberties could flow.
But Sutton said that historical account is oversold. He described the First Amendment as a practical answer to a practical problem: uniting 13 colonies with different established churches. “The First Amendment is also about a practical response to the fact that you have 13 colonies that you need to unify. and many of them have established churches. but they’re different churches. ” Sutton said. “The First Amendment is not this kind of high ideal about freedom of religion. It’s simply about how can we keep these people from killing each other when we know for the last 300 years. different groups of Christians have killed each other in Europe.”.
He argued that the commission’s treatment of specific episodes is selective. Sutton said the reference to prayers at the First Continental Congress is “selective” and pointed out that Benjamin Franklin’s suggestion to start the Constitutional Convention with prayer was rejected. “In 1774, it’s not clear there’s going to be a revolution,” Sutton said. “They have not left, and the clergyman they chose for this prayer is a member of the Church of England. They were trying to signal to England that they did want to maintain their unity. that they wanted to keep their religious bonds together. It was very practical.”.
Sutton said the commission’s framing effectively cherry-picks moments it favors while ignoring others that complicate its narrative. “But this is the selective cherry-picking that the Trump people do. ” he said. adding. “They didn’t have a prayer at the Constitutional Convention. So you can’t have it both ways. If you’re going to talk about when you do. you need to talk about when you don’t and see those as equally valid.”.
Sutton’s criticism was echoed by Dave Campbell. a politics and religion scholar and professor at the University of Notre Dame. Campbell said it is misleading to speak of the Founders as if they shared one view. “It’s a misnomer to speak of the Founders as though they had one view,” Campbell said. “They had different views. but they did agree. even though they had to compromise. on the wording of the First Amendment.”.
Campbell laid out the differences. citing Jefferson’s support for a wall of separation; Washington’s desire for mutual support between the state and Protestant Christianity in general; and Madison’s preference for competition between sects and a marketplace of ideas free from government punishment. “And all of these are very different from both the version of religious liberty we have today and the one the commissioners claim has been distorted. ” Campbell said.
What the commission calls a 20th-century corruption, Sutton and Campbell said, was driven by changing America itself rather than European existentialists or a coordinated effort to erase religion.
Sutton argued that modern secular interpretations gained ground because the nation’s religious makeup changed. with millions of Catholics and Jews arriving in the 19th and early 20th centuries and with the spread of new religions like Mormonism. He said it was U.S. courts responding to that reality—not “those guys”—that pushed legal thinking toward protecting free exercise.
“It’s ridiculous. It’s definitely not those guys,” Sutton said. “The courts were moving in the 1880s. 1890s. toward slowly recognizing that the nation is growing more diverse. and as they do that. they begin to think about the ways in which the free exercise clause can be protected. guaranteed. and applied.”.
He described the shift as a practical process in U.S. states and courts, including efforts in the 1880s and 1890s to remove established prayers from public schools and reduce explicit Protestant curriculum in education.
Sutton also pointed to a post-World War II era when tolerance became more urgent. tied to the horror of Nazi Germany and antisemitic persecution. By then. he said. America had integrated newer immigrants and religious groups across generations. reinforcing the idea of secularism as mutual respect between differing faiths rather than an attack on religion.
Even where the commission frames its project as defending pluralism. critics say the deeper tension is how religious majorities can shape the rules of public life. They said a more neutral approach became necessary so that a predominant faith could not end up dictating how other minority religions are treated.
Campbell described the commission’s definition of freedom as something less than equal respect across religions. “To them. religious freedom means not respecting all religions equally. but instead ensuring that Christianity and particularly their flavor of Christianity has a favored place in the public square and in law. ” Campbell said.
Sutton added that he sees the commission landing within a broader set of fights over religion in public life. including the Bremerton decision involving a high school football coach being allowed to pray at games. debates about whether Christian charter schools should receive state financing. and debates about Ten Commandments displays on school grounds. He said attorneys through religious organizations have treated documents like the commission’s draft as “marching orders. ” aiming to move the country back toward a world where a Protestant majority could impose its will.
He said the courts appear more open to that than they have been in “a couple of generations.”
In the end. the Founders’ original compromise—“there should be no established religion. ” paired with “as much latitude given to the free exercise of religion as possible. ” as Campbell described it—has remained flexible enough to protect growth beyond Protestantism. Sutton said. He pointed to the continuing vitality of religious pluralism and said visitors for the World Cup often comment on how much religion they see around them.
“The twisted history of the Religious Liberty Commission” is. in effect. a contest over the nation’s memory—and over whether religious liberty in the courts should move toward privileging one kind of faith in public life or toward protecting many faiths from pressure. For now. the commission’s draft report has put that dispute squarely in motion. with the founding era’s meaning at the center of every next legal and policy battle.
religious liberty Department of Justice Religious Liberty Commission Founding Fathers First Amendment Trump administration school prayer Ten Commandments religious freedom hotline COVID-19 vaccine mandates military chaplains