SOURCE: “Thomas Jefferson's Letter to the Danbury Baptists: A Controversy Rejoined,” in William and Mary Quarterly, Vol. 56, No. 4, October, 1999, pp. 775-90.

In the following essay, Hutson discusses the newly-restored manuscript of Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptists, and its effect on current controversies over the separation of church and state.

Thomas Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptist Association of Connecticut, January 1, 1802, contains a phrase that has become almost a household expression in the present-day United States: “a wall of separation between church and state.” In his letter to the Danbury Baptists, Jefferson linked this phrase to the religion clause of the First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” By juxtaposing the wall of separation metaphor and the Establishment Clause, Jefferson seemed to indicate that the First Amendment was intended to do more than merely prevent the federal...