Perseus Academic: Religion and the American Constitutional Experiment by John Witte, Jr.

Praise for the Third Edition

“This new edition of John Witte’s indispensable volume, done in collaboration with Joel Nichols, lives up to the standards of the previous volumes. Anyone interested in religious liberty and freedom, besieged in so many parts of the world, will find their narrative of the struggle for religious rights and liberties in American history illuminating. It is impossible to recommend this book too highly.” —Jean Bethke Elshtain, Laura Spelman Rockefeller Professor of Social and Political Ethics, The University of Chicago, author most recently of Sovereignty: God, State and Self, her Gifford lectures

“This book is an extremely valuable, easily readable, history of understandings of free exercise and nonestablishment. In a field in which that history is often portrayed to support one modern outlook or another, the account the authors provide is lucid, full, balanced, and highly persuasive.” —Kent Greenawalt, Columbia Law School

“This study of America’s ongoing effort to secure religious freedom through constitutional law is invaluable, and illuminating, for students and scholars alike. The key principles that originally informed and inspired that effort are identified and clarified; important ideas like ‘church-state separation’ and ‘liberty of conscience’ are unpacked; the twists and turns of the Supreme Court’s First Amendment decisions and doctrines are helpfully navigated; and the American model of religious liberty is put in revealing conversation with others around the world. This edition’s new and timely treatments of the rights and role of religious organizations, and of present-day attempts to downplay the distinctiveness of religion, make an already indispensable resource even better than it was.” —Richard W. Garnett, Notre Dame Law School

Praise for Previous Editions

“A close examination of the context in which the United States committed itself to religious freedom, a valuable presentation of the Supreme Court decisions that have advanced or retarded the great project of religious freedom, and a striking measurement of present American law by international human rights law & A rich resource to be mined, a fair and friendly guide offering directions to the perplexed of good will, and a reasoned and robust call to redress the present balance.” —John T. Noonan, Jr., United States Court of Appeals

"By this book, John Witte has established himself as a leading scholar in the history of American constitutional law of religious liberty. Its excellent topical analysis and its thorough coverage and documentation makes it a perfect textbook, and by virtue of its profound insights it is essential reading for scholars in the field. Indeed, its lively and engaging style makes it accessible to all educated people." —Harold J. Berman, Emory University

"John Witte has provided an excellent interdisciplinary review of the American experiment in religious liberty. He ably integrates the law, the history, and theology from colonial times to the latest issues before the Supreme Court." —Douglas Laycock, University of Texas, Austin

“Witte does a masterful job in compressing a complex and controversial story into a lucid and engaging narrative. This book illuminates, excites reflection, and invites a reappraisal of the essential rights and liberties of religion in America.” —Journal of Church and State

"How fortunate is the reader to be provided with an 'introduction' of this character: comprehensive, systematic, penetrating, ironic, and throughout magnificently clear. Because the subject is complex, the reader will welcome the author's steady determination to see the reader is neither lost nor confused. The ample notes are there not to impress, but to guide; it would be difficult to exaggerate their pedagogical utility, or that of the appendices. The bibliography tells us what we already know: Witte has read it all." —Edwin S. Gaustad, University of California, Riverside