Religion and Republic: Christian America from the Founding to the Civil War (American Theology Series)

In recent years, Americas status as a Christian nation has become an incredibly vexed question. This is not simply a debate about Americas present, or even its futureit has become a debate about its past. Some want to rewrite Americas history as having always been highly secular in order to ensure a similar future; others seek to reframe the American founding as a continuation of medieval Christendom in the hopes of reviving Americas religious identity today.

In this book, Miles Smith offers a fresh historical reading of Americas status as a Christian nation in the Early Republic era. Defined neither by secularism nor Christendom, America was instead marked by Christian institutionalism. Christianityand Protestantism specificallywas always baked into the American republics diplomatic, educational, judicial, and legislative regimes and institutional Christianity in state apparatuses coexisted comfortably with disestablishment from the American Revolution until the beginning of the twenty-first century.

Any productive discussion about Americas religious present or future must first reckon accurately with its past. With close attention to a wide range of sermons, letters, laws, court cases and more, Religion & Republic offers just such a reckoning.