WHAT WOULD YOU SAY? What Does ‘Separation of Church and State’ Really Mean?

If you work on Capitol Hill for any length of time, you have heard somebody, and maybe a lot of somebodies, say something along the lines of “the separation of church and state means people in churches should stay out of politics and government.”

But did you know that in fact, that phrase — “separation of church and state” — appears nowhere in the U.S. Constitution or Declaration of Independence? The phrase was first penned decades after our founding documents were written by one of George Washington’s early successors in the Oval Office.

So what does separation of church and state actually mean? In the following 4:08 “What Would You Say” video from the Colson Center, Joseph Backholm describes the actual origins and application of the phrase, as well as what it means for Americans today:

---