For some inexplicable reason, more and more frequently I have been seeing reference to the Declaration of Independence as some sort of evidence that America is a Christian nation. What better day than the 4th of July to address this document and its historical role in our government.

Contrary to popular belief, the Declaration of Independence has absolutely no legal weight in American law. Our law is founded, first and foremost, on the U.S. Constitution. This is clearly articulated in the Constitution, in Article VI, in what is known as “the supremacy clause.”

So where does the Declaration of Independence stand? The Declaration of Independence was drafted in 1776. It is a document that lists the grievances of the colonists in America who were tired of British rule that imposed upon them the taxes of the British crown but provided them with no representation in British Parliament or say in how their lives were governed.

Thomas Jefferson, having studied John Locke, an English philosopher and social contract theorist, used Locke’s own words in crafting the Declaration of Independence. The primary rationale and reasoning that Jefferson drew upon was Locke’s justification for a people to sever their bonds with their government, dissolve the political order, and restructure it anew.

And thus, from Jefferson, we have this:

And it was at this point that the rebellion in the American colonies was officially undertaken.

The Revolutionary War lasted until 1781 with the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown. Following this, the official end of the war was not achieved until the Treaty of Paris in 1783. There was then the failed attempt to establish a government under the Articles of Confederation. In 1787, delegates from 12 of the 13 states (R.I. did not send a delegate) met to draft what ultimately became the U.S. Constitution. After much debate, the U.S. Constitution was finally ratified by the states in 1789.

The Declaration of Independence is the landmark document that marks America’s severance of British rule. It’s clear, strong language reflects the conviction and resolve that each of the signers had in ensuring their own Life, Liberty, and Property. But the Declaration of Independence is not the law of the land in the United States and does nothing to establish religious (Christian) roots as the foundation of our government.

The Declaration’s guarantees of “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness,” are not secured by the Declaration itself. And while the words “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” do not appear verbatim in the U.S. Constitution, they are clearly embodied in all of our constitutional guarantees. The Preamble to the U.S. Constitution has as its purpose:

• to form a more perfect Union

• establish Justice

• ensure domestic Tranquility

• provide for the common defence

• promote the general Welfare

• secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity

“Life” is secured through the establishment of justice and providing for our common defense, and “Liberty” is called out explicitly. The “Pursuit of Happiness” is a bit more complicated, for how does one guarantee a right to pursue happiness?

Generally understood, the pursuit of happiness is best represented in our ability to enjoy the fruits of our labor and our liberty. We are free to make our own decisions about how to pursue our existence, and to make for ourselves our own home, profession, and domestic life. Our existence, our home, our profession, our domestic life, and our right to such, are the embodiment of our “Estates.” It is through this line of reasoning that the right of “Pursuit of Happiness” becomes a right to our “Estates,” or as Locke concludes, that “which I call by the general Name, Property.” (Locke, Chap. IX, § 123, l.17)

“Property” is thereby secured through the establishment of justice, providing for domestic tranquility, common defense, and the general welfare. It is this approach that gives us the language of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing to all citizens the rights of “life, liberty, and property.”

These same guarantees are again reiterated in the language of the 14th Amendment.

Yet the Declaration’s language of “Nature’s God” and the “Creator”—tenuously religious terms of 18th Century Deists, skeptical of religion and the Judeo-Christian God—are nowhere to be found in the U.S. Constitution. Instead we find prohibitions. Article VI mandates that “no religious test” shall be required to hold public office, and the First Amendment prohibits government from taking any official action with respect to religion, or prohibiting the free exercise, thereof. From these prohibitions, Jefferson’s wall of separation between church and state is clearly visible, and the Judeo-Christian God (or any god, for that matter) are forever shut out of our Constitution.

Thus, we have an inherently godless Constitution, irrevocably committed to a purely secular form of government. And the idea of a Christian Nation becomes little more than the wishful thinking of religious-minded power-mongers and mealy-mouthed ministers seeking to expand the scope of their influence beyond their congregation—a concept that is utterly and completely at odds with the core principles at the heart of our guarantees of life, liberty, and property.

Dershowitz, A. (2003). America declares independence. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

Kramnick, I., Moore, R.L. (2005). The Godless Constitution: A moral defense of the secular state. New York: W.W. Morton & Co.

Locke, J. (2005). Two treatises of government. Laslett, P., ed. New York: Cambridge University Press.